The Doctor’s Rescue Mission Read online

  ‘I guess you must,’ he said, thinking it through as he spoke. ‘The hospital will organise compassionate leave for you for a few weeks.’ He hesitated. ‘I’ll come for a week now, and then again for-’

  ‘The funeral?’ she finished for him, and watched him flinch.

  ‘Morag…’

  She shook her head. ‘It’s not going to happen.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said-’

  ‘Oh, the funeral’s going to happen,’ she said, her anger directed squarely now against the appalling waste of cancer. ‘Inevitably it’ll happen. But as for taking compassionate leave…I can’t.’

  He frowned, confused. ‘So you’ll come back in a week or so?’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’ She lifted her hands back onto the table and stared down at her fingers, as if she couldn’t believe she was about to make the commitment that in truth she’d made the moment she’d heard her sister whisper, ‘Renal cancer.’ It was done. It was over. ‘I’m not taking compassionate leave,’ she said bluntly. ‘I’m going to the island for ever.’

  It shocked him. It shocked him right out of compassionate doctor, caring lover mode. All the things he was most good at. His brow snapped down in surprise, and his deep, dark eyes went still.

  ‘You can’t just quit.’ Grady’s job was his life, Morag thought hopelessly, and she could understand it. Until an hour ago she’d felt the same way. But she had no choice.

  ‘Why can’t I quit?’ And then, despairingly, she added, ‘How can I not?’

  ‘Surely your sister wouldn’t expect you to.’

  ‘Beth expects nothing,’ she said fiercely. ‘She never has. She gives and she gives and she gives.’ Their meal arrived at that moment and she stared down at it as if she didn’t recognise it. Grady leaned across to place her knife and fork in her hands-back to being the caring doctor-but she didn’t even notice. ‘Petrel Island needs her so much,’ she whispered.

  ‘She’s their only doctor?’

  ‘My father and then Beth,’ she told him. She stopped for a minute then, ostensibly to eat but really to gather her thoughts to continue. ‘Because my father was a doctor, more young families have come to the island, and the community’s grown. There’s fishing and kelp farming and a great little specialist dairy. But without a doctor, the Petrel Island community will disintegrate.’

  ‘They could get someone else.’

  ‘Oh, sure.’ It was almost a jeer. ‘A doctor who wants to practise in such a place? I don’t think so. After…after Beth dies, maybe…I’ll try to find someone, but it’s so unlikely. And Beth needs my promise-that the island can continue without her.

  ‘So you see,’ she told him, cutting her steak into tiny pieces that she had no intention of eating. It was so important to concentrate. It was important to concentrate on anything but Grady. ‘You see why I need to leave?’

  There was a reason she couldn’t look at him. She knew what his reaction would be. And here it came.

  ‘But…you’re saying this might be for ever?’ He sounded appalled. As well he might.

  ‘I’m saying for as long as I’m needed. Do I have a choice?’

  He had the answer to that one. ‘Yes,’ he said flatly. ‘Bring your sister here. You can’t tell me there aren’t far better medical facilities in Sydney than on Petrel Island. And who’s going to be treating physician? You? You know that’s a recipe for disaster. Caring for your own family… I don’t think so.’

  ‘There’s no one else.’

  ‘There’s no one else in Sydney?’ he asked incredulously.

  ‘No. On the island. Beth won’t leave the island.’

  ‘She doesn’t have a choice,’ Grady said, the gentleness returning to his voice. Gentle but right. Sympathetic but firm. ‘You have a life, Morag, and your life is here.’

  ‘And Robbie? Her little boy? What of his life?’

  ‘Maybe he’s going to have to move on. Plenty of kids have a city life. It won’t hurt him to spend a couple of months in Sydney.’

  ‘You mean I should bring them both here while Beth dies.’

  ‘You have a life, too,’ he told her. ‘It sounds dreadful-I know it does-but if your sister is dying then you have to think past the event.’

  ‘Take care of the living?’

  ‘That’s right,’ he said, his face clearing a little. ‘Your sister will see that. She sounds a pragmatic person. Not selfish…’

  ‘No. Not selfish. Never selfish.’

  ‘You need to think long term. She’ll be thinking long term.’

