The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [437]
Maybe not; maybe it was only the sound of the body’s residual air escaping with the movement—but it wasn’t; I could see Jamie’s face, holding him, and I knew it wasn’t.
I darted forward, reaching upward as Roger’s body fell, to catch and cradle the head in my hands, to steady him as Jamie lowered him to the ground. He was cold, but firm. Of course, if he were alive, he must be, but I had prepared myself for the flaccid-meat touch of dead flesh, and the shock of feeling life under my hands was considerable.
“A board,” I said, breathless as though someone had just punched me in the stomach. “A plank, a door, something to put him on. We mustn’t move his head; his neck may be broken.”
Jamie swallowed once, hard, then jerked his head in an awkward nod, and set off, walking stiffly at first, then faster and faster, past the knots of sorrowing kin and eager gawkers, whose curious gaze was turning now in our direction.
Brianna had the dirk still in her hand. As people began to come toward us, she moved past me, and I caught a glimpse of her face. It was still white, still set—but the eyes burned now with a black light that would sear any soul so reckless as to come too near.
I had no attention to spare for interference—or anything else. He wasn’t breathing visibly; no obvious movement of the chest, no twitch of lips or nostrils. I felt vainly for a pulse in his free wrist—pointless to poke at the mass of swollen tissue in his neck—finally found an abdominal pulse, beating faintly just below the breastbone.
The noose was sunk deep in his flesh; I groped frantically in my pocket for my penknife. It was a new rope, raw hemp. The fibers were hairy, stained brown with dried blood. I registered the fact faintly, in the remote part of my mind that had time for such things while my hands were busy. New ropes stretch. A real hangsman has his own ropes, already stretched and oiled, well-tested for ease of use. The raw hemp jabbed my fingers, stabbed painfully under my nails as I clawed and pried and ripped at it.
The last strand popped and I yanked it free, heedless of laceration—that hardly mattered. I daren’t risk tilting his head back; if the cervical vertebrae were fractured, I could cripple or kill him. And if he couldn’t breathe, that wouldn’t matter, either.
I gripped his jaw, tried to sweep my fingers through his mouth, to clear mucus and obstructions. No good, his tongue was swollen, not sticking out, but in the way. Air takes less room than fingers do, though. I pinched his nose tight, breathed two or three times, as deeply as I could, then sealed my mouth on his and blew.
Had I seen his face as he hung, I would have realized at once that he wasn’t dead; his features had gone slack with loss of consciousness and his lips and eyelids were blue—but his face wasn’t black with congested blood, and his eyes were closed, not bulging. He’d lost his bowels, but his spinal cord wasn’t snapped, and he hadn’t strangled—yet.
He was, however, in the process of doing so before my eyes. His chest wasn’t moving. I took another breath, and blew, free hand on his breast. Nothing. Blow. No movement. Blow. Something. Not enough. Blow. Air leaking all around the edges of my mouth. Blow. Like blowing up a rock, not a balloon. Blow again.
Confused voices over my head, Brianna shouting, then Jamie at my elbow.
“Here’s the board,” he said calmly. “What must we do?”
I gasped for breath, and wiped my mouth.
“Take his hips, Bree his shoulders. Move when I tell you, not before.”
We shifted him quickly, my hands holding his head like the Holy Grail. There were people all around us now, but I had no time to look or listen; I had eyes only for what must be done.
I ripped off my petticoat, rolled it and used it to brace his neck; I hadn