He left and Amber, shrugging and deciding that since she could not get rid of Spong she would find some use for her, went into the kitchen. The soup was ready now, a rich heavy pottage with the fat swimming in hot oily circles on top of it, and she ladled out a bowlful to eat herself. It made her feel better. Her headache disappeared and she felt almost optimistic again. She was sure once more that she could keep him alive by sheer force of will-power.
I love him so much, she thought, he
When she was ready to go to bed she decided to try bribing Spong. “If you’ll stay awake till three and then call me I’ll give you a bottle of brandy.” If the old woman would watch and let her sleep at night she was willing to have her drunk all day.
The arrangement satisfied Spong who vowed again that she would not so much as close an eye. Once Amber woke suddenly and sat bolt upright, glaring accusingly at her—it was light in the room for the fire was kept burning all night. But the nurse was sitting there beside him, arms folded on her belly, and she grinned across at Amber.
“Fooled ye, mam, eh?”
Amber flopped back down and instantly fell asleep again. She was wakened by a gurgling scream that brought her to her feet at a leap, her heart pounding sickeningly. Bruce, kneeling on the edge of the bed, had grabbed Spong by the throat and she was lashing and flailing about, helpless as a flounder. With his face contorted, teeth bared savagely, shoulders hunched, he was forcing all the strength of his arms into his fingers and they were crushing out the old woman’s life.
Quickly throwing herself onto the bed behind him Amber grabbed his arms and tried to drag him backwards. Cursing, he dropped the nurse, and turned on Amber, his fingers closing around her throat—squeezing the blood into her face and temples until the top of her head felt ready to burst. Her ears cracked and she went blind. Desperately she put up her hands and finding his eyeballs she gouged her thumbs into them. His grip weakened slowly, and then all at once he collapsed onto the bed, sprawling weirdly.
Amber slowly sank to the floor, helpless and stupidly dazed. It was several seconds before she realized what Spong was trying to tell her.
“—it’s broke, mam! It’s broke—that was what drove ’im mad!”
She dragged herself to her feet then and saw that the great swollen mass of the carbuncle had burst, as though the top had been blown off a crater. There was a hole deep enough and large enough to thrust a finger into, and the blood poured out in a dark scarlet stream that ran into a spreading pool on the bed and clotted thickly. A watery gland-fluid came with it, and yellow pus was beginning to work its way upward.
Amber sent Spong to the kitchen for some warm water and began immediately to wash off the blood, wiping it away as it ran out. The bloody rags accumulated in a heap and the nurse was kept busy tearing bandages from some clean sheets. But it would have done no good to bind them on; they would have soaked through in less than a minute. Amber had never seen a man lose so much blood, and it scared her.
“He’s going to bleed to death!” she said desperately, throwing another red sopping rag into the pail beside her. His face was no longer flushed but had turned white beneath the short growth of black bristle and it felt cold and wet to the touch.
“He’s a big man, mam—he can lose a lot of blood. But ye can thank God it broke. He’s got a chance to live now.”
At last the blood stopped flowing, though it continued to seep slowly, and she bound up the wound and turned to wash her hands in a basin of clean warm water. Spong approached her with an ingratiating whine.
“It’s half-after-three now, mam. Can’t I go to sleep?”
“Yes, go on. And thanks.”
“It’s almost mornin’, mam. Could I have the brandy now, d’ye think?”
Amber went out to the kitchen to get it for her; and though for a while she heard her behind the closed door, droning a song, finally she fell silent and then set up a clattering snore that went on hour after hour. Amber was kept busy changing the bandages and refilling the hot-water bottles. Along toward morning to her enormous relief the colour began to return to his face, his breathing became more regular, and his skin was dry again.
By the eighth day she was convinced that he would live, and Mrs. Spong agreed with her, though she said frankly that she had expected him to die. But the plague took them quickly, if at all. Those who lived until the third day could be reasonably hopeful, and whoever lived a week was almost certain to recover. But the period of convalescence was long and tedious and characterized by a deep physical and mental depression, an almost complete prostration, during which any sudden or undue exertion could have rapidly fatal results.