  ‘She is,’ Morag said dully. ‘That’s why she rang me. She’s been ill for months and she’s been searching for some way not to ask me. But it’s come to this. She doesn’t have a choice and neither do I. Without Beth the community doesn’t have a doctor. Robbie doesn’t have a mother. And I’m it.’

  Silence. Then… ‘Your mother?’

  ‘You’ve met my mother. Barbara take care of Robbie? He’s not even her grandchild. Don’t be stupid.’

  He looked flatly at her, aghast. ‘You’re not seriously suggesting you throw everything up here?’ he demanded. ‘Take over the care of a dying sister? Take on the mothering of a child, and the medical needs of a tiny island hundreds of miles from the mainland? Morag, you have to be kidding!’

  ‘Do you think I’d joke about something like this?’

  ‘Look, don’t make any decisions,’ he said urgently. ‘Not yet. Get compassionate leave for a week or two and take it from there. I’ll come over and do some reorganisation-’

  ‘Some reorganisation?’

  ‘I’ll talk to the flying doctor service. We’ll see if we can get a clinic over there once a month or so to keep the locals happy. I can organise an apartment here that’d accommodate your sister. Maybe we can figure out a long-term carer for the kid on the island. He can go to day care here while his mum’s alive, and then we’ll find someone to take him over long term.’

  Great. For the first time since Beth had telephoned, Morag felt an emotion that was so fierce it overrode her complete and utter devastation. She raised her face to his and met his look head on. He was doing what he was so good at. Crisis management. He was taking disaster and hauling it into manageable bits.

  But this was Beth. Beth!

  ‘Do you know what love is?’ she whispered.

  He looked confused. ‘Sure I do, Morag.’ He reached forward and would have taken her hand again but she snatched it back like he’d burn her. ‘You and I-’

  ‘You and I don’t have a thing. Not any more. This is Beth we’re talking about. Beth. My darling sister. The woman who cares for me and loves me and who put her own life on hold for me so many times I can’t think about it. You’d have me repay that by taking a couple of weeks’ leave?’

  ‘Morag, this is your life.’

  ‘Our lives. Mine and Beth’s. They intertwine. As ours-yours and mine-don’t any more.’ She rose and stood, staring down at him, her sudden surge of anger replaced by unutterable sadness. Unutterable weariness. ‘Grady, I can’t stay here,’ she whispered. ‘I’m going home. I’m going back to Petrel Island and I won’t be coming back.’

  He stayed seated, emphasising the growing gulf between them. ‘But you don’t want-’

  ‘What I want doesn’t come into it.’

  ‘And what I want?’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘I want you, Morag.’

  ‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘No, you don’t. You want the part of me that I thought I could become. That I thought I was. Independent career doctor, city girl, partner while we had the best fun…’

  He rose then but it was different. He put his hands on her shoulders and bent to kiss her lightly on the lips. It was a fleeting gesture but she knew exactly what he was doing, and the pain was building past the point where she could bear it. ‘We did have fun,’ he told her.

  ‘We did.’ She swallowed. It wasn’t Grady’s fault that she’d fallen hopelessly in lo
ve with him, she realised. Beth’s illness wasn’t his fault, and it wasn’t his fault that their lives from now on would be totally incompatible.

  It wasn’t his fault that now he was letting her go.

  For richer and for poorer. In sickness and in health. Whither thou goest, I will go…

  Ha! It was never going to work. Beth needed her.

  And Grady wasn’t going to follow.

  But his hand suddenly lifted to her face, as if he’d had second thoughts. He cupped her chin and forced her eyes to his. ‘You can’t go.’ His voice was low, suddenly gruff and serious. The caring and competent young doctor had suddenly been replaced by someone who was unsure. ‘Morag, these last few weeks… It’s been fantastic. You know that I love you.’

  Did he? Until this evening she’d thought-she’d hoped that he had. And she’d thought she loved him.

  Whither thou goest, I will go.

  No. It hadn’t reached that stage yet. She looked into his uncertain eyes and she knew that the line hadn’t been crossed. Which was just as well. It made the decision she was making now bearable. Just. Maybe.

  ‘No,’ she said softly. ‘You don’t love me. Not yet. But I do love Beth, and she needs me. The island needs me. It was wonderful, Grady, but I need to move on.’

