We’re the forerunners, but there’s massive help on the way. Tell me what needs to be done most urgently.’
She heard him. She took the three deep breaths he’d advised while she permitted herself the luxury of sagging against his chest. Feeling his strength. Feeling for this one moment that indeed she wasn’t alone.
Then she regrouped. She hauled herself away. She looked up at him and searched his face and she saw the same implacable strength she’d seen in him four years before.
And his strength fed hers. The islanders were gazing at her with dismay. If she disintegrated they all could, their expressions said, and this one show of weakness had to be her last.
‘We’ve set this up as command centre,’ she managed. ‘There are teams combing the island, trying to account for every islander. Ten confirmed deaths so far. Multiple casualties. But we can’t cope. We’ve run out of every medical necessity. This is our last bag of saline. I’m out of morphine. Bandages. Everything.’ She swallowed and turned to Sam. ‘Priority here is Sam’s leg.’
Grady had already seen. He moved her aside and checked the IV line. Lifted Sam’s wrist.
Looked down at the mangled leg.
‘I’m operating now,’ Morag said, and he nodded, a half-smile twisting his craggy face.
‘Of course you are. All by yourself.’ Then he turned away to the yellow overalls following him up the stairs. ‘We need operating facilities now,’ he called. ‘Urgent. Elsey, get saline, plasma, everything we need for major surgery right now. Bring it all up here from the chopper. Morag, don’t worry about supplies. We came fully loaded for medical emergencies. Max, we need lighting. Jaqui, will you do the anaesthetic? I’ll operate and Morag here will assist. Rod, can you help with the child’s thigh, there? He looks like he needs an IV line and pain relief. Tell me what his blood pressure is. Morag, is there anything else that’s as urgent as Sam?’
In one broad sweep he’d assessed the chaos. Leaving her speechless. ‘No,’ she managed. ‘Not…not yet.’
He nodded. ‘The first Chinook will be landing in the next half-hour,’ he told her. ‘The army’s sending troops. We aim to have everyone accounted for by nightfall. Meanwhile, let’s cope with this and face the rest of the mess afterwards.’
It was a dreadful operation, done in the most primitive of conditions. Removing a man’s leg, even a leg as dreadfully injured as this, was nothing less than butchering. Morag had seen it done-had assisted before with patients with tumours or with complications from diabetes-and each time the operation had made her feel ill. How much more so now when her world was spinning out of control?
And yet…it was in control again-a little-because of this man. Grady was good. There was no one she’d rather have in this emergency than Grady. Once the emergency lights were set up, he went straight in.
They were using the door as an operating table. There was no screening from the rest of the people using the pavilion. Sterility of the environment was a joke. But it couldn’t be allowed to matter. Grady moved with care, blocking out all else.
He took the leg off just above the knee. He tied off damaged blood vessels, working carefully, quickly and skilfully.
Finally the bleeding eased, and by the time the remains of the fisherman’s leg could be removed and taken away for burial, everyone there knew that Sam had a fighting chance at life. And this had been no butchering job. The remains of the leg were viable. He’d have a stump which could be used as a basis for an artificial limb. The operation couldn’t have been done much better if it had been done in a major city hospital.
For the first time, Morag felt the wash of hopelessness recede. Sam had suffered massive blood loss, but if he was going to go into cardiac arrest, surely it would have happened sooner. Now they had saline and plasma flowing at maximum rate, and Jaqui was watching his breathing like a hawk.
Jaqui might look an unlikely doctor-a middle-aged woman, almost six feet tall, skinny and shiny in her canary yellow overalls-but there was no doubting her skills as an anaesthetist. The bleeding had been stemmed and the otherwise healthy fisherman now had a chance to fight back.
Finally, as Grady worked over the dressing, Morag found herself with time to step away. For the first time since she’d seen that awful wall of water, she had time to assimilate what had happened.
Marcus was standing behind her. The big fisherman was waiting in the shadows, as if he, too, was taking a breather from the horror he’d been working with. She stepped back to him, taking in his shocked and haggard face. She knew her own face must mirror it.
‘What’s happening?’
‘The world’s arrived,’ he told her in a voice that was barely audible. It was as if every ounce of strength had been sucked out of him with the shock. ‘The chopper that these people came in on was a forerunner. Two Chinook helicopters full of army personnel are here now, using the paddock up the top of the fells as a landing base. Teams are searching the island. There’s boats out to sea, still searching.’
‘People are still missing?’
He lifted a piece of paper and stared down, unseeing. She followed his eyes and flicked through the names-and winced.
‘The Koori community are missing about eight of their people,’ he told her. ‘They were on the beach. They saw the water being sucked out and went to get a closer look. They ended up being washed everywhere. Lots of lacerations but some of their kids… And some of ours…’ His voice broke and Morag put her arms around him and hugged. Hard.
And tried not to think about a name she’d seen on the list.
‘We can get through this, Marcus,’ she said softly. ‘But we can’t break. Not you and I. Too much depends on us.’
‘You’re right.’ He wiped his face on the back of his sleeve and his face tightened. ‘You’re bloody right, Doc. I’ll be out again in a bit, but I just came to see how Sam was going.’
‘He’ll make it. Thanks to these people.’
‘Yeah, it’s a good thing there’s an outside world,’ Marcus said grimly. ‘And maybe it’s the only thing left to us. I’ve seen the town. The houses…’
‘Don’t think about it.’ She glanced back at the table to where Jaqui and Grady were still working. They could do without her now. It was almost sunset. It was time to move on to her next priority. ‘Marcus, I need to see to the lighthouse. What if the light’s not working? And I need to see Robbie. He’ll be frantic.’
‘Yeah, you go, lass,’ he told her. ‘With two doctors here, they should be able to manage. You carrying your radio?’
She gestured to it on her belt. ‘Always.’
‘You’ll need to walk,’ he told her. ‘Most of the roads are washed out.’
‘Yeah, and I’d imagine my car is floating somewhere in the Pacific.’ She shrugged. ‘I can walk. I can even run. But…’
Marcus saw her hesitation and had no trouble identifying it.
‘I’ve been on the line to some expert from Sydney. The Centre for Seismology or some such. She says the wave was from the shock caused by the earthquake. She also says the epicentre was miles from here. There were two smaller waves after the big one but they’ve settled. The scientists are on full alert for any more shocks, but she says more waves are incredibly unlikely-and even if they happen, we’ll now get heaps of warning.’
‘So we’re safe?’
‘Yeah. Sort of. Robbie’s been watching all afternoon but he’s off duty now.’
She managed a smile. ‘The whole island’s been dependent on a nine- and a ninety-year-old. My guess is that Hubert won’t choose to die this week.’
‘I surely hope not. We’ve had enough deaths.’ Marcus’s smile matched hers-weak and with no life behind it. ‘OK.’ He shrugged. ‘I need to go. I shouldn’t have come, but I couldn’t bear to leave Sam.’
‘He stands every chance of recovering.’ Morag glanced once more over her shoulder to where Grady was completing his work. He had no attention to spare for her, and she had none to spare for him.
But he was here. The thought was overwhelming in the measure of comfort it gave her. This afternoon had been her worst kind of nightmare, and she was taking any vestige of comfort wherever she could find it. So she let herself look at Grady for a moment longer, taking in the solid competency, his air of command, the presence he exuded without ever seeming aware of it.
Enough. She was being silly. His presence was a comfort but there was nothing more to be done here.
‘Let’s go,’ she told Marcus-and she turned away from Grady to follow Marcus, out of the cricket pavilion and
