Sec men moved in to pull Brody from the circle.
“You be careful with him,” Ryan said, turning to look for Mildred. He found her at the edge of the circle closest to the main building. “Fix him up,” he told her.
Mildred just nodded in Ryan’s direction, too busy directing the sec men carrying Foghat to answer him.
Knowing Brody would be in good hands, Ryan looked over at the mountain of a man named Mog. He knew he wouldn’t take him up on it, but Ryan thought he should give the man the chance. “If you step out of the circle now, Mog, you might live to see another day.”
Mog laughed, and the ground seemed to shake beneath him. “You’re good, One-eye, but not good enough. I’m going to enjoy chilling you.”
Ryan shook his head. “No, the pleasure’s gonna be all mine.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
“This way,” Mildred said, leading the way for the sec men carrying the badly bleeding Foghat.
The slave groaned in pain with each step the sec men took. His cries were growing weaker and weaker as the man’s lifeblood dribbled out of the huge rent in his arm.
Mildred opened the door to the nursery. “Put him on that table in the middle of the room!” Foghat needed her immediate attention. When Brody arrived, he could be given a painkiller from the generous medical stores and be made to wait until she’d finished with Foghat. “And when the other one is brought in here, put him on the table by the wall.”
The sec men carried Foghat across the room and eased him onto what was normally a delivery table. There were all sorts of medical instruments and supplies in the nursery, more than was generally necessary for the delivery of babies.
Mildred hoped it would be enough to save the man’s life.
She began by checking the man’s pulse. It was weak, but he still had one. She’d managed to staunch the flow of blood from his arm with a tight tourniquet, but didn’t want to cut off the arm’s blood supply for too long.
“Can I help you, dear?” the old woman who usually worked in the nursery said.
“Get his shirt off and clean up his arm,” Mildred ordered, rifling through the medicine cabinet, hoping to find a vial of morphine. Luckily there was some.
One of the sec chiefs lieutenants had followed the men carrying Foghat into the nursery and was now watching Mildred with a look of disbelief on his face. “What are you doing?” he asked.
“Trying to save this man’s life.”
“Why?”
“For old times’ sake.”
“What?”
Mildred paused for the briefest of moments. “Let’s just say I’m doing this because I can.”
“You’re wasting time, and using up medicine on a slave. Just amputate the arm and send him on his way.”
“No!” Mildred said forcefully.
“But he’s just a slave.”
Mildred paused again, looking at the problem as the sec man would. “How much good to the baron is a one-armed slave? What do one-armed slaves go for at auction these days?”
The sec man fell silent.
“You don’t tell me how to do my job, and I won’t tell you how to do yours. All right?”
The sec man took several steps backward.
“Come on, dear,” the old woman said, taking hold of the sec man’s sleeve and moving him away from Mildred. “We’ll be a while in here, and it won’t be pretty. We’ll let you know when we’re done.”
Reluctantly the sec man left the room, standing out in the hall on the other side of the open doorway.
Mildred got to work on the wounded slave.
Foghat was falling asleep from the morphine, but before he went unconscious, he managed to look up at her, smiled and said, “Thanks.”
“Don’t thank me yet.”
“I know you’ll save my arm,” he said before the morphine finally put him under.
Mildred sighed. “I wish I was as confident as he is.”
JAK GRABBED the barrel of the .50 caliber and helped J.B. lift it into place on the back of the transport wag they would be using to free Ryan, Krysty and Mildred.