His Island Bride

by Marion Lennox

  'I say again—'

  'I know what you're saying,' she said icily. 'I need to think about it. Leave it.'

  He left it. There was another loaded silence.

  'Who's Brenda?' he asked, striving for some neutral topic.

  'She's my cousin and my housekeeper. Her housekeeping's pretty erratic—actually, Brenda's pretty erratic—but we love her. And she's great with the boys.' She gave a faint smile, and the atmosphere lightened a little. 'I'd be lost without her.'

  'She's colourful,' he ventured, thinking of the bow.

  'You'd better believe it. She's the best ballroom dancer on the island.'

  'How many ballroom dancers are there on the island?' he demanded, startled.

  'Population of five hundred. Maybe three hundred. It's our national sport. Half the reason my pilates is so popular is that my oldies get to dance longer.'

  It was so improbable that he grinned. A geriatric fishing community with a penchant for ballroom dancing on the side, propped up by Susan's pilates.

  'How many working fishermen are here?'

  'Three boats,' she said briefly. 'And only one still working full time. The problem is the bridge. The boys have to land their catch at Sandridge to ensure reliable marketing. Nick's the youngest—he's the guy I asked Brenda to contact. The other two boats are winding down. The whole island's winding down, really. We have a small cheese-making industry. There's a kelp factory. Retirement's big business.'

  'Which is where your pilates comes in.'

  'That's what I wanted to do full time.'

  'Wanted?'

  'Before I had the twins.'

  'But you can't do that now.'

  'The nursing pays the bills.'

  'I see.' He didn't, but she wasn't explaining. 'So you live with your boys and with Brenda?'

  'If you're asking if there's another man, there isn't,' she said brusquely. 'Not that it's any of your business.'

  'I know it's not my business.'

  'Good.'

  'Tell me what we're likely to be facing,' he said, deciding medicine was a way they could talk without getting too personal too fast.

  'I hate to think,' she said, braking as a pair of wallabies decided to cross the road. The wallabies got halfway, paused, stared into the headlights and then loped off leisurely to continue their evening perambulation.

  Susie slowed down even further. .

  'If there's someone seriously ill...' he said tentatively, and she shrugged.

  'You think I should be doing lights and sirens? They don't work. If I put a 'roo through the radiator then I walk the rest of the way. The islanders know I do my best. It's the price they pay for living here.'

  'Why isn't there a doctor?'

  'With a population of five hundred?'

  'And now the bridge is down it's worse.'

  'We have tourists doing dumb things on the bridge all the time,' she said. 'We're used to being cut off.'

  'Why doesn't everyone live on the mainland?'

  'Ocean Spray's a great place to live.'

  'You're not lonely?'

  'There's another of those personal questions. Butt out.'

  'Consider me butted.'

  She flicked him a glance that might almost have been one of amusement. He wasn't sure. But then he saw her face set again, and a spasm of pain appeared before she had it under control. His appearance was upsetting her, he thought. It was upsetting her a lot.

  Suddenly he desperately wished he didn't look like Grant. He wished he'd met this woman for the first time with no strings.

  He wished he didn't have Grant's cheque in his pocket.

  That was dumb. It meant that he was attracted to her, and that was even more dumb. This sensation of...interest? was only because she'd been Grant's woman, he thought. Grant's death had left an emotional black hole, one he couldn't find the edge of, much less climb out of.

  'You and Grant weren't close?' she asked into the silence, and he thought about how he should answer. There was no way but the truth, he decided.

  'No,' he said at last. 'Our parents split up. My mother raised Grant, and my father and my aunt raised me. We only got to know each other well...' He hesitated.

  'When Grant became ill?'

  'Yes.'

  'That's none of my business either,' she acknowledged, 'But he only ever talked of you as...'

  'Someone he didn't like much?'

  'I never knew he had a twin. I imagined you older.'

  'Three minutes older.'

  'Hardly enough to turn you into the domineering presence he inferred.'

  'We had an issue with my father's estate,' he said bluntly.

