Doctor on Loan Read online

  ‘Hop it. He must be fine or he’d be showing symptoms by now. Have a coffee. I’ll be here for ten minutes or so.’

  Mary-anne gratefully hopped it. Christie lifted the clipboard from the foot of the bed, and Hugo opened his eyes.

  They weren’t half-bad as far as eyes went, Christie thought. They matched his gorgeous body exactly. Brown and deep set, they had laughter lines creasing in at the edges, as if he spent his life smiling. He might be a dimwit, she decided, but he must be a good-humoured dimwit.

  She gave him a brief smile and went back to studying his report. The vomiting had stopped—he’d got rid of the sea water. He’d had a cup of tea for lunch but had eaten nothing. That was hardly surprising. Then he’d slept again.

  No temperature, blood pressure fine. In fact…

  ‘I’m normal?’ he asked, and she started. His voice was low and deep. This morning it had been husky and shaken, but his confidence had returned.

  ‘Nicely normal,’ she said, and gave him a grin. ‘As normal as someone with the IQ of a newt can ever be.’ She lifted his wrist and checked her watch. ‘Hmm.’

  ‘I told you, I’m normal.’

  ‘Let me listen to your chest.’ She pulled his bedcover down and was presented with a broad expanse of tanned chest, liberally sprinkled with dark, curling hair. Goodness, the man could almost be one of those pin-up types—heman material. She blinked, collected herself like a nicely trained female doctor should and attempted to adjust her stethoscope—and her thoughts—into professional mode.

  ‘Can I ask—?’

  ‘Hush,’ she told him. ‘I’m listening.’

  Silence.

  Then…‘Can I—?’

  ‘Not yet. I’m still listening. Can you roll over onto your side?’ she asked. ‘Carefully, so you don’t hurt your leg. I want to pop the stethoscope on your back.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’ There was enough dryness in his voice to make her blink, but he did what he was told. She listened—and frowned.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ He rolled back onto his pillows to face her. She looked a little more professional now—her jeans were covered with a white coat—but she didn’t look anything like the doctor Mary-anne had told him she was.

  But he’d checked out his knee last time he’d woken. If it really had been dislocated—and it hurt like it had been—she’d put back a badly dislocated knee by herself, and that meant she had skill! Plus, Mary-anne had told him she’d resuscitated him. She might not have hauled him from the water but he still owed her his life.

  ‘You’re carrying a considerable amount of fluid on your lungs, which could cause a bit of discomfort,’ she told him.

  ‘I’ll live.’

  ‘Maybe you will, but I don’t want you lying flat for a while,’ she told him. ‘You’re to stay propped up on pillows for at least tonight. I don’t want pneumonia.’

  ‘That makes two of us,’ he told her. His brows snapped together. ‘I know you put my knee back, and Mary-anne tells me you resuscitated me when I was near dead, but…are you sure you’re a doctor?’

  She smiled at that. He wasn’t the first person to question her credentials. ‘Would you like to see my certificates?’ she asked. ‘I know I look sixteen but I’m twenty-eight and I have all the qualifications you could possibly want.’ Her weary eyes twinkled and he felt the same kick in his guts that he’d felt the first time he’d seen her. ‘I wouldn’t try things I’m not competent to do,’ she assured him, and he had the grace to give a shamefaced grin.

  ‘Maybe it doesn’t always follow. I wasn’t exactly competent to try to come into the harbour. I gather I’ve risked a few lives, apart from my own stupid neck.’

  ‘Mary-anne has been talking?’ Mary-anne’s husband was a local fisherman who’d been out last night in the search, and Mary-anne was nothing if not a straight talker. And it was true, it hadn’t just been Ben who’d risked his life. It had been every islander who’d climbed onto a boat to search.

  ‘Mary-anne has been talking,’ he agreed dryly. ‘It seems half the island put their lives on the line to save my butt.’

  ‘Ben risked his life to save you,’ she said softly. ‘The islanders risked their lives to save Ben. He’s quite a boy.’

  He fell silent at that, while Christie checked his pupils and adjusted the drip above his bed.

  ‘When can I see him?’ he said at last, and his voice was strained. ‘Ben, I mean.’

  ‘I’m not sure.’

