As he disappeared out of sight, Georgia was feeling a little remorseful about her earlier suspicions about Harold and said as much.
‘Don’t be, much better to be safe than sorry, I sure learned that back at Shady Oasis.’ Lola said.
Georgia stood up, ‘I know you are right, but I feel bad all the same, and I am going to feel even worse if he really does bring us some food.’ She shrugged. ‘Meanwhile, I think we should go look at that area map in the reception area. There is no way we can go back, there has to be another way. Maybe we can cut straight south.’
They stood, heads nearly touching, studying the map. ‘There just doesn’t seem to be any rivers or streams down this way,’ Lola sighed, tracing her finger downwards on the map.
‘Maybe we could just circle past Warsaw, walk along the Osage River. At least we would have water.’ Georgia said.
‘Yes, but from what Harold said we would never get over the causeway. They have it barricaded.’
‘Maybe there’s another road across…,’ Lola began, when suddenly Jamie burst into the room. His face was white, eyes wide in panic.
‘Come quickly,’ he said, ‘Deedee is really ill, she suddenly started vomiting everywhere.’
For a split second, they stared at him in shock, frozen in place, Georgia’s hand still on the map. In her mind’s eye, she once more saw the man lying on the ground, letting go of the water bottle, the water pooling around him. Oh God, this cannot be happening.
Then they ran. Between ragged breaths for air, Jamie told them how they had been playing upstairs, and Deedee had gone downstairs a couple of times. He had asked her if she had an upset tummy, but she said she was fine. But shortly after she came back upstairs the last time, she said she felt sick and began retching. She had made it to the bathroom, but missed the toilet, ‘and no,’ he had responded to Georgia’s frantic questioning, ‘no one had been near her, or the bathroom.’
Georgia flung open the bathroom door, nearly tripping over Millie who had been desperately trying to get in. Lola grabbed the dog and pushed her back in the corridor. Deedee was kneeling over the toilet, still retching and beside the toilet was a huge puddle of vomit, streaked with dark brown.
‘Oh crap, is that blood?’ Lola exclaimed, holding her hand to her mouth.
Georgie nodded. ‘I think so.’ She crouched down behind Deedee, her hand on her shoulder. The retching stopped, and Deedee began to wail, ‘I feel so sick!’
‘Can you get a little water Lola? So she can rinse her mouth.’
While they waited, Georgia pulled a handful of toilet paper off the roll, and gently wiped Deedee’s mouth. You will be okay honey. But even as she said it, she knew it wasn’t true, if that was blood, then…,
She stared at the toilet paper for a moment before dropping it into the toilet. It was stained with brown. Dark brown blood, and the bowl was spattered with the same. Maybe that wasn’t so bad? At least it wasn’t bright red. Wasn’t that better? Bright red blood would mean …, hell she had no idea. Either way it was bad. Helplessness and frustration mounted within her. Lola came back with a glass of water.
Georgia took it from her. ‘Best you keep your distance.’
‘Nuh uh. Sorry, we are all in this together, and in all honesty, if she has it, then we are all going to get it.’
Georgia handed the glass to Deedee. ‘Here.’ she said, ‘rinse your mouth with this.’ Deedee leaned over the basin swishing water from cheek to cheek and then spitting it out.
She turned to Georgia, her skin so pale. ‘I’m sorry I made a mess,’ huge tears were streaming down her face. Georgia gently wiped her cheeks with more toilet paper.
‘How you feeling now? Do you think you can lie down for a bit, or are you are going to be sick again?’
‘I want to lie down,’ Deedee said, in a very small voice. Her face pallid and dotted with beads of perspiration. Georgia’s heart was thudding with fear.
‘Do you need to go to the toilet? Or is that end okay?’
‘I already went,’ Deedee said, nearly whispering now.
‘Was it normal, or did you have the runs?’
Deedee sniffed tearfully, ‘I didn’t have to go that way.’ She began to wail again.
‘It’s okay honey, I promise, I will take you upstairs and put you to bed.’
‘Better take a basin,’ Lola said. ‘And I will clean up this,’ she indicated the puddle and the toilet.
