Wuthering Dormice (aka Bike) Part 878 by Angharad Copyright © 2010 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

After our visitor left, Tom announced he was buying a new Land Rover. I asked if he was selling the estate car and he said he wasn’t, but he was trading in the old one–which he considered was a collector’s item. It was thirty years old and clapped–the
only one who might want to collect it was a scrap yard, surely?

He assured me old ’Rovers were very collectable. I’d reserve judgement–perhaps he was talking to a museum?

I was cleaning up after lunch–none of the kids could go to school, so I made them do some schoolwork at home. I set each of them something different, so they couldn’t crib from each other. This took up the rest of the morning, then we had lunch and afterwards, I promised they could go sledging.

I had just finished in the kitchen when the doorbell rang. “Gramps it’s for you,” called Trish.

I looked out the window and a Land Rover Freelander was parked in the drive. Tom pulled on his coat as he walked, almost with a skip in his step, towards the new car. Obviously a test drive–certainly, the weather made it a true test of performance.

I looked at the white stuff blanketing everything and wished I’d learned to ski. I’d done some dry slope practice but never got around to the real thing–oh well, a few more days and hopefully, I can get a bike out again. I should set up the turbo I’d bought back in the autumn, at least I’d get some exercise that way–quite when was another matter.

The kids collected the two sledges we had and the improvised ones I’d been making in the garage. I’d opened up some oil cans, cutting and beating them nearly flat, then put a handle on the front, and screwed a piece of wood for a flat seat. We had effectively four snow play vehicles if the homemade ones worked. I took my camera with me, some hot drinks in a flask and a towel. I also included some chocolate biscuits and of course, my phone.

We trekked about half a mile to the same hill where last winter we’d seen the boy hit the tree. I prayed none of mine would be injured, and to try and make sure, I insisted they carry a cycling helmet with them. They grumbled until I reminded them of what happened last year. Trish and Meems remembered and said so. The mutiny quietened after that.

The makeshift sledges actually worked very well provided you didn’t want to go anywhere in particular. They were also faster than the conventional sledges, like those kamikaze luge things, which to me looks like sitting on a dinner plate and sliding at eighty miles an hour down a bobsleigh run. Quite an adrenalin surge I expect, but too risky for me–I’ll stick to bikes, but not on bobsleigh runs.

During our two hours on the hill, we saw a few minor accidents and I was beginning to believe no one was seriously injured when someone on a luge type sled, shot down the hill at a very fast speed and ended up with a leg either side of a fence post. It was unlikely to help his future prospects in parenthood.

Several people went to assist so I stayed where I was, calling my kids to come to me. However, it seemed as though there were only two adults there, the rest were teens. I made mine stay together with Julie in command. I took one of the sledges and slid down to the accident site. There was quite a bit of blood around, but it might still be relatively superficial. They were going to move him until I told them not to.

The boy was whimpering like a kitten, he was probably about twelve or thirteen, and I was surprised he was still conscious. “Has anyone called for an ambulance?” I asked and it seemed no one had. So I did, explaining the child had injuries to his groin from an impact accident. The ambulance service reported they were under high demand and the road conditions were making things very difficult for attending incidents. They would get there as soon as they could. I wondered if the helicopter might be sent–assuming it was available.

I asked for advice regarding care of our patient and then did what they suggested. Then I knelt by the boy and held his hand, he was drifting in and out of consciousness, and the red area in the snow was getting bigger, despite packing snow around the injury–cold helps reduce bleeding.

I kept talking to him, his name was Nick. Julie sent Trish down to ask if she should take the kids home and I agreed. I gave Trish my key in case Tom was still out and Stella didn’t hear the door–she doesn’t always.

I kissed Trish goodbye and she went back up the slope. I turned back to my patient and talked to him again.

“It looks bad,” said the other adult–a man in his forties. I asked him to keep his opinions to himself as Nick could still hear him even if he was unconscious. “Who are you then–Dr Who?” he laughed at his own joke and I asked him to leave before the ambulance had another casualty.

He stood his ground and swore at me. I did a practice kick at head height in the opposite direction to where he was standing, and he went white. “That’s threatening behaviour,” he blustered as several of the boys laughed at him being intimidated by a woman.

“Actually, you were the one being offensive, now please go,” I exhorted and he took the hint, calling some more obscenities from a safe distance, which included, ‘Toffee nosed bitch.’

