“Is it always like this?” Roslyn asked.
“It’s pretty busy, but not so chaotic as this. Floods and what-have-yous do tend to bring up a lot of things you don't ordinarily get. Also, it’s the cut, remember.”
“And this time mainly a manual cut.”
“Yes.” He nodded gloomily. “You can always count on extras then, like slashes directed at cane but not always going in the intended direction. Like snakebites. I’ve yet to see a snake mount a harvester and attack the operator, then there are illnesses aggravated by weather. And don’t just quote rheumatism and chills. For some reason with every flood I’ve had a burst appendix.”
“Are you expected to serve at the hospital?” Roslyn asked.
‘No, and I never do if I can escape it ... which seldom happens. But we’ve some wonderful Sisters up here, they understand the position and only call upon me if things get beyond them, so I try to respond when I have to with a good grace. Also, there’s outside calls, not many right now since they know I can’t get there. But for very urgent ones, ones that can offer me a dry strip, as Clementine does, I, and Celia ... and Sister Young now ... go along.”
“Let’s hope no calls come.”
“They will,” he shrugged. “Rather, let’s hope that the hospital keeps coping. If they do that there, I’ll do my bit here. It’s doing both that breaks this camel’s back.”
“Then let’s hope that,” Roslyn agreed.
Alas for such a hope! Scarcely had the final patient left than the phone pealed. Picking it up, Roslyn introduced herself, and was met with a sigh of relief.
“Thank heaven for another helping hand! Is the doctor still there?”
“He is.”
“Then he won’t be for long. He’ll be up here. We’re the hospital, incidentally.”
“Yes?”
“We’re expecting an emergency. A group of the district’s honey flow men, who went into the hills to see to their bees after the bad weather stopped, have met with a peculiar accident. They’d put their hives on a rise, but because of a swollen creek had to ascend this time by a more direct route. It was a steep grade though a small grade, so they roped themselves together. You can guess the rest. One went, then they all came down.”
“How many?” Roslyn asked.
“At least twelve.”
“Do you know if they’re badly hurt?”
“Well, I can’t see it being just twelve pairs of stubbed toes.” The speaker sighed. “But we’ll soon know. Fortunately someone saw the accident, raised an alarm, and a rescue party set out at once. At any moment now they should be here.”
“I see,” said Roslyn. “I’ll alert the doctor.”
“And yourself?” begged the voice.
“And myself,” Roslyn promised. She put down the phone and looked at Carl. “The bearer of bad news,” she announced.
Carl began gathering things together. “I walked into something like this the first day I arrived,” he said as he grabbed up extras that experience had taught him he might need. “I was green, Roslyn, green as grass. I’d passed my exams, but I had no idea as to what more than one emergency at a time involved.” A rueful smile. “I know now!”
“I’m green,” submitted Roslyn. “I worked at Casualty, but we had a substantial staff, so you’ll have to brief me.” She looked at the articles he had armed himself with even though he was going to a hospital. “Can I carry something?”
“Just carry yourself,” he smiled, “and thanks for coming.” He called down the hall: “An accident expected at the Cottage, Mary, so unless an urgency crops up, put everyone off.”
“Yes, Doctor.” Mrs. Marriott came to the front door to see them away.
It was only a short distance to the hospital but they still drove there to save precious time. They were relieved to find that the casualties had not yet arrived.
The senior Sister had set the nurses to clearing the casualty department of all but several benches. A huge table was in readiness, screens, piles of towels, and several kettles were bubbling.
Roslyn was introduced to the Sisters, only three of them, for it was a small hospital. Carl, she learned, would be the sole attendant doctor. Since the cyclone, it had been impossible to get the larger plane used by the nearest big town on to the village field. Roslyn was also told that there was universal plasma available and hospital gear to determine a correct group. “Which is a comfort,” sighed the Sister telling her all this. The Sister narrowed her eyes at the window. “Something’s coming now.”