Georgia picked up Deedee’s trembling form, and carried her upstairs, legs over her hips as though she were a toddler. She sent the others downstairs, ignoring their questions and shutting the door behind them.
Deedee began to cry in earnest. ‘Am I going to die?’
‘Of course not, honey,’ Georgia soothed, ‘you are not going to die.’ As she smoothed back her hair she noticed a little color in her cheeks. Was that the fever starting?
She climbed into the bed with Deedee, pulling her against her, gently rubbing her back, soothing her. The blinds were half open and as she sat reassuring Deedee she stared unseeing out of the window. She would wait till Lola came upstairs and then she would go to the kitchen and make up a batch of electrolyte. At least she knew how to do that. One level teaspoon of salt, three level tablespoons of sugar, and just over quarter a gallon of water.
Harold had said lemon juice. There weren’t any lemons, but perhaps…, unexpectedly she heard footsteps pounding up the stairs. Then the door flew open and Lola poked her head in.
‘I think you need to come and see this.’
Chapter Forty One
‘See what?’ Georgia gasped, not certain that she could cope with any more upsets. She had no idea why Lola had raced up the stairs like that, or what it was that she had to see, but she knew it couldn’t be good. Scrambling to stand up, she tangled her feet in the comforter and nearly fell over. ‘Are the others okay?’ she asked, her voice tight with dread.
‘They’re fine,’ Lola said, ‘but I reckon this is something you will want to see.’ she cocked her thumb backwards, vaguely indicating behind her.
Relief flooded through her, ‘oh,’ was all she managed, and then, as she looked back at Deedee’s tear stained face, she sat back down on the bed, torn by indecision, she couldn’t leave Deedee alone, not when she was so desperately ill, and surely whatever Lola wanted her to see couldn’t be that important. ‘I don’t think I should leave Deedee…,’ she began.
But Lola cut across her words. ‘She will be fine.’ She rested her eyes momentarily on Deedee, as she spoke, giving her what seemed to Georgia, an almost contemptuous look, then she turned and walked out of the room.
Hesitantly, she stood up, somewhat baffled by Lola’s expression. What had that been about? She smoothed back Deedee’s hair. ‘I promise I will be right back, just call out if you need me.’ Leaving the door slightly ajar, Georgia followed Lola downstairs.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked as Lola opened the bathroom door.
‘You are not going to believe this, I can scarcely credit it myself.’
‘Just tell me what’s going on?’ Georgia said.
‘Well, I cleaned up Deedee’s sick, and then I took the lid off the cistern to refill it, so I could flush everything away, without any risk of backsplash and I found…, well see for yourself.’
At first Georgia didn’t see anything, but when she leaned over the toilet and peered into the cistern, she saw what Lola was talking about. There, at the bottom of the tank, limply suspended in a couple of inches of water, were what appeared to be several Mars bar wrappers. She reached in and scooped them up, water dripping between her fingers. What the hell?
She stared at Lola in disbelief. ‘You think Deedee ate these? She looked at the wrappers in her hand, counting them. ‘All six?’
Lola nodded. ‘I don’t think - I know.’
‘How, and when, I mean…,’ Georgia fell silent, sudden comprehension dawning on her. Deedee must have been hiding them and it had not been blood splattered on the floor and toilet,
it was half digested chocolate.
Lola slowly slid the lid of the cistern back in place. ‘That I don’t know. But remember how Jamie said that Deedee kept going downstairs?’
Georgia nodded slowly. ‘I do, but even so, is it possible that the other kids ate some?’ Georgia found it hard to believe that Deedee could possibly have done this on her own.
Lola shook her head. ‘I asked Jamie, he swears that he hadn’t had a single one, not since you gave him one in the kiosk. Plus he is sure Rebecca didn’t have any either as she never left his sight, the whole time we were gone.’
Georgia dropped the wrappers in the waste basket and using the clean water in the sink, began washing her hands, lips pressed together, trying to think through all the possibilities. ‘And they are our wrappers? No chance that they have been in there for ages, left by a previous guest?’
Lola held out a towel. ‘No, for sure not, because I would have noticed them this morning, when Jamie and I brought the buckets in and filled the tank.’
