A Breath of Snow and Ashes - Diana Gabaldon [51]
“Elizabeth? Elizabeth, where are you?” Mr. Wemyss was right behind me, calling, as I strode down the hall to the kitchen.
Lizzie was lying in a dead faint on the hearth, a limp bundle of clothes, one frail hand flung out as though she had tried to save herself as she fell.
“Miss Wemyss!” Bobby Higgins shouldered his way past me, looking frantic, and scooped her up into his arms.
“Elizabeth!” Mr. Wemyss elbowed his way past me as well, his face nearly as white as his daughter’s.
“Do let me look at her, will you?” I said, elbowing firmly back. “Put her down on the settle, Bobby, do.”
He rose carefully with her in his arms, then sat down on the settle, still holding her, wincing slightly as he did so. Well, if he wanted to be a hero, I hadn’t time to argue with him. I knelt and seized her wrist in search of a pulse, smoothing the pale hair off her face with my other hand.
One look had been enough to tell me what was likely the matter. She was clammy to the touch, and the pallor of her face was tinged with gray. I could feel the tremor of oncoming chills that ran through her flesh, unconscious as she was.
“The ague’s back, is it?” Jamie asked. He’d appeared by my side, and was gripping Mr. Wemyss by the shoulder, at once comforting and restraining.
“Yes,” I said briefly. Lizzie had malaria, contracted on the coast a few years before, and was subject to occasional relapses—though she hadn’t had one in more than a year.
Mr. Wemyss took a deep, audible breath, a little color coming back to his face. He was familiar with malaria, and had confidence that I could deal with it. I had, several times before.
I hoped that I could this time. Lizzie’s pulse was fast and light under my fingers, but regular, and she was beginning to stir. Still, the speed and suddenness with which the attack had come on was frightening. Had she had any warning? I hoped the concern I felt didn’t show on my face.
“Take her up to her bed, cover her, get a hot stone for her feet,” I said, rising and addressing Bobby and Mr. Wemyss briskly in turn. “I’ll start some medicine brewing.”
Jamie followed me down to the surgery, glancing back over his shoulder to be sure that the others were out of earshot before speaking.
“I thought ye were out of the Jesuit bark?” he asked, low-voiced.
“I am. Damn it.” Malaria was a chronic disease, but for the most part, I had been able to keep it under control with small, regular doses of cinchona bark. But I had run out of cinchona during the winter, and no one had yet been able to travel down to the coast for more.
“So, then?”
“I’m thinking.”
I pulled open the door of the cupboard, and gazed at the neat ranks of glass bottles therein—many of them empty, or with no more than a few scattered crumbs of leaf or root inside. Everything was depleted, after a cold, wet winter of grippe, influenza, chilblains, and hunting accidents.
Febrifuges. I had a number of things that would help a normal fever; malaria was something else. There was plenty of dogwood root and bark, at least; I had collected immense quantities during the fall, foreseeing the need. I took that down, and after a moment’s thought, added the jar containing a sort of gentian known locally as “agueweed.”
“Put on the kettle, will you?” I asked Jamie, frowning to myself as I crumbled roots, bark, and weed into my mortar. All I could do was to treat the superficial symptoms of fever and chill. And shock, I thought, better treat for that, too.
“And bring me a little honey, too, please!” I called after him, as he had already reached the door. He nodded and went hurriedly toward the kitchen, his footsteps quick and solid on the oak floorboards.
I began to pound the mixture, still turning over additional possibilities. Some small part of my mind was half-glad of the emergency; I could put off for a little