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Back Come Again No More Save as PDF
Chapters (55)
  1. Cover
  2. Back Cover
  3. Title Page
  4. Contents
  5. PART I 
  6. 1.
  7. 2.
  8. 3.
  9. 4.
  10. 5.
  11. 6.
  12. 7.
  13. 8.
  14. 9.
  15. 10.
  16. 11.
  17. 12.
  18. PART II 
  19. 13.
  20. 14.
  21. 15.
  22. 16.
  23. 17.
  24. 18.
  25. 19.
  26. 20.
  27. 21.
  28. 22.
  29. 23.
  30. 24.
  31. 25.
  32. 26.
  33. 27.
  34. 28.
  35. 29.
  36. 30.
  37. PART III 
  38. 31.
  39. 32.
  40. 33.
  41. 34.
  42. 35.
  43. 36.
  44. 37.
  45. 38.
  46. 39.
  47. PART IV 
  48. 40.
  49. 41.
  50. 42.
  51. 43.
  52. 44.
  53. 45.
  54. AUTHOR’S NOTE
  55. Touchstone Reading Group Guide

She swung back into the saddle. When they started off, the travois hit a bump, and she heard Eli moan. At least he was alive enough to feel pain. It stopped snowing, the wind-blown clouds began to drift apart. She rode next to the pony drag, a little behind Two Spuds on his pinto, under a moon slender as a potato peel. In its pale light, the bare limbs of a lone cottonwood tree clawed at the sky.

5.

AS THEY RODE, TWO SPUDS TOLD HER WHAT HAD happened, as much as he could figure out. Eli had overshot the turnoff for the house. He must have been driving too fast on the narrow track when he rolled the Cadillac. Somehow, he had dragged himself through the snow back to the car, rigged the spare gas cans to set it afire. The sound of the explosion had awakened Two Spuds in his cabin. He’d ridden out to see what it was, found Eli lying next to the wreck.

“Thank God you went to check,” Juanita said. “Another hour, maybe less, and he would have frozen to death.”

The first thing, she said, was to keep him from dying from the cold. Juanita knew la hipotermia from the years when she had worked as a nurse in clinics in the high mountains of Mexico. Her late husband, Dr. Meredith Hodgson, had trained her well in the treatment of hypothermia. In Chihuahua, the temperature could drop eighty degrees at night. People went to sleep with a thin blanket on a warm evening and froze to death before morning. She had seen patients brought in who seemed to be past saving, but if they could be warmed in the right way, they sometimes survived. It wasn’t the hands and feet you had to worry about, it was the cold that penetrated to the core of a person’s body. Two Spuds had done the right thing, wrapping Eli in the buffalo robe. Now they had to warm him from the inside out. Warm the heart and lungs, the rest would follow.

When they reached the house, she checked Eli’s pulse again. It was faint but steady. Two Spuds untied his rope. They used the old buffalo robe as a stretcher, carried Eli into the house and lifted him onto the long kitchen table. Juanita put a large kettle of water on the stove to boil and peeled back the buffalo robe to have a look at Eli’s broken leg. It was an open fracture, but the tibia had barely broken the skin. She had seen worse.