The Life Saver Read online

  'Was there something spooky down there?' Jo wasn't really thinking about the question.

  OK, here it comes. Don't look, Alice.

  Jo eased the splinter free, thinking that Trudy's description of it had been very accurate. It did look like a steak-knife blade—long, pointed, jagged and nasty.

  'Is it out? I didn't feel it! When I close my eyes, my foot's not there, Mommy, and when I touch it, it's like touching a toy foot!' Alice giggled. She'd forgotten about Jo's last question, too.

  'I'm going to put some cream on it now, Alice,' Jo said, as she made a final inspection to make sure she wasn't leaving any foreign matter inside the shallow wound. She found a couple of specks of dirt and deftly removed them, then asked Nina, 'Is she up to date on her tetanus?'

  'Yes, but her immunisation records are in a file box somewhere, so you'll have to take my word on that!'

  'Get a copy to us when you can. There's no hurry.'

  'When I come in later in the week,' Mrs Grafton promised.

  Jo put a light dressing on the wound, while Cody stalled on putting the blocks back in the box. In the end, his mother let him get away with a token bit of 'help' while doing most of it herself.

  'He used to be such a sweetheart about things like this! Sometimes it really worries me,' she said.

  "They're not terrible and two forever,' Jo answered, although she hadn't had a lot of personal experience.

  The biological clock had been ticking louder of late, however. She never used to mind saying no when a parent asked her if she had kids of her own. Now she sometimes got a tightening in her chest. And she sometimes pretended that she knew more about kids than she really did. Was that pathetic, or natural?

  'No, and thank goodness they're not, even though I love him to pieces,' Nina said.

  She seemed like a nice woman, with a nice family, although Jo had a small, niggling question about the fading bruise on Mrs Grafton's temple. She'd noticed a couple more, including one that was fresher and bluer, along the woman's forearm. This wasn't a common red-flag location for domestic violence injuries, unless the bruise came in the shape of fingermarks, but she made a tiny, cryptic note in little Alice's file about it all the same.

  With the dressing in place and the anaesthesia still keeping the area numb, Alice was happy to go off in Cody's stroller, while Cody ignored his mother's instruction to hold onto the side. She stopped at the front desk to make the appointment for herself that she'd mentioned, and Jo focused her own attention on her next patient. Running behind now, she didn't surface until nearly six.

  Trudy had already gone, as had Amanda. Merril only worked mornings. Dotty was shutting off the front desk computer and taking a late call with an appointment request for tomorrow. 'He has a spot at eleven-thirty,' Jo heard her say into the phone, then she put her hand over the mouthpiece and said, 'Message for you, Dr Middleton, before you go.'

  Jo waited, stretching her tired neck and spine, while a difficult negotiation over tomorrow's appointment with Dr Taylor took place. No, he didn't have anything earlier. Or anything after four-thirty. How about just before lunch?

  Finally, a decision was made.

  'The pathology service called,' Dotty told her, once she'd put down the phone. 'A couple of hours ago, actually. Before we had the little girl with the splinter, I think. I asked if I should get you on the line, but they said no. They said they'd call back, but they haven't.'

  'What was it about, do you know?'

  'Harry Brown's blood-test results from this morning.'

  'I'll call them.' Jo felt a sudden prick of concern.

  Harry's father, the custodial parent, had brought the five-year-old in for a ten o'clock appointment that morning. Both Harry and his dad usually saw Rip, but his schedule had been full, and Bill Brown hadn't wanted to wait. He'd been happy to see Jo instead.

  'Just concerned,' he'd said. 'He seems a bit off colour, and he's got these bruises.'

  It had been a day for questionable bruises, Jo thought now, with those ones she'd noticed on Alice Grafton's mother, on top of Harry's bruises earlier. Bill Brown had shown them to her, seeming genuinely worried and perplexed. 'He says he hasn't had any falls or bumps, and I don't remember any myself. But he was with his mother over the weekend. Last weekend, too, and it was after that when I first noticed them.'

