11

THE LAW OF BLOODSHED

July 1767

I became gradually accustomed to the rhythm of life at River Run. The presence of the slaves disturbed me, but there was little I could do about that, save to call upon their services as little as I could, fetching and carrying for myself whenever possible.

River Run boasted a “simples” room, essentially a small closet in which dried herbs and medicines were kept. There was not much there—no more than a few jars of dandelion root and willow bark, and a few patent poultices, dusty from disuse. Jocasta professed herself delighted that I should want to use the space—she had herself no talent for medicinals, she said with a shrug, nor had any of the slaves.

“There is a new woman who may show some skill in that direction,” she said, long fingers drawing out the line of wool from the spindle as the spinning wheel whirred round.

“She is not a house slave, though; she was fresh come from Africa only a few months past, and has neither speech nor manners. I had thought to train her, perhaps, but since you are here … ah, now the thread’s grown too thin, d’ye see?”

While I spent some time each day chatting with Jocasta and attempting to learn from her the art of spinning wool, Jamie spent an hour or two with the butler, Ulysses, who in addition to serving as Jocasta’s eyes and as major domo of the house, had evidently also been managing the accounts of the plantation since Hector Cameron’s death.

“And doing a fair job of it, too,” Jamie told me privately, after one such session. “If he were a white man, my aunt would have no difficulty in handling her affairs. As it is, though—” He shrugged.

“As it is, it’s lucky for her that you’re here,” I said, leaning close to sniff at him. He had spent the day in Cross Creek, arranging a complicated exchange involving indigo blocks, lumber, three pairs of mules, five tons of rice, and a warehouse receipt for a gilded clock, and as a result, a fascinating variety of scents clung to his coat and hair.

“It’s the least I can do,” he said, his eyes on the boots he was brushing. His lips tightened briefly. “Not as though I were otherwise occupied, is it?”

---

“A dinner party,” Jocasta declared, a few days later. “I must have a proper festival, to introduce the two of ye to the folk of the county.”

“There’s no need of it, Aunt,” Jamie said mildly, looking up from his book. “I think I shall have met most of the county at the stock-buying last week. Or the masculine part of it, at least,” he added, smiling at me. “Come to think on it, though, perhaps it would suit Claire to be acquainted wi’ the ladies of the district.”

“I wouldn’t mind knowing a few more people,” I admitted. “Not that I don’t find ample occupation here,” I assured Jocasta, “but—”

“But not of a sort that interests you,” she answered, though with enough of a smile to take the sting out of the remark. “Ye’ve no great fondness for needlework, I think.” Her hand went to the big basket of colored wools and plucked out a ball of green, to be attached to the shawl she was knitting.

The balls of wool were carefully arranged each morning by one of the maids, in a spiral spectrum, so that by counting, Jocasta could pick up a ball of the right color.

“Aye, well, not that sort of needlework,” Jamie put in, closing his book and smiling at me. “It’s more the stitching of severed flesh that appeals to Claire. I expect she’ll be getting restless these days, wi’ no more than a cracked head or a case of piles to be dealing with.”

“Ha ha,” I said tartly, but in fact he was quite right. While I was pleased to find that the inhabitants of River Run were on the whole healthy and well nourished, there was not a great deal of scope for a physician. While I certainly wished no ill to anyone, there was no denying that I was getting restless. So was Jamie, but I thought that was a matter better left unremarked for the moment.

“I do hope Marsali’s quite well,” I said, changing the subject. Convinced at last that Jamie would not require his aid for a little while, Fergus had left the day before, bound downriver for Wilmington, thence to take ship for Jamaica. If all went well, he would return in the springtime with Marsali and—God willing—their new child.

“So do I,” said Jamie. “I told Fergus that—”

Jocasta turned her head sharply toward the door.

“What is it, Ulysses?”

Absorbed by the conversation, I hadn’t noticed footsteps in the hallway. Not for the first time, I was struck by the acuteness of Jocasta’s hearing.

“Mr. Farquard Campbell,” the butler said quietly, and stood back against the wall.

It was an indication of Farquard Campbell’s familiarity with the household, I thought, that he should not have waited for Ulysses to return with an invitation for him to enter. He came into the drawing room on the butler’s heels, hat carelessly thrust beneath one arm.

“Jo, Mrs. Fraser,” he said with a quick bow to Jocasta and me, and “Your servant, sir,” to Jamie. Mr. Campbell had been riding, and riding hard; the skirts of his coat were thick with dust, and sweat streamed down his face beneath a wig crammed on askew.

