Chapter 7 — On the River

* * *

Lord Ethan was lying in a crumpled heap in the foot well, face down in his own blood and a ghastlier grey than he had been at the start of the trip, before the sun had begun to darken his complexion, and the rifle hung half out of the foot well, looking about to fall.  Dread washed over Tom.  What if the young lord were dead?  He hardly dared check for a pulse for fear of proving this fear true; Phipps was strange and annoying, but Tom certainly didn’t wish him dead.  For Tom to have failed so soon in the charge which Mr. George had left him, it was hardly to be born.

He leaned in close and bent to lightly touch the other boy’s slender neck, and it was not until he felt a pulse that he sighed and realized he had been holding his breath.  He took the gun up from where it had fallen, clicked the safety on, and replaced it in it’s rack and then he carefully — and clumsily, for it was difficult in a space that was meant only for two or three people’s feet — rolled the boy over to have a look at the wound.

There was a surprising amount of blood.  The boy’s left arm was sopping and now that Tom had rolled him Phipps’s jacket was well covered and even his trousers had become stained.  A ragged hole through both the jacket and shirt sleeve showed where the bullet had scored through, and there was a valley cut in Phipps’s arm which appeared as long and deep as a man’s finger, from which blood was freely flowing.  Fighting a wave of dizziness Tom reminded himself that his mother had always told him that wounds which bled well had less chance of becoming infected.  Still, if the boy was unconscious it could be because he had lost too much blood.  Or perhaps he had hit his head when he had fallen.  Tom hoped it was not the latter.

Tom did not have a clear idea of how to treat a severe wound, having never had the bad luck to deal with one before.  He wracked his brain desperately for a few moments.  Hadn’t he heard something about tying something tightly around the affected limb to slow the bleeding?  That would give him more time to bandage it properly.  Tie it with what?  A belt might do.  As he reached for his own belt he realized how much blood he already had on his hands and he stopped for a moment in dismay.  Nothing for it at the moment, though, he could not waste time while Phipps lost more blood, so he pulled his belt off quickly, and cinched it tight around Phipps’s upper arm, then he quickly rinsed his hands in the river, pulled his oilcloth overcoat from under the wagon tarpaulin and put it on to protect his own clothing.  He’d hate to think what his mother would say of his staining his new suit with blood, although it was already looking much less new after several weeks of hard work.

He scooped river water in his hands and tried to spill it over the wound, thinning all the blood and spreading the mess even further, and to his dismay the ragged edges of the shirt washed into the wound rather than away.  Tom hissed at himself in annoyance.  He really didn’t know what else he had expected, that had been rather foolish; there was nothing else for it, he needed to cut away the sleeve of Phipps’s finely made jacket and shirt.  He had to remind himself that they already had a ragged hole and severe blood staining, that they would be unlikely to be easily repaired.  He steeled his resolve and used his belt knife to hack away at them.  As he did so he realized that he could still use the hacked off sleeves and the ruined shirt, for Phipps’s shirt was much cleaner than his own, which he had been thinking he would have to use, and of a higher thread count.  This made him feel better about the necessity, as it was in his raising to never waste any bit of cloth that still had life in it.  He rinsed the shirt sleeve over the side of the raft and wrung it out over the wound, then dabbed at the wound somewhat half-heartedly, grateful that the bullet had but scored and continued on.  He would not have enjoyed having to dig in the wound looking for the bullet.

As he worked, Lord Ethan’s eyelids fluttered, and he whimpered and moved restlessly.  As he would with a small child or a mule, Tom muttered soothing noises and meaningless words — “There, there, you’ll be fine” — this seemed to calm the boy.

“Your shirt is already ruined, I’m going to cut a strip off it for bandages,” he murmured, but the boy seemed to have slipped into unconsciousness again, which Tom took as an implicit acquiescence.  He undid the jacket and waistcoat, untucked the boy’s shirt and unbuttoned it, and cut a strip from the collar to the bottom hem, which he folded into a pad.  However, he was finding working in the foot well of the wagon to be exceptionally difficult, twisting and stretching to try to reach as he cut the shirt, so now he lifted the boy down from the foot well and laid him out on the grass matting of the raft’s surface in order that he might straighten the boy’s limbs and make him more comfortable as well as more easily work on the wound.  He then cut two more strips of narrower width from the opposite side of the shirt for ties.

