Chapter 14

As the sun was halfway in sinking over the horizon in the west, it became colder. The shoes Victoria was wearing, she could walk on it all day, serving customers and making her way in the plaza. They were not comfortable walking miles on the uneven terrain of sharp rocks and potholes.
Her feet were killing her. Victoria was determined to reach the hacienda before nightfall.

Less than a mile from the hacienda, Toronado stopped and refused to move.

"Toronado, come, we are so close. We are almost there. Look, I can see the hacienda in the distance." Victoria, pointing a finger in the direction of the hacienda, pleading with the animal. She was having a conversation with a horse! Why did she feel stupid? "Zorro told me to get Felipe. I have no idea why, but we are so close, come." Pulling the reins.

The horse ignored her, shaking his head, until she let go of the reins and headed in a different direction.
Victoria quickened up her pace to walk fast beside the horse and tried to get a hold of the reins again.
"Come, boy, we need to go the other way." The horse stopped, looked at her as if he was saying I know what I am doing and continued his way, heading straight for a mountain wall she had never been before.

Was Toronado taking her to the cave? She had been there before. It was close to the pueblo, and it might be on the de la Vega property. Victoria tried on more time to pursue the horse to follow her. The black stallion shook his head and continued his way. Victoria, not wanting to leave Zorro alone now he was wounded and vulnerable. She saw no other thing to do than follow the horse. Victoria had once said the horse was more clever than some men. She had to trust the horse knew what he was doing, getting his master in safety.

What she did, felt so wrong. Nothing could harm Zorro. That was what she had like to believe for years. Well, not really, of course. After all, Zorro was a man and no god. It felt wrong, she was trying to get Zorro to safety while he was always rescuing her and the rest of the pueblo. And Victoria had no idea what she was doing or what her next step was going to be. Zorro was powerless at the moment. She could not ask him for help, and the only living creature that could help her was a horse.

A horse! Victoria felt the urge to laugh. It must be a bad dream. Yes, that was it. All she needed to do was wake up and get this done. Victoria slammed herself in her face. Toronado looked like he seriously wanted to ask her, or she lost her mind.
She was not waking up. She pinched herself, and still when Victoria opened her eyes, she was not in her bed. Accepting the truth, it wasn't a bad dream. It was reality. Zorro was injured, maybe dying. And she was his only hope to get him to safety with the help of a large, impressive, half-wild stallion she always feared a bit.

Even if it would be easy to do on a moment like this, removing the mask did not come to her mind. All Victoria could think of is how to help Zorro survive and get him to safety as quickly as possible, keeping an eye open for other travellers or, in the worst-case scenario, lancers or the alcalde.

Toronado had taken the lead, walking closer till his nose almost hit the mountain wall he was heading for. The proud horse stepped his hoof on the ground, and the mountain began to move.

Open-mouthed, Victoria saw how Toronado went inside the mountain.
Zorro, his cave.
So perfectly hidden. You could walk by it less than two feet and miss the entrance. When the door began to close, Victoria hurried to take some steps forward.

She had been in once. The cave was more spacious than she remembered. The ceiling higher, and all was simply bigger. Some things looked slightly different, but most of it was all the same. The table filled with wooden contraptions, bottles and lots of things she couldn't name. The stable for Toronado and in the darkest corner a cot. At the centre was the large mahogany desk and the big chair she had been sitting on when Zorro proposed, and she accepted. On the ceiling, a glider hangs, and one of the walls had a large book cabinet stuffed with books. The short stairs she did not know where leading at. It was all still there.

Toronado stamping a hoof on the floor makes Victoria remembering why she was here.

Zorro. Right. What to do? How to get Zorro off Toronado and give the man medical help. She ain't a doctor. Sure, she knows how to deal with minor injuries.
Zorro had a gunshot wound, and Victoria was pretty sure the bullet was still in the body. He needed a doctor.
She circled the cave. Zorro could easily be twice her weight. There was no way she was strong enough to get him off the horse and on the cot on the other side of the cave.
She saw the cot looked like someone slept on recently. Was Zorro living in the cave? Victoria took off the blankets when, by some miracle, she gets Zorro on the cot. She did not have to get the blankets from under him.

The distance between Toronado and the cot was over seven yards. And the large desk and table prevented from getting the horse closer by.

A closer inspection of the cot taught her it could not get moved either.

