“Catherine,” Scout said. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, I’m fine.”
Her hands felt warm and she swayed slowly back and forth. Her face eased a bit, but Hunter still saw pain in her eyes-his pain. He looked back at Scout.
Scout shrugged. He reached for Hunter’s bag that fell off the bike, dug out the water bottle and used the bag to prop up Hunter’s feet.
“We’ve got to stop the bleeding,” Scout said.
Hunter looked at his arm again, this time in fascination. Blood trickled off his elbow and pooled in the dirt.
Scout held the water bottle for Hunter as he drank, before emptying the rest over the wound, washing away the blood and grime. Hunter winced from the contact of cool water and thrashed his feet around some more at the tingling jolt. Then Scout pulled a small brown bottle from his pocket and unscrewed the cap.
“What’s that?” Hunter asked.
“It’s my bottle of iodine. It will kill all the germs just like when we put it in our bottled water. The iodine will keep the wound from getting infected.”
“Will it sting?”
“Hardly. You shouldn’t feel a thing.” Scout squeezed the bottle and red liquid shot over the open wound.
A cold, raging fire from hell singed every nerve in Hunter’s arm. Catherine winced. Hunter screamed. “Hardly my ass, you lying son of a bitch!”
Scout smiled, then gently wrapped Hunter’s arm with a clean shirt from his own backpack. “Hold your other hand here and apply some pressure until I get back,” Scout said.
Hunter, panting like a mad dog, did what Scout instructed. “Where are you going?”
“I have to find sticks to splint your arm. I won’t go far. Call out if you need me.”
Hunter watched Scout disappear into the inky darkness of the early summer evening. The stars illuminated the night, but probably not enough for speeding across the prairie. Scout would never let him forget this one. He realized that when Jimmy discovered what happened, Hunter would be lucky to leave town riding a tricycle.
Catherine’s warm hands and tiny fingers caressed his head. She smiled at him. Her eyes, brighter than the stars, contained a promise that everything would be all right.
Hunter’s worries dissolved. “Are you doing this?”
“Doing what, silly?” She scooted up on her knees and settled back down without moving her hands.
“Are you making me feel less pain, somehow?”
“I’m returning the favor. You found me, and now I’m helping you. Isn’t that what a friend is supposed to do? Plus, I hate when people suffer.”
“Yeah, but how is this possible? What are you?”
“I’m a little girl, silly.” A breeze stirred through Catherine’s hair and the candle went out. Her eyes still sparkled among the stars, even with the absence of candlelight.
Scout slipped out of the wind-lashed prairie grass and dumped a bundle of sticks with a loud clatter. He prepared a miniature teepee of twigs and then flicked open his silver Zippo, releasing the sweet smell of butane. He ignited a tiny fire and added sticks to the flames. Warm light filled their surroundings.
“Aren’t we going to leave soon?” Hunter asked.
“Not a chance. We’re going to have to make camp and wait ’til morning. You can’t ride like that, anyway.”
Scout lifted Hunter’s bike and set the kickstand, inspecting the handlebars while Hunter worried that he ruined his bike for good this time. He might be forced to ride a new bike, but he liked his Kawasaki. They had covered a lot of miles together over the past two years. The bike started on Scout’s second kick, the engine hummed and Hunter relaxed.
Scout cut the motor, restoring quiet. “We’ll see if it still rolls straight in the morning.”
They ate apples and dried meat from Scout’s backpack clustered beside the jittering flames. Scout left with the water bottles. After a while, he brought them back full and disappeared again, returning with another armload of firewood.
Scout examined two sticks before placing them away from the fire. He pulled a shirt from Hunter’s bag. “Is this clean?”
Hunter nodded. “I washed it in the Platte yesterday.”
“I guess that will have to do,” Scout said, dropping the shirt on the two sticks.
Hunter tracked Scout’s movements around until it made him dizzy. “Why are you so busy? Sit down. Take a break.”
“I’ve got good news and bad news,” Scout said. “Good news is I don’t think your Kawasaki is that bad off.”
Hunter stared at him until the dramatic pause stretched too long. “And the bad news?”
“You won’t be riding for a while with a broken right arm. Can’t throttle, can’t brake, and you certainly can’t steer, but I think that last one is what caused the accident in the first place.”
Hunter understood the real bad news. “I’m going to be stuck in town.”
Scout’s grin flashed in the firelight. “Yeah, that sucks for everybody.”
Hunter groaned, but not from pain.
“One more piece of bad news,” Scout said. “I have to set the arm back in place.”
A shiver ran through Hunter’s body, causing a sudden urge to flee that he was totally unable to muster. “Shouldn’t we wait until we get back to town and let Luis take a look at it?”
Scout nodded. “Sure, we could wait and you could go into shock, but I know how to set a broken bone. Remember, I helped Luis last year when that tree fell on Brady’s leg.”
“Brady! You mean that lumberjack kid with the limp?”
Scout spread his hands. “I don’t want to do this anymore than you, but I’m thinking we might as well get it over with and let you start healing.”
Hunter stared into the flames of the campfire; terrified of the pain to come no matter what magic Catherine worked. A spasm triggered in his right leg. He had never experienced fear like this before, and hated it.
“It’s going to hurt.”
“Yeah,” Scout said.
“Do you have any liquor?”
Scout shook his head. “None that lasted.”