Shades of Gray

Will and Doc Martin are on their way to the Virginia Piedmont to Will’s aunt’s home. Will is sure his aunt’s family will not want to see him because food is scarce, and he will be another mouth to feed. He does not want to see them either, but for other reasons. Will thinks his uncle is a traitor to the South, but Doc Martin tells him that while his uncle did not fight the Yankees, he also did not help them. Will lost his father and his brother, Charlie, in the war; his two little sisters died from a typhoid epidemic that started in encampments, and he believes that grief took his mother’s life. Doc Martin himself has seen many young men die.

Will sees a young girl who looks like his sister, and he and Doc Martin make their way to Ella and Jed Jones’s house. Aunt Ella, whom Will has never met, comes out, and Doc Martin explains that it was Will’s mom’s wish that Will should go live with the Joneses when she died. He explains what happened to the rest of the family. As Will tends to the horse, he meets Meg, the young girl he saw earlier.