Open Wound: The Tragic Obsession of Dr. William Beaumont

by Jason Karlawish

  Beaumont shook his head. “Nothing sensible.”

  He looked to Elias, who shook his head as well.

  Pearce let out a kind of indignant snort. “I got a couple of Blackfeathers under arrest. One of 'em's your Frenchman. Your patient. And Edgar too. Seems that all the island's finest society came out in full fig for the Gumbo ball.”

  Pearce shook his head slowly.

  Beaumont set down the forceps he was washing. “Captain?”

  “Facts are that your boy was the object of a disputation which led to this fight between the Blackfeathers and the St. Louis brigades. So I'm having him and a couple of his comrades sober up in the brig, and we'll see what he says in the morning.”

  He touched two fingers to the brim of his hat.

  “My greetings to Mrs. Beaumont. We missed the two of you at the dance, but I understand she's soon to be lying in with child.” Pearce turned to leave, then turned back. “Your Frenchman had best not be at the root of this. And another thing, William. William, look at me.”

  Beaumont looked up from the instruments he was drying. Pearce gestured at the wounded man.

  “You talk to me first before you move him anywhere. Clear?”

  “Yes, Captain. That's clear.”

  Beaumont slept the remains of that night in a chair beside the wounded man. Sometime between the time when he last checked on the wounded man and sunrise, the man died. A somber group of his fellows from his brigade led in the man's bride, a Fox Indian, a striking beauty, no more that fourteen. Beaumont recognized her from the vaccinations three years past. The girl stood mutely beside the bed, her hands cradling her gravid belly, the outline of her navel visible beneath her thin cotton dress. She leaned in close as if to feel the breath of the man upon her cheek, looked at the voyageurs and Beaumont and Farnham, and then she walked away sobbing.

  FOURTEEN

  IN THE COLD GRAY DAWN BEAUMONT made his slow, solitary way along the hard-packed path to his cottage. A dusting of snow had fallen. Low flat clouds in the far eastern sky glowed pink. A large bird made its slow flight toward the treetops. From the bushes at the forest edge came the full-throated call of birds, and three smaller birds raced out to harass the large bird. Its long wings beat like oars as it soared upward and away until it was a mere speck above the harbor.

  Beaumont had seen the Indian girl before, and she affected him now as when he first met her at the company warehouse. He was in no hurry to return home. He stood along the hilltop facing southeast. Rex was beside him. Someone had wrapped a red kerchief around the dog's neck, and from time to time, he raised one of his hind legs to scratch at it. Beaumont squatted down and untied the kerchief and shook it out into its full dimensions.

  He looked down at the dog.

  “Everyone takes care of you,” he told the dog. “You're lucky.”

  Other men made great study of the Indians. Crooks speculated often about the origins of the Sioux's blood lust, the independence of the Fox and the sagacity of the Chippewa. For Beaumont the Indians blurred together, the tribes indistinguishable one from the other. The girl, however, he remembered. He had vaccinated her skinny arm some three years ago and saw her each season when the Fox came to collect their tribe's fees. She was beautiful and she was brave, unafraid to scorn with a withering gaze the lecherous soldiers, voyageurs and the company clerks. It saddened him to see her crying as she stood before her beloved, mutilated and rigid in death. The facts of the evening were unknown, but the idea that Alexis was involved sickened him.

  When he admitted himself to his house, he found Deborah seated at the kitchen table drinking a cup of milk. Dressed in her nightshirt, cap and stockings, she sat with her back to the low fire, her elbows upon the tabletop, her hands about the cup.

  “Are you well?” His expression was cast in worry.

  “I'm fine.” She set down the cup and patted the space on the bench beside her. “Come sit.”

  “How long have you been up?”

  “Since the hour the soldiers came to fetch you. I couldn't fall back asleep.”

  “Is Sarah up?”

  “Asleep.”

  He eased himself beside her, rubbed his face with his hands, put his arm around her waist and leaned his head upon her shoulder.

  “You should get back to bed.”

  “Later. It's good for me to sit like this. Where's Alexis?”

  “Captain Pearce has him in the brig.”

  “Prison?”

  He drew out a deep breath. “There was a stabbing last night. He didn't do it. That I am certain of. He's clever and foolish, but he's not violent.”

  “What happened to the man who was stabbed?”

  “It was a complicated wound.”

  She set down her cup and took up her husband's hands in hers. “I'm sure I'll hear all about it in the coming days. Emilie Crooks is convinced Alexis was one of the vandals who took down their privy. She's asked me when he has time to work if he's so busy drinking and skylarking. William, he's becoming an embarrassment.”

  “I heard all about her precious privy. She should pay more attention to her boy George if that's her complaint. That lad's discovered the bottle like an Indian.”

  The trumpet calling reveille carried in from the fort.

  Deborah exhaled. “It just doesn't seem worth it.”

  “What's not worth it?”

  “Worth having him about. Alexis. Our salon's little experiment in reading to him seems to have improved his English but not his morals. Poor Sally must be distraught. She invested so much hope in him.”

  He did not lift his head from her shoulder as he considered her remark. In time, she spoke again.