Impatient, Toronado again stamps a hoof.

"Yes, I know. I try to think what to do!" Victoria irritated answers. For a second, the thought, stupid horse, flashed through Victoria her head.
She could try to wake Zorro. If any, it is easier to move him when he was awake.
"Zorro, Zorro." Carefully shaking his leg.

His eyes open, and he looks down at her, closing his eyes again. "Zorro, you need to wake up. I need your help." He comes from far when again his eyes open, he recognized her stuttering.

"Victoria. Go, get safe."

"We are in your cave. We are safe. Zorro, you need to help me. I can't get you off Toronado on my own." Victoria is desperate as she sees Zorro is fading away again.

"Safe. Love you."

Zorro was unconscious again. Victoria tried to wake him one more time, had to give up minutes later.
It was no use. Victoria felt hopeless. Zorro had sunken into unconsciousness again, and she couldn't get him to wake again. He had mentioned Felipe. Why Felipe?
The de la Vega hacienda was nearby. Desperate times called for desperate solutions.
"Toronado, you stay here and don't move. I am going to find Felipe and get help."

The horse neighs a little like he has understood what she said.

Victoria walked to the exit of the cave and looked at the complicated system of pulleys and ropes. Following one of them, she pulled one rope. Nothing happened. It had to be here somewhere?
She took a step back in the cave, and the door opened. How the hell did she do that? She must have stepped on something like Toronado had done to get in.
Once outside, she's orientating and headed south and sooner than Victoria expected, the hacienda came in sight.

Walking, stumbling and running as fast as possible, Victoria made her way to the hacienda.

After dinner, Alejandro had taken one of his favourite books, don Quichot, and relaxed in the library. Startled when someone was banging so hard on the door, he feared it would not hold. The don placed the book on the small side table. Whoever it was trying to get his attention, he wasn't giving up. Don Alejandro shouted, "Patience, patience, I am coming."

When he opened the door, the don saw the tavern owner, and she looked terrible.

"Victoria, what?"

The woman walked in, ignoring the don. "Felipe, I need to find Felipe."

"Felipe isn't here. He is in the pueblo. Haven't you seen him on your way over?"

Desperate times call for desperate solutions. For the second time, the saying flashes through her head.
"Don Alejandro, it is Zorro. He got shot, and it looks bad. Zorro told me to get Felipe. I don't know why. Zorro needs our help."

Alejandro's face froze solid, not expressing any emotion or what the man was thinking. Like he had not heard or understood what she was saying. Victoria tried again.

"Please, don Alejandro. He might die?s

lk

That worked. Alejandro woke from where his mind had wandered off to take her elbow and said with a sore voice. "Show me where he is."

"In a cave, near the hacienda. It is close by. We can walk. I think that is faster than saddling horses first."

"I feared you might say that." was the don's response. "Come, show me."

Victoria started running again, glimpsing over her shoulder to see, or the old don could hold up with her. His face was pale, and he looked concerned. Her waist started to hurt.
As hard as possible, she puts her fist in her waist, not slowing down. The old don effortless keeps up with her. Like what Victoria had told him had given him wings.

She stopped at the mountain wall. "Help me, don Alejandro." Stamping her feet hard on the ground near the spot where she had seen it Toronado do it before. "There has to be a hidden floorboard or something on the ground somewhere."

It was almost dark now, but it did not take long before the don yelled, "found it." and the hidden door opened.

The time that had passed might have been too long. Perhaps Zorro had died in the time she had needed to get help. And Victoria sigh relieved when Alejandro had checked his heartbeat and says. "He is still alive. We need to get him off the horse." Alejandro had run into the cave without stopping. He did not even stop to look around to take in where he was.

Toronado helps as much as he can. And with the combined effort, Victoria and Alejandro manage to get Zorro out of the saddle. The man groans in pain. Leaning heavily on the shoulders of the old man and frail woman, both make the most of their efforts, manage to get Zorro onto the cot, half dragging half carrying the masked man in their midst.

Don Alejandro is heavily breathing as he puffs. "What happened, Victoria?"

Victoria also in need of a few moments to regain her breath, "Señorita Annabella. She shot him in the back. I knew that snake was not to be trusted."

Alejandro was getting up and walked over to the table full of strange contraptions and equipment, Victoria did not know its purpose. He opens a draw looks in it and closes it to open the next. "We need to see, or the bullet is still in."

