Diver Down (Mercy Watts Mysteries)

by A W Hartoin

  I put on speed and ran past Joe, Andrew, and Todd hauling BCDs off a dive boat. I tripped and went down on my knees. Sand dug into my scrapes and I winced as I scrambled to my feet. “Lucia!”

  She didn’t turn and I ran up behind, gasping for breath. “Lucia!”

  “Mercy!” She lifted the brim of her crazy hat. “What happened to you?”

  “What happened to you? Why aren’t you in the hospital?”

  “They needed the bed. Something happened on one of the cruise ships.”

  “Mercy.” A weak voice came from the other chair. Graeme. He laid back on the lounge chair, limp with red cheeks.

  I pushed the hair off my forehead. “Graeme?”

  His head lolled to the side. “Uh huh?”

  My anger evaporated. “Has he been drinking?” Graeme’s left hand was wrapped around a tall glass on the table between.

  “No,” said Lucia. “But he just started acting funny.”

  Mom joined us. “What’s going on?”

  “I’m not sure yet.” I walked around their chairs, my feet sinking into the sand, cool under the shade of the palm trees. Graeme wasn’t focusing on me or anyone. I sat on the edge of his chair and turned his face toward me. “Graeme, can you see me?”

  He said yes in a slurred voice that sounded like he’d been pounding tequila shots. I picked up his trembling wrist and took his pulse. One hundred and forty beats per minute and he was at rest.

  “Did he take anything, Lucia?” I asked.

  “Like what?” Her voice went up in pitch.

  “Like anything. Any medications at all.”

  “No, nothing. He got the pills you gave me, but he didn’t take any.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Absolutely. He doesn’t like to take medication, if he doesn’t have to.”

  My eyes fell on the glass, still in Graeme’s hand. I leaned over his body and took it. Smelled like sweet tea. Maybe raspberry. The glass was nearly empty.

  “What is this, Graeme?” I asked.

  He slurred something incoherent.

  “Lucia, what is this?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know. The waiter just brought it. What’s wrong with him?”

  “You didn’t order it?”

  “No. The guy said it was for me, but I didn’t want it, so Graeme drank it.”

  I shot to my feet. “Mom, find a car. Any car. We have to get him to the hospital now.”

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Just go. Find Spitball or Mauro. Somebody now.”

  I took Graeme by the shoulders and tilted his torso over the edge of the chair. He groaned. I pinched his nose shut and pried his mouth open. He fought me, but I got him in a headlock. My fingers got past his teeth and he bit me. Now that’s a special pain.

  “What are you doing?” screamed Lucia.

  “He’s been poisoned.” I don’t know how I wasn’t screaming, the pain was that bad.

  “I’ll help you!”

  “No! I can do it!” The trouble was I couldn’t. Graeme was totally out of it, but it didn’t stop him from biting the hell out of me and thrashing around like a toddler waiting for a shot.

  Aaron dropped into view next to me. “Need help?”

  “Got to make him throw up,” I said through clenched teeth.

  Aaron grabbed Graeme’s face and muscled his jaws open. Those stumpy little hands were amazingly strong. Years of chopping, I guess. I shoved my fingers deep into Graeme’s gullet. His body convulsed and a stream of brown gushed past my hand.

  Chapter 10

  LOUISE AKA NURSE Crabby didn’t require a bribe to put Graeme on a gurney. Maybe it was his sweaty, shaking body lying on the floor in front of her desk or Mauro screaming in Spanish or maybe it was me. I caught a glimpse of myself in the ER door. I would’ve been afraid of me. No question. I was halfway to crazy town and I looked it.

  Louise and I pushed Graeme through the corridors into Room Three where Lucia had been only hours before. Louise took his vitals while I stood at the door, screaming for a doctor. A page went out and it was in English, but so heavily accented that I couldn’t tell what they said. Dr. Navarro ran around the corner with a stack of charts in his arms. My reappearance in his ER startled him and he dropped four of the heavy metal folders with a clatter.

  I ran over. “I’ll get them. He’s in Three. Go.”