  'You mean he didn't get it all?' she asked, and he blinked at that. He'd been so accustomed to being cast as the villain of the piece that her calm assumption of Grant's likely greed left him speechless.

  'He wasn't all bad,' he said at last, and she gave a hollow laugh.

  'Hey, you're talking to the woman he proposed to just so he could make love to me without precautions. Don't defend the indefensible.'

  'OK,' he muttered, and that felt bad, too.

  'It's damned if you do and damned if you don't,' she said with sudden sympathy. 'Half of you wants to hate him because he was a cheating, lying low-life, and the other half still thinks of him as he could be, charming and fun and.. .alive.'

  'Yeah,' he said morosely, and they both stared straight ahead.

  'You're on leave?' she said suddenly.

  'I... Yes.'

  'Since Grant died?'

  'Maybe.'

  'Because it hurt so much?'

  He hesitated. It was hard to explain, his reasons for taking extended leave. But there was something about Susan's quiet enquiry that made him try.

  'I just couldn't do it,' he said after a while, wondering what it was about this woman that made him heed to talk. 'We fought so hard for his survival. I donated bone marrow. We fought with everything we had, yet still we lost. And now.. .I'm an orthopaedic surgeon, but every patient I see.. .seventy-year-olds with advanced rheumatoid disease, joints diseased with age...it's doing my head in.'

  'You're angry at his death?'

  'It just seems such a damned waste,' he said savagely. 'And Marilyn...'

  'Marilyn?'

  'My ex-fiancée.' He gave a rueful smile. 'Don't look like that. Marilyn and I were colleagues first, lovers second. She's been supportive but by a month after Grant's death, when I hadn't moved on, she was increasingly resentful. There was a Chair in the Orthopaedics department I was aiming for, and when I lost interest Marilyn lost interest. So here I am. I guess I'm depressed and I'm self-treating by travelling. But as far as loving Grant...'

  'Maybe we should start a club,' she said softly. 'The Grant Renaldo Love to Hate Club. I wonder how many members we'd pull in.'

  'Lots,' he said flatly.

  'So I wasn't the only sucker?'

  'Maybe you're the only one that ended up with children. But, yes, he hurt a lot of people.'

  'Including you,' she said sympathetically. 'I'm sorry.'

  'How can you be sympathetic after what he did to you?'

  'I can't hate him completely. He gave me the twins.'

  'He messed up your life.'

  'Maybe. But who's to say I would have been happier if I hadn't met him? Maybe I'd have met someone else, maybe in London.'

  Then she shook her head. 'No. I guess I would have had to come home anyway. At least this way I had the chance to get the additional nursing training.'

  'That's something else I don't understand.'

  'You see, I knew the island,' she told him, speaking softly, and he knew she'd made a conscious and a difficult decision to talk. 'My initial plan was to base myself in Sandridge but to come back here part time and do exercise rehabilitation— there's such a need among the elderly here. Then when I found I was pregnant I panicked. I knew I'd be here full time and there was no medical service. Once I had twins I wouldn't be able to go back and forth to Sandridge
as I'd planned, so I decided to provide as full a service as I could. So I did another year of training to get basic first aid under my belt. It nearly killed me to do it, having the twins in the middle of it, but I was determined. I came back here when the twins were twelve .months old and now I'm set for life.'

  'So the pilates is going well?' he said cautiously, and she smiled and relaxed a little.

  'It is. A huge percentage of the population are over sixty, and on the use-it-or-lose-it principle I've talked them into pilates. We're doing fine. Doris is a case in point. When I came here she was struggling to use a walking frame. Now she's running her own bed and breakfast and bossing every tourist she comes into contact with. She's not quite ballroom dancing again but we're working on it.'

  They'd reached the little township now. They passed Doris's place on the headland and Sam thought again he should have followed in his own car. But Susie hadn't suggested it. Maybe subconsciously she did want to talk to him, he thought, and then he thought that maybe that was wishful thinking.

  Wishful thinking? Did he want her to relax and talk to him?

  She'd been his brother's girlfriend. She was the mother of his nephews.