“What is it, Farquard? Has something happened?” Jocasta sat forward on the edge of her chair, her face reflecting his obvious anxiety.

“Yes,” he said abruptly. “An accident at the sawmill. I’ve come to ask Mrs. Fraser—”

“Yes, of course. Let me get my box. Ulysses, will you have someone fetch a horse?” I rose hastily, searching for the slippers I had kicked off. I wasn’t dressed for riding, but from Campbell’s look, there wasn’t time to change. “Is it serious?”

He put out a hand to stop me, as I stooped to pull my slippers on.

“Aye, bad enough. But you needn’t come, Mrs. Fraser. If your husband might fetch along some of your medicines and such, though—”

“Of course I’ll come,” I said.

“No!” He spoke abruptly, and we all stared at him. His eyes sought Jamie’s, and he grimaced, lips tight.

“It’s not a matter for the ladies,” he said. “But I should be most grateful for your company, Mr. Fraser.”

Jocasta was on her feet before I could protest, gripping Campbell’s arm.

“What is it?” she said sharply. “Is it one of my Negroes? Has Byrnes done something?”

She was taller than he by an inch or two; he had to look up to answer her. I could see the lines of strain in his face, and she plainly sensed it as well; her fingers tightened on the gray serge of his coat sleeve.

He glanced at Ulysses, then back at Jocasta. As though he had received a direct order, the butler turned and left the room, soft-footed as ever.

“It is a matter of bloodshed, Jo,” he said to her quietly. “I do not know who, nor how, nor even how bad the injury may be. MacNeill’s boy came for me. But for the other—” He hesitated, then shrugged. “It is the law.”

“And you’re a judge!” she burst out. “For God’s sake, can you not do something?” Her head moved jerkily, blind eyes trying to fix him, bend him to her will.

“No!” he said sharply, and then, more gently, repeated, “No.” He lifted her hand from his sleeve and held it tightly.

“You know I cannot,” he said. “If I could …”

“If you could, you would not,” she said bitterly. She pulled her hand out of his grasp and stood back, fists clenched at her sides. “Go on, then. They’ve called ye to be judge; go and give them their judgment.” She whirled on her heel and left the room, her skirts rustling with angry futility.

He stared after her, then, as the sound of a slammed door came from down the passage, blew out his breath with a wry grimace and turned to Jamie.

“I hesitate to request such a favor of you, Mr. Fraser, upon such short acquaintance as we have had. But I would greatly appreciate your accompanying me upon my errand. Since Mrs. Cameron herself cannot be present, to have you there as her representative in the matter—”

“What is this matter, Mr. Campbell?” Jamie interrupted.

Campbell glanced at me, plainly wishing me to leave. Since I made no move to do so, he shrugged, and pulling a handkerchief from his pocket, wiped his face.

“It is the law of this colony, sir, that if a Negro shall assault a white person and in so doing, cause blood to be shed, then he shall die for his crime.” He paused, reluctant. “Such occurrences are most thankfully rare. But when they occur—”

He stopped, lips pressed together. Then he sighed, and with a final pat of his flushed cheeks, put the handkerchief away.

“I must go. Will you come, Mr. Fraser?”

Jamie stood for a moment longer, his eyes searching Campbell’s face.

“I will,” he said abruptly. He went to the sideboard and pulled open the upper drawer, where the late Hector Cameron’s dueling pistols were kept.

Seeing this, I turned to Campbell.

“Is there some danger?”

“I cannot say, Mrs. Fraser.” Campbell hunched his shoulders, “Donald MacNeill told me only that there had been an altercation of some kind at the sawmill, and that it was a matter of the law of bloodshed. He asked me to come at once to render judgment and oversee the execution, and then left to summon the other estate owners before I could obtain any particulars.”

He looked unhappy, but resigned.

“Execution? Do you mean to say you intend to execute a man without even knowing what he’s done?” In my agitation, I had knocked Jocasta’s basket of yarn over. Little balls of colored wool ran everywhere, bouncing on the carpet.

“I do know what he’s done, Mrs. Fraser!” Campbell lifted his chin, his color high, but with an obvious effort, swallowed his impatience.

“Your pardon, ma’am. I know you are newly come here; you will find some of our ways difficult and even barbarous, but—”

“Too right I find them barbarous! What kind of law is it that condemns a man—”

“A slave—”

“A man! Condemns him without a trial, without even an investigation? What sort of law is that?”

