Unhallowed Ground (31 page)

‘Dave! Dave! Come on, wake up! We’re back now, we’ll soon have you inside and strapped up.’

But wait.

There is something else.

Something unspeakable.
Dear God, no.
Rigidly she keeps the torch directed in the same place. She does not move it because she can’t. That torch beam and Georgie’s arm are in such terrible communication, she feels they can never be parted.

If this young man has hurt his ankle, if the snowplough rolled over and crushed his ankle, then everything is all right now. She will touch his friend on the back in a moment, she will touch him on the back and show him. Everything’s fine. No need to worry. She feels her frozen face crack into a rictus smile. He does not have a foot any more. His foot has gone, you see. It is chopped off neatly right at the ankle, as if by an axe or a cutlass, and there is nothing but splintered bone.

S
HE HAS ALWAYS CRAVED
for safety in life, for when she is safe she is loved.

Donna, of course, holds the opposite view.

But now poor Georgie has never felt more unsafe.

If the accident had been any further away they would not have made it back. But they manage. There is no alternative. They have to get Dave to safety. It’s just no good sobbing and trying not to look at the awful wound or the pulsing blood, the gore. Georgie tries, but fails, to lift the heavy shoulder end, so she takes the legs instead. Black blood pumps, they staunch it, they tie it, they shove a spare clean overall around it, which the man fetches down from the cab.

Wildly they fight their way back through the frenzied teeth of the gale, but this seems normal now, as if Georgie makes a habit of this, bent like this, muttering, slipping, cursing like this, not minding the warm feel of fresh blood as it slops through her gloves, her sleeves.

Back at the cottage she yells at Lola, ‘
Get back! Get back!
’ and doesn’t stop to figure out how the dog escaped from the kitchen. After their hurried departure she had left the front door open and now there’s a pile of snow in the hall, so that after they drag their burden inside Georgie has to use a shovel to lever the door closed again. They both feel, having seen the butchery, that it is essential to close the door.
And lock it.

And now, still grunting and sweating, they cart the unconscious Dave to the sofa and lay him there. The blood pumps from his severed right leg and the exposed bone is bluey white, like a lamb bone fresh from the freezer.

The difficulty lies in facing the facts, and Georgie can’t bring herself to do that. ‘The lorry must have done this… it must have rolled back over his leg after you’d gone to fetch help…’

The dark weathered man glances back at Georgie, and his eyes are so full of knowledge that she wants to put out her hand and close them.

‘That must be what happened to your friend.’ Georgie can hardly force the words through her chattering teeth, and the words knock together like enamel. ‘The snowplough must have moved again somehow…’ Georgie sobs, knowing otherwise, ‘perhaps some sharp piece of metal…’

‘Don’t talk rot!
Somebody has cut off his foot.
When I left Dave his ankle was broken. Jesus Christ Almighty. The machine ran over his ankle, but now he has lost his whole sodding foot… God God God.’ There are tears of fury in his eyes and he looks at Georgie as if she’s not there, as if none of this can be real. ‘Build up the fire,’ he says ominously.

And she cries, fearing the worst, looking into his eyes for an answer, ‘
Oh no, oh no
, we can’t do that, not that…’

But he says, ‘Well, I don’t sodding know what else to do… we have to staunch the bleeding…’

‘But the shock, my God, it’ll kill him.’

‘Well, what the hell do you suggest?’

The fire is a hot one, having burned solidly for several weeks now. The ashes underneath are white hot, so hot you can’t get near them without stretching your arm and turning your face away. But Georgie banks it up just the same.

‘Or the cooker perhaps,’ says the tall, wide-shouldered man looking round, unaware, it would seem, of the darkness or the reason behind it.

‘The electric’s off.’

His eyes close with an awful weariness. ‘Of course. Shit, I knew that. No telephone either? Is there anyone else round here who might know what we should do?’

She thinks hard at first, Georgie has to concentrate to remember exactly where she is… who her neighbours are… reality is hard to pinpoint. Eventually she shakes her head, ‘No. Nobody. No-one at all.’

While she is building up the fire he is kneeling on the floor at the injured end of his dormant companion. ‘Can you find some newspaper for all this blood? And we ought to raise the leg up somehow. Should I relax this tourniquet now, isn’t that what they do, release it every so often… Jesus Christ, and he’s only eighteen.’

