Thomas jerked awake. It was dark and cold and he did not know where he was. Then he heard a faint noise and remembered. He and Francis had lost their way and stopped by the trail. He heard the noise again, this time louder. Maybe it was someone coming to rescue them. He struggled to sit up, but the weight of the snow pinned him. He pushed his hand out through the air hole and waved it as best he could. And he shouted. Francis did not stir beside him.
Suddenly he felt the burden of the snow being lifted and then he was being picked up and put on a sled. We have been found, he thought as he went back to sleep.
Thomas drifted in and out of consciousness. Once when he woke he was on the sled, then he was in the sick room at the post where he felt someone remove his furs.
When next he woke his face and fingers tingled and burned. He heard a voice say. “This boy’s arm is frozen from the elbow to the fingertips. Better hope he stays unconscious while the freezing comes out.”
“No,” he tried to say. “No. I can feel both my arms.”
On his fourth awakening he managed to open his eyes. The doctor looked down at him. Behind him, Thomas could see Henry and Luke.
“It is about time,” the doctor said. “I thought you were going to sleep the day away.”
“How am I?” Thomas managed to ask through his swollen lips. His face still burned.
“Your face and both of your arms were frostbit, and the four small toes on your left foot were frozen.”
“What does this mean?”
“Well, the frostbite areas will be sore for a while but they usually recover. As a rule the frozen parts get gangrene and have to be amputated.”
“I will lose my toes?”
“I am afraid so.”
“Where is Francis?”
“In the bed beside you.” He stepped away. Thomas raised himself so he could see Francis.
Suddenly Thomas remembered the conversation he had heard. “His arm?”
“It is frozen.”
“Oh, no.” Thomas fell back on the bed.
“Are you sure it has to be amputated?” Henry asked. He was standing beside Francis’ bed.
“I have been here for eleven years, and I have never seen a frozen limb that did not have to be cut off.”
“He will not be any good with only one arm,” Luke said solemnly.
Francis stirred and opened his eyes. It took a few moments for them to focus and then he smiled feebly. His lips moved as he asked faintly. “How is Thomas?”
“He is fine,” Henry said. “He is in the next bed.”
“Hi, Francis.” Thomas raised his arm and waved. “We survived. We made it.”
Francis nodded, and then noticed the doctor. His brow wrinkled in a frown. “Why are you here?” he asked, his voice just a whisper.
“To check you boys over,” the doctor answered.
“Well, my face hurts,” Francis said.
“That is the frost bite coming out.”
Francis concentrated for a few moments. “My toes are sore, and so are the fingers on my left hand. They must be frostbit, too.” He paused then said. “And my right arm is very sore.”
There was silence and no one would look him in the eye.
“What is it?” Francis demanded, his voice strengthening with fear. He tried to raise his hand and when it would not move, he reached over with his left hand and touched it. “Why is it so cold?”
“Your arm has been frozen,” the doctor said gently.
“Frozen?”
“Yes.”
“When will it all thaw?”
“It should be completely thawed by tonight, but it will be very painful.”
“Yes,” Thomas said. “My toes are beginning to thaw and they hurt like hell. Worse than my face.”
“There is nothing more I can do until tomorrow,” the doctor said and left the room.
“I will get you both some food from the kitchen,” Henry said. He hurried off after the doctor.
“I will get some gin,” Luke said. “It will help deaden the pain.”
“What did the doctor say about my arm?” Francis demanded, after they had left.
Thomas did not want to be the one to give him the news. After all, maybe the doctor was wrong in this case. He sure hoped so for the sake of his toes.
“He said he would have to wait until the freezing comes out. Same with my toes.”
Francis laid back and stared at the ceiling. “I know what happens to frozen limbs. Jarvis told me about a man who lost his leg to gangrene after it was frozen. The man was never the same in the head and had to be sent back to England.”
“That will not happen to you.”
“How do you know?” Francis asked, angrily.
Henry returned with some food and Luke with the gin. They stayed most of the night drinking with Thomas and Francis. Thomas drank little, but for the first time since arriving at the post, Francis got drunk. He just lay in the bed and swallowed cup after cup of the gin. But it did little to deaden the pain in his arm. At times he held tightly to his bed post with his left hand, moaning as the freezing came out.
“You go to the quarters,” Henry finally said to Luke. “I will stay here and keep the fire going.”
* * *
When Luke returned in the morning, he had Jarvis with him. Thomas and Francis were awake, but Henry had fallen asleep beside the stove.
“How are your toes?” Luke asked.
“They have red blisters on them and they feel strange,” Thomas said, holding out his foot for Luke to see.
“What about your arm?” Luke asked Francis.
Francis just turned his head away.
Henry stirred and stood up. He picked up a piece of wood and put it in the stove. The doctor entered the room. He walked over to Thomas and examined his face then did the same with Francis.
“They are doing fine,” he said.
Then he looked at Thomas’ toes and shook his head.
“These have to be amputated.”
“What happens if I do not agree?”