  ‘You said he wasn’t badly injured.’

  ‘No, but…’ Christie’s voice faltered. ‘He’s not ready for visitors.’

  Hugo’s black eyebrows snapped together. ‘Dr Flemming—you are Dr Flemming, I gather. The nurse told me…’

  ‘Yes, I’m Dr Flemming.’ She smiled at him. ‘And you’re Hugo Tallent.’

  ‘Fine detective work.’ His mind wasn’t on her, though. ‘Dr Flemming, you’re not telling me everything.’

  ‘About?’

  ‘About Ben. Is he more badly injured than you’ve let on?’

  ‘No.’ She hesitated, wondering just how much she should say. It was Ben’s business, and for all the brains he’d shown this man might be as sensitive as a Brahman bull.

  But he’d need to see Ben before he left the island—most people in Hugo’s position would insist on it, she thought—so if he wasn’t to do more harm, then he probably needed to know the full story.

  ‘Ben’s mother drowned when he was eight,’ she told him. There was no gentle way to put this. ‘Ben was washed out in a rip, holding onto his surfboard. His mother panicked and swam out to reach him. She was lost, but they found Ben hours later, floating beyond the waves. I…He’s carried it hard—that she died because of him.’

  She hesitated but it had to be said. ‘I think most of the reason you’re here now is because of Ben’s sheer, bloody-minded determination to save you, and that is a legacy from his past.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘And you’re not his mother,’ she said softly, watching his face for signs of comprehension. ‘No matter how much he’d want it to be. If you understand what I mean.’

  He did. She could see it in the look of dismay and intelligent comprehension that flashed into his eyes as she spoke. And the consternation. Maybe she had to rethink this a little, then. He wasn’t entirely a dope.

  ‘Hell.’

  ‘It is,’ she said quietly. ‘For Ben, it is. But meanwhile—’

  ‘I need to see him.’ It was a desperate growl and it made her blink.

  ‘Maybe tomorrow,’ she agreed. ‘We’ll get you a wheelchair. I’m afraid you might not be weight-bearing on that knee for a day or two. It depends on the extent of the bruising. Meanwhile, if you’re up to it, our local police sergeant would like to see you.’

  ‘The police…’

  ‘The sergeant needs to know what happened. Who to contact. I’ve held him off until now, but if you’re up to it…’

  ‘I’m up to it.’ His mind clearly wasn’t on his own problems. It was still on the boy. ‘So much harm…’ He flicked a look up at her. ‘The islanders must think I’m a fool.’

  ‘It has entered their minds,’ she agreed neutrally, softening it with a smile. It wasn’t her job to make him feel bad. He was doing a good enough job of that himself. ‘But, then, we’re inclined to think that of all mainlanders.’ She glanced at her watch, but before she could leave, his hand came out and caught hers, holding her urgently to him.

  ‘Please—I need to explain.’

  She looked down at their linked hands. For heaven’s sake, she had so much to do. She should pull away, but…

  She gave an inward sigh, and capitulated, and there was a small part of her that was pleased she could do it. She sort of liked the feel of his hand…

  ‘So, tell me,’ she said, with more brusqueness than she intended. ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘Really?’

  She smiled, disengaged her hand from his and sat on the chair beside him. It felt great
to get the weight off her feet—and also, for some strange reason, it felt great to get her face on eye level with his. It lessened the doctor-patient relationship. It made her feel she was able to empathise just a little more, which, for some strange reason, felt really important.

  And he seemed to feel it, too. He was watching her face, as if he badly wanted her to understand.

  ‘It wasn’t my boat,’ he told her.

  ‘No.’

  ‘You know that already?’ Still the tension was in his voice. He sounded as if he was close to breaking, and he needed to tell someone why. He needed to justify what was close to unjustifiable.

  Christie sighed inwardly. Of course. What male didn’t need to justify his foolhardiness? But if it helped, then she was ready to hear it. After all, it was better to listen than to prescribe a sedative. ‘The harbour-master told me the boat’s registered to your father,’ she said gently.

