Here is chapter 2, in total there will be 10. I hope that readers will be encouraged to follow the story, and even to make some reviews.
Chapter 2. Not My Son – don Alejandro.
In the tavern Victoria and I, with the help of some parishioners, had organized the wounded and the doctor and his assistant were attending to one of them in the area at the back of the tavern, behind some of the tables set to one side. The mother had already taken the child away, who with the screams of one of the patients (laudanum is not as effective as we would like) had started crying again and was deafening us all. I am too old for this.
Victoria had returned to the kitchen, was preparing a stew that smelled wonderful, and had even had time to come out and pour me some wine. She said it was to calm my nerves. What a woman, I remember thinking at the time that I wished I had had a daughter like her. I looked at the clock and saw that it was barely 3pm, so the shooting would have been over about an hour and a half earlier, and while most of us men were still stunned by what had happened, the doctor and his assistant on one side and Victoria and her girls on the other were already going about their business. It's clear that idle living softens the brain, which is why I try to keep busy with the hacienda instead of letting an administrator take care of everything. I reflected on how many times I had tried to get Diego to understand, but that I had long since ruled out that this boy would listen to what I was saying, that his mind was always on other things that I couldn't even imagine.
I had barely drunk half a glass of wine when my world turned upside down. Felipe came running into the tavern with his hands and shirt stained with blood and gesturing. His gaze was frantic, and he seemed to be looking for someone, so I got up and stood right in front of him. At that speed I couldn't decipher what he was saying, I could only make out "Diego... doctor". I asked him loudly if Diego was hurt, as if yelling at him would do any good, but I was so nervous. He nodded and gestured again "doctor."
I ran to the back of the tavern and Felipe overtook me when he saw Doctor Hernandez there. The doctor knew what was going on as soon as he saw the boy, he doesn't need someone to slowly explain to him when there is an emergency, at his age I'm sure he has seen more than enough. The doctor put his instruments in his briefcase and followed Felipe out the door, with me close on his heels. His assistant followed a moment later.
We didn't have to go far, because right next to the tavern is the newspaper office. There, lying on the floor as long as he is (and he is well long, he has gone out to his maternal grandfather) was Diego, with his right leg wrapped in pieces of white cloth soaked in blood that had also formed a puddle on the floor. For a moment I felt dizzy, and I think I even mumbled, "Not Diego, not my son," but the doctor was on hand, holding me by the elbow to keep me from falling backwards to the floor, while his assistant brought me a chair to sit on. Good reflexes. Then the doctor bent down next to Diego, checked that he was still breathing, opened his briefcase, took out a pair of scissors to cut the soaked cloth, once the bandage was removed he put the tip through the hole in the pants and cut them to access the wound. By then I had come to my senses a bit and when the doctor wiped the leg with a cloth to see what he was dealing with I saw that it was clearly a bullet wound, almost perfectly circular.
"We need to get him to my office as soon as possible." said the doctor. His assistant went out the door, I guess to prepare the table.
Well, hearing that I thought of something simple I could do instead of just sitting there like a good-for-nothing. I got up, walked out into the square, and told the first two men I met to come with the tone of voice I used in the army when addressing a particularly dense soldier. They almost stood at attention and everything, but the important thing is that they followed me in.
Felipe and I took Diego by the shoulders, the other two men took care of the legs, the doctor took a bandage from his briefcase and as soon as we lifted Diego, he put pressure on the wound. It occurred to me that Diego weighs a lot, and he is not fat. I thought he must have strong bones.
When we walked out the door we saw that the square was full of curious onlookers. Victoria made her way over to ask, "What's wrong, is it Diego?" when she saw that it was him she turned pale, and I worried that she was now the one falling to the ground, but she held on.
I replied that Diego had been hit by a bullet, as we continued moving towards the doctor's office. Then the alcalde also came over to ask if anyone else was wounded, as if it wasn't obvious just by looking around. For reasons unknown to me he decided to follow us to the doctor's office. That man is a real pest.
We left Diego on a table in the back, the assistant prepared some instruments, and told us to wait outside.
Victoria reached out her hand to me, I don't know if it was to comfort me so I could comfort her, but it seemed like a good idea either way. We waited not knowing what to say. I think it was an hour, but it felt much longer. At last the doctor came out carrying a bullet in a little metal dish. In a professional voice he said:
"I have removed it, and contained the bleeding, but he has lost a lot of blood and there is a risk of infection."
I nodded, somewhat relieved, and asked if we could move him to the hacienda while beside me Victoria squeezed my hand.
"In a cart and slowly I see no inconvenience. The wound itself is not very serious, it is the delay in attending to it that has complicated things." reflected the doctor.
I couldn't help but speak aloud. "With all the noise in the square no one heard him if he called for help. He probably fainted soon after."
"Luckily he had time to improvise a bandage, because of the amount of blood on the ground, if he hadn't put a cloth compressing the wound he would have been dead." the doctor informed me.