Once the arm was bandaged, and he had assured himself that the bandages were snug but not too tight, Tom released the tourniquet from Phipps’s upper arm and reclaimed his belt, and chaffed the other boy’s forearm and hand to assure himself that blood was moving in the limb.  The hand was cold at first, but soon seemed warm again, and the bandage was not immediately soaked through, so he thought he may have done a passable job.  The young lord had not regained consciousness, however, so Tom decided it might be best to continue to clean him up and to make for him a more comfortable bed where he could be out of the sunlight, which he was afraid might dehydrate and burn an unconscious person.

He unhooked the tarpaulin at the back of the wagon and looked around at what was available.  Several bolts of fine cloth — velvets in rich, dark colours and cottons in bright prints — were rolled up near the back of the wagon, which had been very nice on the nights he and Pickering had slept under the tarpaulin to avoid rain.  And there, tucked to one side, just where it always had been, was Pickering’s bedroll.  Somehow it surprised him, that the bedroll should still be here although the man himself was miles away — perhaps dead.  Poor fellow.  So calm and focused on his work, and so simple and easily confused.  If he were lying dead Tom could imagine that his face would not look angry, merely baffled.  Yet, it was almost certain that, whether he were dead or alive at this moment, Pickering would likely never see this bedroll again, nor, if he were to be asked, would he object to it being used by someone who needed it.  He took it up, and spread it beneath the cart just as Pickering would have if they had been camping along the road on a normal night.  He checked the chocks on the wheels to make sure they were still firm, kicking one a bit tighter — he did not want the wagon to roll while the other boy slept beneath it, and the chances of things working loose were much better with the river tilting the raft constantly, if slightly, this way and that.

It was well that Tom was quite familiar with removing clothing from unconscious bodies, from having put many a small, sleeping child to bed.  He cut the jacket without compunction at this point, having consigned it in his mind to not being clothing any more, although he did wish that he had a pair of scissors, as the knife was unwieldy.  Boots and the only slightly blood stained trousers were managed without a great deal of trouble.  The waistcoat, surprisingly, looked as though it might be salvageable, and provided a bit of a challenge, as the boy’s shoulders were well formed and a little broader than Tom had expected of the boy’s generally slender build, although the rest of his body looked much like a small child’s — with rounded, soft limbs unaccustomed to work.  Nothing like the narrow shoulders and wiry, tough limbs Tom was used to seeing in boys his own age in his neighbourhood, where they had all grown up on hard work and Tom’s family was unusual for the quality, if not great quantity, of nutritious food his mother had managed to supply.

After the vest the shirt was very easy; as it was half gone already Tom slashed it without compunction and tore the rag in half, electing the cleaner half his drying cloth.  Cold river water made the boy mutter and twitch, yet still he did not seem inclined to truly regain consciousness, so Tom tucked him into the bed beneath the wagon, and turned his attention to cleaning up the rest of the mess.

The waistcoat and trousers he tied by a string to a trailing corner of the raft in order to get the small amount of blood out of them by soaking in the river.  It would not be as good as dragging behind the sailing ship, as his father had told them they did when at sea, but it would help.  The jacket he used first to dab the blood off of his own oilskin coat and then (with repeated rinses in the river) to mop up the blood in the foot well of the wagon, as flies were beginning to gather.  He was able to remove very little of the blood from the grass matting where he had bandaged Phipps — the grass had absorbed the blood and the stain would have to remain.  He wondered if it might not have been a better plan to have wrapped Phipps in his oilcloth coat rather than putting it on himself; perhaps he mightn’t have spread the blood so far?  Or he might then have covered his oilcloth on both sides and still got a lot on his own clothes and the matting, there was no way to know.  So he gave up on the grass matt and took the bloody clothes — rags, now — and tied them, also, by a string to the other back corner of the raft.

He was exhausted to the point of trembling, by this time, and sat down with his back to the wheel to think what he could do next.  The banks of the river slipped inexorably past, which came almost as a surprise, he had been so taken up with dealing with Phipps wound.  They had certainly floated miles downstream by now, and every turn of the river had taken them further from the possibility of rejoining what remained of the caravan; he was not even sure of the general direction he might go if he were to take to the shore at this point.  Almost certainly Brackenstall and Ivanovitch would decide to take the few horses and men they had left and get to Abernetty as quickly as they could, as they now had no supplies, not even bedrolls, and very little ammunition.