Victoria begging the don. "He needs doctor Hernandez."

"No, Victoria." Alejandro had found a pair of scissors and tweezer in one of the drawers. "I hate to say it, but the less know, the better. Help me." Out of a cabinet, Alejandro took a bottle Victoria recognized as one from her tavern and contained a strong rum Alejandro sometimes purchased for his vaqueros.

He wanted to get drunk? Sure alcehol numbs the pain but the bullet was still inside. "Don Alejandro, I don't think you should..."

"I am a former officer. I have done this before in much worse circumstances. Help me roll him on his stomach. Turn on that lamp and hold it as close as possible."

It was after Alejandro said that when she noticed the candles on the walls burning, providing the light, that should have made her wonder why they were on in the first place.

Alejandro took the rope from the floor Zorro had been tied up with before walked to the masked man and tied his hands to the cot.

Victoria rushes over to the cot and tries to stop the man what he is doing. "Don Alejandro, what are you doing?"

Victoria only saw sorrow in the man's eyes. "I am making sure he can't move. Victoria, I don't want to do this. But it is only the two of us. And I don't think he is going to be friendly when he wakes while I try to get the bullet out."

Alejandro found a second rope he cut in half. The longest half he used around Zorro, his chest, and the shorter to tie the legs together.

"Alejandro, I don't think."

"That is good, Victoria. We need to act and don't think." Alejandro washed his hands and the tweezer in the rum and kneeled beside the cot. "Hold the lamp a little higher and closer. Keep it still. He has lost a lot of blood. First, we must get the bullet out. After that gets done, you may get angry, cry and do what you want."

The worst minutes of her life so far passed very slowly. Alejandro seems to know what he is doing. Victoria can barely look at how the man does his best to get the bullet out. Zorro doesn't move or moans any more.

Alejandro is proudly holding the tweezer and a small steel ball in the air.
"There is the little devil." The short procedure made the wound starts bleeding again.

Alejandro gets up and takes the lamp out of Victoria her hands. From the mahogany desk, he takes the bottle of rum and scans the table until he finds a small piece of wood.

"Don Alejandro, what are you going to do?" Victoria wonders.

"Old army trick to make sure the wound won't get infected." He hands her the piece of wood.

"Where do I need this for?" Hesitantly, Victoria accepts the thick short stick.

"Push it between his teeth and hold it in his mouth as I pour the wound with rum."

"Why do I need to do that?" An anxious feeling crept up on her. Somehow she knew and feared what the don was up to. Actually, Victoria only asked because she hoped she was wrong.

Patiently, the man explains. "The worst is yet to come. What I am about to do is going to hurt even more, and we must prevent Zorro from biting his tongue off."

Victoria, her eyes, turned big. "Don Alejandro, I am not sure whether I can..."

"Do it?" Alejandro, finishing what Victoria was stuttering. "You don't have a choice, dear. Hold the stick between his teeth and try not to think."
He waits for Victoria to nod. She has a determined look on her face. "And whatever you do, keep your fingers as far away from his mouth as possible."

.

.

Despite what we see in series and movies, at that time it was not so common to disinfect instruments and hands while taking care of injuries. Many lives could have been saved if doctors had cleaned their hands and instruments before providing medical care. Just think of all the stories of soldiers whose body parts were removed, and the many who didn't survive afterwards.

The cases of maternal fever and infant mortality decreased dramatically when Dr. Semmelweis, a physician in Vienna, realized in 1848 that doctors did not clean their hands properly between caring for patients who eventually died and helping the birthing woman.
There were two departments in the hospital he worked. The poor ward where midwives helped with childbirth and the number of cases of maternal fever was low. And the ward for the rich patients, where many women and children died. The only difference he could discover was that in the poor ward, the midwives rarely came into contact with the deceased. His collegues helping the woman on the rich ward did.
He instructed his colleagues to wash their hands with a chlorine solution, and the deaths of maternity women and babies dropped right off. It took years for the medical community to finally understand what caused this.

So this rum trick that Alejandro does was not something that would have been common in a time when no one had heard of bacteria. That's not to say that precautions like washing hands and instruments were not taken (sometimes). They just didn't know why some things helped and others didn't.

And maybe I'm completely wrong on everything and someone has a much more accurate factual knowledge of wound care before the 20th century. ;)