Kitabı oku: «Bride by Accident», sayfa 2

CHAPTER TWO

‘IS THERE someone inside?’

The call echoed through the smashed bus and no words had ever sounded sweeter.

Emma had listened to the sirens approaching. She’d heard vehicles stop, people talking, urgent voices, kids crying. And now there was a voice, calling through the shattered back window. It was the voice of the man she’d thought was Corey.

It wasn’t Corey. She must have been stupid to think it was.

Whoever it was, at least it was help.

‘They’re here,’ she told Suzy.

Suzy couldn’t answer. Of course she couldn’t. But the little girl’s bravery defied description. She was following orders to the letter, not moving a fraction. Her eyes were locked onto Emma’s, and Emma knew that contact was dreadfully important.

So was the contact Emma’s fingers were making. She was holding the ballpoint as if it was the most precious thing in the world. As indeed it was. It was the fine thread between life and death.

And now it seemed as if life might just win. Might…

‘We’re in here,’ she called, trying to make her voice assured. Mature. In charge. ‘Suzy and I are here, just waiting for rescue. We’re hoping for the fire brigade.’

There was a moment’s hesitation.

‘Is Kyle in there with you?’

Lightness faded. There was no way to dress this up to make it less brutal. She tightened her grip on Suzy’s forehead, and forced herself to respond.

‘Kyle’s been crushed,’ she said flatly. ‘He’s dead. He must have died instantly.’

There was a moment’s silence. An awful silence while those outside the bus took in the awfulness.

Then another question, as if he was afraid to ask.

‘Is Suzy OK?’

‘She’ll be fine,’ Emma said, forcing her voice to sound firm and sure. ‘But we’ve had some problems. I’ve performed a tracheostomy. I’m holding a ballpoint casing in position to help her breathe. We can’t move.’

There was an even longer silence at that.

‘You’ve performed a tracheostomy?’

‘Yes. Her face has been badly hurt. But she’ll be fine, just as soon as you can get her out of here.’

‘Who the hell are you?’

‘Emma.’ What did he want? she thought grimly. Proof of medical qualifications?

‘You’re the pregnant lady who was driving the Kia?’

‘That’s me.’ She smiled down at Suzy and tried again to force lightness into her voice. ‘So there’s me, there’s my bulge and there’s Suzy. We’d appreciate it if you could get us out as soon as possible. Please.’

‘We’ll do our best.’ There were sounds of an argument outside the bus but she couldn’t make out exactly what was being said. A few voices, mixed.

‘Miss?’ It was another voice. Lower. Deeper.

Different.

‘Yes?’

‘I’m Greg Nunn from the fire brigade.’

That was good news.

‘We hoped the fire brigade would come,’ Emma said, speaking to Suzy as much as to the voice outside. ‘If we have a fire engine, then we think that anything’s possible. We’re very pleased to hear from you, Mr Nunn. Suzy and I were hoping we might get rescued by the fire brigade—and here you are.’

Only they weren’t quite close enough. ‘We can’t come in,’ Greg told her. ‘No one can until the bus is secure. This bus isn’t too stable.’

Her smile faded a bit. Not too stable…

‘We know that,’ she said in some asperity. ‘What are you going to do about it?’

‘Can you lift the little girl out?’

‘I told you, I can’t. First, we’re right down at the front of the bus and I’m not very good at climbing and lifting. Second, I’m holding a tracheostomy tube in place.’

‘Can you come out yourself?’

He had to be joking.

‘No,’ she said flatly.

‘If she’s holding a tracheostomy tube in place, she can’t,’ the first voice said. The doctor?

‘Who are you?’ she asked—and it was suddenly absurdly important that she knew. He had a doctor’s bag. He had to be a doctor.

She could really use a doctor right now.

‘I’m Devlin O’Halloran,’ he told her. ‘Dr O’Halloran.’

She froze.

Things were swinging away from her again. The sensation of dizziness she’d fought ever since her car had been struck came sweeping back, and for a horrible moment she thought she might pass out.

Devlin O’Halloran.

Was this someone’s idea of a sick joke?