I felt the boy’s body, he was becoming cold, so I stripped off my coat and placed it over him–that wind wasn’t taking any prisoners. It was now about fifteen minutes since I’d called for help then we heard the helicopter, not the air ambulance but the big red and silver search and rescue thing.

I asked one of his mates to go and tell his parents what had happened and to tell them to head for the QA hospital. He trudged off through the snow, another I made wait, to give his details to the helicopter team. Once they were here, I was going to try and catch up my own lot of responsibilities, who had a ten minute start on me, plus a trudge up the hill. At least Trish had taken the sled with her.

The next question was; where were they going to park their chopper? It was soon answered, they touched down on the top of the hill and moments later the lineman came stumbling down the hill pulling a stretcher behind him.

As soon as he arrived he confirmed my diagnosis, the kid was in shock and had lost a significant amount of blood. I helped ease him onto the stretcher and two of the larger boys and I helped carry him back up to the ‘van’ as the crewman called it.
He’d taken details of the boy’s name and address from his friend and then for some reason asked me to go back with them.

“Why?”

“You seemed to be in control there so you can tell the A&E medics what happened.”

“But I’ve told you–why can’t you tell them? If you plucked this boy off a ship or from the sea, you wouldn’t ask a passing mermaid to go with you, would you?”

“Yes I bloody would, always fancied my chances with a mermaid,” he said laughing, “Come on, get in, this kid’s cold.”

Instead of arguing any further I got in the helicopter and sat on a very basic seat strapped in and deafened by the noise of the thing as it heaved it itself skywards.

Thankfully, the flight was a short one and I accompanied the stricken child and crewman into the hospital–only to be asked to wait in the waiting room.

I sat trying to warm up a bit, then remembered I had a hot drink in my rucksack. I had just poured myself a cup of drinking chocolate–I don’t like it really, I’d made it for the kids–but I was cold: I took my first sip of the yucky stuff when I heard a semi familiar voice.

“Lady Cameron, I wondered if it was you?”

“Mr Nicholls,” I replied.

He beckoned me over to the clinical area and I was forced to put my drink down. “I thought it was you–this kid should be dead. He’s got about two blood cells left in his body, so he should be brain damaged as well, plus the fact, I’m going to have to dig his testicles out of his lungs.”

“I hope that’s an exaggeration.”

“He is smashed, his pelvis should be in powder form, but it isn’t, he’s lost loads of blood, so he should be brain damaged but he isn’t. His testicles are damaged but they may survive–dunno if he’ll ever father any kids, but they should be up round his ears by the description of the impact.”

“He was travelling, possibly twenty five or thirty miles an hour when he impacted.”

“That could have cut him in half on a concrete post–make a wish time,” he shrugged. “Then low and behold I find the Angel of Mercy has been holding his hand. It explains why we’re not doing a post mortem and instead waiting for the urologist to come and put his dinky back together–though he won’t be playing with it for a week or two.” He smiled and I gave a nervous chuckle at his graveyard humour.

“Oi tought it was you, how are ya me darlin’?”

“Mr O’Rourke, how nice to see you again.” We shook hands.

“You know Lady Cameron, do you, Mick?” asked Ken Nicholls.

O’Rourke winked at me, “Oi helped her wid a liddle problem a year or two ago. What’s dis, Lady Cameron, did ya marry Soimon efter?”

I nodded, “’Fraid so, one less eligible bachelor to go round.”

“Oi did da same wid Anne.” At the astonishment on my face, he added, “Didn’t she tell ya?”

“No, I suppose it’s none of my business.”

“Oi suppose dat’s one way o’ lookin’ at it.”

“You know this lady has saved you a lot of work, Mick?”

“No, how’s dat?”

“She has this magical touch which heals people.”

O’Rourke laughed, “Dis bugger, is an awfu’ joker, so he is.”

“I’m not joking, Mick–I’ve seen her repair a leaking aneurysm by touching the patient. The guy was down for emergency surgery as soon as the theatre was clear. I did another scan and it was healed.”

“Ya jokin’ Ken, ya got da wrong patient, again,” he winked.

“She removed two bullets out of her father in law’s back. She has some magical power. This lad you’re gonna see, he should be dead. He hit a concrete fence post at thirty miles an hour on a luge, his groin stopped him.”

“Oh shite.”

“He’s lost a bit of blood and was shocked, but he should be dead–he isn’t because, Lady C was holding his hand, much longer and I suspect he’d have got up and walked home.”

