Page 36 of Snowy and the Seven Doves
Once the patient was on the bed, Ash brought the lamp over and Snowy collected two candelabra and several standard candles from around the room. Once they were lit, Margaret was able to get her first good look at poor Mr. Snowden.
He shivered, but at the same time struggled to escape from the blanket. Margaret nodded to Snowy to peel it back, which he did, then attempted to pull down the shirt, the only garment Mr. Snowden was wearing.
“That is going to have to come off, too,” Margaret said. “Can someone get the fire going? And I will need warm water. I have soap and cloths to bathe him with in my bag.”
“He is not wearing anything except the shirt,” Snowy objected. “Perhaps we should wait for the doctor.”
“He is far too hot to feel the cold,” Margaret retorted. “And if you are concerned about his modesty or mine, then cover his, um, male parts with a handkerchief.” She had picked up a candle and was running a hand down one leg.
Some bruising on his upper thighs.A hint of a few cut-like wounds that would show once they turn him over. The rest of his leg was unmarked, though it burned with his fever. The same was true of his other leg, except that one of the cuts was red, puffy, and weeping.
Snowy had the shirt off and placed it over Mr. Snowden’s crotch. Margaret moved to the head end of the bed and looked down into the young man’s face, marred with multiple bruises and cuts. Both eyes were swollen nearly shut and the mouth and nose were puffy.
She felt the head, moving it from side to side so she could examine as much of his back as possible without rolling him over. She would wait for that until she had examined his torso and the arms.
She found no further injuries, apart from a badly-bruised ear.
Now for the arms. She started with the one that was not splinted. Meanwhile, Peter re-entered the room carrying an armload of wood, and Ash brought in a bucket of water. “It’s warm,” he said. “I begged it from the house next door.”
Margaret nodded her thanks and continued her examination, trying to be gentle. Mr. Snowden was becoming more and more restless, and Snowy was trying to hold him still, while murmuring his lullaby. The arms had taken a lot more punishment than the legs; presumably Mr. Snowden had held them up to protect himself.
After that, she checked his broken arm for open wounds, as well as she could without removing the splint. There was nothing beyond the bruises and the break, which had not opened the skin.
The torso had a few bruises, but she didn’t think any ribs were broken.
Now she wanted to see the back. “Roll him over, please. Gently.”
With Snowy on the shoulders, Peter on the hips, and Ash maneuvering the feet, they eased him over onto his belly, displaying the ruin of the poor man’s back.
He had been hit with a thin cane or a whip, which had left thin, bloodied stripes from his neck down to the top of his thighs. Many of them oozed a smelly pus, and were hot, red, and swollen. No wonder he had a fever!
“This is where the trouble lies,” Margaret said. “If we can cleanse these sufficiently, we may have a chance of saving him. If the corruption has not spread. If he is strong enough to fight it.”
“You will try?” Snowy asked.
Margaret grimaced. “Perhaps I should wait for the doctor.”
“I trust you,” Snowy told her. “Whatever you decide, I will support you.”
Downstairs, there was a knock on the front door. Snowy and Peter went down to see who it was, and Ash stayed to hold the candle for Margaret while she bent closer to the worst of the wounds.
“I would not want to leave this for much longer,” she told Ash.
“I agree,” Ash said. “If we don’t get the poison out, it will kill him. It might do so anyway.”
“Help me roll him to his side, Ash. I’ll wash the rest of him, at least, and if Snowy can find us some clean sheets, we can cover him up to wait for the doctor.”
Snowy returned to say that Drew’s relative and his colleagues had all been called out to a fire in the slums, with dozens of casualties, and that he had sent the men he’d brought with him to fetch supplies from the House of Blossoms.
Margaret bit her lip and summoned her courage. “I will have to do what I can, then.”
“Instruct us, Margaret,” Peter said. “We will help where we can.”
In the end, she needed all three men to hold Mr. Snowden down while she cleaned his wounds with soap and water, breaking open the surface as needed to make sure that no infected fluids remained.
Alcohol came next, drawing a scream from the poor patient. Then an ointment of her own making, a concoction of potted marigold, chamomile and dill from her garden, and honey from her country neighbors’ apiary, and more alcohol.
Finally, clean dressings from her basket. Thank goodness she had thought to pack them, since the linen cupboard in this house had been invaded by mice and, she had no doubt, spiders and other creatures.