‘I don’t think we ought to relax it. We should keep it tight until we’ve… after all… we’re not worried about gangrene yet, gangrene wouldn’t happen that fast…’ For several seconds she thinks she might faint.

And the man looks as if he might cry when he groans, ‘I know fuck all about gangrene.’

All those courses she could have gone on, all that blasted basic first aid that you owe to yourself and others. Everyone should have some bloody idea about how to cope with an accident. Why stay dependent on others? But she’s never been on a first-aid course, she was never remotely interested.

But they seem to share the same lack of knowledge, God knows where it comes from… fiction, probably, mixed with the fag ends of life-saving programmes missed on TV. There is something reassuring in this. They do not argue over what they believe should be done.

He joins Georgie to search the kitchen. The only suitable knife, the knife she shows him, is stainless steel. The blade is wide, but wide enough?

‘We might have to sear it several times,’ he says, terribly drawn, his teeth gritted against the thought.

She mutters miserably, ‘You better get your coat off.’ Partly because his coat is wet and partly because she wants him to know that if anyone is going to cauterize anything round here, it’s him, not her. They return to the roaring fire, where Georgie thrusts the knife in the flames, willing herself to calmness while he watches anxiously over her shoulder. ‘I’d better get some towels, some sheets, I’d better look for some antiseptic.’

And all the while she dreads the chance that David might wake up, groan, show some signs of life which will make hurting him and the sealing of his wounds all the more ghastly. Because what they are planning to do is monstrously preposterous, there is no getting away from that.

She tries to distance herself, to be practical.

She stares at the boy’s deathlike face. ‘D’you think we should try some alcohol? Whisky?’

‘We might have to do that later, but I don’t think we should try that yet, and alcohol’s bad for shock, they say. Don’t they?’

‘But fluids! He has to have fluids!’

‘Yes, but not now. For Christ’s sake, not yet.’

When will the blade be hot enough and how will they tell? Georgie bustles about the cottage gathering armfuls of towels and sheets that her nervous companion rips up and neither of them really knows why. Perhaps this is a practical method of delaying the awful moment of truth. Her inadequate first-aid kit is discovered underneath the sink and the Dettol is on the top shelf in the kitchen. Dettol, surely, rather than the childlike Germoline in its silly little pot, enough for one scraped knee, not a massively serious injury. The finger-sized bandages laugh at her. The tin of Band Aid is a mirthless joke, ditto the eyepatch, the Dispirin, the Rennies and the half-squeezed tubes of God knows what. These, presumably, have had their day, but they are not going to save Georgie now.

‘I don’t even know your name.’

‘Oliver. And yours?’

‘Georgie Jefferson. This is ludicrous. Here we are dealing in conventional introductions…’

‘Listen. Georgie, you’re going to have to hold the leg firmly in case Dave wakes up or tries to move, the knife mustn’t slip…’

‘
Shit.
’

Dave can’t be cold, that’s one blessing. Only his face and legs are exposed, the rest is under a duvet and blankets. Oliver begins to untie the laces on the one boot that is still here, but his hands are shaking badly.

‘Yes, I’ll hang on for dear life, I’ll try.’

‘The sodding snowplough broke down. We were on our way out. We knew it was a dead loss. We were on our way out when it broke down and Dave crawled underneath to see if the bugger was leaking again. That’s when it slid back. His fucking ankle was right there. I had to let the snowplough slip further before I could free him to pull him out. God, he was screaming blue murder…’ he shudders. ‘I’ll never forget those screams. Perhaps someone else’s phone is working?’

Georgie shakes her head hopelessly. There is no point in playing games, it is far too late for that. There is no outside help to be had. There’s only Georgie and Oliver. The man, Oliver, has crinkly black hair, he’s a medium-sized, stocky bloke who looks capable and serious. His face is pleasant, his hands are large, with no accent it isn’t possible to guess if he’s local or not.

He asks, ‘This is your house then?’

‘Yes, but not for much longer.’ They are trying to pass the awful minutes with safe, sane conversation. ‘In fact, I’d planned to leave this morning. I’ve had quite enough of Wooton-Coney.’