“A bad one, madame!” he snapped. “But it is still the law, and I am charged with its fulfillment. Mr. Fraser, are you ready?” He clapped the hat on his head, and turned to Jamie.

“I am.” Jamie finished stowing the pistols and ammunition in the deep pockets of his coat, and straightened, smoothing the skirts down across his thighs. “Sassenach, will ye go and—”

I had crossed to him and grabbed him by the arm before he could finish.

“Jamie, please! Don’t go; you can’t be part of this!”

“Hush.” He laid his hand on mine and squeezed hard. His eyes held mine, and kept me from speaking.

“I am already part of it,” he said quietly. “It is my aunt’s property, her men involved. Mr. Campbell is right; I am her kinsman. It will be my duty to go—to see, at least. To be there.” He hesitated then, as though he might say more, but instead merely squeezed my hand again and let me go.

“Then I’m going with you.” I spoke quite calmly, with that eerie sense of detachment that comes with awareness of impending disaster.

His wide mouth twitched briefly.

“I did expect ye would, Sassenach. Go and fetch your wee box, aye? I’ll have the horses brought round.”

I didn’t wait to hear Mr. Campbell’s expostulations, but fled toward the stillroom, my slippers pattering on the tiles like the beat of an anxious heart.

---

We met Andrew MacNeill on the road, resting his horse in the shade of a chestnut tree. He had been waiting for us; he stepped out of the shadows at the sound of our hoofbeats. He nodded to Campbell as we halted by him, but his eyes were on me, frowning.

“Did you not tell him, Campbell?” he said, and turned the frown on Jamie. “It will be no affair for a woman, Mr. Fraser.”

“Ye called it a matter of bloodshed, did ye no?” Jamie said, a marked edge in his voice. “My wife is ban-lighiche; she has seen war wi’ me, and more. If ye wish me there, she will go with me.”

MacNeill’s lips pressed tight together, but he didn’t argue further. He turned abruptly and swung into his saddle.

“Acquaint us, MacNeill, with the history of this unfortunate affair.” Campbell urged his mare’s nose past the withers of Jamie’s horse, skillfully edging between MacNeill and Jamie. “Mr. Fraser is newly come, as you know, and your lad said only to me that it was bloodshed. I have no particulars.”

MacNeill’s burly shoulders rose slightly, shrugging toward the iron-gray pigtail that bisected his collar. His hat was jammed down on his head, set square with the shoulders, as though he had used a carpenter’s level to even it. A square, blunt man, MacNeill, in words as well as appearance.

Told in brief bursts as we trotted, it was a simple story. The sawmill’s overseer, Byrnes, had had an altercation with one of the turpentine slaves. This man, being armed with the large slash-knife appropriate to his occupation, had attempted to settle the matter by removing Byrnes’ head. Missing his aim, he had succeeded only in depriving the overseer of an ear.

“Barked him like a pine tree,” MacNeill said, a certain grim satisfaction apparent in his voice. “Took his lug and a wee bit o’ the side of his face, as well. Not that it will ha’ impaired his beauty ower-much, the ugly wee pusbag.”

I glanced toward Jamie, who lifted one eyebrow in response. Evidently Byrnes was no favorite with the local planters.

The overseer had shrieked for help, and with the assistance of two customers and several of their slaves, had succeeded in subduing his assailant. The wound stanched and the slave locked in a shed, young Donald MacNeill—who had come to have a saw blade set and found himself unexpectedly in the midst of drama—had been dispatched at once to spread the word to the plantation owners nearby.

“You’ll not know,” Campbell explained, twisting in his saddle to speak to Jamie. “When a slave must be executed, the slaves from those plantations nearby are brought to watch; a deterrent, aye? against future ill-considered action.”

“Indeed,” Jamie said politely. “I believe that was the Crown’s notion in executing my grandsire on Tower Hill after the Rising. Verra effective, too; all my relations have been quite well behaved since.”

I had lived long enough among Scots to appreciate the effects of that little jab. Jamie might have come at Campbell’s request, but the grandson of the Old Fox did no man’s bidding lightly—nor necessarily held English law in high regard.

MacNeill had got the message, all right; the back of his neck flushed turkey-red, but Farquard Campbell looked amused. He uttered a short, dry laugh before turning round.

“Which slave is it, d’ye know?” he asked the older man. MacNeill shook his head.

