A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon [383]
Spilled water streaked her skirt. I could see the tiny head lolled back on her lap, water dribbling down a slack and horribly flattened cheek.
“She can’t,” Marsali was saying, over and over. “She can’t, she can’t!”
Disregarding my own advice about fingers, I ruthlessly thrust an index finger into the baby’s mouth, prodding the palate for a gag reflex. It was there; the baby choked on the water in its mouth and gasped, and I felt the tongue close hard against my finger for an instant.
Sucking. She was an infant, still breastfed—and suckling is the first of the instincts for survival. I whirled to look at the woman, but a glance at her flat breasts and sunken nipples was enough; even so, I grabbed one breast, squeezing my fingers toward the nipple. Again, again—no, no droplets of milk showed on the brownish nipples, and the breast tissue was flabby in my hand. No water, no milk.
Marsali, grasping what I was about, seized the neck of her blouse and ripped it down, pressing the child to her own bared breast. The tiny legs were limp against her dress, toes bruised and curled like wilted petals.
I was tipping back Hortense’s face, dribbling water into her open mouth. From the corner of my eye, I saw Marsali rhythmically squeezing her breast with one hand, an urgent massage to make the milk let down, even as my own fingers moved in an echo of the motion, massaging the unconscious woman’s throat, urging her to swallow.
Her flesh was slick with sweat, but most of it was mine. Trickles of perspiration were running down my back, tickling between my buttocks. I could smell myself, a strange metallic scent, like hot copper.
The throat moved in sudden peristalsis, and I took my hand away. Hortense choked and coughed, then her head rolled to the side and her stomach heaved, sending its meager contents rocketing back up. I wiped the trace of vomit from her lips, and pressed the cup to her mouth again. Her lips didn’t move; the water filled her mouth and dribbled down her face and neck.
Among the buzzing of the flies, I heard Lizzie’s voice behind me, calm but abstracted, as though she spoke from a long way off.
“Can ye stop cursing, ma’am? It’s only that the weans can hear ye.”
I jerked round at her, only then realizing that I had in fact been repeating “Bloody fucking hell!” out loud, over and over as I worked.
“Yes,” I said. “Sorry.” And turned back to Hortense.
I got some water down her now and then, but not enough. Not nearly enough, given that her bowels were still trying to rid themselves of whatever troubled them. Bloody flux.
Lizzie was praying.
“Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee . . .”
Brianna was murmuring something under her breath, urgent sounds of maternal encouragement.
“Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus . . .”
My thumb was on the pulse of the carotid artery. I felt it bump, skip, and go on, jerking along like a cart with a missing wheel. Her heart was beginning to fail, arrhythmic.
“Holy Mary, Mother of God . . .”
I slammed my fist down on the center of her chest, and then again, and again, hard enough that the bed and the pale splayed body quivered under the blows. Flies rose in alarm from the soaked straw, buzzing.
“Oh, no,” said Marsali softly behind me. “Oh, no, no, please.” I had heard that tone of disbelief before, of protest and appeal denied—and knew what had happened.
“Pray for us sinners . . .”
As though she, too, had heard, Hortense’s head rolled suddenly to one side, and her eyes sprang open, staring toward the place where Marsali sat, though I thought she saw nothing. Then the eyes closed and she doubled suddenly, onto one side, legs drawn up nearly to her chin. Her head wrenched back, body tight in spasm, and then she suddenly relaxed.