  “Do you see what I mean?”

  Beaumont considered her question. “I've—we've—put a lot into that lad, and he's not well yet. I just don't see.” He stopped speaking.

  “He's well enough to dance,” she said plainly.

  “Yes, I heard all about that. And to drink.” He swiveled upon the bench to better face her. “And chop wood. And sweep the kitchen. He's well enough to do chores.”

  “William, by the winter there shall be another child in this house. You shall be a father again. The prospect of a long winter with him here among us and the new baby and Sarah, it worries me. You know Sarah's starting to speak French. She seems to understand him when he chatters at her. And you. I heard you last night when they came for you. There was panic in your voice. You're affected by him too.”

  He surveyed the crowded kitchen, a space smaller even than the cluttered room his mother kept. His counted out the collection of mismatched mugs along the shelf. There were seven. He traced out the image of an old man's profile in the water stain in the ceiling. “What do you mean affected?”

  “I mean only to say that since he moved in here, since you started talking about composing his case for that journal, you've become distracted, distant even. Don't mistake me, William, I want you to succeed. Your success is our success, and you've done so well with him, that he does not fully heal is of small matter. Write up what you have for the Reporter, and let's let him leave before the freeze.”

  She looked about the kitchen, then faced her husband.

  “Let me start some breakfast,” she said.

  He rose.

  “No, you sit. I'll bring Sarah to you and take care of breakfast, and then I need to get back to the fort. Captain Pearce wants a meeting about the events of last night. I need to get Alexis back before he has him horsewhipped on the parade ground.”

  A CORPORAL ADMITTED BEAUMONT into the captain's office. The captain sat behind his desk, cleared of all objects save his short quill, an unlit candle in a pewter stand, an ink bottle and his sword. His cheeks glowed with a fresh shave, and his hair was combed back in a great wave. Ramsay Crooks was thoroughly relaxed with his massive legs extended and crossed at the ankles, his boots at high polish, arms crossed behind his head. The Reverend James sat stiff in his seat.

  The captain cleared his throat. �
��Doctor, I seem to recall a gathering of the same principals assembled here many months ago, and now we're all once again gathered by the river. You well know what happened last night. The voyageurs had their Gumbo ball, words were exchanged, and a man took a knife. And at the center of it all was your Frenchman with the hole in his side.

  “Seems that early in the evening his brother Edouard saw fit to make the man a kind of circus show and took bets on how much whiskey Alexis could drink. You know the rest. The lad gulps it down and then slips it out his bunghole. Word got out about his trick, and a couple of St. Louis brigade fellas who lost some cash made a joke of Alexis. Called him the boy with the asshole in his side and fell into mocking him. Edouard made him into an affair d'honneur. They got into fisticuffs. Within an hour a St. Louis man was found in a pool of bloody mud. You saw the results.”

  Pearce gazed at his desktop, then looked up.

  “Frankly, I'm fed up. Your boy with the hole in his side is more trouble than he's worth. I think I speak for the rest of the island when I say that the lad needs to be gone. If he's well enough to chop wood and drink whiskey like a fish, he's well enough to leave. And if I find he was involved in that stabbing, I'll cast him off personally.”

  Beaumont was nodding slowly. “Captain, with all due respect, embarrassing as his behavior is . . . ”

  The captain interrupted. “Shameful, I should say.”

  “Shameful, embarrassing, be that as it may, it strikes me as an uneven exercise of justice to cast away an innocent man. Can anyone properly vouch if Alexis was even there when the fight happened?”

  “He's an instigator.”

  “He's simply trying to recover and make a living, and I've seen fit to provide him the charity to make that possible. What sense is there to cast him away because others abuse him? I fail to see the logic of that ethic.”

  Pearce exploded. “Damn you, William Beaumont, that man's a drunk and a drain on this island!” He slammed his fist upon the desktop. “You should be ashamed for harboring him. Ashamed! This isn't the first time he's pulled that drinking stunt, and I have good reason to believe he was among the vandals who stove in the Crooks's privy. Reverend?”

  The reverend blinked like a bird.

  “Alexis is certainly a kind of instigator, but I am neither a lawyer nor a constable. And yet, his drinking and trickery and malfeasance mar the very charity that you and your wife have given him.”

  Like a praying mantis, the reverend slowly folded his long fingers into a kind of teepee before his face.

  Beaumont swallowed hard. “Captain, Reverend, Alexis St. Martin is my patient. He costs the island nothing, and if his drinking is cause for exile, you'd be left with a garrison of schoolboys and girls. He drinks no more than any other soldier and holds it better than half.”

  Crooks erupted into laughter. “Am I the only one? Am I?” His face had reddened. He wiped his eyes. “Holds it better than half! Good God, I should think he should hold it better. Or rather should not.” He gestured as though possessed by some fit and collapsed back upon his chair.

  The reverend spoke up. “Doctor, sentiment for the man clouds your judgment. Were he my servant, I would soundly discipline him.”