“Young Donald didna say. But ye ken as well as I do; it’ll be that bugger Rufus.”

Campbell’s shoulders slumped in acknowledgment.

“Jo will be sore pained to hear it,” he murmured, shaking his head regretfully.

“It’s her ain fault,” MacNeill said, brutally thwacking a horsefly that had settled on his leg above the boot. “Yon Byrnes isna fit to mind pigs, let alone run Negroes. I’ve told her often enough; so’ve you.”

“Aye, but Hector hired the man, not Jo,” Campbell protested mildly. “And she couldna well dismiss him out of hand. What’s she to do, then, come and manage the place herself?”

The answer was a grunt as MacNeill shifted his broad buttocks in the saddle. I glanced at Jamie, and found him poker-faced, eyes hidden in the shadow under the brim of his hat.

“There’s little worse than a willful woman,” MacNeill said, a trifle louder than strictly necessary. “They’ve none to blame save themselves if harm comes to them.”

“Whereas,” I chipped in, leaning forward and raising my own voice enough to be heard over the clop and creak of the horses, “if harm comes to them because of some man, the satisfaction of blaming him will be adequate compensation?”

Jamie snorted briefly with amusement; Campbell cackled out loud and poked MacNeill in the ribs with his crop.

“Got ye there, Andrew!” he said.

MacNeill did not reply, but his neck grew even redder. We rode in silence after that, MacNeill’s shoulders hunched just under his ears.

While mildly satisfying, this exchange did nothing to settle my nerves; my stomach was knotted in dread of what might happen when we reached the mill. Despite their dislike of Byrnes and the obvious assumption that whatever had happened had likely been the overseer’s fault, there wasn’t the slightest suggestion that this would alter the slave’s fate in any way.

“A bad law,” Campbell had called it—but the law nonetheless. Still, it was neither outrage nor horror at the thought of judicial atrocity that made my hands tremble and the leather reins slick with sweat; it was wondering what Jamie would do.

I could tell nothing from his face. He rode relaxed, left hand on the reins, the right curled loosely on his thigh, near the bulge of the pistol in his coat.

I was not even sure whether I could take comfort in the fact that he had allowed me to come with him. That might mean that he didn’t expect to commit violence—but in that case, did it mean he would stand by and let the execution happen?

And if he did …? My mouth was dry, my nose and throat choked with the soft brown dust that rose in clouds from the horses’ hooves.

I am already part of it. Part of what, though? Of clan and family, yes—but of this? Highlanders would fight to the death for any cause that touched their honor or stirred their blood, but they were for the most part indifferent to outside matters. Centuries of isolation in their mountain fastnesses had left them disinclined to meddle in the affairs of others—but woe to any who meddled in theirs!

Plainly Campbell and MacNeill saw this as Jamie’s affair—but did he? Jamie was not an isolated Highlander, I assured myself. He was well traveled, well educated, a cultured man. And he knew damn well what I thought of present matters. I had the terrible feeling, though, that my opinion would count for very little in the reckoning of this day.

It was a hot and windless afternoon, with cicadas buzzing loudly in the weeds along the road, but my fingers were cold, and stiff on the reins. We had passed one or two other parties; small groups of slaves, moving on foot in the direction of the sawmill. They didn’t look up as we passed, but melted aside into the bushes, making room as we cantered past.

Jamie’s hat flew off, knocked by a low branch; he caught it deftly and clapped it back on his head, but not before I had caught a glimpse of his face, unguarded for a moment, the lines of it tense with anxiety. With a small shock, it occurred to me that he didn’t know what he was going to do either. And that frightened me more than anything else so far.

We were suddenly in the pine forest; the yellow-green flicker of hickory and alder leaves gave way abruptly to the darker light of cool deep green, like moving from the surface of the ocean into the calmer depths.

I reached back to touch the wooden case strapped on behind my saddle, trying to avoid thinking of what might lie ahead, by making mental preparations for the only role I might reasonably play in this incipient disaster. I likely could not prevent damage; but I could try to repair what had happened already. Disinfection and cleansing—I had a bottle of distilled alcohol, and a wash made from pressed garlic juice and mint. Then dress the wound—yes, I had linen bandages—but surely it would need stitching first?

In the midst of wondering what had been done with Byrnes’ detached ear, I stopped. The buzzing in my own ears was not from cicadas. Campbell, in the lead, reined up sharply, listening, and the rest of us halted behind him.