  Even then he could have stopped her. He could have come up with some sort of alternative. Come with her now, try the island for size, think of how it could work…

  No. That was desperation talking and desperation had no foundation in solid, dreadful reality.

  She didn’t need to end this. It was already over.

  ‘What can I do?’ he asked, and she bit her lip.

  ‘Nothing.’ Nothing she could ever vocalise. ‘Just say goodbye.’

  And that was that.

  She rose on tiptoe and kissed him again, hard this time, and fast, tasting him, savouring him for one last moment. One fleeting minute. And then, before he could respond, she’d straightened and backed away.

  ‘I need to go, Grady,’ she told him, trying desperately to keep the tears from her voice. ‘It’s been…fabulous. But I need…to follow my heart.’

  CHAPTER TWO

  MORAG felt the earth move while she was at Hubert Hamm’s, and stupidly, after the first few frightening moments, she thought it mightn’t matter.

  Hubert was the oldest of the island’s fisherman. His father had run sheep up on the ridge to the north of the island. That was where Hubert had been born and the tiny cottage was still much as Elsie Hamm had furnished it as a bride almost a hundred years before.

  The cottage had two rooms. There was a tiny kitchen-living room where Robbie sat and fondled Hubert’s old dog, and an even smaller bedroom where Hubert lay, approaching his death with stately dignity.

  It’d be a while before he achieved his objective, Morag thought as she measured his blood pressure. Six months ago, Hubert had taken himself to bed, folded his hands across his chest and announced that the end was nigh. The only problem was that the neighbours kept dropping off wonderful casseroles and puddings, usually staying for a chat. His love of gossip was therefore thoroughly catered for. Hubert’s bedroom window looked out over the whole island, and he was so eagle-eyed and interested that death seemed less and less enticing.

  With Morag visiting every few days, his health did nothing but improve, to the extent that now Morag had no compunction in bringing Robbie with her as she took her weekly hike up the scree. There was a rough vehicle track round the back of the ridge but the scenery from the walking path was spectacular. She and Robbie enjoyed the hike, and they enjoyed Hubert.

  Would that all deathbeds were this healthy, prolonged and cheerful.

  ‘I’m worse?’ Hubert asked-without much hope-and she grinned.

  ‘Not so you’d notice. But you’re certainly a week older and that has to count for something.’

  ‘Death’s coming. I can feel it,’ he said in solemn tones, but a sea eagle chose that moment to glide past his window and his old eyes swung around to follow its soaring flight.

  Death might be coming, but life was still looking good.

  Consultation over.

  ‘Have you finished? Is Mr Hamm OK?’ Robbie looked up as she opened Hubert’s bedroom door, and she smiled across at her nine-year-old nephew with affection.

  ‘Mr Hamm’s great. His blood pressure’s fine. His heart rate’s nice and steady. Our patient looks like living for at least another week-if not another decade. Are you ready to go home?’

  ‘Yep.’ Robbie gave Elspeth a final hug and rose, a freckled, skinny little redhead with a grin that reminded Morag achingly of Beth. ‘When Mr Hamm dies, can I have Elspeth?’

  Elspeth, an ancient golden retriever, pricked up her ears in hope, but back in the bedroom so did Hubert.

  ‘She’ll stay here until I’m gone,’ the old man boomed.

  ‘Of course she will,’ Robbie said, with all the indignation of a nine-year-old who knew how the world worked. ‘But you’ve put names on everything else.’

  He had, too. In the last six months Hubert had catalogued his cottage. Everything had a name on now, right down to the battered teapot on the edge of the fire-stove. ‘Iris Potter, niece in London,’ the sign said, and Morag hoped that Hubert’s niece would be suitably grateful when the time came.

  ‘There’s no name on Elspeth,’ Robbie said reasonably. ‘And she’s an ace dog.’

  ‘Yeah, well, you’re a good lad,’ Hubert conceded from his bed. ‘She’d have a good home with you.’

  ‘I bet she could catch rabbits.’

  ‘My oath,’ Hubert told them, still from behind the bedroom door. ‘You should see her go.’

