“Hold fire,” Ryan called. “They’ve broken. Use the oars and get the raft out into the current. On the far side. Then all take cover in case they start trying to snipe at us.”
“You hit, lover?”
“Ball in the leg. See to Jak. Think he got shot in the guts. More serious.”
While Doc worked the steering oar, J.B. took over Ryan’s Steyr rifle and kept watch for any resumption of hostilities. But the villagers had taken at least a dozen fatalities and had lost all heart for the fight.
Krysty and Mildred dragged Ryan and Jak behind the cover of the cabin while the doctor checked their wounds.
She first examined Jak, who was still folded up, hands clasped over his midriff, moaning to himself.
“Move yourself, Jak, so I can see what the damage is.”
Ryan had reloaded his SIG-Sauer, holstering it and sitting up to peer at his own wound. There was a ragged tear in his pant leg, halfway between the knee and hip. He touched himself gingerly on both sides of the thigh, whistling with relief as he felt both an entrance and an exit wound.
“Think I’m lucky,” he said. “Think the ball went clean through near the outside. Doesn’t feel like it hit anything too serious on the way. How’s the kid?”
“Don’t call me that, Ryan,” Jak said through gritted teeth. “I’m all right. Sore.”
“But I saw you go down, gut shot.”
“Look,” Mildred said, her voice high with relief. “Look at his belt.”
Ryan rolled on his side and looked across the cramped little cabin, seeing that Jak’s broad leather belt had a massive brass buckle. And there was the soft lead musket ball, splashed in a bright blur across the brass.
“Lucky,” Ryan said.
“Feel like kicked by mule,” the teenager complained. “Bastards!”
“We did take their food and their raft,” Mildred stated gently.
“Still bastards. How’re you, Ryan?”
Mildred left Jak and knelt by Ryan on the rocking, shifting logs.
After a few moments she agreed with his own diagnosis. “Need to look properly when we can get a chance. But I think you’re right. Seems to have gone clear through and not even nipped the muscle. Pure flesh wound. I’ll wash it out, then tie it up for you to ease the bleeding.”
Outside there was the hollow sound of a smoothbore musket being fired, and a ball struck the outside of the cabin. But it sounded partly spent, with little menace. It was followed almost immediately by the full-throated crack of the powerful Steyr SSG-70, and a whoop of elation from the Armorer.
“Got that son of a bitch!” he whooped. “Don’t think they’ll bother us no more.”
“Anymore,” Krysty said from habit, though J.B. couldn’t hear her.
“How is young Jak?” Doc called. “And what of our beloved leader?”
“Jak’s got a nasty bruise around about his navel,” Mildred shouted. “Lucky pup, I tell you.”
“And Ryan?”
“I’ll be fine in a while,” Ryan yelled himself. “Got a musket ball went in and out. Have it bandaged and be lighter than rain. How’re we doing out there?”
“Making about eight or ten miles an hour,” J.B. replied. “Think we’re already clear from any more danger from the double-poor villagers.”
Mildred had told Ryan to tug down his pants, and she examined the bleeding wound. “I think we should pull into the bank for a few minutes when it’s safe,” she said. “Like to do my medical work on dry land.”
Jak was already on his feet, peering out of the cabin, wincing as he touched the deep purple bruise that had sprung up on his snow white stomach. “I’ll help with oars. Steer us in.”
“Me, too,” Krysty said, stooping to kiss Ryan on the cheek. “Glad it’s not too bad, lover. When you went down I thought Well, I just thought. That’s all.”
Ryan lay back, feeling slightly sick, the pain beginning to swell in his leg, which throbbed with the pulse.
THEY HAD MOORED THE RAFT among a grove of tamarinds that grew close to the banks of the Tennessee River. J.B. went a little way upstream, and Jak picked his cautious path downstream to keep watch while Mildred operated on her patient.