Buckley, Christopher - The Judge Hunter by Buckley Christopher

Author:Buckley, Christopher [Buckley, Christopher]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

– CHAPTER 29 –

Doctor Pell

Mrs. Pell answered the door. She stared at the three bedraggled people before her. Then, squinting at Huncks, his shirt caked stiff with blood, she said, “Hiram! Good Lord—come in, come in!” She shouted, “Thomas! Thomas!” The woman’s got bellows for lungs, Balty thought.

Dr. Pell hove into view, a trim, elegant man in his early fifties with a long nose, spectacles at the end of it, lips pursed in reproof at his wife for summoning him so brusquely from his Madeira. Seeing Huncks, his eyebrows shot up.

“Hiram!” He barked at Mrs. Pell, “Why didn’t you tell me it was him, foolish woman? Don’t stand there gawking. Hot water. Get my instruments ready!”

He led Huncks into his surgery, in a building attached to the main house. Balty started at the arms and legs hanging on the walls, then saw they were prostheses. They gave the room a macabre aspect.

Pell slid his spectacles back up the bridge of his nose and examined the entry wound.

“Musket?”

Huncks nodded.

“And these?”

“Friends,” Huncks said.

“Lucy!” Dr. Pell bellowed.

“What?” she shouted from another room.

“Are you seeing to the water?”

“What did you suppose I was doing? Needlepoint?”

“Wouldn’t surprise me in the least,” her husband muttered.

Mrs. Pell arrived, toting a kettle.

“What’s your name, love?”

“Thankful.”

“What a sweet name. I’d be thankful if you’d reach me that copper bowl there.” She poured steaming water into it and went about sorting her husband’s instruments.

“Do you want something for the pain?” Pell asked.

“Wouldn’t refuse a brandy.”

“Brandy! Quickly, woman! Stop fussing with the water. Can’t you see the man’s in agony?”

Balty sensed this marital opera bouffa between the Pells was contrived.

“Yes. Coming.” Mrs. Pell took a bottle off a shelf, poured a large measure into a glass, and gave it to Huncks.

“Here you are, my dear. Who did this to you? Never mind. Let the butcher have at you first. If you survive his ministrations, you can tell us all about it then.”

She took Thankful by the hand. “Come, love. Let’s get you out of those clothes and into a hot bath.” She said over her shoulder, “If Hippocrates can spare us.”

“Hippocrates will manage,” Dr. Pell said, scissoring Huncks’s shirtsleeve. “As he always does.”

“I see you and Lucy are as domestic as ever,” Huncks said, wincing as Pell began probing the wound.

“Marry a rich widow and reap the whirlwind. Ah, there you are.” He nudged the tip of the probe against the ball. Huncks gasped.

“What range?”

“Fifteen paces.”

“Fifteen? Should’ve smashed right through the bone.”

“Went through someone else first.”

Dr. Pell chortled. “Lucky you. Unlucky him. Lucy! Oh, that woman.”

Balty said, “Could I help?”

“That bit of wood there. Give it to Hiram.”

It was indented with tooth marks. Balty handed it to Huncks. Huncks regarded it dubiously. “Who’s been chewing on this?”

“If you die of infection, it won’t be from that.”

Huncks tossed the bite stick over his shoulder. “I’ll take my chances.”

Pell inserted the extractor. Huncks sucked in his breath and bared his teeth.

“Should’ve taken laudanum.”

“I know you prefer your victims to be drugged,” Huncks grunted. “So they won’t realize you’ve no idea what you’re doing.

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