  Dr. Navarro shoved the rest of his charts in my arms. “Lucia?”

  “Graeme. Poisoning. Antifreeze, I think.”

  He cursed in Spanish and ran into Graeme’s room. At least I think it was cursing. It had that ring. I gathered up the charts and followed him in, dumping the charts in a chair. Dr. Navarro tested Graeme’s pupil response with his penlight and smelled his breath. Graeme was still out of it, but conscious. He knew his name, but that was about it.

  “What makes you think it’s ethylene glycol?” Dr. Navarro asked.

  “He drank a glass of sweet tea and this happened. Antifreeze is easy to conceal and the symptoms are right.”

  He ordered Louise to draw blood and get a urine sample.

  “That will take too long. Do you have dialysis?”

  “There’s a clinic in French Harbor.”

  “Not here? You’re the hospital.”

  “No fluid, but we have sodium bicarbonate and ethanol.” He scribbled on Graeme’s chart and told Louise to set up the IV.

  I picked up Graeme’s trembling hand and he turned his head towards me, eyelids at half-mast. “He’s not too bad,” I said. “It should work.”

  “It should. We’ll get him to French Harbor if he goes into renal failure.”

  Louise ran back in and did the IV. Another nurse hung the bag of sodium bicarbonate and got ready to pour the ethanol down his throat. He wasn’t going to like that, but it was drink or take it through the nose. Not a great choice either way.

  “Graeme, you have to drink this stuff, okay?” I squeezed his hand.

  The drip started and I watched as the bicarbonate headed towards Graeme’s vein. The nurse put a cup to his lips and poured some in. He shook his head and the fluid ran out of the side of his mouth.

  “Graeme! You have to drink it or they’ll shove a tube up your nose,” I said.

  That got his attention with a quickness and he drank the cupful, coughing and sputtering, but he got it down.

  “Now it’s just wait and see,” said Dr. Navarro, watching the heart monitor.

  Graeme was resting comfortably and his pulse and breathing had slowed. But ethylene glycol poisoning wasn’t an exact science. It affected different people differently. Graeme’s kidneys could still shut down or he could walk away. We just didn’t know.

  “Are you going to admit him?” I asked.

  “I would, but all our beds are full.”

  “How is that possible?”

  “We have thirty-three beds and a population of sixty-five thousand,” he said quietly.

  “Holy crap. I don’t even know what to say.”

  “It’s a whole different world out here. Have you given any thought to our medication situation?” he asked.

  “I haven’t. I’m sorry.” I ran my hand through my hair, which was only slightly less tangled than a cat’s hairball.

  “Mercy, let me see your hand.”

  “Huh?”

  Dr. Navarro took my hand out of my snarled hair and flattened it on his palm. Red raised splotches covered my hand and extended up my arm to the elbow. “Looks like contact dermatitis.” Then he saw the roach spray and cocked his head to the side. “What have you been doing?”

  “You don’t want to know,” I said.

  He bent over my hand and sniffed. “It smells sweet.”

  “Yeah. I sort of shoved it down Graeme’s throat.”

  “And you didn’t wash it?”

  “There wasn’t time.”

  “You’re having an allergic reaction in addition to the usual irritation. Louise, can you get a colloidal bath for Mercy?”
r />   “Yes, doctor.”

  The hospital’s intercom crackled to life. “Dr. Navarro to Room Twelve. Dr. Navarro to Room Twelve.”

  He left and Louise came back with a pink plastic basin with cream-colored bits floating around in the water.

  “Yum,” I said.

  Louise frowned. No sense of humor. She set me up next to Graeme’s bed and put the basin on the rickety arm of the chair. I put my arm in. Ahhh. Warm and soothing. Just what the doctor ordered, literally.

  Louise hesitated and glanced at Graeme. “Someone tried to kill him, didn’t they?”

  “Yes.”

  “And his wife, the one with the stab wound.”

  “Her, too. Actually, her mostly. I think she was the intended victim.”

  Louise straightened the thin sheet over Graeme’s legs. “I’m sorry I was difficult earlier. I shouldn’t have taken your money.”