Corey. Devlin. Of course.

It wasn’t a joke.

‘I can’t come on board,’ he told her, and his voice sounded strained to breaking point. ‘We can’t put extra weight inside. We’re working to secure the bus now.’

‘That’s good,’ she managed, but her tone must have changed.

‘Are you sure you’re all right?’ he demanded, then, as an aside, added, ‘Damn, I’m going in.’

‘You go in and the whole thing goes down the cliff,’ she heard someone say. ‘It doesn’t need any more weight. Get real, Doc. We’re working as hard as we can.’

Forget the O’Halloran bit, she decided. Her brain was working on so many levels it was threatening to implode from overuse.

She couldn’t think about the O’Halloran thing. She didn’t want to look around the bus—she mustn’t. She had to keep positive—keep hopeful—so that she could remain smiling down at Suzy as if she really believed things were fine.

‘What’s happening out there?’ she called.

This was surreal. She was kneeling by Suzy it was as if they were in a cave and the rest of the world didn’t exist. She could hear the sea below them, the waves crashing against the cliffs.

It was a normal sunny day. There were shafts of sunlight piercing the shattered windows. Fifteen minutes ago this had been a glorious morning.

If she looked downwards she could see the sea through the smashed windows. This was wild country and the wind was rising. The sea here was a maelstrom of white foam against the cliffs. Waiting…

‘We’re attaching cables to the bus,’ someone called. ‘To get you steady.’

‘That’s a good idea.’

‘But we don’t have enough cable,’ someone else called. ‘We’ve sent for some from the town. We need steel cables to attach to the trees, and the only trees strong enough are along the cliff a bit.’

‘But we’ve hooked a rope on the fire-engine,’ someone else called. ‘That should help.’

‘Not enough to let Doc down into the bus,’ someone else called. ‘The road surface isn’t stable enough. But we’re working fast.’

‘Work faster,’ she said faintly. ‘We like the idea of the fire-engine but Suzy and I are running out of things to talk about.’

It took half an hour. Half an hour while Suzy’s throat swelled even more, and it became more and more difficult to keep the plastic tubing right where it had to be. There was bleeding into the wound and a couple of times her breathing faltered.

Emma lifted her a little, cradling on her knees so her head was slightly elevated. She watched her like a hawk, and as her breathing faltered she moved, adjusted, adjusted…

Somehow she kept her breathing.

She must be in such pain. The child lay limply in Emma’s arms and stared up at Emma her as if the link to this strange lady above her was the only thing between her and death.

Which wasn’t so far from the truth, Emma thought, as the minutes dragged on.

The ballpoint casing couldn’t last for ever.

Hurry.

But finally the cable arrived. She heard shouts, barked orders as the men and women outside finally had something to do.

And then…

‘She’s secure. We’re coming on board.’

‘Don’t wait for an invitation,’ she called, and she knew that her voice was starting to wobble. ‘Come on in. And bring morphine.’

‘We’re coming now.’

Two of them came on board. The doctor—Devlin?—and a middle-aged lady in khaki overalls with an ambulance insignia.

They crawled into the bus the same way Emma had come in. She cradled Suzy and watched them come—but only with her peripheral vision. She was still looking down at Suzy, aware that the eye contact she had with the little girl had assumed immense importance.

‘They’re coming, Suzy,’ Emma whispered. ‘The cavalry. Dr Devlin O’Halloran and friend.’ She glanced up at the approaching figure—a big man in a loose pullover and jeans. Someone had given him leather work gloves. He had a thatch of deep black hair, wavy, sort of flopping over his eyes as if he was in need of a good haircut. He looked so like…

No. He didn’t look like anyone, she told herself fiercely. No one she could think of right now.

‘I guess this must be your local doctor,’ she told Suzy. ‘Do you know him?’

But Suzy’s eyes were blank. Glazing a little. Shock and pain and blood loss were all taking their toll.

‘Have you brought fluids and morphine?’ she demanded. That was what she needed most.

‘We have.’

Dev had paused momentarily by Kyle—just momentarily. Emma hadn’t looked that way again. Not once. But she knew what he’d be seeing and she heard in his voice how much he hated it.

