A Breath of Snow and Ashes (29 page)

He rubbed the maimed hand slowly to and fro against his thigh, stretching it out, as though his phantom fingers reached and yearned for the touch of singing sinew. Then he shook his head, as though dismissing the vision, and curled his hand into a fist. He turned to me.

“Ye werena intending to take Christie’s fingers straight off, were ye, Mrs. Fraser?”

“No,” I said, startled. “Of course not. He doesn’t think . . . ?”

Arch shrugged, bushy white brows raised toward his receding hairline.

“I couldna say for sure, but he seemed verra much disturbed at the thought of being cut.”

“Hmm,” I said. I’d have to speak to Tom Christie.

Jamie had stood up to take his leave, and I followed suit automatically, shaking out my skirts and trying to shake out of my head the mental image of a young man’s hand, pinned to the ground, and an ax chunking down.

“No Frasers at Glenhelm, ye said?” Jamie asked thoughtfully, looking down at Mr. Bug. “Leslie, the nephew—he would have been Bobby Fraser’s heir, would he?”

“Aye, he would.” Mr. Bug’s pipe had gone out. He turned it over and knocked the dottle neatly out against the edge of the porch.

“Both killed together, were they? I mind my father telling of it, once. Found in a stream, their heads caved in, he said.”

Arch Bug blinked up at him, eyelids lowered, lizardlike, against the sun’s glare.

“Weel, ye see,
a Sheaumais,
” he said, “a bow’s like a good-wife, aye? Knows her master, and answers his touch. An ax, though—” He shook his head. “An ax is a whore. Any man can use one—and it works as well in either hand.”

He blew through the stem of the pipe to clear it of ash, wiped the bowl with his handkerchief, and tucked it carefully away—left-handed. He grinned at us, the remnants of his teeth sharp-edged and yellowed with tobacco.

“Go with God,
Seaumais mac Brian.
”

LATER IN THE WEEK, I went to the Christies’ cabin, to take the stitches out of Tom’s left hand and explain to him about the ether. His son, Allan, was in the yard, sharpening a knife on a foot-treadled grindstone. He smiled and nodded to me, but didn’t speak, unable to be heard above the rasping whine of the grindstone.

Perhaps it was that sound, I thought, a moment later, that had aroused Tom Christie’s apprehensions.

“I have decided that I shall leave my other hand as it is,” he said stiffly, as I clipped the last stitch and pulled it free.

I set down my tweezers and stared at him.

“Why?”

A dull red rose in his cheeks, and he stood up, lifting his chin and looking over my shoulder, so as not to meet my eye.

“I have prayed about it, and I have come to the conclusion that if this infirmity be God’s will, then it would be wrong to seek to change it.”

I suppressed the strong urge to say “Stuff and nonsense!”, but with great difficulty.

“Sit down,” I said, taking a deep breath. “And tell me, if you would, just why you think God wants you to go about with a twisted hand?”

He did glance at me then, surprised and flustered.

“Why . . . it is not my place to question the Lord’s ways!”

“Oh, isn’t it?” I said mildly. “I rather thought that’s what you were doing last Sunday. Or wasn’t it you I heard, inquiring as to what the Lord thought He was about, letting all these Catholics flourish like the green bay tree?”

The dull red color darkened substantially.

“I am sure you have misunderstood me, Mistress Fraser.” He straightened himself still further, so that he was nearly leaning over backward. “The fact remains that I shall not require your assistance.”

“Is it because I’m a Catholic?” I asked, settling back on the stool and folding my hands on my knee. “You think perhaps I’ll take advantage of you, and baptize you into the church of Rome when you’re off your guard?”

“I have been suitably christened!” he snapped. “And I will thank you to keep your Popish notions to yourself.”

“I have an arrangement with the Pope,” I said, giving him stare for stare. “I issue no bulls on points of doctrine, and he doesn’t do surgery. Now, about your hand—”

“The Lord’s will—” he began stubbornly.

“Was it the Lord’s will that your cow should fall into the gorge and break her leg last month?” I interrupted him. “Because if it was, then you presumably ought to have left her there to die, rather than fetching my husband to help pull her out, and then allowing me to set her leg. How is she, by the way?”

I could see the cow in question through the window, peacefully grazing at the edge of the yard, and evidently untroubled either by her nursing calf, or by the binding I had applied to support her cracked cannon bone.

“She is well, I thank you.” He was beginning to sound a little strangled, though his shirt was loose at the collar. “That is—”

“Well, then,” I said. “Do you think the Lord regards you as less deserving of medical help than your cow? It seems unlikely to me, what with Him regarding sparrows and all that.”

He’d gone a sort of dusky purple round the jowls by this point, and clutched the defective hand with the sound one, as though to keep it safe from me.

“I see that you have heard something of the Bible,” he began, very pompous.

“Actually, I’ve read it for myself,” I said. “I read quite well, you know.”

He brushed this remark aside, a dim light of triumph gleaming in his eye.

“Indeed. Then I am sure you will have read the Letter of St. Paul to Timothy, in which he says,
Let a woman be silent
—”

I had, in fact, encountered St. Paul and his opinions before, and had a few of my own.

“I expect St. Paul ran into a woman who could outargue him, too,” I said, not without sympathy. “Easier to try to put a stopper on the entire sex than to win his point fairly. I should have expected better of
you,
though, Mr. Christie.”

“But that’s blasphemy!” he gasped, clearly shocked.