  “I get it. You’re understaffed and underpaid. You’re under everything, I imagine,” I said.

  “Yes. We’re out of medication one third of the time. I’ll give your money back. You came here expecting help, not blackmail.”

  “Keep it. Donate to the hospital or whatever. We got what we came for.”

  “Thank you. We can use it,” she said. “I’ll go see if I can find a bigger basin.”

  “I’m fine. This is plenty big.”

  “It’s for your leg. He vomited on your leg too, right?”

  I extended my right leg. The swollen redness from earlier was still there, but it was considerably better. “No,” I said slowly. “He didn’t.”

  Louise squatted in front of me and palpitated the area. “It looks like the same reaction.”

  “Oh my god.” I yanked my cellphone out of my still wet pocket. The screen was fogged with water and the damn thing was dead. “I’ve managed to drown my cellphone. Louise, can I borrow yours? I have to call my mother.”

  Louise gave me her Nokia, so old that I was surprised it still worked. Mom answered after the third ring with a suspicious hello.

  “Mom, it’s me. How’s Lucia? Is she with you?”

  “Mercy, thank goodness. Yes, she’s right here and she’s fine. How’s Graeme?”

  “I think we caught it in time, but this wasn’t the first attempt,” I said.

  “We’ve established that. Don’t think our discussion is over,” said Mom.

  “Whatever. I meant that this isn’t the first poisoning. They tried before.”

  Louise placed a metal bucket in front of my chair and put my leg in.

  “What do you mean? Lucia’s fine, other than the leg thing.”

  “Remember my leg being swollen and red? I just figured out the cause. Graeme barfed all over my hand and arm. Now my arm looks like my leg.”

  “It wasn’t the vomit?”

  “It didn’t get on my leg, but when we were getting Lucia off the beach during the storm, I knocked over a glass. It went all over my leg.”

  Mom gasped and told Lucia.

  “Ask her where that first drink came from,” I said. “It was on her side table before the storm.”

  Mom asked and I waited. I wanted to jump out of my chair and run around the room.

  “She doesn’t know,” said Mom. “Can you ask Graeme?”

  Graeme was snorting and thrashing around trying to avoid his next dose of ethanol. Plus, he wasn’t so much coherent.

  “No. Mom, don’t let Lucia drink anything that isn’t out of a sealed can or bottle. You have to be the one to open it. Not the bartender or any of the staff.”

  “Got it.”

  “Is Aaron there?”

  Mom gave the phone to my partner. “Hey. What’s ya doing?” he asked.

  “I need you to cook for me,” I said.

  He inhaled and, unless I missed my guess, jumped to his feet and was looking for a frying pan or, god help me, a lionfish.

  “Aaron, focus. Someone is trying to poison Lucia. They put antifreeze in her drinks. They could try food next, since we’re on to them. You need to cook every meal for her and the rest of us, just in case.”

  “I’m on it. Do you want ribeye?”

  “Really?”

  “I got ribeye and blue cheese.”

  “That sounds fabulous, but see if Lucia can handle something that heavy first. How about the consommé you were talking about?”

  “Yeah, yeah. We’ll start with consommé and then—”

  I didn’t have time to listen to the full menu and I was starving. That didn’t help. “You rock, Aaron. Give the phone to Mom.”

  “Okay. I got more lionfish,” he said.

  “That’s a dream come true. Mom, please.”

  He handed over the phone before he got to making lionfish hot dogs. It was coming. I was starting to get a sense for these things.

  “When are you coming back?” asked Mom.

  “I have no idea. They don’t have a bed for Graeme, so as soon as he’s mobile I’d guess.”

  “We’ve got to get off this island.”

  “I know, but Chuck said there aren’t any available flights.”

  Mom’s voice got all oozy. “You called Chuck.”

  “Sorta kinda. Anyway, can you call him and find out if he’s got any information? My phone is dead,” I said.

  “What kind of information?”

  “He’ll know.”

  “You two talking a lot these days?”

  “Only when absolutely necessary,” I said.

  “You could’ve called Morty, but you didn’t. You called Chuck.”

