The Crossing tbt-2

by Cormac McCarthy

  Hay una mesa chica en la casa? O una silla?

  Hay una silla.

  Bueno. Traigala. Y traigame una contenidor de aqua. Una bota o cualquiera cosa que tenga.

  Si senor.

  Y traiga un vaso de aqua potable.

  Yessir.

  El debe tomar agua. Me entiendes?

  Yessir.

  Y deja abierta la puerta. Necesitamos afire.

  Yessir. I will.

  He came back carrying the chair upside down over his arm by the rung and he had a clay olla of water in one hand and a cup of wellwater in the other. The doctor had risen and he had donned a white apron and he was holding a towel and a bar of darklooking soap. Bueno, he said. He folded the soap in the towel and stuck it beneath his arm and took the chair from Billy carefully and righted it and set it in the floor and turned it slightly in the place he wished for it to go. He took the olla from Billy and set it on the chair and he bent and sorted through his bag and came up with a bent glass straw and stood it in the cup Billy was holding. He said for him to give his brother the water to drink. He said for him to see that he drank. slowly.

  Yessir, Billy said.

  Bueno, said the doctor. He took the towel from under his arm and rolled his sleeves up each another turn. He looked down at Billy.

  No to preocupes, he said.

  Yessir, said Billy. I'll try.

  The doctor nodded and turned and left to go wash his hands. Billy sat on the pallet and leaned forward and held the cup and the straw for Boyd to drink. I can pull these covers up, he said. Are you cold? You aint cold are you?

  I aint cold.

  Here you go.

  Boyd drank.

  Dont drink too fast, Billy said. He tilted the cup. You looked like one of these dirtfarmers in that rig.

  Boyd drank deeply through the straw and then turned away coughing.

  Dont drink so fast.

  He lay getting his breath. He drank again. Billy took the cup away and waited and then offered it again. The glass pipe rattled and sucked. He tilted the cup. When Boyd had drunk all the water he lay getting his breath and he looked up at Billy. There's worse things to look like, he said.

  Billy set the cup on the chair. I didnt take much care of you did I? he said.

  Boyd didnt answer.

  The doctor says you're goin to be all right.

  Boyd lay breathing shallowly, his head back. He stared at the dark vigas of the ceiling overhead.

  He says you're goin to be good as new.

  I didnt hear him say it, Boyd said.

  When the doctor came back Billy picked up the cup and rose and stood holding it. The doctor was drying his hands. El tenia sed, verdad?

  Yessir, Billy said.

  The woman came through the door carrying a pail of steaming water. Billy went to her and took the bucket by the bail and the doctor gestured for him to place it on the hearth. He folded the towel and laid it by his bag and laid the soap on top of it and sat. Bueno, he said. Bueno. He turned to Billy. Ayudame, he said.

  Together they turned Boyd on his side. Boyd gasped and clutched about in the air with one hand. He seized Billy's shoulder.

  Easy pardner, Billy said. I know it hurts.

  No you dont, wheezed Boyd.

  Esta bien, said the doctor. Esta bien asi.

  He gently pulled away the stained and blackened sheeting from Boyd's chest and lifted it free and handed it up to the woman. He left the black and weedy poultices in place, the one on his chest and the larger one behind his shoulder. He leaned over the boy and pressed the poultices gently each in turn to see if anything should run from beneath them and he tested the air tentatively with his nose for any hint of rot. Bueno, he said. Bueno. He touched gently the area under Boyd's arm between the poultices where the skin was blue and swollenlooking.

  La entrada es en el pecho, no?

  Si, said Billy.

  He nodded and took up the towel and soap and dipped the towel in the olla of water and soaped it and set about cleaning Boyd's back and chest, washing carefully around the poultices and under his arm. He rinsed the towel in the olla and squeezed it out and bent and wiped away the soap. The towel where he turned it was dark with grime. No estas demasiado frio? he said. Estas comodo? Bueno. Bueno.

