Pay the Devil - Jack Higgins [36]
Clay found himself in a large, stone-flagged kitchen with rough plastered walls and ceiling and a wide fireplace. Marteen and Cathal faced each other across the table, a chessboard between them, and their father sprawled in a wing-backed chair by the fire with a deerhound at his feet.
His right trouser leg had been split open to the waist and the bandage twisted about his thigh was saturated with blood, but the blue eyes were calm in the great bearded face.
He smiled and extended a hand. “It might be your grandfather standing there before me, God rest him.” He shook his great head and laughter echoed around the room. “The tales I could be telling you.”
Clay warmed to the man instantly, with that instinctive liking that must come at once or not at all. As he took off his coat, he smiled. “My grandfather seems to have cut quite a swathe through these parts as a young man.”
Shaun Rogan poured himself another whiskey. “And that’s an understatement if ever I heard one.” He chuckled. “I can’t get over how like him ye are. And just as quick off the mark. The way you stamped that gun out of Burke’s hand was something to see.”
“A pity you couldn’t have kicked the bastard in the face while ye were about it,” Kevin added in a hard voice.
“I considered it more important to make sure his bullet didn’t go where he wanted it to.” Clay took a pair of surgical scissors from his bag and cut away the bandage from Shaun Rogan’s thigh.
The wound was seven or eight inches long, with raw, angry edges. He sponged the blood away with a piece of cloth and examined it closely. After a while, he nodded in satisfaction. “It’s a clean slash. With luck, you’ll be riding again in a fortnight.”
Shaun Rogan cursed fluently and Kevin grinned. “A week or two by the fireside will do you no harm. The boys and I can manage things.”
Clay asked Mrs. Rogan for some strips of linen and a basin and then he raised her husband’s leg on a stool, instructing Kevin to hold it firmly in position. Next, he reached for the whiskey bottle and poured some into the open wound. Big Shaun stifled a curse and gripped the arms of his chair until the knuckles turned white, as the liquor burned into his raw flesh. “And what the hell is that supposed to do?” he demanded.
Clay threaded a curved needle with silk. “Bullet wounds stay clean, knife wounds tend to go bad, don’t ask me why. There’s a man called Lister who thinks he knows the reason, but we won’t go into that now. Whiskey or any raw spirit helps to keep a wound clean. We proved that in the war.”
He started to stitch the wound and Big Shaun kept on talking, voice steady and controlled despite the great drops of cold sweat which had appeared on his forehead at the first touch of the needle. “You were with the Confederates, weren’t you, Colonel? Trust an Irishman to choose the losing side.”
“The Yankees had an Irish Brigade,” Clay said. “At Gettysburg, their chaplain, Father Corby, gave them absolution before battle and denied Christian burial to any man who refused to fight.”
“God save us all, but he must have been the hard one,” Cathal said.
Big Shaun grunted as the needle pushed through his flesh again. “Your father, how did he die? I knew from your uncle that he hadn’t joined the army like yourself.”
“He bought two ships and made a fortune running the blockade from Nassau to Atlanta,” Clay said calmly. “He was shot dead in a running fight with a Yankee frigate three months before the end of the war.”
Shaun Rogan solemnly crossed himself. “May he find peace.”
“He certainly never found it this side of the grave,” Clay said.
He skilfully knotted the final stitch, snipped the loose ends, and then bandaged the leg with clean linen. As he tied the knot, Shaun Rogan sighed. “By God, it feels better already. You know your business, Colonel.”
“I ought to, I’ve had enough practice,” Clay told him.
Marteen produced clean glasses and a fresh bottle of whiskey and Kevin Rogan filled a glass and pushed it across. “The laborer is worthy of his hire, Colonel, as the good book says.”
“Ah, yes, the question of payment,