They were the last words Roslyn heard for hours; also she found no time to say anything herself.
Within minutes a procession of cars pulled up, and from the cars the unfortunate bee-men either limped, were helped or carried.
All at once the big table was cluttered with scissors, forceps, bandages and lint. All the staff, Roslyn and Carl were grabbing up what they needed, not speaking, just getting down to the job.
Roslyn, at an indicative nod from Carl, started up a transfusion; fortunately the man was a universal recipient. She had always liked this job, it did her heart good to see pink stealing back into pale skin and ashen lips. While she worked, another nurse dealt with an injured arm hanging useless but Roslyn could see that the poor fellow would be all right.
She applied a roller bandage, under, across, under, back and across again. She dealt with a Colles’ fracture, which she had seen Chris deal with often, but always on women, since women were generally more slender-wristed than men, so more prone.
A collapse case came in, and everyone dropped tools to help.
“Shock,” said Carl, and it was the first time he, too, had found a moment to speak. Mechanically Roslyn sought out hot water bottles and blankets. Hot water bottles and blankets up here!
Boracic lint, sterilized gauze, cottonwool flew from hand to hand. Roslyn attended to a simple strain with a cold application, then took on a fracture which would need a splint.
Exactly two hours after the Sister had narrowed her eyes at the window and announced: “Something’s coming now” it was over. The shock still would have to be watched, of course, there would be sedation needed here and there, fractures made more comfortable, the blood transfusion checked, but it was over. Safely over.
“Thank heaven,” said Carl. “Thank you, Sisters and nurses.”
But back at the surgery he was more personal.
“Thank you, Roslyn,” he smiled. And kissed her.
Roslyn thought many times about that kiss in the week that followed. She wondered, just as she had wondered once with Chris, why a kiss from someone so nice, someone she thought so much of, could mean so little.
She had wanted to like Carl. But then she had wanted to like Chris. When she had assured Mrs. Maddison that day that she had plenty of love, she had really meant it. Love, as well as her love for Belinda, for her own children when she got them. But to get them your first had to get—Oh goodness, Roslyn thought wryly, now she was sounding like Mrs. Beeton! First catch your hare. But although she laughed at herself there was still a wonder in her. Why? Why am I waiting for someone else the same way as I did with Chris? I know no one up here, except—
Her week of introspection proved busy, apart from self-analysis, yet not so hectic.
Surgery was always long and arduous, but Roslyn, after what Carl had warned her of the danger season and what it invariably entailed, had expected that. Also, although quite a few casualties came in, there were never masses at a time, as on her first day up at the hospital.
That initial event had broken the ice very successfully as regarded friendship with the staff. It had also cemented something between Roslyn and Carl; if not what Carl unmistakably wanted it to be, they were at least firm friends having a perfect understanding.
There had been no urgent calls that needed to be aliened to by plane. Fortunately so, for mostly the ground was squelchy and unsuitable. But Clementine’s land was all right, and when a call came that one of the cutter’s uves nee
ded, attention, Carl had no hesitation.
“No trouble there. Get your bag, Sister.”
“You’ll need me?” Roslyn was anxious to go, but for some odd reason she found herself holding back.
“Of course.” He gave her a quick shrewd look. “Don’t tell me you don’t want to see Belinda!”
“Oh, no, I can’t tell you that.”
“Then you don’t want to see Marcus. Now I don’t like that.”
“Why?”
“Too much dislike can mean something altogether different.”
“A psychiatrist as well as a doctor?” she tossed, and went into gather what she wanted.
The town was only partially submerged now. Some of the shops had cleaned themselves up and were opened for trade. In anticipation of the time when she would see Belinda, Roslyn had purchased some little gifts she knew would please the child. She now stowed the chocolate bar, the colouring pencils and the little jack-in-the-box in her bag.
“No need for equipment,” Carl advised when she joined him, “Marcus keeps an excellent medical chest.”