‘We’ve brought everything we need,’ Devlin said, but the inflexion in his voice was odd. He wasn’t commenting on Kyle. He didn’t have to.

‘There’s nothing we can do here,’ he said to the woman with him, and it was almost a sigh. He started to clamber lower.

Helen remained with Kyle, her face closing in distress. ‘I’ll call in a stretcher for Kyle,’ Helen said, as Dev fought his way over the upended seats to reach Emma and Suzy. ‘Unless you need me there. Do you?’

‘Go ahead,’ Devlin said grimly. And then he paused.

He’d reached them. He saw—and his face grew almost incredulous as he saw the situation they were in. As he saw Emma’s makeshift attempt at a viable tracheostomy. ‘How the hell—?’

‘Don’t ask questions,’ Emma said, fighting off faintness once more. ‘I want morphine and intravenous fluid and I want it now.’

‘But…’

She didn’t have time to listen to buts. ‘The ballpoint’s secure enough,’ she said grimly. ‘For now. But we need to work fast.’

A stunned pause.

‘Yes, ma’am,’ he said. He cleared a flat spot to put his bag and hauled it open, with another fast, incredulous glance at Emma. Then he started work.

‘It’ll be a couple of minutes before we have Suzy ready to shift,’ he told Helen. ‘Go ahead and lift Kyle free. I’ll manage here. I think. Or rather, we will.’

It was a dreadful place to work. An impossible angle. Far too much broken glass. Seats that were upside down. Suzy was lying on the outside wall of the bus, jammed against the bus wall and two seats. Over the last half-hour Emma had wiggled so she was right in there beside her, supporting her head as best she could. It was impossibly cramped.

Dev had taken the situation in at a glance. Emma underneath the little girl, her fingers holding the ballpoint tube.

‘I can’t move,’ Emma said—unnecessarily—and Dev nodded.

‘Don’t.’ He smiled down at Suzy, a slow, lazy smile that almost reassured Emma. Almost. ‘You guys just stay still while I do my stuff,’ he told them. He wouldn’t be sure if Suzy was hearing him but he wasn’t taking chances.

‘Suzy, I’m giving you something for the pain right now,’ he told her. ‘Then I’m going to put a little tube in your arm so we can replace some of the blood you’ve lost. As soon as you stop hurting so much, we’ll lift you out of here. Your mum and dad are waiting on the cliff.’

Of course they would be. Emma winced. All the mums and dads would be frantic. By now the rest of the kids would probably have been taken back to town, she thought, and reunited with their parents.

Except for Kyle.

Don’t go there.

She was close to breaking, she thought, suddenly fighting another wave of nausea. It was adrenaline that had kept her going until now. But Dev was here and…

‘Don’t give in now, Emma.’ Devlin’s voice jerked her back. To the urgency of what she was doing. The dizziness receded. ‘Suzy needs you too much.’

‘I wasn’t planning on giving in,’ she said with what she hoped sounded like indignation. ‘Only wimps give in.’

‘And you’re no wimp.’

He sounded teasing, she thought. Nice.

That was another crazy thing to think. Just because he had Corey’s face…

No.

He had a syringe prepared now. Swiftly he swabbed Suzy’s arm and injected what must be morphine. He wasn’t touching her throat. He had too much sense.

‘I don’t think a stretcher’s going to work in here,’ he said, glancing at the chaos around them as the morphine slid home. ‘That ballpoint needs to stay absolutely still. I don’t think taping’s going to work.’

‘I don’t see how it can.’ She was lifting the tube a little so it wasn’t hitting the far wall of the trachea. A proper tracheal tube would go down, past the damage and the swelling. But to put a proper tracheal tube in now…To remove the ballpoint and to take such a risk…

No. She needed to keep it in place until they got somewhere with decent theatre facilities, where they could operate fast. Where they’d have oxygen to compensate for faltering breathing.

She couldn’t leave her ballpoint.