Voices in the distance, lots of voices, in a deep, angry buzz, like a hive of bees turned upside down and shaken. Then there was the faint sound of shouts and screams, and the sudden loud report of a shot.

We galloped down the last slope, dodging trees, and thundered into the sawmill’s clearing. The open ground was filled with people; slaves and bondsmen, women and children, milling in panic through the stacks of sawn lumber, like termites exposed by the swing of an ax.

Then I lost all consciousness of the crowd. All my attention was fixed at the side of the mill, where a crane hoist was rigged, with a huge curved hook for raising logs to the level of the saw bed.

Impaled on the hook was the body of a black man, twisting in horrid imitation of a worm. The smell of blood struck sweet and hot through the air; there was a pool of it on the platform below the hoist.

My horse stopped, fidgeting, obstructed by the crowd. The shouts had died away into moans and small, disconnected screams from women in the crowd. I saw Jamie slide off in front of me, and force his way through the press of bodies toward the platform. Campbell and MacNeill were with him, shoving grimly through the mob. MacNeill’s hat fell off, unregarded, to be trampled underfoot.

I sat frozen in my saddle, unable to move. There were other men on the platform near the hoist; a small man whose head was wound grotesquely round with bandages, splotched with blood all down one side; several other men, white and mulatto, armed with clubs and muskets, making occasional threatening jabs at the crowd.

Not that there seemed any urge to rush the platform; to the contrary, there seemed a general urge to get away. The faces around me were stamped with expressions ranging from fear to shocked dismay, with only here and there a flash of anger—or satisfaction.

Farquard Campbell emerged from the press, boosted onto the platform by MacNeill’s sturdy shoulder, and advanced at once on the men with clubs, waving his arms and shouting something I couldn’t hear, though the screams and moans around me were dying away into the silence of shock. Jamie seized the edge of the platform and lifted himself up after Campbell, pausing to give a hand to MacNeill.

Campbell was face-to-face with Byrnes, his lean cheeks convulsed with fury.

“… unspeakable brutality!” he was shouting. His words came unevenly, half swallowed in the shuffle and murmur around me, but I saw him jab a finger emphatically at the hoist and its grisly burden. The slave had stopped struggling; he hung inert.

The overseer’s face was invisible, but his body was stiff with outrage and defiance. One or two of his friends moved slowly toward him, plainly meaning to offer support.

I saw Jamie stand for a moment, assessing events. He drew both pistols from his coat, and coolly checked the priming. Then he stepped forward, and clapped one to Byrnes’ bandaged head. The overseer went rigid with surprise.

“Bring him down,” Jamie said to the nearest thug, loudly enough to be audible over the dying grumbles of the crowd. “Or I blow off what’s left o’ your friend’s face. And then—” He raised the second pistol and aimed it squarely at the man’s chest. The expression on Jamie’s own face made further threats unnecessary.

The man moved reluctantly, narrowed eyes fixed on the pistol. He took hold of the brake-handle of the winch that controlled the hoist, and pulled it back. The hook descended slowly, its cable taut with the strain of its burden. There was a massive sigh from the spectators as the limp body touched the earth.

I had managed to urge my horse forward through the crowd, till I was within a foot or two of the end of the platform. The horse shied and stamped, tossing his head and snorting at the strong smell of blood, but was well trained enough not to bolt. I slid off, ordering a man nearby to bring my box.

The boards of the platform felt strange underfoot, heaving like the dry land does when one steps off a ship. It was no more than a few steps to where the slave lay; by the time I reached him, that cold clarity of mind that is the surgeon’s chief resource had come upon me. I paid no heed to the heated arguments behind me, or to the presence of the remaining spectators.

He was alive; his chest moved in small, jerky gasps. The hook had pierced the stomach, passing through the lower rib cage, emerging from the back at about the level of the kidneys. The man’s skin was an unearthly shade of dark blue-gray, his lips blanched to the color of clay.

“Hush,” I said softly, though there was no sound from the slave save the small hiss of his breath. His eyes were pools of incomprehension, pupils dilated, swamped with darkness.

There was no blood from his mouth; the lungs were not punctured. The breathing was shallow, but rhythmic; the diaphragm had not been pierced. My hands moved gently over him, my mind trying to follow the path of the damage. Blood oozed from both wounds, flowed in a black slick over the ridged muscles of back and stomach, shone red as rubies on the polished steel. No spurting; they had somehow missed both abdominal aorta and the renal artery.