They need this kind of mindless talk that requires no concentration. Their eyes are riveted on Dave’s face, both terrified that the boy might wake and they’ll have to cope with his anguish. Georgie, holding her breath for long periods of time, allows it to shudder on its way out.

Oliver slaps his head with his hand. ‘
For Christ’s sake, how did this happen?
God almighty, come on, come on, let’s face it, some tosser’s chopped off Dave’s sodding foot. I was only gone for ten minutes and look?
How else could this have happened?
Shit, who the hell could do this?’

Georgie does not answer. She squeezes her hot hands more tightly together. She checks the look of the knife in the fire, it is red hot and glowing, while Oliver goes on, hysteria rising. ‘Some axe, bloody sharp, a bloody strong bastard.
What else could have happened?
How else does somebody’s foot get sliced off…?’

‘The snowplough…’ starts Georgie, thinking of Lot and his woodpile.

‘Damn it!
Dave was out of the snowplough!
I wouldn’t have left him underneath! And it would fucking well crush his foot, not actually chop it off! By the time I left him he wasn’t anywhere near the snowplough. Oh,
Jesus Christ
.’ And Oliver says again, as if she didn’t hear him at first, ‘the kid is only eighteen!’

‘The kettle’s boiling. D’you want a drink now—or later?’

But now Oliver sets his face as if he’s going to war, there is no expression upon it and it suddenly feels that they’ve done this before and know exactly what to do. It is extraordinary. Some inner strength, her mother would call it. Well, Sylvia would faint if she were here now. With determined hands Georgie unwraps the bleeding stump and raises it onto the pile of books that are covered with several towels. There’s newspaper all over the floor as if Georgie is houseproud, as if she cares a damn at this stage what the blood will do to the carpet. She rolls up her sleeves like a dull, conscienceless automaton. With a terrible solemnity, that of a ritual, Oliver dons the oven glove to grasp the handle of the now white-hot knife. He swings it from the fire very quickly and, as sweat pours down his face, gaunt in the candlelight, he lays it firmly against the pumping, raw and awful wound—holds it… holds it—he could be holding the sizzling steel against his own flesh by the horrified look on his face, and after counting to ten he replaces it swiftly back on the fire.

Then sags. And screws up his face in agony.

Burning pork. Singeing in the soupy air. Georgie has the leg gripped above the knee, and when it’s over it is hard to let go. She is locked there, locked in combat with every nerve in her body. She has to ask if it’s time to let go, and Oliver says, ‘Yes, let go now. But we’re going to have to do it again.’

With horrified awe they inspect the result. Half the wound has gone quite black. A layer of charred skin has formed, bubbling and blistering around it. Thank Christ it seems to have stopped the bleeding.

There is no reaction from Dave. Not a flicker. No movement.

After the longest five minutes of her life Georgie and Oliver repeat the whole abominable process, laying the knife on the other, untreated half of the stump.

‘OK. Now. Should we cover it, or will it stick?’

‘Perhaps we should lie clean sheets over it and leave it.’

‘What about antiseptic?’ And her fingers play stupidly with her mouth.

‘Don’t let’s do anything else for now. I don’t think I can do any more,’ Oliver admits with a groan. ‘Let’s not disturb it. I don’t reckon we should wet it with anything.’

‘No.’ Just put it away and cover it up. But they decide to keep the leg raised. They feel they ought to do that.

The atmosphere in the room is so stifling that by now they are both gasping for breath. ‘That’s some fire,’ says Oliver, rolling down shirtsleeves covered in blood and not even noticing. Georgie sits beside him where he has sunk down on the floor. They rest their backs against a chair so they have a good view of the comatose Dave. And then Oliver puts out his hand and takes Georgie’s. She feels her face going, slipping away into tears of tension, she shakes, she jerks, and, still sobbing, she creeps into his arms and he holds her.

The pair hold each other, sitting there, listening to the wind wailing down the chimney, watching the snowflakes land on the logs and spit, as aware of Dave’s breathing as they are of their own. They make a gory sight, both smeared copiously with blood, and Oliver has a smear of crimson slicing his cheek like a scar. They don’t talk. They can’t talk. They just try to comfort each other until the violent shivering stops.

He turns and pushes her hair away, where it has stuck to her forehead. Eventually he smiles and sighs. ‘You were great.’