  There was a thought from left field. Nephews.

  He needed to phone his great aunt, he decided. Aunt Effie would be.. .flabbergasted?

  'I'm sorry to ask this of you,' Susie said, and he hauled himself back to the here and now.

  'You're sorry?'

  'Brenda suggested that you come. I had no right to expect you to. But...'

  'It's a huge responsibility to be sole medic for the whole island,' he ventured, and she grimaced.

  'I didn't think it through properly before I came,' she admitted. 'When the bridge is out, when something happens and immediate help's needed, then I'm it. Brenda's right. Having a doctor, even if it's just for tonight, is a blessing. So I'm saying thank you very much in anticipation for what you're called on to do tonight. I know you've been trapped into doing it, but it helps.'

  CHAPTER FIVE

  The harbour front looked dark and deserted. This was a working harbour, Sam saw, taking in the situation as Susie parked the car, but there wasn't much working going on tonight. There was a small cluster of pleasure boats—small cabin cruisers and yachts—tied at the wharf but the big pens were empty.

  'The fleet went out tonight,' Susie said briefly as she manoeuvred the car as close as she could to the dock. 'Prawning's started.'

  'So who's Henry?'

  'An ex-bank manager with the seamanship of a newt. One of a trio of ex-financiers who think they know everything. I've lost count of the number of times Nick's been called on to get them out of trouble. What the hell's he done now?'

  And then she saw. They both saw.

  A crane was at the far end of the wharf, where a single overhead lamp cast an eerie glow through the sea mist. The crane was linked to a boat, a sleek, fibreglass cruiser a little smaller than the one that had nearly killed Sam that morning. It looked like the crane had been used to haul the boat out of the water and swing it around over the jetty so the hull was accessible to work on. But things hadn't gone according to plan. The boat's stern was still dangling from the crane's cable, but there was a chain dangling free. Snapped. The bow was almost on the ground.

  There were two elderly men standing back, their faces showing collective relief at Susie's arrival.

  'That's Ted,' Susie said briefly as she climbed from the car. 'Retired accountant. And Lionel. Retired financial advisor. Morons both. I bet they've left him stuck under there.'

  They had. As they approached they could see a man pinned by a shoulder underneath the hull, gazing out at his mates with despair. But he didn't look in agony and he didn't look like the whole weight of the boat was on top of him.

  It looked as if he'd been scrubbing the hull when the chain had snapped. There'd been a pile of tools in a crate close by. The crate was now partly crushed, but it formed a wedge of smashed wood, taking the brunt of the boat's weight.

  But the guy was still obviously trapped, and obviously in pain.

  'Suse,' he gasped as he saw her. 'I thought you'd never get here.'

  'You didn't think,' Susie said carefully to the two onlookers in general, 'to get the damned thing off him.'

  'We were worried it'd slip more,' one of the men said.

  'Did you call Nick?' she demanded.

  'Donna said he's out,' Lionel told her.

  'If Nick's the fisherman, then prawning's started,' Sam said mildly. 'I guess that means we're on our own.'

  She bit her lip. 'You distracted me,' she muttered. 'I should have thought..For a fleeting second she closed her eyes but when she opened them she was in control again. Ready to do what she had to do. She moved forward with purpose but Sam gripped her shoulder, tugging her back.

  'No.'

  'What do you mean, no?'

  'Wait. You know the drill, Susie. First rule of a medical crisis— check that there's no external danger. There is here. Wait.'

  'I can't—'

  'Wait! Is there anyone else you can ring to help with the crane?'

  'Yes, but—'

  'Then do it.'

  ' He made sure she had the message—that she wasn't about to defy him—then moved to the end of the boat, carefully assessing the whole situation. He hauled a crate forward, climbed up and tugged the chain holding the stern of the boat up. It seemed solid.

  But one chain had snapped. This one would have almost double the load. If one could snap, so could the other.

  'He's hurt,' Susie said. She'd made a fast phone call and he knew she was finding it almost impossible to stay back. The guy trapped under the boat looked pale and ill, but he was still talking. A trapped arm didn't make it a life-or-death situation where risks were reasonable.