“It is not,” I countered, “unless you’re saying that St. Paul is actually God—and if you are, then I rather think
that’s
blasphemy. But let’s not quibble,” I said, seeing his eyes begin to bulge. “Let me . . .” I rose from my stool and took a step forward, bringing me within touching distance of him. He backed up so hastily that he bumped into the table and knocked it askew, sending Malva’s workbasket, a pottery jug of milk, and a pewter plate cascading to the floor with a crash.

I bent swiftly and grabbed the workbasket, in time to prevent it being soaked by the flood of milk. Mr. Christie had as swiftly seized a rag from the hearth, and bent to mop up the milk. We narrowly missed bumping heads, but did collide, and I lost my balance, falling heavily against him. He caught hold of my arms by reflex, dropping the rag, then hastily let go and recoiled, leaving me swaying on my knees.

He was on his knees, as well, breathing heavily, but now a safe distance away.

“The truth of it is,” I said severely, pointing a finger at him, “you’re afraid.”

“I am not!”

“Yes, you are.” I got to my feet, replaced the workbasket on the table, and shoved the rag delicately over the puddle of milk with my foot. “You’re afraid that I’ll hurt you—but I won’t,” I assured him. “I have a medicine called ether; it will make you go to sleep, and you won’t feel anything.”

He blinked at that.

“And perhaps you’re afraid that you’ll lose a few fingers, or what use of your hand you have.”

He was still kneeling on the hearth, staring up at me.

“I can’t absolutely guarantee that you won’t,” I said. “I don’t
think
that will happen—but man proposes, and God disposes, doesn’t He?”

He nodded, very slowly, but didn’t say anything. I took a deep breath, for the moment out of argument.

“I
think
I can mend your hand,” I said. “I can’t guarantee it. Sometimes things happen. Infections, accidents—something unexpected. But . . .”

I reached out a hand to him, motioning toward the crippled member. Moving like a hypnotized bird trapped in a serpent’s gaze, he extended his arm and let me take it. I grasped his wrist and pulled him to his feet; he rose easily and stood before me, letting me hold his hand.

I took it in both of mine and pressed the gnarled fingers back, rubbing my thumb gently over the thickened palmar aponeurosis that was trapping the tendons. I could feel it clearly, could see in my mind exactly how to approach the problem, where to press with the scalpel, how the calloused skin would part. The length and depth of the Z-shaped incision that would free his hand and make it useful once more.

“I’ve done it before,” I said softly, pressing to feel the submerged bones. “I can do it again, God willing. If you’ll let me?”

He was only a couple of inches taller than I; I held his eyes, as well as his hand. They were a clear, sharp gray, and searched my face with something between fear and suspicion—but with something else at the back of them. I became quite suddenly aware of his breathing, slow and steady, and felt the warmth of his breath on my cheek.

“All right,” he said at last, hoarsely. He pulled his hand away from mine, not abruptly, but almost with reluctance, and stood cradling it in his sound one. “When?”

“Tomorrow,” I said, “if the weather is good. I’ll need good light,” I explained, seeing the startled look in his eyes. “Come in the morning, but don’t eat breakfast.”

I picked up my kit, bobbed an awkward curtsy to him, and left, feeling rather queer.

Allan Christie waved cheerfully to me as I left, and went on with his grinding.

“DO YOU THINK he’ll come?” Breakfast had been eaten, and no sign yet of Thomas Christie. After a night of broken sleep, in which I dreamed repeatedly of ether masks and surgical disasters, I wasn’t sure whether I wanted him to come or not.

“Aye, he’ll come.” Jamie was reading the
North Carolina Gazette,
four months out of date, while munching the last of Mrs. Bug’s cinnamon toast. “Look, they’ve printed a letter from the Governor to Lord Dartmouth, saying what an unruly lot of seditious, conniving, thieving bastards we all are, and asking General Gage to send him cannon to threaten us back into good behavior. I wonder if MacDonald knows that’s public knowledge?”

“Did they really?” I said absently. I rose, and picked up the ether mask I had been staring at all through breakfast. “Well, if he does come, I suppose I’d best be ready.”

I had the ether mask Bree had made for me and the dropping bottle laid out ready in my surgery, next to the array of instruments I would need for the surgery itself. Unsure, I picked up the bottle, uncorked it, and waved a hand across the neck, wafting fumes toward my nose. The result was a reassuring wave of dizziness that blurred my vision for a moment. When it cleared, I recorked the bottle and set it down, feeling somewhat more confident.

Just in time. I heard voices at the back of the house, and footsteps in the hall.

I turned expectantly, to see Mr. Christie glowering at me from the doorway, his hand curled protectively into his chest.

“I have changed my mind.” Christie lowered his brows still further, to emphasize his position. “I have considered the matter, and prayed upon it, and I shall not allow ye to employ your foul potions upon me.”

“You stupid man,” I said, thoroughly put out. I stood up and glowered back. “What
is
the matter with you?”

He looked taken aback, as though a snake in the grass at his feet had dared to address him.

“There is nothing whatever the matter with me,” he said, quite gruff. He lifted his chin aggressively, bristling his short beard at me. “What is the matter with
you,
madam?”

“And I thought it was only Highlanders who were stubborn as rocks!”

He looked quite insulted at this comparison, but before he could take further issue with me, Jamie poked his head into the surgery, drawn by the sounds of altercation.

“Is there some difficulty?” he inquired politely.

“Yes! He refuses—”

“There is. She insists—”

The words collided, and we both broke off, glaring at each other. Jamie glanced from me to Mr. Christie, then at the apparatus on the table. He cast his eyes up to heaven, as though imploring guidance, then rubbed a finger thoughtfully beneath his nose.