Kate Wingo - Western Fire 01 (12 page)

C
ulling to mind the seven newly dug graves in the lower field, Mercy feared that the same fate awaited Spencer McCabe. One day his luck would run out; and when that happened, he, too, would lie dead in some farmer’s field. And though she bitterly lamented that their paths had ever crossed, the thought filled her with a deep sense of sorrow.

“What do you want me to do with this,” Dewey asked as he re-entered the kitchen, a large water pail clutched in his hands.

“Pour the water into the kettle and put it on the fire to boil,” Mercy instructed him.

A moment later, Pru returned with a basket of bandages slung over her arm, a large knitting needle ominously protruding
from the basket.

“Pru, would you be kind
enough to put the bandages over there and –” Mercy reached for the knife that Spencer had laid on the table, handing it to her sister – “and put this knife in the water once it starts to boil. I’m not sure that . . . that it’s been properly cleaned.”

Spencer chuckled, rewarding her with a warm smile. “See? I told you
that you could do this.”

“So you did,” Mercy replied, briefly returning his smile before setting the knitting nee
dle and pen knife on the table.

Ready to begin, she hurriedly
braided her hair, not wanting her movements impeded in any way. With that finished, she knelt on the floor at Spencer’s feet, her hands hovering over his blood-soaked boot.

Spencer inclined his head toward his brother. “Dew
ey, why don’t you grab hold of my shoulders so I don’t end up in anyone’s lap.”

“Whatever you say, Spence
.”

Mercy blushed, well aware whose lap
he referred to. Silently hoping that he would remain chair-bound, she grasped his boot with both hands and pulled. When she heard Spencer grunt with pain, she instantly ceased her efforts.

“I can’t do this without hurting you,” she
husked.

“Hell, Mercy
. Ten minutes ago you were ready to shoot me dead.”

“That was different. I . . . I didn’t know
that you were injured.”

Chuckling, Spencer brushed his fingers across her flushed cheek. “You are something else, Miss Mercy Hibbert. Yes, indeed, you are truly something else.”

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?” she asked shyly, both relieved and disappointed when he removed his fingers from her face.

“Uh
-huh. Now, how about getting this boot off of my foot?”

Determined to see the thing through, Mercy once again placed her hands around Spencer’s booted ankle. This time, she focused her complete and undivided attention on removing
the stubbornly affixed boot.

Several seconds later, she lurched backwards, the thrice damned boot triumphantly clutched in her hands.

“I did it!” she exclaimed, her joy quickly transmuting into a guilt-laden remorse when she saw the painful grimace stamped onto Spencer’s face.

Not wasting another second, she carefully peeled his sock away from his ankle. Then, shoving her
qualms aside, she rolled up his trouser leg several inches. When she saw the gaping hole in the side of his lower calf, her fingers stilled.

“Would y’all happen to have
a bottle of liquor hidden away in a cabinet?” Spencer asked, a hopeful gleam in his eyes. “It might help to dull the pain.”

“I will have you know that we do not keep the devil’s brew in this house,” Mercy informed him,
horrified that he would even think such a thing.

“Yeah, guess I was hoping for too much, huh?”

“Entirely too much,” she retorted, belatedly realizing that she was being teased by the scoundrel. Ignoring him as best she could, she bunched his trouser leg above his knee cap, completely exposing his lower leg.

“I’m thinking
that it might be easier for you if I was laid out on the kitchen table,” Spencer suggested, gesturing for his brother to lend him a hand.

Without a word, Dewey helped
his brother get to his feet. Once he was perched on the edge of the table, Spencer carefully lifted both his legs, swinging them lengthwise onto the table. Mercy nodded her approval, his suggestion having been a good one.

“What now?” she asked, looking to Spencer for guidance.

“Just keep blotting the blood with a towel while you use the pen knife to cut the skin around the wound. When that’s done, you can dig the bullet out with a knitting needle.”

Mercy nodded. “Yes, I . . . I think I understand.”

Reaching for a clean towel, she laid it over the bullet hole, applying a minimal amount of pressure as she cleaned the wound. With that finished, she picked up the pen knife, unnerved when a pair of shadows unexpectedly fell over her.

“Perhaps it would be better if the two of you waited in the parlor until I’m finished,” she suggested, her voice sounding unduly strained even to her own ears.

Dewey and Prudence glanced at one another, clearly doubting her ability to perform the surgery without their assistance.

“You heard the lady.” Spencer jerked his head
towards the doorway. “Now, scram.”

“Thank you,” Mercy said once Dewey and Pru
had exited the room.

“Whatever I can
do to help the pretty doctor.”

Embarrassed, Mercy averted her gaze from Spencer’s face
. She unwillingly recalled that he’d also said she was pretty the night that he kissed her behind the barn.

With a shake of
the head, Mercy shoved the errant memory to the back of her mind. Leaning over top of Spencer’s leg, she gingerly poked at the bullet hole with the tip of her index finger. When he groaned aloud, she ceased her exploration, wondering how he expected her to cut through his skin with a pen knife when he could barely tolerate a light touch of the finger.

“Get me something to bite down on,”
Spencer rasped. “I’ve got a feeling that this is gonna be one helluva ride. And don’t forget to put my knife in the fire. The damned thing has to be red-hot to cauterize the wound.”

Circumstances being what they were, Mercy decided not to chastise Spencer for his coarse language.
Instead, she scurried across the kitchen and removed the knife from the kettle of boiling water. Carefully, she set the blade in the fire before retrieving a clean towel from one of the wall hooks. After folding it several times, she passed it to him, watching grimly as he sank his teeth into it.

Knowing
that she couldn’t put off the inevitable, Mercy reached for the pen knife. With the thumb and forefinger of her left hand, she pulled the skin away from the bullet wound. Spencer jerked ever so slightly.