Behind me, a heated argument had broken out; some small, detached portion of my mind noted that Byrnes’ companions were his fellow overseers from two neighboring plantations, presently being rebuked with vigor by Farquard Campbell.

“… blatant disregard of the law! You shall answer for it in court, gentlemen, be assured that you shall!”

“What does it matter?” came a sullen rumble from someone. “It’s bloodshed—and mutilation! Byrnes has his rights!”

“Rights no for the likes of you to decide.” MacNeill’s deep growl joined in. “Rabble, that’s what ye are, no better than the—”

“And where d’you get off, old man, stickin’ your long Scotch nose in where it’s not wanted, eh?”

“What will ye need, Sassenach?”

I hadn’t heard him come up beside me, but he was there. Jamie crouched next to me, my box open on the boards beside him. He held a loaded pistol still in one hand, his attention mostly on the group behind me.

“I don’t know,” I said. I could hear the argument going on in the background, but the words blurred into meaninglessness. The only reality was under my hands.

It was slowly dawning on me that the man I touched was possibly not fatally wounded, in spite of his horrible injury. From everything I could sense and feel, I thought that the curve of the hook had gone upward through the liver. Likely the right kidney was damaged, and the jejunum or gallbladder might be nicked—but none of those would kill him immediately.

It was shock that might do for him, if he was to die quickly. But I could see a pulse throbbing in the sweat-slick abdomen, just above the piercing steel. It was fast, but steady as a drumbeat; I could feel it echo in the tips of my fingers when I placed a hand on it. He had lost blood—the scent of it was thick, overpowering the smell of sweat and fear—but not so much as to doom him.

An unsettling thought came to me—I might be able to keep this man alive. Likely not; in the wake of the thought came a flood of all the things that could go wrong—hemorrhage when I removed the hook being only the most immediate. Internal bleeding, delayed shock, perforated intestine, peritonitis—and yet.

At Prestonpans, I had seen a man pierced through the body with a sword, the location of the wound very much like this. He had received no treatment beyond a bandage wrapped around his body—and yet he had recovered.

“Lawlessness!” Campbell was saying, his voice rising over the babble of argument. “It cannot be tolerated, no matter the provocation. I shall have you all taken in charge, be sure of it!”

No one was paying any attention to the true object of the discussion. Only seconds had passed—but I had only seconds more to act. I placed a hand on Jamie’s arm, pulling his attention away from the debate.

“If I save him, will they let him live?” I asked him, under my breath.

His eyes flicked from one to another of the men behind me, weighing the possibilities.

“No,” he said softly. His eyes met mine, dark with understanding. His shoulders straightened slightly, and he laid the pistol across his thigh. I could not help him make his choice; he could not help with mine—but he would defend me, whichever choice I made.

“Give me the third bottle from the left, top row,” I said, with a nod at the lid of the box, where three rows of clear glass bottles, firmly corked, held a variety of medicines.

I had two bottles of pure alcohol, another of brandy. I poured a good dose of the brownish powdered root into the brandy, and shook it briskly, then crawled to the man’s head and pressed it to his lips.

His eyes were glazed; I tried to look into them, to make him see me. Why? I wondered, even as I leaned close and called his name. I couldn’t ask if this would be his choice—I had made it for him. And having made it, could not ask for either approval or forgiveness.

He swallowed. Once. Twice. The muscles near his blanched mouth quivered; drops of brandy ran across his skin. Once more a deep convulsive gulp, and then his straining neck relaxed, his head heavy on my arm.

I sat with my eyes closed, supporting his head, my fingers on the pulse under his ear. It jumped; skipped a beat and resumed. A shiver ran over his body, the blotched skin twitching as though a thousand ants ran over it.

The textbook description ran through my mind:

Numbness. Tingling. A sensation of the skin crawling, as though affected by insects. Nausea, epigastric pain. Labored breathing, skin cold and clammy, features bloodless. Pulse feeble and irregular, yet the mind remains clear.

None of the visible symptoms were discernible from those he already showed. Epigastric pain, forsooth.

One-fiftieth grain will kill a sparrow in a few seconds. One-tenth grain, a rabbit in five minutes. Aconite was said to be the poison in the cup Medea prepared for Theseus.

I tried to hear nothing, feel nothing, know nothing but the jerky beat beneath my fingers. I tried with all my might to shut out the voices overhead, the murmur nearby, the heat and dust and stink of blood, to forget where I was, and what I was doing.

Yet the mind remains clear.

Oh, God, I thought. It did.