Chapter 9
“I know it,” Bennet said, though he did not know whether the man had heard.
He saw, past the line of casks, a darker square where a crate had been set, and upon it, the coil whose end had been gnawed.
The bright thread was running to join it.
He went across the floor as if through mud.
A board gave beneath his left foot with a crack; the sound went through his bones.
He put his hand against a cask to steady himself and felt the heat in it like a pulse.
At the crate, he set the neckcloth across his mouth and nose, leant, and brought the knife down upon the cord.
The blade bit; the hissing sound split into two smaller sounds like water thrown upon iron.
He pressed again with that steadiness that moves through resistance by refusing to quarrel with it.
The cord parted. The end closest to him burned to a black bead and died.
The farther end continued its small advance, but he saw that it would reach now only dead powder, not the heart of the coil.
“Out,” a voice cried at his back, not commanding now, imploring. “Sir—out—”
He looked over his shoulder but did not see faces; only the door with the rain beyond it, and a sheet of smoke that had thickened until the world had narrowed to the length of his arm.
He took a step and felt the floor rise as if to meet him.
A high thin crack came from somewhere behind him.
Instinct made him turn his head towards it though there was nothing to see.
The air shifted; in the same moment, there was a blow—no object he could name, only the striking of force upon the ear and skull—and all the light went to bright stars at the edge of his sight.
He found himself upon one knee, with one hand flat upon the board to keep the world from sliding. His mouth filled with the taste of metal. Something was sounding in his ear; he could not tell whether it was outside or within. He waited, and the floor steadied under his palm.
Stand, he told himself, as one might address a reluctant horse. Stand, and go forward; there is work.
He set his foot, felt it take, and rose. The stars faded to a milky wash. He saw, as if from a distance, the sleeve of his shirt darkening from cuff to elbow, and knew he had torn the skin upon the crate.
He went towards the door. The air near it had made a small bargain with the rain and could be taken. He felt a hand upon his shoulder, then two or three at once, and heard his name called.
“Bennet—Bennet—here—mind the sill—”
He was over it, and the rain struck him with such vigour that he felt, for a second, the absurd wish to thank it.
The yard was a confusion of figures—some running, some bent over tubs set upon trestles.
The bell kept on in the tower with that stubborn pace bells have when the ringer’s breath is spent.
Bennet took one step, then another. He meant to say, Mind the second man, his ankle, but the words would not form. He lifted his hand to point, and someone caught the wrist.
“Sir, be still—” a sergeant said, his voice firm with that careful civility men use when fear sits beside it. “Sir, you are—get him down.”
Bennet did not understand what was meant by down until the ground approached of its own accord and his knees went without being asked.
Two men had hold of him, one under each arm.
The rain had thickened into a sheet through which faces were torches—and there were lanterns too, brought with haste, their glass beaded and streaming.
The heat followed him out of the door as if it had a grievance to pursue.
“Blanket,” someone cried. “Bring the—no, the wet one—God’s sake—”
The smell of singed cloth reached him then, a sourness that passed the nose and struck a memory of a winter hearth and a scullery girl’s ribbon caught too close. He felt nothing at his legs but heaviness; his hip seemed stiff, as if it had grown old.
Men pressed near him. One dragged at his boot; another caught his shoulder and pressed him to the ground. The first shock of the wet blanket against his leg and hip made him see the stars again, finer now, like dust scattered in sunlight.
He hissed through his teeth.
“Hold him, Jem,” the sergeant said. “Do not strike; lay it—aye—there. Sir, forgive us. It must be done.”
Bennet tried to lift himself upon his elbows and could not.
Rain ran into his eyes; he closed them and opened them again.
The face above him altered; what had been the sergeant’s blunt features were replaced by the garrison commander’s, his hair darkened by rain to almost black.
The commander did not kneel; he bent in the way of a man who hates bending but will do it when he must.
“You have done enough, Captain Bennet,” he said, very distinctly, as if clear words might make a salve. “Do you hear me?”
Bennet made an effort to answer; what came was a breath rather than a word. He wished to say, the fuse, but could not shape it. The commander’s gaze moved from Bennet’s face to his leg.
“Get the surgeon,” he said. “Run.”
From the open door there came a flare and a cough of sound, then the wind shifted. In seconds, the smoke lay upon the ground like a cloak. The men at the trestles bent their heads and set their shoulders; water went into the room in a steady fall.
Somewhere within the chamber a board gave, and there was a small rushing as of air being drawn where it had not gone before; yet there was no great detonation.
He tried again to sit. A hand went to his chest and kept him where he was.
“Sir,” the sergeant said, almost with reproof. “If you please.”
Bennet let the breath go out of him. He saw the surgeon come at a half-run that looked odd upon him, for he was a man careful of his steps, who had never mislaid a foot in his life. The surgeon’s case hung upon a strap across his body and beat against his hip as he moved.
“Hold the light,” the surgeon said. He knelt at Bennet’s side, and without preamble put his hand where the blanket did not cover and where the cloth of the trousers had been. His touch was light.
“Can you feel that?”
Bennet found his voice. “I feel enough.”
“That, at least, is a comfort,” the surgeon said.
He glanced once at the commander, who had come closer. “I must see him settled before we test what has been spared.”
“What of the store?” the commander asked, not to Bennet.
“The flame is near beaten, sir,” a voice from the door replied. “The line is cut. The far coil burned to ash only. The casks sweat, but they hold.”
The commander looked down again. “Do not move him yet,” he said. “Bring a board; lift gently. Captain Bennet, can you attend?”
Bennet inclined his head. He felt the world grow narrow and precise: the wetness upon his lips that might be rain, the scrape of a blade somewhere within the open door, the sound of the pump-lads gasping and then laughing without amusement. The surgeon’s face entered his sight, upside-down.
“You will not be gallant for me,” the surgeon said, and there was something like a smile at the corner of his mouth. “You will be obedient. There is a difference.”
Bennet closed his eyes because there was no sense to be made with them open.
He heard the board set down beside him. He was shifted onto it, then lifted.
The rain sounded louder for a moment. Then the pain gathered itself and became darkness.
He let it come.