  ‘You know, you could get up and show Robbie,’ Morag said, trying not to smile, and had a snort of indignation for her pains.

  ‘What, me? A dying man? You know…’

  But she never found out what she was supposed to know. Right at that moment the house gave a long, rolling shudder. The teapot, balanced precariously on the side of the stove, tipped slowly over and crashed to the floor.

  For one long moment Morag didn’t realise what was happening. Then she did. Unbelievably, she did. It seemed impossible but there was no time to wonder if she was right or not.

  Earthquake?

  ‘Robbie, out! Get away from the house.’ She shoved Robbie out the door before he could utter a response. Elspeth gave a terrified whimper and bolted after him, and they were barely clear before Morag was back in the bedroom, hauling Hubert out of bed and of the house after Robbie and Elspeth.

  ‘What the…?’ For someone supposedly ready to meet his maker, Hubert clearly had a way to go. He was white with terror. Morag was practically carrying him across the cottage floor as his old feet tried their hardest to scuttle on a surface that was weirdly unstable.

  ‘It must be an earthquake.’ She had him clear of the doorway now. Robbie was crouched on the back lawn, holding onto Elspeth, and the dog was whimpering in terror.

  ‘I don’t believe it.’ Hubert sank to his knees and grabbed his dog as well. ‘We haven’t had one of these on the island for eighty years.’

  They were clear now of anything that could fall. The earth seemed to be steadying again and she had everyone well away from the house. Morag was hugging Robbie, and Robbie and Hubert were both hugging Elspeth, so they were crazily attached. It was a weird intimacy in the face of shared peril.

  They didn’t talk. Talking seemed impossible. They just knelt and waited for a catastrophe that…that suddenly seemed as if it might not happen.

  More silence. It was almost eerie. They sat and waited some more but the tremors seemed to have stopped.

  Then they sat up and unattached themselves. Sort of. A bit.

  ‘Was it really an earthquake?’ Robbie demanded, and when Morag nodded, he let out his breath in one long ‘Cool…’

  But his body was still pressed against Morag’s and he was still holding on.

  ‘We haven’t had one of these for e
ighty years,’ Hubert whispered.

  ‘You’ve experienced this before?’

  ‘We’re on some sort of fault line,’ Hubert told them, his colour and his bravado returning as the ground settled. ‘A bunch of scientists came here years back and did some testing but no one took much notice.’ He snorted, his courage building by the minute. ‘It’ll be the same as last time. A bit of a wobble and a fuss and then naught for another eighty years.’

  ‘I hope you’re right.’ Morag grabbed Robbie around his middle and hugged, hard. Her little nephew was usually the bravest of kids but it didn’t take much for him to remember that the world was inherently unsafe. His ‘cool’ had been decidedly shaky. Seven years ago his father had drowned, and four years back he’d lost his mother. Now he clung alternately to Morag and the dog, and Morag kissed his hair and hugged him tight and wondered where to go to from here.

  The only damage up on the ridge seemed to be a dent in Hubert’s teapot. But down below… She shaded her eyes, trying to see down to the little village built around the harbour. It was a gorgeous day. The sleepy fishing village was far below them, but from here it looked untouched.

  Maybe a dented teapot was the worst of it.

  Please…

  ‘Maybe you’d better stay up here for a bit in case another shock comes,’ Hubert told her, his voice showing that he was just as wobbly as Robbie.

  But she had no choice. She was the island’s only doctor and if there was trouble in the township…

  ‘I need to head back to check the lighthouse and radio the mainland,’ she told Hubert, but she was speaking to Robbie as well. There was a bit of a stacks-on-the-mill process happening here. Robbie was on her knees, Elspeth was sprawled over Robbie, and Morag had a feeling that if dignity hadn’t been an issue then Hubert would be up here as well. Nothing like the earth trembling to make you unsure of your foundations.

  Robbie sat even more firmly in her lap. ‘I think we should all stay here,’ he told her. ‘What if it gets worse?’

  ‘Aftershocks,’ Hubert said wisely. He’d moved away a little in an attempt to regain his dignity. Now he clicked his fingers for Elspeth to come to him. Elspeth wriggled higher onto Robbie’s lap and Hubert had to sidle closer himself to pat his dog.