  ‘Yeah.’ He looked grim. ‘But my brother, Peter, borrowed it.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Who does when Peter’s concerned?’ he said bitterly. ‘My father lives in Brisbane. When he retired, he and my mother built the yacht and they loved it. Since my mother died it’s been my father’s life. I don’t know how Peter managed to persuade him to lend it to him, but he did. Peter sailed it to Cairns, but then he was offered a berth on a bigger boat heading for the Bahamas. So Peter, being Peter, took off and left Sandpiper sitting in Cairns harbour. Not even in a safe berth.’

  ‘So…’

  ‘So my father decided to sail it home himself—but he has a dicky heart. It wasn’t safe for him to try. It’s the beginning of the cyclone season. If the boat doesn’t get south now it’ll be stuck in Cairns for six months, and six months without his boat would break my father more than anything else. And it’s too big to haul by road.’

  He hesitated, watching Christie closely and willing her to understand. For some reason, it was desperately important that she did. ‘My father’s just lost my mother,’ he told her. ‘He…he needs that boat.’

  She softened, just a little. Maybe he wasn’t a complete sandwich short of a picnic, then. ‘I start to see.’

  ‘I tried to hire someone to sail it south but had no takers,’ he went on urgently. ‘With my father more and more distressed, and saying he’d sail it himself, I had no choice. You might have gathered by now that I’m a fair-weather sailor. My radio failed, the storm hit from nowhere, I was dismasted and there was a lee shore. I was being driven onto the rocks. And without a radio…’

  ‘It’s rare for radios to fail.’ Christie frowned. She knew enough of sailing to know that a decent radio was a sailor’s lifeline.

  Hugo’s voice tightened in anger. ‘That’s courtesy of Peter,’ he told her. ‘He’d sold the good radio and replaced it with a cheap, battery-operated one—with no spare batteries—just like he sold every decent fitting to give him funds for his overseas jaunt. I refitted as best I could, but I was in a rush and a spare battery for the radio didn’t occur to me.’ He shrugged. ‘So I sailed, I got into a mess and I checked Peter’s notes, which said Briman Island is a safe harbour.’

  ‘Which it is,’ Christie told him. ‘Once you’re inside the harbour, it’s fine, but it’s not a safe harbour entrance. With an easterly blowing like it is now, not even the fishing boats can get in or out.’

  ‘Except when they’re taking hair-raising risks to save me.’ Hugo groaned and sank back deep into the pillows. ‘Of all the stupid, senseless, dopey…’

  ‘Your boat’s been salvaged,’ Christie offered. She was so rushed for time that to sit here was stupid, but at least it was giving her the assessment she needed. The mental acuity test she could have been using after a period of unconsciousness—asking him questions like when he was born, what year it was now, who the current prime minister was—wasn’t necessary while she did this. He’d been unconscious, but he didn’t appear to have any brain injury at all.

  The relief was enormous and she found her tense body relaxing as he spoke. He really was OK. Thank God! Drilling burr holes to relieve the pressure of an intracranial bleed wasn’t an area of medicine that interested her one bit. Especially since she was on her own.

  As well as that, it was sort of peaceful, talking to him. He was distressed, but there was an air of calm and competence about him. She couldn’t put her finger on what it was exactly. Tranquillity, maybe? It was a ridiculous idea, but this was still blessed time out from what was waiting for her elsewhere in the hospital.

  The tranquillity had to end. She had a major worry apart from her concerns over this man’s head injury, Ben’s horrors and her normal medical work. She’d spent the first part of last night worrying about Liz Myers’s labour contractions. They’d eased but hadn’t quite ceased. They must!

  But Hugo Tallent wasn’t thinking about her medical worries. He was thinking of what she’d just told him. ‘The boat’s been salvaged?’ he repeated, staring at her like he couldn’t believe what she’d said. ‘Sandpiper has been salvaged? You’re kidding. I thought she was lost, for sure.’

  Boat. Sandpiper.

  Right. This man’s boat was the least of her problems, but she could give him news that would leave one of them feeling better.

  ‘I gather she righted herself, and was washed in through the harbour mouth,’ she told him. ‘It was incredibly lucky. She was washed up on the rocks of the harbour wall. The fishermen and the harbour-master have pulled her up into dry dock and they tell me she’s repairable. With enough money.’