“This is equipment of a different sort,” Roslyn explained,, and he smiled and nodded.
“You must explain the family tree to me one day,” he said, getting into the car beside Roslyn. “I still haven’t established whether you’re sister, mother, aunt—”
“You know I’m not her mother.”
“Yes, I know that.” They left the surgery and climbed: up to the field where he kept his Cessna.
When they put down at Clementine, Marcus Moreno was there to meet them. Roslyn tried to hide her quick look to see if Belinda was mischievously pretending not to be present when all the time she was hiding behind him. but he still noted Roslyn’s glance.
“The kid isn’t here, and it’s unfortunate you are, too.”
“I beg your pardon?” Roslyn said icily. After Carl’s politeness, kindness and consideration, Marcus Moreno now sounded more brusque than ever.
“I didn’t send for Carlton for fun, your fun,” he said deliberately, “I sent in dead earnest. We have an extremely sick woman here.”
“And that’s why I brought Sister,” Carl started to placate him, but Marcus Moreno stopped him.
“She’s desperately ill. It started as an appendix, I would say, but I think there’s been a rupture, or near-rupture, and now it’s more a peritonitis case.”
“In that instance,” began Roslyn, but he beat her to it.
“In that instance she’ll have to go to the coast and there won’t be room for both of you.” A deliberate pause to get what he had to say next command full significance. ‘We’ll have to have you here,” he finished.
“Can we see the patient, please?” Roslyn demanded angrily before Carl could come in professionally, something she knew she should not do, a nurse should never precede a doctor, but really, this man—!
Without a word, Marcus nodded to the waiting jeep, and the next minute they were speeding towards the Clementine chalets.
“I would have brought her to the house.” Marcus broke his silence. “However, I thought the least movement would be the best.”
“You’re right,” Carl nodded.
“I’ve also fixed a cradle to go into your Cessna so that he’s spared as little contact as possible. She’s very sore, poor girl.”
“You’ve thought of everything,” Carl commended. “Good man!”
“It may still be nothing.” Roslyn could not resist that.
“It is,” Marcus said coolly, and he drew the car up at he married quarters.
He was right ... of course he was right. Wasn’t this paragon always right? Roslyn would have given anything or the call to be a false alarm, both for Krysanthe, the Greek wife of a Greek cutter, who was, as Marcus had said, in considerable pain, as well as for herself.
But Carl, after probing as gently as he could, said almost word for word what Marcus had said. He also commended Marcus’s ice pack—learned from his home doctor, no doubt, seethed Roslyn.
“I’ll have to get her down to the coast,” Carl frowned, “and the air ambulance is right out because of the state of the strip. I wouldn’t dare operate here, and an operation it, most certainly is. I’ll get you to contact the clinic, Marcus, alert them that I’m coming in the Cessna, and to have everything ready. Then I want you to get every man you can to carry this woman to my craft. I want a minimum of jolting—but you would understand that already. Also I want the passenger’s seat removed” ... so Marcus was right again, there would be no room for her ... “and as much space as available. Shove everything you can out, excluding, of course, the engine.”
“Will be done,” Marcus assured him, and strode off. When he had gone, Carl turned and smiled: “Sorry, Roslyn.”
“It’s nothing. I mean it is something, I’d have liked to have helped, but I understand, of course.”
“I’ll be back as soon as possible for you. I promise.”
“You may run into a few calls and be unable to come.”
“If it can be done then I’ll be here. After all, it’s to my advantage, too.”
“Your—”
“Think that over,” Carl said quickly, for Marcus and a score of workers were coming into the chalet.
Roslyn had no more time to speak with Carl. She stood by him as he administered a sedative to Krysanthe, she fussed round the cradle that Marcus had fixed, adjusting it here and there.
Then they were all returning to the field, arranging the patient, standing back as Carl carefully took off. The craft rose, then disappeared.