  When he was done he laid the towel by and set the olla inthe floor and leaned and took from his bag a folded towel which he laid on the chair and opened carefully with just his fingertips. Inside was a second towel cured in the autoclave and done up in a bundle fastened with tape. He gently pried loose and lifted away the tape and holding the edges delicately between thumb and finger he spread the towel open upon the chair seat. Inside were gauze squares and squares of muslin and cottonballs. Small folded towels. Rolls of cloth bandage. He lifted his hands away without touching anything and he took two small enameled pans nested together from his bag and one he laid near the bag and the other he leaned and dipped partly full of hot water from the bucket and then conveyed it carefully in both hands to the chair and set it at the edge of the chair away from the bandages. He selected from their fitted compartments in his case his tools of nickel steel. Sharpnosed scissors and forceps and hemostats some dozen in number. Boyd watched. Billy watched. He dropped the instruments into the pan and he took from the bag a small red bulb syringe and placed that in the pan and he took out a small tin of bismuth and he took out two small sticks of silver nitrate and unwrapped them from out of their foil coverings and laid them on the towel beside the pan. Then he took out a bottle of iodine and loosed the cap and passed the bottle up to the woman and he held his hands over the pan and instructed her to pour the iodine over his hands. She stepped forward and took the cap from the bottle.

  Andale, he said.

  She poured.

  Mas, he said. Un poquito mas.

  Because the outer door was open the flame in the glass fluttered and twisted and the little light that it afforded waxed and waned and threatened to expire entirely. The three of them bent over the poor pallet where the boy lay looked like ritual assassins. Bastante, the doctor said. Bueno. He held up his dripping hands. They were dyed a rusty brown. The iodine moved in the pan like marbling blood. He nodded to the woman. Ponga el resto en el agua, he said.

  She poured the remainder of the iodine into the pan and the doctor tested the water with one finger and then quickly fished a hemostat from the pan and with the hemostat he took up a packet of the muslin squares and dipped them and held them up to drain. He turned to the woman again. Bueno, he said. Quita la cataplasma.

  She put one hand to her mouth. She looked at Boyd and she looked at the doctor.

  Andale pues, he said. Esta bien.

  She blessed herself and bent and reached and took hold of the rag that bound the poultice and lifted it and slid her thumb beneath the poultice and pulled it away. It was of matted weeds and dark with blood and it came away unwillingly. Like something that had been feeding there. She stepped back and folded it from sight in the dirty sheeting. Boyd lay in the flickering light of the votive candle with a small round hole a few inches above and to the left of his left nipple. The wound was dry and crusted and palelooking. The doctor bent and swabbed it carefully with the cotton. The iodine stained Boyd's skin. Blood welled slowly in the hole and a thin line of it ran across Boyd's chest. The doctor laid a clean gauze square over the wound. They watched it slowly darken with blood. The doctor looked up at the woman.

  La otra? she said.

  Si. Por favor.

  She leaned and freed the poultice from Boyd's back with her thumb and lifted it away. Larger, blacker, uglier. Beneath it was a ragged hole that yawned redly. About it the flesh was crusted with scale and blackened blood. The doctor placed a sheaf of the gauze squares over the wound and placed a square of muslin over them and pressed upon it with the tips of his fingers and held it there. Slowly the cloth darkened. The doctor placed more patches. A thin trickle of blood ran down Boyd's back. The doctor swabbed it up and pressed again with the tips of his f
ingers against the wound.

  When the bleeding had stopped he took a cloth and dipped it in the iodine solution in the pan and while he held the packing against the wound in the boy's back he set to cleaning closely about both wounds. He dropped the soiled swabs in the dry tray beside him and when he was done he pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose with the back of his wrist and looked at Billy.

  Take his hand, he said.

  Mande?

  Take his hand.

  No se si me va permitir.

  El to permite.

  He sat on the edge of the pallet and took hold of Boyd's hand and Boyd clasped it in his grip.