The sun was sliding far down the end of the sky, and they were often in the shadow of the hills as the raft moved along, with a consequent cooling of the air, but Tom felt cold even beyond that.  It had suddenly come to him that he was alone in a way which he, a city-raised boy who had grown up in the bosom of a large family, had never before experienced.  He was alone on a small raft on a swift river with an unconscious companion.  He looked around at the dark under the trees and he shivered.  He had grown used and even fond of trees and wild places during the past few weeks and in his journey the summer before, but he had always been in the company of others, a group which had a destination, supplies, and expertise.  All his previous life and experience was in dealing with the crowded streets of Sandwell neighbourhood.  At that moment the raft gave a quick lurch, tilting sharply so that the corner nearly went under the water.  Only the once it bobbed, and then spun slowly and went on as though nothing had happened.

Tom sat for several minutes looking at the corner which had so misbehaved as though he might catch it acting up again if he watched closely, and then he crawled cautiously toward the edge and stretched to reach the string which floated in the river water.

The rags of Phipps’s jacket and shirt which had been tied to it were gone, the string having been snapped.

He dropped the string and sat back to his wagon wheel, looking at the dark water all around for any ripple that might indicate anything moving beneath it, and found many.  So many, he decided, that they probably indicated nothing but eddies in the currant of the river.

“Something on the bottom — rocks or something — might have caught it,” he told himself, and then he took the gun down and loaded it again with only slightly shaking hands and laid it across his knees while he sat and thought about what needed to be done next, for work was what he knew, and keeping his mind occupied was the best remedy for worries.  He realized then that he was thirsty, and immediately upon realizing that he knew he was hungry as well.  “I’m sure the young lord needs sustenance, also, with the injury and all.”

This line of thought bolstered him and he stood, though he found a powerful desire to keep his back against the wagon.  He knew that this was completely foolish, and he forced himself to turn and reach beneath the seat for the jug of cold tea, though the skin of his back crawled at doing it.  The jug was just where he had left it that morning, in it’s spot next to the rations box.

Turning his back again toward the wagon, Tom took a deep breath and let it out slowly and was glad that the young lord was not awake to see his foolishness.  He sank back down to sit, uncorked the jug, and took a sip of the tea.  He was indeed very thirsty, and there wasn’t much left, but they were surrounded by water.  For now he would give Phipps the last of the good tea, and when it was done he would fill the jug with river water, though he quailed at the thought of sticking his hand into the water at the moment.

He moved to kneel by Lord Ethan’s shoulders.

“Sir?”  He wasn’t even sure if it was correct to call a boy ‘sir,’ yet he assumed it would do, and he would feel odd calling him ’Master Ethan,’ as Mr. George had usually done, because it would involve using his first name, and he just wasn’t sure he was allowed.  “Sir, wake up.”

“What?”  The young lord’s voice was as crisp as though he had been merely closing his eyes, not asleep at all, though his next words belied that.  “What’s happened?”

“Have a little cold tea.”

The boy frowned, puzzled.  “LaPierre?”

“Yes, sir.  Tom LaPierre.”

There was a pause, and then Lord Ethan struggled to sit up, cursed, and fell back.

“Your arm’s not right.  Let me help you.”  Tom put down the rifle and jug, slid an arm under the smaller boy’s shoulders, and levered him to a seated position, grateful that the clearance of the wagon, designed for the worst roads, allowed that.

“Thank you.  J——­ G—.  I was shot, wasn’t I?”

“You were.”

“Bandits.”

“Yes.”

“I’ll take that drink.”  He sipped from the jug, drew a long draught, lowered it, wiped his mouth, and asked, “Do we have anything besides tea?”

“I don’t know.”

“Something a bit stronger might be welcome.”

His tone was strained, as though his inclination were to be a bit peevish, but he was perhaps too worn and confused, and he was trying to cover it all with a feeble sort of joking.

“I haven’t anything at the moment,” Tom said.  He wasn’t sure exactly what might be in the cart.

“I guess I shall have to make do.”

“Would you like something to eat?  We have the trail rations — nuts, and dried fruits and meats.”

