“I don’t—”
The boy slipped out of her arms and took hold of her hand, pulling at her.
He wanted her to follow. Frankie glanced back. No one was watching her. Outside, Ethel was giving out shots and Barb was cleaning an old woman’s machete wound.
Frankie hesitated; she’d been warned to be careful. The VC could be hiding anywhere.
The boy tugged harder. He looked so innocent, so young. Not someone to fear.
“Okay,” she said.
He led her down a cracked stone hallway, through which vines crawled between the crumbling stone tiles and spread out, tentacle-like, across the mold-blackened floor. At a closed wooden door that hung half off its hinges he paused, looked up at her, and asked a question in his language.
She nodded.
He opened the door.
Frankie smelled something rotten and foul …
Inside, a candle flame illuminated a child lying on a grass mat, covered in dirty blankets, with a chamber pot not far away. Frankie covered her mouth and nose with a handkerchief and moved closer.
The girl was adolescent, thirteen maybe, with tangled black hair and sallow skin. Her left hand was wrapped in a dirty, bloody bandage.
Frankie knelt beside the girl, who eyed her warily. “I won’t hurt you,” she said, lifting the bandaged hand and slowly unwrapping it. The smell of rot assailed her. The hand had been mangled beyond recognition. Green pus oozed out of the open sores. In one finger, a bone stuck up through ripped black flesh.
Black flesh. Gangrene. She’d read about this, but had never seen it.
The boy said something in his language. The girl shook her head violently.
“Stay here,” Frankie told the boy, carefully releasing the girl’s ruined hand.
She went through the doorway and down the hall, out to the sweet, fresh outside air. “Captain Smith! Over here! Bring your bag.”
She led the doctor back to the dark, fetid room. He crossed the stones quietly, his footfalls matching the rapid beats of Frankie’s heart.
He knelt by the girl, examined her injuries, and then sighed heavily. “She must work in one of the sugarcane mills. This is a roller injury.”
“What can we do?”
“We could send her to the Third Field Hospital. They have a Vietnamese ward, but these villagers are a self-reliant people. They won’t want to let her go, and we can’t guarantee her we’ll come back. Amputation and antibiotics are the best chance she has to live. If we do nothing, the gangrene will spread and she’ll die from the infection.”
They looked at each other, but neither thought there was a question. They had to try to save this girl’s life.
“I’ll call for Ethel—”
“No. I want you, Frankie. Tell the boy to leave.”
Frankie felt a surge of panic, but Captain Smith was already kneeling, opening his bag. He took out a syringe and administered a sedative. When the girl closed her eyes and went limp, Captain Smith said, “Hold her down, Frankie,” and pulled out a saw.
The young Vietnamese boy ran.
Dr. Smith administered morphine.
“Hold her by the forearm,” Captain Smith said. “Hard.”
Frankie held on to the girl and did her best to help; the amputation was so brutal she had to look away several times, but when the surgery was over and the girl lay still, Frankie carefully treated the stump and wrapped it in clean white gauze. When Frankie finished treating the amputation, she turned and saw a slim, elderly South Vietnamese woman standing against the wall, with tears in her eyes. “Maybe that’s her grandmother,” Frankie said softly.
“Give the antibiotics to her and try to explain,” Captain Smith said. “Show her how to wrap the bandage.”
Frankie nodded. She went to the silent woman in the back of the room and did her best to explain what care the girl needed.
The woman gazed up at her steadily, nodded in understanding, and then bowed deeply.
Frankie gave the woman the antibiotics and gauze, and then followed Captain Smith out of the building. As she moved toward the truck bed, she felt a tug on her sleeve.
The little boy held out his small hand, unfurled his fingers. In his palm lay a smooth gray stone. He said something in his language, pushed it toward her. She had a feeling it was a precious possession. “Is she your sister?” Frankie asked.
He smiled, pushed his hand at her again. She took the stone gently, not wanting to offend. Then she reached behind her neck to unclasp the Saint Christopher medal she’d worn since her confirmation at thirteen. She handed the necklace to the boy, whose eyes widened in joy.