I canmakethem, Shaw thought. If he had time he’d do so now.
“Look everywhere. You take the kitchen. And dining room. All the closets and pantries. Oh, liquor too. It’s an antiseptic.”
She walked off to start the search. Shaw stepped into the nearest bedroom.
After a few minutes she called, “Got something here maybe you can use. Like, a weapon.”
“All right. Keep looking.”
In the two bedrooms all Shaw found was bar soap and washcloths.
He called again to Hannah, “The stove work?”
A clank, then a gasp. “Spiders!” After a moment: “No gas.”
So he couldn’t boil and sterilize bandages. He’d make do with soap. After running the water in the bathroom for a few minutes to clear the impurities, he soaked the washcloths. On one he rubbed the bar, creating a good lather.
In the parlor he called to Hannah, “Any knives?”
“A couple.”
“Bring me the smallest, a kitchen knife, not dinner.”
She appeared with a paring blade.
Shaw helped Parker roll over. He asked, “Aren’t ripped jeans in now?”
She offered a tepid laugh.
He undid the tourniquet and tossed it aside.
Starting at the bullet hole, he cut a long slit in the jeans and pulled the two sides open wide. He looked over the wound. The round had been clean enough so that no serious infection had set in. Nor had the bleeding increased. She was stable for now.
He gripped the soapy cloth.
She said, “This where you tell me it’s going to hurt?”
“Take a deep breath.”
She did, and as he washed the wound, she said, “Oh, well. My... Oh shit.”
He then rinsed the leg with the water-saturated cloth and patted the skin dry. He cut a long strip of cotton from a sheet, about six inches wide, and, after pressing a dry terry-cloth square over the wound, bound her leg tightly.
“Okay?” he asked.
“As can be expected,” Parker whispered. She blinked away tears and took a clean washcloth to wipe sweat from her forehead. A feeble smile. “Guess you turned the heat up.”
Smiling too, he rose. The patient was taken care of, as best he could do. Now it was time for weapons.
He walked into the kitchen. “You said you had something we could use?”
She lifted a plug-in air freshener.
He frowned.
She asked, “Like can’t you make it into a bomb, or something?”
“Glade?”