Anti-climax, offered Marcus, nodding the workers away again. He turned to Roslyn. “Rather a letdown, I suppose, after your satisfactory coup earlier in the week. Oh, yes” ... as she looked questioningly at him ... “I heard all about Resourceful Roslyn.”
“Then you won’t want me to tell you about it.”
No, he agreed, and this time he nodded to the car.
She got in and they started off.
“Where am I to stay?” she asked.
“Where do you think? There are no chalet vacancies.”
“I thought... I mean ... well, now that I’ve officially left—”
“But you haven’t, have you, you’re back again.”
“I didn’t arrange that!” she retorted.
“You did arrange that you wouldn’t be far away though.”
“All right, I did,” she said directly. “I didn’t want to leave Belinda, and it was the only thing offering.”
“It was not. However, you wouldn’t wait.”
She looked at him in complete bewilderment, but he did not enlighten her.
“Seems you’ve won this round, Sister Young, for there awaits your heart’s delight.” He waved an arm to a distant Belinda. “By the way” ... idly ... “you still haven’t said what category of delight, how you fit into the jigsaw.” Carl had asked almost the same thing, only in different words thought Roslyn, and she had not told him. Well, she would not tell this man, either.
“No, I haven’t,” she agreed just as idly, and then, not idly, she opened the car door before the car had actually stopped, and ran over the lawn to catch Belinda in her arms.
It was gratifying to feel Belinda’s tight response. Roslyn had not been quite sure of that. She had been prepared to have the child greet her casually, even indifferently, she had never been an outwardly affectionate baby, and even before this last week’s separation the two of them, because of old Marco, had been frequently apart. But the small fierce arms around Roslyn assured her that she had been missed, and missed badly. She felt a hard lump in her throat. It was not right that a baby should be asked to suffer this.
“Ness, Ness,” said Belinda into Roslyn’s neck, “naughty Ness for going away.”
“Remember the sick people, darling—Ness is a nurse and must look after them.”
“Blinda is sick.”
Roslyn looked on the obviously thriving baby. “You’re not, you know, you’re getting br
own and fat.”
“Not!”
“These people, Belinda, were really ill. They fell down a mountain.”
Belinda’s eyes opened wide.
“Better now?” she asked a little tremulously, for, for all her outward indifference, she was a very tender-hearted child, and Roslyn hastened to assure her:
“Yes.”
It was a mistake. Belinda said triumphantly: “Now Nessie home again.”
Roslyn started to say: “But it’s not my home, pet,” but stopped herself. After all, why upset the child?
“Just for a while, Belinda.”
Belinda left it at that, but Roslyn had a shrewd feeling she would not be abandoning the subject. She began chattering about frogs and crickets and a dog that Fath-er had given her.
“Come,” she said, anxious to show the dog.
It was a delightful night for Roslyn. Connie was quite willing for her to take over Belinda, who was a nice child, Connie reported, but certainly had a mind of her own, and Marcus Moreno left them alone. It was like old days having Belinda all to herself. If only, Roslyn sighed, those days could come again.
“Ness crying,” Belinda discovered.
“I’m not really, honey, it’s just that I hate leaving again tomorrow.”
“No,” said Belinda, puckering up herself.
“I have to. Lots of sick people.”
“Blinda sick,” the cunning little girl tried again.
“You’re not.” Roslyn did not say it so emphatically this time. Obviously the child wanted her, and in child welfare didn’t that comprise the beginning and the end of all disputes, the wish and the love of the child ? A giddy thought came to Roslyn. She saw a court and a learned judge saying to Belinda:
“Now, child, which person do you want to go with?”
She did not realize she had said her thoughts aloud until Belinda said with certainty:
“You and Fath-er.”
It was cold water on Roslyn. Belinda could not want that man, she could not possibly want him.
“Darling, Marcus has his work to do, wouldn’t you like to come with me?” It was unfair, and it was rather wicked of her but still she asked it jealously.
Cane Music Page 12