  'We'll get this thing propped up first,' he growled.

  'Henry's in pain.'

  'And we're no good to him squashed. What did you say about not rushing across the island in case we hit a 'roo? You had it right then. Henry, we'll get you out as fast as we can but we're getting decent props under the boat first. You want to tell us what happened while we work?'

  'I can tell you what happened,' Susie muttered.

  'Help me with this first,' Sam said. He strode toward the far end of the jetty, where a group of large oildrums stood in a row. He spun one round, dropped it and rolled it toward the boat. 'Help me,' he ordered. 'Get these drums under the boat. Now.'

  They worked fast. Lionel and Ted weren't completely useless—once they were given a job to do they joined in with gratitude. Sam had them rolling every drum there was over to the boat. There he set them up lengthways on their sides, facing the boat, wedging eight drums along the width of the jetty. There was a six-inch wooden ledge at either side of the jetty, so once in line the drums couldn't move.

  Once he had them more or less in line he shoved them forward, inching them tighter, using all his strength to push them hard in against the sloping hull, so hard that the tension eased from the remaining chain. Once there they forming a solid wedge that meant if the chain snapped, the boat couldn't fall further onto Henry.

  Then he ran another line of drums behind to back up the first row. If the boat dropped now it might even take the weight off Henry—it certainly would no longer crush him.

  Only when he was sure the thing was done would he approach Henry, and he didn't let Susie near even then.

  Henry had lain and watched in silence, helpless but seemingly reassured by Sam's decision., When Sam finally dropped to his knees and came in beside him he groaned in relief.

  'So let's see the damage,' he said. 'Susie, what about formal introductions?'

  'Henry, this is Dr Renaldo,' Susie told him, thinking she ought to be under there fend not Sam. To be extraneous in this sort of crisis felt wrong. 'Sam, this is Henry Martin. Henry's obviously been lying under his boat to clean it rather than put it into dry dock. Which is dumb, not to mention illegal. It costs five bucks a day to u
se the dry dock, so he'll have waited until the fleet's out to use the crane while no one's watching. Henry, are you out of your mind?'

  'Five buck is five bucks,' Henry said defensively. 'Glad to meet you, Doc.'

  'You would have let Susie come under here without props if I hadn't come?' Sam asked mildly, and there was an awkward hush. Of course they would have, he thought grimly. Susie was the reliable one.

  Like he was. The recognition was suddenly piercing. Good old Susie, here to pick up the pieces. Like good old Sam, picking up Grant's pieces.

  Only in Susie's case it was for a whole island.

  He had to move on. 'Level of pain, Henry?' he said. 'On a scale of one to ten.'

  'Seven?' Henry said cautiously, and Sam nodded.

  'Let's get that right first. Susie, do you have any opiates in that wonder bag of yours?'

  'You should be used to the contents of my bag by now,' she said, and he heard her smile. She fetched it and would have brought it to him but he stopped her with a curt order.

  'No. Push it over to me.'

  'It's safe now.'

  'It won't be safe until we have him out of here.' And they needed to do that fast, he thought, noting the sheen of sweat around Henry's eyes, feeling his pulse, worrying.

  Henry must be well over seventy. They needed to get things settled before his heart reacted to the strain.

  There was a good pulse in the wrist of his trapped shoulder. The blood circulation wasn't compromised, but there was still a fair weight on his shoulder.

  'Is there someone coming to help with the crane?' he asked.

  'Yes,' Susie said. 'The cavalry. A couple of retired fishermen. Oldies but goodies, unlike some here I could mention. Five more minutes tops.'

  'I'll give you morphine while we wait,' Sam told Henry, and Henry's eyes widened.

  'Can you do that?'

  'If Susie says I can.'

  'Help yourself,' Susie said. 'You're the doctor.' She let out her breath in a sigh of relief. 'And you have no idea how good it feels to say that.'

  And then the cavalry arrived. Two men who were as old as Henry and Ted and Lionel, but who carried the scars of a lifetime of being out in all weathers.