“Dat’s a bit far-fetched, Ken, oi know she’s beautiful an all dat, but she doesn’t faze me wid her beauty. Whereas, we all know ya’re a fool for a pretty face.”

“I’ve seen her do it, she resuscitated her foster daughter after she had drowned.”

“Small kids do dat, go inta hoibernation mode.”

“She hadn’t fallen through ice–it was a swimming pool. Believe me, Mick, this lady is something very special.”

“Oh oi know dat all-roit.” He smiled at me.

“Can you wait a little longer, Lady C?”

“I suppose so,” I said wishing I had a cup of tea to drink and somewhere to sit, my jeans were still wet from kneeling in the snow.

“Go and sit in my office, I’ll get them to bring you a cuppa–you look cold.”

“I am, thank you, the tea would be much appreciated.”

As I walked to his office, he was telling Mick O’Rourke he should speak to Sam Rose, if he didn’t believe him. I knew what that was about.

A receptionist brought the tea and a biscuit, which was very welcome. I’d barely finished it when the two surgeons came back. “Lady C, can you come with us please?” I put down the cup and went out the door with them. “I know you don’t like experiments, but can you do your magic one more time?”

“What on that young man?”

“Um–no, we’ve got a baby, who stopped breathing half an hour ago.”

“But isn’t that beyond the possible?” I protested.

“They took that long to get here, stuck in the snow–I can’t do anything for her, she’s clinically dead–maybe you can?”

“But what if I can’t?”

“Nothing is lost is it, but at least then all that can be done has been done.”

“I need to be on my own with the baby.”

“Sure.” He led me to a small cubicle and lying on the couch was a very pale looking infant with blue lips. I felt the tears form in my eyes, I didn’t want to do this, I really didn’t.

I picked her up, she was quite cool. If I succeeded in starting her heart, would she be damaged elsewhere? Was the energy in me enough–I’d been obviously sharing it with young Nick, although I hadn’t even thought about it. The other thing that went through my mind was I knew exactly who they’d compare me with if it worked–all of which was no comfort to either this poor wee soul or her distraught parents–I could hear the mother crying in the next cubicle.

I drew the curtain and sat with the child. “Come on little one, wake up sweetheart,” I held her to me, and blew on her, imagining the air going into her lungs enriched with the magical light. I did the same again, and this time imagined it making her heart begin to beat–gently–the blood oxygenating in her lungs and moving around her body, with a blue fluorescence healing as it went. I spoke to her again gently, asking her to come back to me and her parents and to breathe again. I don’t believe in afterlifes and all that stuff, but I hoped there was enough of the essence of the baby still around or in her to hear my plea. I kept on talking to her and visualising her reviving, blowing on her occasionally, I did this over and over again.

After that I don’t remember too much, they came back and found me cuddling the baby who was sleeping with me although I was leant semi-conscious against the couch so as not to fall off the chair.

Sam Rose was summoned and the baby rushed off to ICU, Ken Nicholls and Mick O’Rourke were both rubbing my hands and face and talking to me. “Jesus, Mary and Joseph–dat was a miracle, an’ oi saw it wid me own eyes.”

“Now d’you believe me?” Nicholls was asking him.

“Oi’ll nivver doubt yous again, so I won’t.”

I awoke some hours later in a quiet side ward, lying on top of a bed, still dressed but covered by a blanket. I staggered out of the door and the nurse made me go back to the bed. Mr Nicholls was summoned.

“Why am I here?” I asked.

“You collapsed after saving a teenage lad and a baby girl.”

“Oh yeah, I remember the boy, did you have to operate?”

“No, his penis spontaneously healed while you were still in the hospital. Mr O’Rourke is most impressed.”

“Please you have to swear him to secrecy and the families.”

“How do I do that with the families?”

“Tell them if they tell a living soul, it all undoes and the previous state arises.”

“That’s tantamount to a threat.”

“I know, but we all know what will happen if you don’t–the press will crucify me–like it happened two millennia ago.”

“I see–I’ve asked them to keep it quiet.”

“Please do so more firmly and explicitly.”

“It took a lot out of you this time didn’t it?”

“Yes, I feel exhausted.”

“You’ve slept for four hours.”

“Hell, I need to get home, I’ve kids to see to, of my own.”

“They know where you are and why you’re here. Once again thank you. You’re a very special lady.”

“Yeah, one with a very long walk ahead of her.”

“No, I’ve got a 4x4 ambulance to take you home if you want to go.”

“Please.”

“Okay, I’ll send up a cuppa and the driver when he gets here.”