Page 20 of The Horseman of Sleepy Hollow
In a moment of frantic decision, I ripped off the blindfold. I used the bedpan quickly and then padded on bare feet to the heavy wooden door.
It stood slightly open, and for a moment I feared I might encounter the Horseman's baleful eye watching me through the crack. Cautiously I eased it wider, conscious of increasingly sharp flickers of pain along the seam the Horseman had sewn along my wound.
A dark hallway lay beyond the door. Along its right-hand wall, narrow shelves were stacked with goods. I squinted at them and noted bags of flour and meal, jars of preserves, clay pots, bundles of dried herbs, strings of onions, clumps of carrots, a pumpkin or two, and a lumpy sack, probably full of potatoes—or skulls.
Daylight seeped under a door at the far end of the hallway.
Desperation loosed my feet and I ran to the door, keeping my steps as light as I could. I seized the handle and pushed—but a horrific stab of pain shot through my back and bowels as I lurched into the white glare of the outdoors.
I nearly screamed. Spots swam in front of my eyes, and I braced my forehead against the rough log wall of the cabin, biting my fist in agony. The Horseman had said I nearly bled to death. Perhaps my wound went deeper than I realized.
My breath hissed in and out through my teeth. I risked a slow movement—again the pain shot across my lower back, and with it an oozing sensation. Did I tear open my stitches?
Eyes tightly closed against the pain, I tried to form rational thoughts.
I could try to keep going, to find a path down to the valley. But if a brief run down the hall and a lunge through the door had done such damage, a two or three hour walk would certainly do me in.
I could stagger back into the cabin and collapse on the bed again. I could tell the Horseman that I fell while using the bedpan, and that tore my stitches that way. He might believe me. Or he might realize that I defied him, and then he would refuse to help me anymore.
"Curse this godforsaken wound!" I struck my forehead against the log.
A large hand landed atop my head, holding it immobile. "I suggest you avoid damaging yourself further."
Every muscle in my body softened with relief, even as my blood chilled at the heavy disappointment in the Horseman's voice.
"Katrina." His mouth brushed my ear, and I could not help thinking of those soft, full lips I had touched. "Why did you disobey me?"
"I am afraid you might kill me," I replied, in a voice as sick and quivering as my stomach felt.
His hand tightened a little, slid downward toward my neck slowly, as if he was memorizing the shape of my skull. "I may have to. But I would rue the day."
"What does that mean? You have to tell me what's going on. Please. Ignorance does not keep anyone safe. It only augments the danger, and heightens anxiety."
"You may be right." He collected my hair into a fistful and gently tilted my head backward, just a little. I kept my eyes shut. "But should I reward such blatant disregard for your physician's orders?"
"Surely you can understand my reluctance to trust said physician."
"Yet you would beg for my touch."
"I did not beg! I would never do such a thing."
"Hm. Pity." The Horseman's fingertips brushed my waist, and he let loose a sharp swear. "You have torn your stitches, you insufferable fool! Inside, now."
He hitched my arm across his burly shoulders and we shuffled inside together, back to the room where he helped me onto the bed with a gentleness that belied the incessant stream of profanity from his mouth. Some of the curse words were new to me.
"I had heard that Irishmen were foul of speech," I told him as he replaced the blindfold over my eyes. "But you must have the foulest tongue of them all."
"Keep silent until I have repaired the damage you did," he snapped.
I waited until he was done stitching me up again, and then I said, "You really did save my life. And I'm not your prisoner, am I? You merely want me to stay here so I can heal."
"As I have told you. And onlynowyou believe it?"
"How long must I stay?"
His sigh was a gust of frustration. "Two days if you behave, longer if you don't."
"Will you stay and talk to me?"
