Outlander - Diana Gabaldon [31]
“I can dress the wound, yes,” I said with considerable asperity. “Provided you’ve anything to dress it with. But just what do you mean ‘wetnurse’? And why do you suppose I’d want to help you, anyway?”
I was ignored as Dougal turned and spoke in a tongue I dimly recognized as Gaelic to a woman who cowered in the corner. Surrounded by the mass of men, I had not noticed her before. She was dressed oddly, I thought, in a long, ragged skirt and a long-sleeved blouse half-covered by a sort of bodice or jerkin. Everything was rather on the grubby side, including her face. Glancing around, though, I could see that the cottage lacked not only electrification but also indoor plumbing; perhaps there was some excuse for the dirt.
The woman bobbed a quick curtsy, and scuttling past Rupert and Murtagh, she began digging in a painted wooden chest by the hearth, emerging finally with a pile of ratty cloths.
“No, that won’t do,” I said, fingering them gingerly. “The wound needs to be disinfected first, then bandaged with a clean cloth, if there are no sterile bandages.”
Eyebrows rose all around. “Disinfected?” said the small man, carefully.
“Yes, indeed,” I said firmly, thinking him a bit simpleminded, in spite of his educated accent. “All dirt must be removed from the wound and it must be treated with a compound to discourage germs and promote healing.”
“Such as?”
“Such as iodine,” I said. Seeing no comprehension on the faces before me, I tried again. “Merthiolate? Dilute carbolic?” I suggested. “Or perhaps even just alcohol?” Looks of relief. At last I had found a word they appeared to recognize. Murtagh thrust the leather flask into my hands. I sighed with impatience. I knew the Highlands were primitive, but this was nearly unbelievable.
“Look,” I said, as patiently as I could. “Why don’t you just take him down into the town? It can’t be far, and I’m sure there’s a doctor there who could see to him.”
The woman gawped at me. “What town?”
The big man called Dougal was ignoring this discussion, peering cautiously into the darkness around the curtain’s edge. He let it fall back into place and stepped quietly to the door. The men fell quiet as he vanished into the night.
In a moment he was back, bringing the bald man and the cold sharp scent of dark pines with him. He shook his head in answer to the men’s questioning looks.
“Nay, nothing close. We’ll go at once, while it’s safe.”
Catching sight of me, he stopped for a moment, thinking. Suddenly he nodded at me, decision made.
“She’ll come with us,” he said. He rummaged in the pile of cloths on the table and came up with a tattered rag; it looked like a neckcloth that had seen better days.
The mustached man seemed disinclined to have me along, wherever they were going.
“Why do ye no just leave her here?”
Dougal cast him an impatient glance, but left it to Murtagh to explain. “Wherever the redcoats are now, they’ll be here by dawn, which is no so far off, considering. If this woman’s an English spy, we canna risk leaving her here to tell them which way we’ve gone. And if she should not be on good terms wi’ them”—he looked dubiously at me—“we certainly canna leave a lone woman here in her shift.” He brightened a bit, fingering the fabric of my skirt. “She might be worth a bit in the way of ransom, at that; little as she has on, it’s fine stuff.”
“Besides,” Dougal added, interrupting, “she may be useful on the way; she seems to know a bit about doctoring. But we’ve no time for that now. I’m afraid ye’ll have to go without bein’ ‘disinfected,’ Jamie,” he said, clapping the younger man on the back. “Can ye ride one-handed?”
“Aye.”
“Good lad. Here,” he said, tossing the greasy rag at me. “Bind up his wound, quickly. We’ll be leaving directly. Do you two get the horses,” he said, turning to weasel-face and the fat one called Rupert.
I turned the rag around distastefully.
“I can’t use this,” I complained. “It’s filthy.”
Without seeing him move, I found the big man gripping