  Do your damndest, Boyd whispered.

  Que dice?

  Nada, said Billy. Andale.

  The doctor took a sterile cloth and wrapped it around the little flashlight and turned the flashlight on and picked it up and put it in his mouth. Then he dropped the cloth into the pan with the swabs and leaned and took a hemostat from the pan and bent over Boyd and gently lifted away the pads from the exit wound and trained his light upon it. The blood was already beginning to well anew and he placed the hemostat in the wound and snapped it shut.

  Boyd bowed and threw his head back but he did not cry out. The doctor took another hemostat from the pan and he dabbed up the blood with a cloth patch and studied the wound with the light and then clamped again. The tendons in Boyd's neck shone taut in the lamplight. The doctor gripped the flashlight in his teeth. Unos pocos minutos mas, he said. Unos pocos minutos.

  He placed two more hemostats and then he took the red bulb syringe from the pan and filled it with the solution and he instructed the woman to take the towel and hold it against the boy's back. Then he slowly flooded the wound. He cleaned the wound with a swab and flooded it again washing out clots of blood and bits of matter. He reached into the pan with his hand and brought up a hemostat and clamped it in place.

  Pobrecito, said the woman.

  Unos pocos minutos mas, said the doctor.

  He flooded the wound out once again with the syringe and he took up one of the sticks of silver nitrate and with a muslin swab held in a hemostat in one hand he cleaned away clots and debris while with the other he cauterized with the silver nitrate. The silver nitrate left pale gray tracks in the tissue. He clamped one more hemostat and again flooded the wound. The woman doubled the towel against Boyd's back and held it. With the forceps the doctor picked out something small from the wound and held it to the light. It was about the size of a grain of wheat and he held it and turned it in the small cone of light.

  Que es eso? Billy said.

  The doctor leaned with the flashlight in his teeth so that the boy could see better. Plomo, he said. But it was a small chip flaked off from Boyd's sixth rib and he was referring to the faint metal coloring along the conchoidal edge of the bone. He laid it on the towel together with the forceps and with his forefinger he felt along Boyd's ribs from front to back. He watched Boyd's face while he did so. Te duele? he said. Alla? Alla? Boyd lay with his face turned away. He sounded as if he could hardly breathe.

  The doctor took a pair of small sharpnosed scissors from the pan and glanced at Billy and then began to snip away the dead tissue along the edges of the wound. Billy reached and took Boyd's hand in both of his.

  Le interesa el perro, the doctor said.

  Billy looked toward the door. The dog sat watching them. Git, he said.

  Esta bien, the doctor said. No to molesta. Es de su hermano, no?

  Si.

  The doctor nodded.

  When he was done he instructed the woman to hold the towel beneath the wound in the boy's chest and then he flooded and cleaned it also. He flooded it again and he probed it with a swab. Finally he sat back and took the flashlight from his mouth and laid it on the towel and looked at Billy.

  Es un muchacho muy valiente, he said.

  Es grave? said Billy.

  Es grave, the doctor said. Pero no es muy grave.

  Que seria muy grave?

  The doctor adjusted his spectacles, pushing them back again with his wrist. It had grown cold in the room. You could see very faintly the doctor's breath plume and lapse in the lapsing light. A light bead of sweat lay across his forehead. He made the sign of the cross in the air before him. Eso, he said. Eso es muy grave.

  He reached and took up the flashlight again, holding it in one of the muslin squares. He put it in his teeth and took up the bulb and refilled it and laid it by and then slowly unclamped the first of the hemostats that lay in a circle of hardware about the wound in Boyd's back. He drew it away very slowly. Then he unclamped the next.

  He took up the bulb and gently washed the wound and swabbed it and took up the silver nitrate stick and gently touched it in the wound. He worked from the top of the wound downward. When he had removed the last hemostat and dropped it into the pan he sat for a moment with both hands over Boyd's back as if exhorting him to heal. Then he took up the tin of bismuth and unscrewed the lid and held it over the wounds and shook the white powder over them.