  “Uncle Morty would tell Dad,” I said. This conversation was almost as annoying as Chuck. I could hear the huge smile on Mom’s face.

  “Chuck doesn’t keep things from your father or does he now…for you,” she said.

  “Mom, drop it. I asked him and he’s doing me a favor. Did you tell Dad?”

  “Not yet. There’s nothing he can do and I don’t want to hear the yelling.”

  I agreed and hung up. The less yelling the better. I settled back in my cracked vinyl chair and got mesmerized by Graeme’s heart monitor, the steady beep beep.

  I woke two hours later with my head on Graeme’s bed and my leg and arm still in the warm water. Contrary to middle school beliefs, I did not pee.

  “Hey,” slurred Graeme.

  I rubbed my eyes. “How are you feeling?”

  “Like I drank antifreeze.”

  “So not great then.”

  “I’ve been better and more sober,” he said.

  I smiled and lifted my arm. My swelling was down and the red had gone to pink. “Ethanol is an effective treatment for ethylene glycol poisoning, believe it or not.”

  “What’s up with the baking soda?” he asked, pointing to the sodium bicarbonate drip.

  “That corrects the metabolic acidosis and increases the elimination of renal glycolic acid.”

  “It makes me pee.”

  “Something like that,” I said with a smile.

  “When can I leave? I gotta get back to Lucia,” he said, his eyes still unfocused.

  “I don’t know. It’s not up to me.”

  “Someone tried to kill her.”

  “Yes.”

  “You were right all along. I thought you were crazy,” he said.

  I patted his leg. “It’s a common opinion.”

  “What are we going to do? We can’t get off this island. I called the airline.”

  “I know. We’re just going to hunker down and wait it out.”

  “I hate this.”

  “Me, too.”

  After another half hour, Dr. Navarro came in and checked Graeme’s chart. “You were lucky.”

  “It runs in the family,” said Graeme with his eyes half-closed.

  “I’m going to keep you for another hour and see how it goes. No more sweet tea.”

  Graeme smiled. “Never again.”

  Dr. Navarro hooked his chart over the end of the bed and said, “Mercy, can you step outside with me?”
>
  “Sure.” I dried off my arm and leg with a towel he gave me and we went into the hall. Officer Tabora was waiting. He had two other officers behind him and they looked distinctly serious and not in a we’re investigating an attempted murder way and you’re a witness. More like we think you’re the suspect way. I can’t explain what the difference is exactly, but I’d been Dad’s suspect in several crimes ranging from sneaking out to stealing his booze. I could always tell when he thought I’d done something. The Roatan cops had that same aura about them. I guess cops are all the same.

  “Miss Watts, you must come with us,” said Officer Tabora. He had a sheen of sweat on his brow and his hand on his weapon.

  Seriously, dude. No need for that. I think the three of you can take me.

  “Where would we be going?” I asked.

  “We’ll be more comfortable at the police station here in Coxen Hole.”

  I laughed. “I’ve been in a lot of police stations and I mean a lot. They are never comfortable.”

  “You’ll have to come with us,” Tabora said.

  Dr. Navarro stepped up. His cheeks were flushed and he fidgeted with his lapel. “Is this really necessary?”

  “It is.”

  The good doctor glanced at me and I said, “You had to call them. Don’t worry about it.”

  That’s what I said, not how I felt. I was worried as all get out. In a Third World country suspected of attempted murder. I’d seen too many episodes of Locked Up Abroad to think this was okay.

  Tabora took my arm and I stepped back out of his grasp. “Am I under arrest?”

  “We’d like to question you.”

  “Go for it. I’m quite comfortable here,” I said.

  “It’s not appropriate.”

  “This is the Wild West remember? Appropriate hardly seems important.”

  Graeme called out behind me, “Mercy, what’s going on?”

  “The cops want to question us about your poisoning,” I said, over my shoulder.

  “They can come in,” he said.

  I raised an eyebrow and gestured to the door. The three shuffled their feet and looked vaguely confused. They wanted me, not Graeme.

  “You were going to question the victim, right?” I asked.