  ‘Money’s no problem.’ He let his breath out in a sigh of relief. ‘At least I can tell Dad she’s safe, and he’ll love repairing her.’

  ‘He might have been more upset if his son had killed himself,’ she said dryly. ‘You’ll need to let him know what’s happened. Mary-anne will organise a phone by your bed.’

  ‘I guess…’ He hesitated. ‘I’ll need to charter a boat or light plane to get me off the island.’

  ‘You don’t like our medical facilities?’ She smiled, but there was strain around her eyes. Her other problems were crowding in, and he had no choice about staying.

  ‘It’s not that,’ he said shortly. He stared down at the cradle over his injured leg. ‘This leg is inconvenient, but I need to be back in Brisbane.’

  ‘I’m more worried about your lungs than your leg,’ she told him. ‘But you’re lucky. We have a retired physiotherapist living on the island. I’ve asked him to see if he can shift a bit of that fluid. It’ll make you more comfortable.’

  ‘I’ll live,’ he said shortly. ‘There are physios in Brisbane. I can’t stay here.’

  That’s what he thought. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘But I’m afraid you’re stuck with us for a bit. The weather’s lousy. A cyclone’s sweeping the north of the state and we’re feeling it here. It’s earlier than usual but that’s what caused your problems. All emergency services are headed north, we can’t land light planes and our harbour’s unusable. So, unless you wish us to risk more lives on your behalf, Mr Tallent, I suggest you lie back and accept our hospitality.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘You may have money…’ she told him, her gentleness fading. She was pushed to the limit and the last thing she needed was a rich, foolhardy yachtsman throwing his weight around. ‘But I’m afraid money’s no use to you here. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.’

  She looked around as Mary-anne opened the door. Great. ‘Can you take over, please, Nurse?’ She spoke more formally than normal—in truth, her weariness was causing an edge she didn’t normally feel. ‘We can stop the specialling—just cut it back to hourly obs. I’ll stop back in after the physio’s been.’

  ‘You’re needed in the women’s ward, Doctor,’ Maryanne said apologetically. ‘Mrs Myers…Her contractions have started again. Strongly this time.’

  Oh, help…

  Christie closed her eyes for one weary moment. It was all the respite available for her, and it wasn’t enough. O
pening her eyes again, her face set into a grim mask.

  ‘I’ll leave you in Mary-anne’s hands, then, Mr Tallent,’ she said tightly. ‘Get some rest.’

  She closed the door behind her, leaving the yachtsman to take on board all that she’d told him.

  And he didn’t like any of it.

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHRISTIE had no more time to think of Hugo Tallent, or anyone else. Liz Myers was in real trouble.

  Since Stan had had his stroke, babies weren’t delivered on Briman Island—not if they had any sense. Their mothers went to the mainland a few weeks before delivery and stayed there until confinement. Although Christie had obstetric and surgical training, there were severe limits to what she could do alone.

  Until the last few months she’d been able to cope in emergencies. Stan Flemming had been a fine doctor, and he and Christie worked well as a team. In the three years before Stan’s stroke they’d operated as surgeon and anaesthetist for quick, straightforward procedures like emergency Caesareans.

  But no more. Stan had lost sensation down his right side and was still slightly confused. Sometimes he seemed fine, but spasmodically he’d lose track of where he was or what he was doing, or he’d hold something and suddenly find it was on the floor. It meant that medically Christie was very much alone. It also meant the bright, confident smile she assumed as she entered the room where Liz Myers lay was totally false. Inside she was wobbling like jelly.

  ‘Hi, Liz. What’s happening?’ Liz Myers was thirty-five weeks pregnant, but she was tiny and the baby was already big. On Christie’s orders she’d gone to Townsville a month ago for a ultrasound and they hadn’t liked what they’d found.

  ‘Come back here no later than thirty-six weeks into your pregnancy,’ the Townsville obstetrician had told her. ‘You’re heading for a Caesarean.’

  And on seeing the pictures from the ultrasound, Christie had agreed entirely. ‘If you must marry a six-foot-six fisherman, with shoulders like an ox, then what do you expect?’ she’d told her friend. ‘Liz, you’re tiny, Henry is a very big man and you’re carrying Henry’s son. You’ll go back to Townsville.’