Evidently Claire was right in what she’d told him about testosterone, and he’d already known that Arnold was a ram, in terms both of balls and hardheadedness.
“Ah, I have it!” Arnold exclaimed triumphantly, and Jamie saw—with grudging admiration—the general emergent. This admiration disappeared with Arnold’s next sentence.
“Lord John Grey,” he said. “We could transport Mr. Bledsoe to his lordship’s house.”
“No!” Jamie said by reflex.
“Yes,” Arnold said, but in self-congratulation rather than contradiction; he was paying no attention. “Yes, the ideal solution! His lordship and his brother are much in my debt,” he explained to Peggy, with a feigned modesty that made Jamie want to hit him. “And as his lordship and Mrs. Fraser—” At this point, he caught sight of Jamie’s face and arrested his speech just in time to prevent exactly such a happenstance. He coughed. “The ideal solution,” he repeated. “Will you go and tell Mrs. Fraser what we intend, sir?”
“We?” Jamie said. “I intend nothing of the—”
“What the bloody hell is going on down here?” Claire’s voice came from the stairway behind him, and he swung round to see her leaning on the banister, a-flicker like a ghost in the light from the tin sconce above her. There was blood smudging her apron, blotches black on the pale cloth.
“Nothing, a nighean,” he said, fixing Arnold with a firm eye. “Only discussing where Mr. Bledsoe should be.”
“I don’t care where he should be,” she snapped, coming down into the foyer, skirts rustling with agitation. “Where he will be is dead, if I can’t take care of his leg quickly.” Then she noticed the glaring going on betwixt him and Arnold and moved up beside Jamie, looking hard at the governor herself.
“General Arnold,” she said, “if you have the slightest concern for Miss Shippen’s cousin’s life, you’ll oblige me by taking my husband promptly to fetch the instruments I need. Hurry!”
Arnold blinked, and Jamie would have smiled had he not been worrit for the lass—she was fierce, but she looked pale, and her fists were clenched in the cloth of her apron. It might have been to keep her from slapping the governor, but he rather thought it was to hide the fact that her hands were trembling—and he realized with a shock that she was afraid.
Not afraid of the circumstance or any future danger—afraid that she couldn’t do what she knew she must.
His heart smote him at the thought. He took Arnold firmly by the upper arm, compelling him toward the stair.
“Aye,” he said abruptly to Claire. “We’ll take the man to Lord John’s house, and whilst ye fettle him for the job there, I’ll fetch what ye need from the shop. The general will help me to move him.”
Arnold’s stiff resistance ceased abruptly as he took Jamie’s meaning.
“Yes,” he said. “Yes, I—” A long moan from above interrupted him, and Claire’s face tightened.
“There isn’t time,” she said, quite calmly. “Miss Shippen—Peggy. Fetch me the largest knife you have in the kitchen, and do it now. Have your servants bring more hot water and cloth for bandages. A strong sewing needle and black thread.” Her eyes sought Jamie’s, and he let go of the governor at once and went to her.
“Ye’re all right, lass?” he said quietly, taking her elbow.
“I am,” she said, and squeezed his hand briefly. “This is very bad, though. I don’t—I’m sorry, I’ll need you to help hold him.”
“I’ll be fine,” he said. “Dinna be worrit. Only do what ye need to do. I promise I willna vomit on him while ye’re taking off his leg.”
He hadn’t actually meant that to be funny, and was surprised—but pleased—when she laughed. Not much of a laugh, but the tension in her arm relaxed, and her fingers were steady on his.
He could tell the minute they entered the room. He didn’t know what it was had changed, but clearly Claire had heard the beating of the wings of Death from the floor below; he could sense them now. Bledsoe was still conscious, but barely so; a slice of white showed as one eyelid lifted at their entrance.
“We’re here, man,” Jamie whispered, sinking to his knees and grasping Bledsoe’s hand. It was cold to the touch and clammy with sweat. “Dinna fash, we’re here. It’ll be done soon.”
There was a strong smell of laudanum in the air, together with the stink of tar and blood and burnt hair. Claire was on the other side of the bed, holding Bledsoe’s wrist, her eyes flickering from his slack face to the mangled leg.
“Sepsis,” she said, quietly but in a normal voice. “Do you see the red line there?” She gestured at the wounded leg, and Jamie saw it clearly: a streak of an ugly dark-red color that he thought hadn’t been there before—or perhaps it had, and he’d not noticed. The sight of it made the fine hairs ripple on his shoulders, and he shifted uneasily.
“Blood poisoning,” Claire said. “Bacteria—germs—in the blood. It moves very fast, and if it should get into the body proper . . . there’s nothing I can do.”
He looked up sharp, hearing a tiny tremor in her voice.
“But before that, ye might? There’s a chance?” He tried to sound encouraging, though the thought of the alternative made the gooseflesh that much worse.
“Yes. But it isn’t a good one.” She swallowed. “The shock of the amputation may well kill him on the spot. And if it doesn’t, there’s still a great chance of infection.”