  He'd lowered his voice at that point and had spoken in a rush over the top of his son's head. 'You know, Dr Middleton, you can't help wondering, all the things you read about abuse. I'm not suggesting Vanessa—lord no, never—but I think she's been seeing someone new, and I'm thinking, some guy I don't even know, involved in my boy's life...'

  So Jo had asked Harry some questions, but he'd insisted he hadn't hurt himself and that no one had hurt him. Wondering about his platelet count as a possible cause, she'd ordered a full blood count and a clotting test, and had asked for a quick turnaround on the result, which would mean she'd have it by the end of the day.

  Why would the pathology lab have called once and not followed up?

  She went back into her office and picked up the phone.

  When she put it down again twenty minutes later, she was steaming.

  And she was scared.

  Dotty had gone but Rip's office door was still slightly ajar and she heard his swivel chair creak. She went in to him at once and saw him quickly fold a piece of printed paper. His face looked tired and tight, and it was probably lucky that she had something urgent on her mind or she would have had a hard time fighting a need to go up to , him and soften away the tightness with her fingers, the way a potter worked fresh clay.

  'Rip?' she said. 'Do you have any more contact details on Harry Brown, other than his home address with his dad and his mother's place in Rutland, and their various phone numbers? I mean, there's nothing in either of their files, but something anecdotal? Bill is usually your patient, so I thought you might.'

  'What's the problem?'

  'I got those results back on Harry's blood tests from this morning. He has a platelet count of two.'

  'My lord! Two?' A normal, healthy count should be between one and two hundred, anything below about forty was a serious concern, and a count this low was life-threatening. 'The lab just called with it now?'

  'No, I called them.'

  'You shouldn't have had to—'

  'No. Exactly. Someone—a doctor whose name I didn't recognise—had called at around three when I was in the middle of a procedure. He declined Dotty's offer to put me on the line and said he would call back, which she correctly interpreted as an indication that it wasn't urgent.'

  Rip made a disgusted sound.

  'Yeah, I know,' Jo said. 'Because it is urgent, incredibly urgent, and he didn't call back. As soon as Dotty told me— and thank goodness she did—I called him and got a result that we should have heard about as a number-one priority the moment they had it.'

  'And the service can't blame that on their chronic shortage of cyto technicians.'

  'No, they can't. It's a huge stuff-up, and I'm really worried now. I've tried Harry's dad's house, his work, his ex-wife, her cellphone, his cellphone, and I'm getting nothing. No pickup. No machine. Cells switched off. I've left a message at his work number and on both their cells—'

  'While Harry has a platelet count of two.' Rip stood up, his tension transformed into active energy. They both understood the significance of the figure. 'That child could practically bleed to death from a bruised shin.'

  'Or have an intracranial hemorrhage in his sleep tonight. He presented with unexplained bruising, but it wasn't dramatic. Bill was concerned about non-accidental injury, and I'm wondering if that led me astray? Did I focus on the wrong thing? Should I have sent it to the stat lab at Duchesne County Memorial? His ex-wife has a new partner. I ordered a full blood count, but it was more to rule out a platelet problem, not to confirm it. Whether this is more my fault than the lab's or not, I'm not prepared to let this go till the morning, Rip.'

  'Of course not.'
/>   'We have to get hold of the family and get Harry admitted. I'd like to give the news in person, but at this stage I'd take a carrier pigeon rather than waste any more time. You've seen the dad a few times, haven't you?'

  'Yes, five or six, since I joined the practice.'

  'Hasn't he said anything useful? Are there grandparents in the area? I looked up Brown in the phone directory but there are a gazillion of them, and we don't have the mother's maiden name in the file.'

  'I think it was Brown.' Ripley wiped a hand around the back of his neck as he spoke, massaging the tightness away.

  Jo's turn to frown. 'What?'

  'I think that's how they met. On some tour. The tour guide thought they were a couple because they were both called— It's not important. Let me think. Bill Brown has a fishing cabin on the Franklin River, near Sherrington. Would he have gone there midweek?'

  'He was worried about Harry's health. Talked about him being off colour. Maybe he thought some wild mountain air...'