“That flesh is dead. It will only decay and cause infection which will eventually kill you.”
Thomas looked at Henry then back at the doctor. He did not want to lose his toes, but the alternative was worse. “All right,” he said. “When?”
“This afternoon.”
When the doctor tried to check Francis’ arm, Francis covered it up. “No,” he said. “You leave it alone.”
“But I have to look at it.”
“No.”
The doctor shrugged and left the room.
“You should let him see it,” Henry said.
“And have him tell me it has to be amputated, like he told Thomas?”
“He might not say that.”
“It does not matter. He is not going to see it.”
Thomas resigned himself to the amputation. There was nothing else he could do. He knew it would be painful, and he drank some of the gin. The surgeon came and had Henry and Luke hold Thomas’ leg so he could not move it and began to cut the infected parts off with a knife. In spite of the gin Thomas was not prepared for the tremendous pain. He cried out and tried to pull his leg away. Henry and Luke held firm until the procedure was over. The doctor took a red hot poker which had been heating in the stove and laid it on the site where the toes had been. Thomas screamed as the heat sealed off the blood vessels to stop the bleeding.
Francis occasionally glanced over at the operation then quickly away. When the job was complete and Thomas’ foot bandaged, Francis struggled to sit up in bed.
“I am going back to the men’s quarters,” he said, climbing off the bed.
Jarvis put his hand on his shoulder to restrain him. “You are going to die from that arm,” he said.
Francis reached up and flung his hand aside. “I am not going to be a one-armed man.”
“Would you rather be dead?”
“It would be better.” Francis’ face was flushed and he was hot to the touch.
“You are not well enough to leave,” the doctor said.
“Yes, I am.” He held onto the end of the bed then staggered over to the door. He opened it with his left hand, his right arm hanging useless by his side.
“Go with him,” the doctor said. “He has to do this.”
Jarvis and Henry hurried after him.
“We are going to have to cut that arm off,” the doctor said to Luke who was helping Thomas get settled in bed. “Under his clothes it is as bad as the toes we just removed and it will kill him if we do not.”
White Paddler burst into the room then stopped at the sight of Thomas on the bed with a bandaged foot. He smiled his relief as he walked over to the bed. He looked down at Thomas’ foot.
“What happened?”
“I had four toes amputated,” Thomas said.
“I heard two of you were lost overnight. Where is the other man?”
“He went back to the quarters.”
“Then no one froze his arm as I had heard.”
“Francis did. His right arm was completely frozen.”
“And he is all right?” White Paddler asked. He looked at the doctor.
“No. He just does not want it amputated,” the doctor replied.
“Is there anything I can get you?” White Paddler asked Thomas.
Thomas shook his head. “The doctor thinks I will be up and walking in a few days.”
Little Bird quietly pushed opened the door. When Thomas saw her he smiled broadly not wanting her to know the pain he was in. After all, he was a man and a man was not weak, especially in front of his girl. And he did think of her as his girl although he had not said anything to her or anyone else.
* * *
Two days later, Jarvis held the sick room door open as Luke and Henry carried Francis back to the bed. He was in a state of delirium and his sleeve was wet with oozing fluid. The doctor slit his sleeve and revealed a blackened arm with decaying flesh. Thomas held his breath at the smell.
The doctor began to layout his saw and knife and he put the poker in the fire.
“What are you doing?” Thomas asked.
“I have to operate.”
Francis was floating in and out of consciousness. Once he looked up and smiled at Henry. “Father wants me to clean the store,” he said.
“It might be too late,” the doctor said, after cutting off Francis’ sleeve. “It is worse than I thought. I will need you men to hold him down.”
Henry, Luke, and Jarvis, grabbed hold of Francis’ body. Thomas stood beside the table, leaning on a chair for support.
Suddenly Francis opened his eyes wide and stared at Thomas. “Do not let him cut it off,” he begged. “Please, do not let him.”
Thomas put his arm on Francis’ shoulder. “He has to.”
“Nooo,” Francis yelled drawing out the word. He began to fight off the hands holding him.
“Keep him still,” the doctor said.
The men tightened their hold. Thomas kept his eyes on Francis who stared back at him.
“Please,” Francis whispered.
The doctor picked up his curved amputation knife and held it over Francis’ arm. Francis fought harder when he saw the doctor’s hand and let out a long, pain-filled howl when the knife cut into his flesh above the infected area. The men worked hard to hold him down while the doctor began to saw the bone and when he was just about through, Francis passed out.
“It is about time,” the doctor said, with a sigh. “I have never seen a man stay awake this long.” He completed his work, cauterized the open wound with the poker then bandaged the stump.
“Can I stay with him?” Henry asked.
“He will probably be out for a long time.”
“That is all right. We have a pact.”
“Let me know when he wakes up, then.”
The pact. Thomas thought of the pact the four of them had made so long ago. They had agreed to look after each other, but so far John was dead, Francis had lost his arm, and he had lost three toes. It was almost as if the pact had jinxed them.