‘I think the only way is if we inch her out,’ Devlin was saying. He was setting up an IV line, knowing they had to get fluid in. It’d make it more complicated to lift her but they could place the bag on her chest and she needed the fluid so much… ‘Literally inch by inch,’ he continued. ‘If I lift her, can you come with me every step of the way? Can you do that?’

‘I can.’

He was looking at her—really looking at her—and there was concern in his face. ‘You’ve been in the accident yourself. You were concussed. You shouldn’t be here.’

‘I am here. Let’s get on with it.’

‘I can ask Helen to take over.’

‘You can’t.’

‘Why not?’

‘It’s taken me time to figure out where this has to lie,’ she told him, motioning with her eyes to the ballpoint. ‘If I wobble even a fraction from where I’m holding it, it’ll block, but I’ve figured out now how to get it back. I’m the only safe person to hold it.’

He stared at her for a long moment—and then nodded. There was no choice and he knew it.

He went back to fitting the intravenous line. Above them came the sound of scraping, of broken glass being scrunched.

Kyle’s stretcher was being hauled from the bus.

‘Do you want any more help in here?’ Helen sounded subdued—as well she might. She’d helped the stretcher out and then had paused at the window.

‘We’re going to have to do this on our own,’ Devlin told her. ‘Just clear a path, Helen, and cross every finger and every toe. And then some.’

He shouldn’t ask her for help.

He didn’t have a choice.

Dev lifted the little girl carefully, so carefully, inching his way backwards out of the bus. Every move had to be measured so the woman—Emma—could keep up with him. Her hand was holding the ballpoint steady so air could enter Suzy’s lungs. She looked so battered he’d been afraid she’d faint, but that battering wasn’t affecting her hand. It was rock steady.

Could she keep it up?

Maybe they should stay, he thought. Maybe they should try and stabilise the airway.

To operate in these confines, to remove the ballpoint and try and replace it here…

They couldn’t.

It was a huge risk to move Suzy, but it was a risk they had to take. He was forced to depend on this woman he didn’t know. This woman who should be a patient herself.

She must be a doctor. She had to be. To perform a trach-eostomy in these conditions, with such a result—it was an operation that was little short of miraculous.

But where had she come from? She wasn’t a local. Yet tourists didn’t tend to travel alone, not when they were six or seven months pregnant.

Now was not the time to ask questions, he decided as he kept inching out. He had Suzy cradled in his arms and Emma was with him every inch of the way.

Just as long as she held up.

He glanced at her face and it was sheet-white. She had the baby to consider, he told himself savagely. She’d been almost unconscious when he’d found her. She should be in hospital herself.

If she were in hospital, Suzy would be dead.

He needed her. Suzy needed her.

He kept inching out backwards.

Emma kept following.

They emerged to a scene that made Emma blink.

The children were gone—all of them. The bus driver, the truck driver, the injured teacher—they were gone, too. They must have been ferried away from the scene at some time while the bus had been in the process of being stabilised. There were two steel cables running from the bus’s chassis to the trees on the opposite side of the road.

Since those cables had been attached, they’d been safe.

What else?

Kyle was still there. His tiny, blanket-covered body lay to one side and there was a fireman sitting beside the stretcher. Just sitting. As if he’d sit however long it took. No matter that there was nothing to do. The man’s stance said that he was simply here to guard. To begin the grieving for the loss of a tiny life.

Once again Emma felt tears welling behind her eyes.

‘Not yet,’ the man beside her said, and she blinked.

He knew what she was thinking?

‘I’m fine,’ she muttered, and he smiled, albeit a shaky one.

‘I know you are. You’re great.’

There was a stretcher waiting, with Helen hovering. They lay laid Suzy down with care. The morphine had taken hold now and she was drifting in a haze of near-sleep.

‘I’ll take over now,’ Devlin said, moving to take over her grip on the ballpoint, but Emma shook her head.

‘I know how it should feel,’ she told him. ‘I have it right where it should be. I’m hanging on until we get to a proper theatre with proper equipment. And a surgeon. Tell me there’s a surgeon at Karington.’

‘That would be me,’ he said gravely.

That would be him.

