baby.’
‘You…you sedated her?’
‘Needs must,’ Jessie grinned. ‘It’s not so different from sedating a horse.’ Then, at Fern’s look, she laughed and relented. ‘OK, Quinn gave me instructions before he went to Theatre-while you were prep-ping Sam.’
‘I…I see…’
‘I don’t think you see very much at all,’ Jessie corrected her kindly. ‘Fern, you look as exhausted as Lizzy. Bring her down to bed, Quinn…’
‘But…’
‘I have a huge bedroom and two beds,’ Jessie assured her. ‘And I take my parrot up to the kitchen at night-so there’s no need to worry about anything but my snoring. Quinn, you’re not going to bed yet?’
‘Not yet. Not until Sam’s fully recovered from the anaesthetic and settled into natural sleep. It could be a couple of hours.’
‘Then Fern and I had better sleep so that at least someone’s functioning in the morning.’ Jessie’s kindly eyes assessed Fern’s face. ‘Can you walk, Fern, or does Quinn have to carry you?’
‘I can…’
She couldn’t.
Fern didn’t finish her sentence. Quinn had already swung her up in his arms and was heading for the door, squeezing all the protest out of her.
‘For a very clever vet, you ask some very silly questions, Jess,’ he smiled back at the vet, but the tenderness on his smile was all for Fern. ‘My lady has her own method of transport.’
CHAPTER SEVEN
FERN slept the sleep of the dead.
When finally she woke the sun was pouring in over her bedcovers and Jessie was walking towards the bed carrying a tray.
‘Bacon on toast and coffee,’ she smiled. ‘Hungry?’
‘Y-yes.’ Fern rubbed her eyes.
Then she rubbed them again. Jessie seemed to have grown a new breast in the night.
As she stared, the middle breast wriggled.
‘OK, you,’ Jessie said placidly, cradling the extra breast in the cup of her palm. ‘I know it’s time for another feed.’
She grinned down at Fern’s look of astonishment.
‘I’ve won another baby in the night,’ she said. ‘A
tiny wombat. One of the local farmers found it in his back paddock when he went to check on a calving. I’m not sure of its chances-it seems badly shocked-but this way at least it has a hope. My movement, warmth and heartbeat are the closest approximation I can get to his mum.’
‘I…see…’
This place was a madhouse. Hospital, home, veterinary clinic, orphanage…
They were so busy. It was great of Jessie to bring her breakfast. Fern glanced at the bedside clock.
And glanced again.
Eleven o’clock!
It couldn’t be.
‘It sure is,’ Jessie smiled, seeing Fern’s look of astonishment. ‘I thought if you didn’t have this now you’d be running breakfast into lunch. Besides…’ she sat down on the bed in comfortable companionship, still stroking her wriggling extra breast ‘…the air ambulance is due in half an hour to take Sam to the mainland and we thought you’d want to say goodbye.’
‘Oh…Of course…’ Fern took the mug of coffee with gratitude. She sipped and sipped again and her crazy world finally tilted back to the right way up. ‘How is…how is Sam?’
‘His obs are good so far,’ Jessie told her. ‘Quinn has the morphine so topped up he’s hardly conscious-but his blood pressure’s holding and Quinn’s happy with his electrolytes and his haemoglobin level. Things are looking good.’
‘And Lizzy…?’
Jessie cast her a sideways look. ‘She’s packing.’
‘Packing!’
‘That’s what I said. Quinn told her an hour ago that Sam was being taken to Sydney for plastic surgery and she flew out of bed and headed home. She said she’d be back with a suitcase and if we let Sam go without her she’d murder the lot of us.’
‘Oh…’
‘It seems Sam Hubert has some decisions to make,’ Jessie said gently, her eyes warm with sympathy, but Fern shook her head.
‘No,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t think he has.’
Her clothes from the night before were disgusting. Jessie had lent Fern a nightgown to sleep in and now she offered a light skirt and blouse.
‘It’s lucky we’re almost the same size,’ Jessie smiled, and Fern shook her head.
‘Your blouse hangs loose.’ Fern grimaced and gave the top button of the skirt up as a lost cause. ‘You’re too darned thin.’
‘Yeah, well, I haven’t always been this thin. There are silver linings to every dark cloud,’ Jess said enigmatically.
Once again Fern looked at the dark shadows around Jessie’s eyes and wondered.
It was none of her business but the warmth she was feeling towards Jessie made her wish very much that Jessie, one day, would tell her what was causing the shadows. Fern had the feeling that in Jessie there could be a friend.
Quinn met them as they emerged into the corridor.
His eyes lit at the sight of Fern. Even for a man trained to cope with sleep deprivation there was weariness around Quinn’s eyes this morning.
Fern’s heart stirred at the sight of it. It was all she could do not to put her hand up to smooth away the lines of fatigue.
‘You should be in bed, Dr Gallagher,’ she said gently. ‘I can take over now.’
He smiled down at her, his smile a caress, and the wrenching sensation in her heart turned to something else entirely. Something like jelly.
‘Let’s get rid of your Sam and then we’ll think about bed.’ His smile deepened and Fern gasped. There was no mistaking the gleam of wickedness in those eyes.
‘Dr Gallagher…’ she whispered unsteadily.
‘Dr Rycroft!’ His voice was a parrot-like imitation of her shocked tone. He motioned to the door. ‘You’ll be wanting to see Sam before he goes. He’s awake-just-and he has the ward to himself. We let Frank go home this morning. He was whinging that a man couldn’t get any sleep in a place like this and I reckon if Frank’s well enough to whinge he’s well enough to go home. So you have privacy.’
‘Th-thank you.’ Fern walked uncertainly forward.
Quinn opened Sam’s door for her and let her pass.
‘Go and bid your love goodbye, Fern,’ he said softly. ‘Though I don’t think that’s really right, is it, Dr Rycroft? Go in and say goodbye to your friend.’
Sam was drifting in and out of sleep.
The nursing sister was sitting by the bed. Geraldine looked up and smiled as Fern walked in and then rose and left.
It was as though Quinn had given her orders to leave Sam and Fern alone.
‘Call me when you leave him,’ the nurse whispered, ‘and I’ll come back.’