  'From what he said about it, I doubt there's a phone.'

  As if the word 'phone' was a cue, the instrument rang out at the front desk. Jo dashed to it to pick it up before the machine clicked on, because Dotty would already have set it for overnight. 'Hello, Harriet Family Medicine Center, Dr Middleton speaking.'

  'Hi, Dr Middleton, this is Vanessa Brown...'

  Harry's mother had gotten the message Jo had left on her cellphone. That was the good news. The bad news was that she had no idea where Harry and Bill were, except that they wouldn't be at either set of grandparents because her parents were away and Bill's were both in a nursing home.

  Ms Brown had stressed at the beginning of the call that she was not the custodial parent, which Jo already knew. She sounded busy, tired and impatient, until Jo explained, as gently as she could without understating the case, that Harry's platelet count was catastrophically low. It didn't matter why, at this stage, although that would be determined as quickly as possible. The critical issue was the danger of a serious bleed. Harry needed hospital treatment as soon as he could get it.

  'Oh. Oh. Oh,' Vanessa said, and Jo could almost hear the grind of shifting gears as her important state government job suddenly ceased to matter and her son became the only thing in her life that did. 'Where will he go? Duchesne County Memorial?'

  'Yes, as soon as we track him down. Dr Taylor wondered if he and his father could be at a fishing cabin near—'

  'Sherrington. There's no phone. It's crazy. Bill switches off his cell. If it's even in range out there. I'll kill him. Yes, he could well be there. Or anywhere. They go off on these wild...' She made a frustrated sound. 'He teaches Harry way more than he learns at school, he's an incredible parent, but it's still crazy, and when something like this...' She cut herself off again. 'Let me give you directions. Try the cabin first.'

  Rip raised his eyebrows at Jo the moment she got off the phone.

  'We're trying the cabin first,' she said. 'His mother is driving up from Rutland and she'll meet Harry at the hospital. Assuming we've found him and sent him there. I left my cell number on the messages I left for Bill, so he may call back as we're driving.'

  'I've locked up. Let's go.' He put his hand to his head as he turned.

  'Are you OK, Rip?'

  'Will you stop asking me that?' He stopped abruptly in the doorway and she almost ran into him. For a moment her hand hovered near his shoulder blade but she managed to pull back without making contact. The breath felt too full in her lungs suddenly, and when she let it out, it wasn't quite steady.

  'Only if you answer,' she said.

  'I have a headache, that's all.' He stepped aside to let her pass through, then closed and locked the door behind him, which gave her a moment to study him.

  She'd begun to take notice of things about him that she'd never been interested in before. When had that started? They were, oh, trivial things, too—physical details like the sturdy length and bulk of his forearms, the angle of his neck when he bent his head, and the way his dark hair sat so neat against his head behind his ears.

  And for some time she'd known him well enough to be able to guess, quite often, what he was thinking. She could do it now. 'That sheet of paper you were looking at when I came in, that was...?'

  ' Yes, the patient information leaflet that comes with the nicotine patch. Classic case of doctors making the worst patients. I'm dreaming up a nicotine overdose on the basis of one slight symptom.'

  'I'll keep an eye on you,' Jo told him. 'Meanwhile, take something for the headache.'

  'Now you're patronising me. I already did.'

  'Are we arguing again, Rip?' She didn't really mind if they were. She quite liked arguing with him.

  He sighed. 'Problem is, the patch only takes care of the physical symptoms, not the psychological ones. I'm...' He searched for the right word. 'Disappointed that I'm not finding this easier.'

  He reached his car, parked next to Jo's on the little apron of tar to the side of the professional building that was reserved for doctors. Jo patted his shoulder and he glanced down at the place where her hand rested, then looked up at her face. Another one of those moments.

  Moments of contact.

  New.

  She took her hand away and said, 'You're doing really well. Don't be so hard on yourself.'

  If he appreciated her concern, he didn't say so. 'There's no point in taking two cars. We'll use mine.'

