Page 29 of Beneath the Harvest Moon

Gabriel removed his leather tool wallet and small pewter bowl, with a semi-circle cut into the wide rim, from his bag.

Blythe poured steaming liquid from the kettle into the porcelain bowl.

After he washed and dried his hands, he asked, “Are you still able to withstand the sight of blood?”

She nodded while washing her hands.

He withdrew the sharpest scalpel, then lifted his patient’s arm and set the bowl beneath the elbow joint. After tapping the clammy skin to find the vein, he made an incision. Red liquid dribbled into the pewter dish. “I will only take a few ounces, and we shall see if he improves.”

After a couple of minutes, Gabriel placed a wadded piece of clean linen against the wound before bending the patient’s arm back.

Blythe removed the bowl of blood.

He pressed firmly on the wound to help the blood coagulate and seal the incision.

“Is there anything else we can do?”

Gabriel shook his head. “I can let more blood if the fever does not abate.”

“What have I done wrong?” Blythe’s voice trembled.

“Nothing, Blythe, you have done everything you could.” Admiration swelled in his chest. Despite her time in York, she remained an intuitive and adept nurse.

James’s uneven, wheezing breaths continued.

Blythe rested a palm against the boy’s forehead. “He’s on fire and his skin is clammy.” She emptied the washbasin into the slop bucket before refilling it with cold water. “If only we had an icehouse in the village.” She poured several ounces of vinegar into the water, then returned to the bedside with a saturated cloth.

She ran the cloth across the boy’s forehead, the palms of his hands and the soles of his feet.

He checked the wound, but blood oozed from the cut. Using a strip of cloth on the table, he bound the linen in place around the boy’s elbow and sat in the spindle-legged chair before the brazier while Blythe finished bathing their patient.

Grey smudges marred the skin beneath her eyes, and fine lines bracketed her mouth. “How long has it been since you slept?”

“I don’t… do not know.”

He resisted the urge to rub those fine lines away but could not ignore the increasing desire to take care of her. “Rest, and I will tend to him for the next few hours.”

“I cannot sleep while he is suffering.”

“You are of no use to him if you are exhausted.”

“I will sit for a while until he requires bathing again.” She plopped down on the small cot on the other side of the room.

Blythe resisted the urge to flop onto the mattress. Everything ached from her head to her toes. Even her bones throbbed with weariness, not to mention the leaden weight in her chest.

At least Gabriel was here. Now she need not worry about making a mistake that would endanger the boy’s life. “Do you think he will survive if he has to fight both lung fever and smallpox?”

“I cannot say. He is young and healthy, so he stands a good chance.”

Her eyelids drooped, but she blinked away the heaviness. “Are you certain there is nothing else we can do?”

Gabriel nodded. “Lie down and rest before you topple over.”

She lowered onto the straw-filled mattress tick covered with a thin sheet.

Gabriel rose. “Allow me to remove your clogs.”

The skin beneath her stockings tingled at the heat from his hand around her ankle when he set her feet on the bed.