“I don’t think I can manage it at the moment.  I’m a little dizzy, nauseous... something.  I think perhaps I should go back to sleep.”  Phipps tried to lie back down using only his good arm, lost his balance somewhat just at the end, thumped down the last few inches and cursed roundly again, then subsided into quiet.

“Don’t you think you could try to eat just a little something?  It might make you feel better.”

“And it might not!  Let me die in peace, not throwing up.”  Phipps turned his head away and fluffed the blankets up around his face as though to hide from the light.

Tom went silent, affronted.  He re-corked the jug and sat back to the wheel again, looking out at the water.  After a moment his stomach growled.  He wasn’t sure what the protocol was on eating in front of a lord when they refused food, but he couldn’t afford to starve just because Phipps wouldn’t eat.

“Begging your pardon, sir, but I’m going to get a little food out.  If you change your mind, just say.”

A mumble which sounded like an assent was his only answer, so Tom got up and fetched himself a large handful of dried food, and sat against the wagon wheel to eat.

After a few minutes there was a quiet rustle of the blankets.

“LaPierre?”  Phipps had rolled his head back toward Tom.

“Yes?”

“You bandaged my arm up?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you.”

Tom did not quite know how to respond to this.  On the one hand the boy had just been so very rude that he almost wished for a moment that he hadn’t bothered, but what else could anyone have expected him to do?  He couldn’t have watched the boy bleed to death.  Tom settled for uncomfortably muttering, “I hope I did a good enough job, sir.”

“I suppose you must have done as good a job as could be expected.  Under the circumstances.”  He nodded once, then turned his head away again and closed his eyes.

And then there was silence, and soon Tom thought he heard even breathing over the constant ripple of the water, and he knew he was alone again.  The sun was setting, now, and it would soon be dark.  There would be much to be done in the morning and he was the only one who was going to do it, so he’d better get some sleep.  He would have to bunk in on the other side of the wagon, where it was much closer to the side of the raft, but he trusted himself to not roll off the raft in his sleep — years of sleeping with his brothers had taught him to wake up before he rolled over.  In only a few more minutes he had rolled out his blankets and half covered himself, fully clothed and with the rifle ready by his side, and though the water lapping only a few feet away was not conducive to his comfort he slipped off to sleep much more easily than he would have thought possible.  It had been a long day and he was exhausted from many long days of hard work.

It seemed he had only closed his eyes for a moment, however, when he woke suddenly to another jolt of the raft.  It was now pitch black and Tom stared wildly around, disoriented by the sense of motion and the sameness of the stars above and the glittering little wavelets sparkling with the off light of the two little moons.  The wagon above was a solid black mass, and there he could see the black ragged fringe of trees at the edge of the river, which seemed to grow closer and then pull away as the raft spun, disturbed from it’s usual path by whatever they had encountered.  Something rose up or rushed toward them, blotting out the stars — a mass of twisted tentacles, black and reaching!  He snatched up the rifle and opened fire without thinking of aim — the thing was far too close for that to matter — and was blinded by the flash of the shot in the dark.  The roar of the gun woke Phipps who, by the time Tom bothered to listen to him, had settled from his initial shout to a really good cursing streak, the gist of which seemed to be that he thought Tom had been setting off fireworks as a prank and that was a rude thing to do when some people might have tests in the morning.  Tom was still blinking red spots out of his eyes and rubbing the arm which had taken the kick of the gun at a rather poor angle, when Phipps suddenly remembered where he was and moved on, without taking a breath, to asking what (with expletives) Tom had been shooting at.

“I- I don’t know.  I thought it was something coming up out of the water.  It had... tentacles.”

“Tentacles?”  Phipps was sitting up and looking around.  “What about branches or roots?  Was it a dead tree?  Like that one upstream?”

Tom peered and blinked, and was able to make out what Phipps indicated, against the glitter of the river; a tree, on it’s side, somehow snagged, its great spread of roots now reaching high above the water.  Of course that was what it had been.  Tom felt a complete idiot.  There must be many dead trees in the water at this time of year, the spring rains having washed them downstream.

“Er.  It may have been.”

Lord Ethan sighed in an exaggeratedly exasperated manner and fell back to the deck.  “Ow!  D—–­ it, I think I pulled a muscle in my stomach, now.  I’m going back to sleep.”

And, although he lay for a few minutes staring out into the dark, his face burning with embarrassment, Tom eventually fell back into a deep sleep as well.

* * * * * * * * * * * *