  Neither of them was on call tonight. The Harriet Family Medicine Center rotated on call periods with the newer two-doctor practice in the neighbouring town of Netherby, and this was one of their nights.

  'So we're both going?' Jo said, and wished at once that she hadn't.

  His car yelped as he pressed the button on his key fob to unlock the door. He looked at the key fob, not at Jo, as if the automatic car door opening technology was way more fascinating.

  'You said "we" after you'd talked to Vanessa Brown.' He spoke slowly. 'I assumed you wanted help in finding the place. And since our dinner's obviously postponed... But if you're happy to go alone, that's fine, too.'

  She didn't want the decision left up to her. She wanted his company, but she didn't want to have to say it in case she sounded as if she wanted his company too much. And she was a bit unsettled about why she wanted his company so much, and that was just ridiculous all round!

  She stayed helplessly silent for a second too long, and Rip said, 'Look, this is stupid.'

  Which it was.

  Stupid and ridiculous.

  They agreed on that, at least.

  'I'm coming, Jo, OK? I'm driving. There's a map in the glove compartment. Using that and the directions from Harry's mother, it's your job to get us there. Later, if we get a good outcome on this, we'll drive into Burlington for a late meal. Take-out pizza or drive-through burgers, if it comes down to that. Is that a plan?'

  'It's a good plan.'

  Settling back into the front passenger seat, she didn't dare say anything until she'd talked herself out of this fluttery feeling in her stomach, and that task took far longer than it should have done.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  'It's pitch dark,' Jo said.

  'It's the cloud cover, and there's no moon unfortunately.'

  'Can you go a little slower, Rip? There's supposed to be a turn-off coming up. Vanessa said there used to be a couple of red reflectors on the sign but she hasn't been here for several years so she couldn't promise that the sign was the same.'

  'I'm glad we're in late March, not January. I'm starting to see snow beside the road from those falls last week. If we get any higher up, and onto a track that hasn't been cleared—'

  'Here!' She'd glimpsed some circles of red, flaring out like eyes when the beam from Rip's headlights hit them. 'Yes, it says Brown. This is the place. She says the track winds in for a couple of hundred yards.'

  'Can you see any lights?' Rip asked.

  'Not yet. Keep driving. I don't know what our next move will be if no one's there. I
feel as if we're bomb-disposal experts, and we know the timer is ticking down but we can't find the bomb.'

  'I know.' His teeth were clenched. 'Do you want to know how much I'm punishing myself for not taking more notice of the pathology service's quality? To be honest, I thought it was just me—impatient, on a short fuse, spoiling for a fight with anyone I could find.'

  'Don't, Rip. It was gradual, and there's been nothing flagrantly irresponsible until now. Ironic that it should happen today, when we'd already decided to make a change.

  I was to blame, too, for not putting a more urgent priority on the tests. And anyhow, as you said, you've had...things on your mind this past year or so.'

  'That's no excuse. If I was dropping the ball, I should have taken time off. You should have called me on it.'

  'Called you? We felt for you, Rip!'

  'You shouldn't have. I should have kept my private problems separate from my work.'

  'You did.'

  'I didn't. Not always. Sometimes it was an act.'

  'Give Hollywood a call, then, because you were good.'

  He made a frustrated sound, and she felt helpless again. Helpless about how she felt now, and about how she should have acted in the past. There was an intimacy to them being enclosed in his car together like this in the gathering darkness, both of them impatient and aware of the urgency of their mission. She felt as if their relationship had suddenly arrived at a critical balance point which made everything they said to each other significant in a way it had never been before.

  'Snow,' he said a moment later. 'There is snow. Damn! This car does snow like a figure skater.' It was the one Tara had usually driven, Jo knew—the one he should probably sell if he was truly committed to moving on after the divorce. 'We should have stopped at my place on the way,' he went on, 'and swapped for the SUV.'

  He tightened his grip on the wheel as the vehicle careened across an old drift of snow that had melted in the sun and refrozen as ice. After slithering dangerously close to the trunk of a pine, they cleared the stand of trees and the track became mud again, rutted but far less slippery.