  He laid gauze squares on the wounds and over the wound in the boy's back he placed a small clean towel from among his sterile dressings and he taped them down and then he and Billy eased Boyd up and the doctor quickly wrapped him about with a roll of cloth bandaging, passing the roll under his arms, until he reached the end of it. He fastened the end with two small steel clamps and they pulled Boyd's jumper back over him and eased him down again. His head lolled and he sucked a long rasping breath.

  Fue muy afortunado, the doctor said.

  Como?

  Que no se le han punzando los pulmones. Que no se le ha quebrado la gran arteria cual era muy cerca de la direccion de la bala. Pero sobre todo que no hay ni gran infeccion. Muy afortunado.

  He wrapped his instruments in the towel and placed them in his bag and he emptied the basins into the bucket and swabbed them out and put them away and closed the bag. He rinsed and dried his hands and stood and took his cufflinks from his pocket and rolled down his sleeves and fastened them. He told the woman that he would return the following day and change the dressings and that he would leave the supplies with her and show her how he wished it to be done. He said that the boy must drink plenty of water. That they must keep him warm. Then he handed Billy his bag and turned and the woman helped him on with his coat and he took his hat and thanked her for her help and ducked out through the low door.

  Billy followed him out with the bag and intercepted the doctor coming around to the front of the car with the crank. He handed him the bag and took the crank from him. Permitame, he said.

  He bent in the dark and found the slot in the radiator grill with his fingers and fitted the crank and pushed it into the socket. Then he stood and swung the crank. The motor started and the doctor nodded. Bueno, he said. He stepped back along the fender and idled down the throttle and turned and took the crankhandle from BillyaEU' and bent and stowed it under the seat.

  Gracias, he said.

  A usted.

  The doctor nodded. He looked toward the doorway where the woman stood and he looked again at Billy. He took a cigarette from his pocket and put it in his month.

  Se queda con su hermano, he said.

  Si. Acepte el caballo, Por favor.

  The doctor said that he would not. He said that he would send his mozo with the horse in the morning. He looked at the sky to the east where the first gray light was shaping out the roofline of the hacienda from the accommodate darkness. Ya es de manana, he said. Viene la madrugada.

  Yes, said Billy.

  Stay with your brother. I will send the horse.

  Then he climbed into the car and pulled shut the door and switched on the lights. There was nothing to see yet the ejiditarios had come to their doorways all down the wall of dwellings, men and women pale in the lights, pale in their clothes of unbleached cotton, children clutching at their knees and all of them watching while the car trundled slowly past and swung around in the compound and went out a
nd down the road with the dogs running alongside howling and leaning to nip at the softly rumpling tires where they turned on the clay.

  WHEN BOYD AWOKE late in the morning Billy was sitting there and when he woke midday and when he woke again in the evening he was there. He sat nodding and tottering on into the twilight and he was surprised to hear his name called.

  Billy?

  He opened his eyes. He leaned forward.

  I dont have no water.

  Let me get it. Where's the glass?

  Right here. Billy?

  What?

  You got to go to Namiquipa.

  I aint goin nowheres.

  She'll think we just ditched her.

  I caint leave you.

  I'll be all right.

  I caint go off down there and leave you.

  Yeah you can.

  You need somebody to look after you.

  Listen, Boyd said. I've done got over all that. Go on like I asked you. You was worried about the horse anyways.

  The mozo arrived at noon the day following riding a burro and leading Nino on a rope halter. The workers were in the fields and he rode across the bridge and up past the row of their habitations calling out as he went for senor Paramo. Billy went out and the mozo halted the burro and nodded to him. Su caballo, he said.

  He looked at the horse. The horse had been fed and curried and watered and rested and looked another horse altogether and he told the mozo so. The mozo nodded easily and undallied the end of the halter rope from the horn of his saddle and slid from the burro.