Taking a deep breath, she pressed the tip of the pen knife near the edge of the bullet hole and commenced to slice through the skin. Inwardly cringing,
Mercy did her best to ignore Spencer’s muffled groans. Although to his credit, other than a few strained twitches, he somehow managed to keep his body motionless while she widened the bullet hole.

Fearful of doing more harm than good, Mercy set the pen knife aside, after which she blotted the crudely made incision with a wadded towel. Glancing at Spencer, her heart caught in her throat at seeing
his pain-wracked expression. His normally tanned face drained of all color, he clutched the sides of the table, his chest heaving.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, wishing
that there was something she could do to ease his pain.

Spencer blinked his eyes at her
. The simple gesture imbued Mercy with newfound strength. Reaching for the knitting needle, she used it to probe the bullet hole. As she did, she offered up a silent prayer, hoping that removing the lead slug from Spencer’s leg would be as easy as he’d claimed it would be.

It was not.

Although able locate the small slug burrowed in the fleshy part of Spencer’s calf, no matter how much she poked and prodded, she was unable to successfully extract it.

Suffering in stoic silence, Spencer bent his good leg at the knee, his booted foot stomping down on the wooden table top when she tried, once more, to nudge the bullet out of its bloody pocket. As torturous as it was for her, she could not begin to comprehend the agony that
he endured.

Finally, midway into her labors, Mercy stopped, teardrops streaming down her cheeks. Mindless of the blood covering her hands and fingers, she swiped the h
umiliating tears off her face.

“We have to send for the doctor,” she wailed. “I can’t dislodge the bullet.”

Spencer reached up and yanked the towel out of his mouth, filling his lungs with huge draughts of air.

“No doctors,” he rasped between breaths. “Just stop worrying about hurting me. Otherwise you’ll never get the damned thing out
of my leg.”

He was right. She had to
persevere.
She had to do this
.

Once more, Mercy picked up the knitting needle, tightly
gripping it as she would a pencil. Bending over top of Spencer’s leg, she applied herself with focused determination. A few moments later, she felt the bullet begin to give way. Until . . . finally . . .
yes!

No sooner had Mercy
extracted the piece of lead from Spencer’s calf than it slipped through her bloodied fingers, dropping onto the floor.

“Good girl,” Spencer hoarsely whispered, his entire face covered with perspiration. “All that’s left now is to cauterize the wound.”

Mercy froze, having put all thoughts of that particular procedure to the back of her mind.

“How . . . how do I . . .
do that?” she sputtered.

“Clean the wound as best you can
. Then run the knife blade over the hole to seal it closed.”

The very thought caused Mercy to wince
, every instinct telling her that this would prove to be as painful, if not more so, than removing the bullet. Not wanting Spencer to see her fear, she walked over to the kettle of water, intentionally ignoring the knife that protruded from the flames. Dunking a towel into the water kettle, she got it good and wet before wringing it out.

Wet towel in hand, she cleaned Spencer’s leg, taking some comfort in the fact that much of the bleeding had already sto
pped.

Unable to prolong the inevitable, Mercy carefully wrapped a dry towel around the knife handle. As she pulled it free of the fire, she could see that it had changed colors due to the heat, the metal blade throwing off a burnished sheen.

Without a word, Spencer put the folded towel back into his mouth, signaling that she could begin. Clenching her teeth, Mercy girded her courage by telling herself that it would soon be all over.

With that thought in mind, she lowered the knife to Spencer’s wound, grimacing
at the smell of burning flesh.

Spencer, holding the table in a white-knuckled grip, heaved upward, his body writhing in pain. Terrified that he might inadvertently kick the knife out of her hand, Mercy slapped a hand on
to his thigh, her fingers digging into his straining muscles as she held him steady.

When she was done, she dropped the knife and staggered toward the head of the table. Reaching down, she removed the towel from Spencer’s mouth, her heart aching at the thought of how much pain she’d
inflicted upon him.

Just then
, Dewey and Pru rushed into the room, their sudden entrance making Mercy think that they’d been standing in the doorway all along. Ashen-faced, Dewey placed a hand on his brother’s shoulder.

“Are you all right?” he asked, his sixteen
-year-old voice boyishly cracking.

Covering his younger brother’s hand
with his own, Spencer wordlessly nodded.

“Maybe you should give him
a glass of water,” Pru suggested, gesturing to Spencer’s sweat-soaked shirt.

“
Of course! How remiss of me!” Mercy rushed over to the crock where they stored their drinking water.

Removing the lid, she reached for the dipper
that hung above it, filling it to the brim. She hurried back to where Spencer still lay on the table. As gently as possible, she slipped her free hand under his head, assisting him into a sitting position.

H
e took several noisy gulps. Then, taking the dipper from her hand, he splashed the remaining water onto his face. Unable to stop herself, Mercy brushed the damp hair off his brow.

“Thank you,” Spencer murmured.

Flustered, Mercy stepped away from him, hastily retrieving the basket of bandages. Although she had no idea how one went about bandaging a bullet wound, she assumed that it could be no more difficult than any of the other feats she’d performed so far that evening.

Covering Spencer’s leg with several strips of cotton cloth,
Mercy knotted the ends to hold them in place, satisfied that the bandage would hold until morning.

Finished, she motioned for Dewey to assist her in moving Spencer from the tabl
e. Between the two of them, they maneuvered him down the hall to the front parlor, Pru holding a candle aloft to light the way. Once there, they positioned him on the settee. Though Mercy knew that it would provide little in the way of comfort, given Spencer’s incapacitated condition, it would be impossible to move him to an upstairs bedroom. Not that he seemed to mind, having fallen into a deep slumber the moment his head touched the settee’s padded arm.