There was a tentative knock at the door, and Jamie came in nervously rolling his shoulders. ‘I counted the remaining bars, as you asked, Lola, and there are only twelve left.’
‘There were eighteen,’ Georgia said, ‘and if you subtract those ones,’ she indicated the waste basket under the sink, ‘it leaves us with twelve.’
‘The little minx!’ Lola said, shaking her head in disgust.
‘So Deedee doesn’t have cholera?’ Jamie asked.
‘I very much doubt it,’ Lola said, ‘I think all that girl is suffering from is a case of toxic gluttony.’
Georgia nodded. ‘I agree with Lola, the silly girl ate six candy bars in what? Less than two hours? No wonder she’s been throwing up, after the pitiful way we have been eating, all that extra sugar would have just been too much for her system. Still, just to be certain, I will ask her.’ She was still not sure whether to be angry or relieved.
There was another knock at the door, and they all looked up to see Ruby standing in the doorway, wringing her hands,
‘Is everything alright? Perhaps I should make us all a nice cup of tea? I always think things look better after a cup of tea, don’t you?’
Georgia shook her head. ‘Not right now, Ruby,’ she said, as she headed past her and up the steps.
Lola’s voice drifted up behind her, ‘well you can tell her from me, her hide needs tanning.’ There was a momentary pause, then Ruby’s voice, almost inaudible, ‘goodness me, do you really think so?’
As Georgia reached the landing, she heard the sudden scamper of feet, and then the indignant squeak of bed springs, as someone (namely Deedee), leapt onto the bed. Lola was right, she was a little minx. She had obviously been listening at the door, so she was not so sick after all. And with the upstairs hallway, serving as an acoustic trap, she would have heard most of, if not all of their discussion downstairs.
She pushed open the door, to find Deedee lying back against the pillows, eyes tightly shut, feigning sleep. For a moment Georgia stood watching her. She had such a sweet face, her little Apache, and the chocolate must have been such a terrible temptation. For a moment she almost felt sorry for her. Even so, it was stealing, and for one of them to be stealing emergency rations was even worse. What if they had been stranded somewhere without food, and in desperation had gone to those rations, only to find they no longer had them? She knew it was an important issue, but right now, that aspect of it was not so significant.
She had been so afraid for Deedee. Terrified that she was going to die, and a tiny part of her was still afraid that she did have cholera and all of this was some sort of mix up. So for her own peace of mind, she just needed to hear Deedee admit it. She leaned over and shook Deedee gently by the shoulder. ‘I know you are not asleep, we have to talk.’ Deedee didn’t move.
‘Okay, here’s the thing, did you take some chocolate from my pack earlier today, and eat it?’ She waited, not really expecting an answer. When Deedee remained ‘asleep’, Georgia walked over to the door, opened it and then shut it firmly, watching for Deedee’s reaction. Almost immediately she opened her eyes, then realizing she had been caught out, sat up.
‘So tell me about the chocolate.’
‘Wasn’t me,’ Deedee half whispered, staring down at her hands.
‘Believe me Deedee, I am not in any mood,’ Georgia snapped, ‘you are already in enough trouble as it is, do not add to it by lying.’ But what if she isn’t lying, what if these wrappers have nothing to do with it? She suddenly felt less certain. On the other hand, how had the wrappers found their way into the cistern? I will ask you again. Did you take chocolate from my pack and eat it?
‘I didn’t take it from your pack.’ Deedee said finally, with just the whisper of defiance in her voice.
Georgia stared at her, an eyebrow raised in question, not saying anything. The silence lasted a moment, then two. Finally Deedee mumbled something that she could not quite make out.
‘What was that?’
‘It was me, I went to get my hairclips and I found the chocolate in my own bag.’
Once she had established that Deedee had indeed eaten all six bars, Georgia stood up, feeling almost sick with relief, and without another word to Deedee she walked out of the room.
‘She ate all of them,’ she said, as she rejoined the others in the lounge area and sat down between Jamie and Lola.
‘Then she hasn’t caught cholera?’ Rebecca asked, echoing Jamie’s earlier question.