  Captain Pearce nodded. “I've heard enough,” he snapped. “Doctor, I've ordered Major Thompson to conduct an inquiry into the events of last night. If I find that your boy was even ten feet from that stabbing, he's gone. Gone, do you hear me?”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  “But never mind the hearing. It's your reputation at stake. Not mine. If you had any sense of propriety, you'd see the sense of discharging this drunk—this instigator—from your household and your charity. I've nothing more to say.”

  FIFTEEN

  THE FOUR MEN HAD BEEN LOCKED IN THE CELL since before dawn. Alexis was huddled into a corner on a wooden pallet. He sat with his knees pressed up to his chest and was wrapped in a thin blanket so that only the tip of his long nose and chin were visible. His brother Edouard lay on the opposite pallet, his legs crossed, his arms behind his head. Etienne, a fellow voyageur, lay on the floor. His forearm was slung over his eyes, and he was snoring lightly. Edgar stood with his back to them all, his face pressed to the cold grillwork, his hands wrapped around the vertical iron bars. The voyageurs were still outfitted in their clothes from the previous night's dance, pantaloons and red neck kerchiefs. They stank of whiskey and sweat. They had filled their slops bucket to the brim.

  Alexis looked over at his brother. “I'm not a show thing.”

  Edouard turned his head so as to face his younger brother. “What?” he replied dully.

  “I said, I'm not a show thing.”

  Edouard shrugged. He swung his hips so that he could reach deep into the pocket of his trousers. “Here.” He tossed Alexis a small cloth purse of coins. It landed with a dull clunk on the cell's packed earth floor. “I had Pierre place a bet on you. So now you're a rich show thing.”

  Alexis regarded the purse, and then he bent down, looked inside and clutched it close to his chest under the blanket.

  “It came to me as an inspiration,” Edouard explained. “You know how I am. You still drunk?”

  Alexis closed his right eye, then his left, then opened the right again. “No, but I'm still seeing double. You might have told me.”

  Edouard shrugged. “And then what? Look, we all made something from it. You got plans to work with that hole?” He pointed at his brother. “You could make some good money with that.”

  They had done their best to refashion the bandages so that the wound was once again compressed and covered.

  “When we get out of here, I'm coming with you.”

  “Not with that.” Edouard regarded his brother for some time. “You had a woman with that like that?”

  Alexis blushed.

  “Never the mind. I was just wondering. Just keep your shirt on if you do.”

  The brothers sat in silence. Alexis frowned. He took the purse out and hefted its weight.

  “You work for the doctor?” Edouard asked.

  “I do chores.”

  “He pays you? They have good money I bet.”

  Alexis shrugged his shoulders. “I told you. He takes care of me.”

  “When you gonna be better?”

  Alexis shrugged. “The doctor puts things in, takes things out, looks at it, even put some beef in it, but it still won't heal.”

  “Beef?”

  “As some sort of a plug to close up the hole. Didn't work. Something happened to the beef. It just got a hole cut into it. I never seen a man smile the way he did when he saw that. It was like he was happy it didn't work.”

  Edouard considered the idea, his brow knit into sharp ridges.

  “He treats you well?”

  “Sometimes when he's poking into it, I feel faint, and everything goes dark like I'm in a cave. He agreed to sew it up, but I won't let him. I'm afraid when he starts cutting he won't stop.” He coughed and picked after something in his hair. “He's a strange man. Very serious, you know, like a priest. His wife's sweet in the way the English can be. The child, she's cute. They're to have another.”

  Alexis stared off into the gloom.

  “I want to go.” He shivered and clutched the blanket around his skinny shoulders. “Every day he changes the bandages. Sometimes twice a day. It has gotten smaller. Someday it will close. What choice I got? He saved my life.”

  Edouard gazed at Edgar, who remained with his face pressed to the cold grillwork. He took up his wooden cup and tossed it at Edgar, who did not flinch when the cup bounced off his back and clattered on to the floor. “God, man, why don't you sit your ass down.”

  Edgar did not move.

  “He deaf?” Edouard St. Martin asked Alexis.

  Alexis raised his dark eyes slowly. “No. Just leave him be, Edouard.”

  Edouard dangled a leg off the cot and nudged Etienne with the heel of his boot. “Etienne, what the fuck are you doing sleeping like we were in camp gazing
up at the stars? Do any of you care we've been here for what, six hours?” He sat up on the edge of the cot. He called out. “Hello? Hello? Can we get some breakfast? Hey shit carrier, why don't you ask them to get us breakfast?”

  Edgar did not move from his place, but he spoke in a monotone. “You talk to me like that one more time, and I will rip off your nuts and stuff them down your skinny Gumbo throat.”

  Etienne yawned. “Watch out Edouard, he'll do it,” he said plainly. “The man's crazier than a badger in heat.”

  Edouard looked at his fellow prisoners. “They think one of us stabbed Philippe? By God, the man was fucking that Fox chief's daughter practically in broad daylight on the beach.” Edouard laughed. He booted Etienne gently once more. “You heard them, no? She's a shrieker.” He mimicked the woman's ecstasy, then stopped and looked at the other men. He turned to his brother. He was serious now. “Alexis, listen to me, we got to get out of here. Where's that doctor of yours?”