"Yes, thank God he knew how to react," I said. "I'm going to the hacienda to get the wagon," I said, separating from Victoria.
Felipe, who until then had been in a corner unnoticed, stepped forward and pointed to his chest. Then he made a gesture as if he were writing. This time I really understood him, and I approved of his idea, he would get to the hacienda faster and he could bring a wagon. I turned to the doctor for pen and paper, and wrote a note to Ernesto, our foreman, who knows how to read because Diego helped him learn when Ernesto was a youth and Diego was just a boy of seven. I wrote the note while Felipe barely managed to stay still, eaten up with impatience; as soon as I put it in his hand he shot out the door.
I was wondering why the alcalde didn't get the hell out of there, when he seemed, at last, to think the same as me and said in a self-satisfied voice that he had other important matters to attend to. Thinking about a new absurd tax, yelling at Mendoza for something ridiculous, or daydreaming about his adored Madrid, no doubt. Then he added in a disingenuous tone that he hoped Diego would recover soon. I thanked him more for getting rid of him as soon as possible than anything else and he finally left.
After a short while the doctor came out of the consulting room and told me that I could go in with him, although he was unconscious and it was better to let him sleep. I went in and when I saw Diego I expressed my relief aloud, supposing that he had been unconscious all the time, but the doctor told me that he had not been, that he was awake when the extraction began, that he had been given laudanum but had not fallen asleep until after the bullet was removed.
I was surprised and expressed my amazement, because I had not heard Diego complain during the procedure, the doctor told me that he had asked for a stick wrapped in a cloth to bite on.
Victoria leaned out the door asking if she could come in, as if she didn't know that obviously she could, because I have long considered her part of the family even though we don't have the same blood. She seemed a little scared but determined to be there for Diego, so I told her that I'm sure Diego would feel better if she was there, which now that I think about it doesn't make much sense if he was unconscious, but it seemed to me that I would feel better. The doctor warned us to try not to wake him up, that getting some rest would do him good.
As I thanked the doctor, who was already on his way out the door, he made a comment that led to a strange conversation.
"He was actually lucky that the bullet didn't pierce the femoral artery, with that upward trajectory it came very close."
I got the feeling that something was amiss here. "Upward? If he was in the newspaper office. I wonder how that could have happened."
"Maybe someone fired from the ground, who knows. It was also fortunate that when it went through the wall the bullet didn't drag any splinters, I've seen wounds like that and they're very dangerous."
Of course he was absolutely right, wounds with some foreign element like splinters, cloth or dirt can be really terrifying. I have seen men lose an arm or a leg from a wound that seemed unimportant at first and ended up causing gangrene, but with Victoria there I preferred not to add anything else, hoping that Diego would not suffer any complications. She looked at Diego with a worried face and put her hand on his, as if to encourage him.
Felipe arrived with the cart in less time than seemed possible, and with the help of the doctor's assistant and another man who was passing by and to whom I gave some coins, we moved Diego carefully. When we began to move him he became agitated and opened his eyes, he looked confused, but when the doctor explained in a calm voice that he had already removed the bullet and that we were taking him to the hacienda I could tell that he relaxed a little.
As we were trying to carefully place him in the wagon the alcalde came to the door to pester. He decided that what my son needed at that moment was some sarcastic commentary.
"Why, Don Diego, it turns out that staying hidden in your office hasn't done much good."
I couldn't help but respond to him. "And what did you want Diego to do, who never goes armed?"
I only succeeded in giving him more fuel, I´m that thick. "Yes, sure, that's usually a good way to avoid trouble, although it doesn't always work." he told me cheekily.
For a moment it seemed to me that Diego was looking at him as if he wanted to break his nose, but when I moved his leg to position it properly he groaned asking us to be careful. That seemed to amuse the alcalde, easy when you're not the one with the bullet hole.
"Well, well, we already know you're hurt, I'm sure you can hold on for a bit."
When I finally left the leg on the blanket we had placed I clearly saw how Diego's face twitched in pain, hearing the alcalde speak again, I instinctively stopped looking at Diego to turn to him, in time to see his disdainful gesture.
"It doesn't seem serious, I'm sure in a few days we'll have him around again with his newspaper and his poetry."
I dismissed the string of swear words that came to mind, after all Victoria was ahead of me, but in reality it was mostly so as not to make a spectacle because she's surely heard much worse things in the tavern, I simply said. "We're leaving." and tapped Felipe's shoulder to signal for us to get going.
As we were moving Diego, Victoria had come into the tavern for a moment, she informed me that she had told her girls she was coming with us and had saddled her mare, so it was clear she was going with us. I told her that we could take care of Diego at the hacienda, but she reminded me that when she was hurt Diego was by her side and I didn't feel up to taking her up on it. I have known for a long time that if a woman like her is determined to do something I have no way to stop her. Deep down I was glad she was with us.