The Furies by Irving McCabe Page A

rolled the Archduke onto his side. A stream of blood trickled from the wounded man’s mouth: his eyes opened again and his lips began to move. ‘Sophie…don’t die…please…for the children…’ He began to cough and splutter.
    â€˜Keep him on his side,’ Gabriel said, concerned the Archduke might choke on his own blood. He slit the back of the jacket from the hem to the collar, then watched Harrach and the aide pull the tunic off from the front. More blood spurted from the wound when the tunic was removed, only stemmed when the chief applied more pressure with his fingers.
    With the Archduke positioned on his side, Gabriel leant over the body to examine the wound. He couldn’t see an exit hole – only the entrance wound just above the right clavicle – but when the pressure of the chief’s hand was eased, the flow of blood coming through the hole was heavy and suggested a major vessel was involved. Could it be the subclavian vein, which lies close to the lung? It would explain why the wounded man was coughing up blood: for a moment Gabriel’s hopes rose; the Archduke might survive a subclavian vein wound. But when the chief removed his hand and Gabriel slipped his little finger into the gushing hole, he felt the track pass away from the lung and up towards the base of the skull. The Archduke must have been leaning backwards when the shot was fired, as the bullet had travelled upwards once it entered the neck. And that meant that either the jugular vein or carotid artery had been injured.
    In a battlefield situation a wound like this would normally be considered fatal, and any attempt at surgery would almost always result in death. Gabriel knew the situation was beyond serious, almost certainly hopeless, and he looked across at the chief. He could tell by the expression on his mentor’s face that he thought the same.
    In any case, what more could he do? He had no surgical kit, no bandages, no instruments – apart from a penknife. The aide had cut a piece of linen shirt into strips, and in desperation Gabriel used the blunt end of the penknife to stuff a piece of this ad-hoc dressing into the wound to try and reduce the blood loss. But the wound track was long – longer than the four-inch hilt of the penknife – and Gabriel suspected that the bullet was embedded deep at the back of the neck. Within a few seconds, blood was again seeping through the exit hole. More ominously, Gabriel heard the Archduke’s breathing change to shorter gasps with longer pauses between each breath.
    â€˜Can’t you do something more?’
    Gabriel looked up to see Potiorek staring down at him, the look on the General’s face one of utter desperation.
    â€˜Can’t you operate, stop the bleeding?’ Potiorek persisted.
    Gabriel’s eyes flicked towards the chief and they exchanged glances. The chief looked up at Potiorek.
    â€˜General, I’m afraid this is a fatal, untreatable wound.’
    Even though the chief’s words only confirmed what Gabriel knew to be the truth, hearing them filled him with dismay. It was always horrible when – in spite of your best efforts – a patient died under your care. But this, Gabriel thought, was different. The second most important man in the Austro-Hungarian Empire was going to perish right in front of him and there was nothing more he could do. He tried to suppress his rising anger. Why were they here at the Konak? Why hadn’t they driven to the hospital? He heard the Archduke mumble a few indistinct words, and then there was one final, drawn-out, sighing exhalation – almost a farewell: then silence.
    The chief felt for the carotid pulse on the other side of the neck, then looked across at Gabriel and shook his head. Gabriel knew it was over and sat back on his haunches, the desolate feeling of losing a patient already beginning to well up inside of him.
    And now – just as he was about