There was a moment of shocked silence. "Christ," said the fat man named Rupert. "I've ne'er heard a woman use such language in me life."
"Then ye've ne'er met my auntie Grisel," said another voice, to laughter.
"Your husband should tan ye, woman," said an austere voice from the blackness under a tree. "St. Paul says 'Let a woman be silent, and—' "
"You can mind your own bloody business," I snarled, sweat ripping behind my ears, "and so can St. Paul." I wiped my frehead with my sleeve. "Turn him to the left. And if you," adressing my patient, "move so much as one single muscle wile I'm tying this bandage, I'll throttle you."
"Och, aye," he answered meekly.
I pulled too hard on the last bandage, and the entire dressing scooted, off.
"Goddamn it all to hell!" I bellowed, striking my hand on the ground in frustration. There was a moment of shocked silence, then, as I fumbled in the dark for the loose ends of the bandages, further comment on my unwomanly language.
"Perhaps we should send her to Ste. Anne, Dougal," offered one of the blank-faced figures squatting by the road. "I've not heard Jamie swear once since we left the coast, and he used to have a mouth on him would put a sailor to shame. Four months in a monastery must have had some effect. You do not even take the name of the Lord in vain anymore, do ye, lad?"
"You wouldna do so either, if you'd been made to do penance for it by lying for three hours at midnight on the stone floor of a chapel in February, wearing nothin' but your shirt," answered my patient.
The men all laughed, as he continued. "The penance was only for two hours, but it took another to get myself up off the floor afterward; I thought my… er, I thought I'd frozen to the flags, but it turned out just to be stiffness."
Apparently he was feeling better. I smiled, despite myself, but spoke firmly nonetheless. "You be quiet," I said, "or I'll hurt you." He gingerly touched the dressing, and I slapped his hand away.
"Oh, threats, is it?" he asked impudently. "And after I shared my drink with ye too!"
The flask completed the circle of men. Kneeling down next to me, Dougal tilted it carefully for the patient to drink. The pungent, burnt smell of very raw whisky floated up, and I put a restraining hand on the flask.
"No more spirits," I said. "He needs tea, or at worst, water. Not alcohol."
Dougal pulled the flask from my hand, completely disregarding me, and poured a sizable slug of the hot-smelling liquid down the throat of my patient, making him cough. Waiting only long enough for the man on the ground to catch his breath, he reapplied the flask.
"Stop that!" I reached for the whisky again. "Do you want him so drunk he can't stand up?
I was rudely elbowed aside.
"Feisty wee bitch, is she no?" said my patient, sounding amused.
"Tend to your business, woman," Dougal ordered. "We've a good way to go yet tonight, and he'll need whatever strength the drink can give him."
The instant the bandages were tied, the patient tried to up. I pushed him flat and put a knee on his chest to keep him there. "You are not to move," I said fiercely. I grabbed the hem of Dougal's kilt and jerked it roughly, urging him back down on his knees next to me.
"Look at that," I ordered, in my best ward-sister voice. plopped the sopping mass of the discarded shirt into his hand. He dropped it with an exclamation of disgust.
I took his hand and put it on the patient's shoulder. "And look there. He's had a blade of some kind right through the trapezius muscle."
"A bayonet," put in the patient helpfully.
"A bayonet!" I exclaimed. "And why didn't you tell me?"
He shrugged, and stopped short with a mild grunt of pain. "I felt it go in, but I couldna tell how bad it was; it didna hurt that much."
"Is it hurting now?"
"It is," he said, shortly.
"Good," I said, completely provoked. "You deserve it. Maybe that will teach you to go haring round the countryside kidnapping young women and k-killing people, and…" I felt myself ridiculously close to tears and stopped, fighting for control.
Dougal was growing impatient with this conversation. "Well, can ye keep one foot on each side of the horse, man?"
"He can't go anywhere!" I protested indignantly. "He ought to be in hospital! Certainly he can't—"
My protests, as usual, went completely ignored.
"Can ye ride?" Dougal repeated.