Her eyes met his. A surgeon. She had a surgeon right here. The relief was so great it made her dizzy all over again.

‘Well, hooray,’ she managed. ‘So what are we waiting for? Let’s find you a theatre and a scalpel and something to replace this blasted pen. But you’re not removing me from it except by scalpel.’

And twenty minutes later she was finally, finally able to step away.

Not only was Dev O’Halloran a surgeon, he was a surgeon with real skill. Inserting a tracheostomy tube into a wound that was massively swollen, where the cut was jagged and rough, where there was too much bleeding already and where the patient was a child with a trachea half the size of an adult’s…It was a nightmare piece of surgery that Emma couldn’t imagine doing. But, then, she couldn’t have imagined using a ballpoint casing and a pencil sharpener to perform similar surgery. It seemed that on this day anything was possible.

Devlin’s surgery worked. Finally, finally the tube was in place. Emma’s ballpoint casing was just an empty piece of plastic abandoned on the tray, and she was free to step back from the table.

They’d used a local anaesthetic. Anything else would have been too risky with the breathing so fragile. But Suzy was so shocked and so groggy with the morphine that she didn’t register as Emma stepped back.

‘Give the lady a chair,’ Devlin growled, and one of the nurses pushed a chair under her legs.

Emma sat.

Her legs felt funny, she thought.

Dev was still working, closing the wound, doing running repairs to the ravages of the little girl’s face.

Preparing her for the trip to Brisbane where a skilled plastic surgeon could take over.

She needed to get out of there, Emma decided. Dev had skilled nurses to help him. He no longer needed her.

The smells of the theatre were making her feel ill. She was accustomed to them. They shouldn’t…

‘Excuse me,’ she said, and pushed herself to her feet.

‘Go with her, David,’ Devlin said urgently to one of the nurses.

‘I’ll be fine,’ she muttered.

But she wasn’t.

No matter. She made her jelly legs move.

Ten minutes later, after as nasty a little interlude in the bathroom as she could imagine, she emerged a new woman. Or almost a new woman. She’d washed her face, splashing water over and over until she felt that she was almost back to reality.

What was she about—almost passing out in Theatre?

It was hardly surprising, she told herself. Students did it all the time, and even more experienced theatre staff did it more often than they liked to admit. The trick was to hold it back until you were no longer needed.

She’d done that. She should be proud of herself.

She wasn’t.

She swiped some more cold water onto her face and stared into the mirror.

What had she done? Realisation was only just dawning.

She’d risked her baby.

The sight of those cables when she’d climbed from the bus had made her feel sick. She hadn’t realised. When she’d climbed on board she’d thought at some superficial level that the bus might slip, but she hadn’t considered it as a real possibility. It was only now as she thought back to the huge cables and thought of what might have been…

Her hand dropped to her swollen belly and she flinched.

She’d taken a gamble. She’d won, but such a gamble.

Maybe she wasn’t such a new woman. Maybe she’d better splash some more water.

Finally she took a deep breath and went to face the world again. In the waiting room there was a man and a woman—farmers? They looked up as she emerged from the washroom, and their faces reflected terror.

Oh, help. They’d be Suzy’s parents, Emma thought. They’d seen her go into Theatre with their daughter, and then they’d seen her rush out to the washroom. Ill.

Two plus two equals disaster.

‘Hey, it’s fine,’ she told them, rushing to take that dreadful look from their faces. ‘Everything’s gone brilliantly. Suzy’s breathing’s stabilised and Dr O’Halloran is just fixing the dressings. She’ll need to go to Sydney to have her face repaired by a plastic surgeon, but even that doesn’t look too difficult. I’d imagine you’ll have a Suzy with a couple of scars—but that should be the extent of the damage’s all. Honestly.’

The couple visibly restarted their breathing process. Their combined faces sagged in relief.

‘But you…’

‘I’m pregnant,’ she said, trying to make her voice cheerful. ‘I’m really sorry I scared you, but pregnant women throw up all the time.’

Their faces cleared still more. ‘Oh, my dear…’ the woman faltered, and Emma suddenly decided against medical detachment. She bent over and hugged her.