Georgia gave her a reassuring smile. ‘No, she isn’t showing any of the other symptoms, and appears to be making a fast recovery.’ The relief in the room was palpable, and when she told them how she had heard Deedee scuttling back into bed, they all burst out laughing.
‘However,’ Georgia continued as the laughter died down, ‘as much as I hate to say this, Deedee has to be punished, we simply cannot allow anyone to steal, especially food.’ As one, everyone fell silent.
‘Any ideas? Anyone?’ Georgia asked, slowly looking at each of them in turn. At first no one had anything to say, and then all of a sudden they were in the middle of a heated discussion. No one could agree on anything and everyone had an opinion.
It was quickly established that Deedee couldn’t be sent to her room as punishment, because they all used the room. Nor could they send her to bed without any supper. The very idea was ludicrous, when you didn’t know when or where the next meal would be coming from. So that clearly was out of the question and as Rebecca was quick to point out, Jamie would no doubt, secretly share his food with her.
‘No, I wouldn’t,’ Jamie said, but they could tell by the way he denied it, that he had already made up his mind to do just that should the need arise.
As for Lola, for all her, ‘she needs her hide tanned’, she didn’t want her punished at all. ‘I reckon, she has been punished enough.’ And that was the only thing she had to say on the subject.
At this point, Rebecca stood up, holding the bible above her. ‘She should be made to read this,’ she exclaimed, ‘that way she would learn about the wrath of God.’
At least Georgia thought that is what she had said, but she had been distracted by the sight of Ruby emptying the entire contents of her handbag on the kitchen table. What was she doing? But whatever Rebecca’s reasoning had been, it was a moot point anyway. Deedee couldn’t read.
Georgia left the group, still talking nineteen to the dozen, and went over to Ruby. She looked up as Georgia approached. ‘Oh dear, this is all my fault.’
‘What’s your fault?’ She asked, putting a comforting hand upon the old woman’s shoulder.
‘And here you are,’ Ruby continued as if Georgia had not spoken, ‘all thinking it was that poor slip of a girl, and all the time it was me.’ She held out her own uneaten chocolate bar as explanation. ‘I am not quite sure how it ended up in my bag, but it seems I was the one who took the chocolate.’ She looked hugely embarrassed as she went over to the others and began apologizing profusely, star
tling everyone when she then offered to go upstairs to give it back to Deedee and make amends.
There was a chorus of ‘No’s’ and ‘don’t do that’ and similar comments and in the midst of this, the subject of all their discussions (who had no doubt, been eavesdropping), came downstairs.
She had the grace to look shamefaced, said that she was feeling much better now, and then stunned everyone into silence by sincerely apologizing to them all, adding that she would do her best to make it up to them. Then quite before Georgia could stop them, she and Jamie had taken up their bows and slipped out of the cottage, leaving the rest of them sitting there, speechless.
Georgia threw her arms up in disgust, she was not very good at this disciplinarian thing. Then she ran to the door and called out after them, ‘make sure you stay within cooee.’
Without turning, Jamie gave the thumbs up sign and Georgia watched them until they disappeared out of sight into a small stand of trees. Sometimes it was really hard to remember that they were only eight and eleven.
Calm descended once more on the cottage. Ruby had gone upstairs for a nanny nap, as she like to call them, and Rebecca was stretched out on one of the sofa’s leafing through a stack of magazines she had found in a cupboard. Checking that Rebecca would keep an eye on Ruby, Georgia and Lola headed out to the reception area, to get the large wall map.
They had just unpinned it and were rolling it up, when they heard Harold calling out to them.
‘As promised,’ he said, as they stepped outside. He waved his hand as though he were introducing someone, indicating three cardboard boxes stacked one on top of the other, on a bright green moving trolley.
‘Oh to have one of those!’ thought Georgia, looking admiringly at the fat little tires. So much better than a shopping caddy! Then she took in the fact that Harold had brought them three whole boxes of food.
‘Is that all food?’ Lola asked, as he shunted them off the furniture trolley.
‘It sure is,’ he said, pulling the trolley upright, and then before they really had a chance to thank him, he said he had better get back, and strode off across the forecourt and into the undergrowth across the road.
Survivors of the Sun Page 40
