‘Now, Cate, you know I gotta move them cattle up on high land.’
‘Take the bottle with you and mind you put it on a couple of times a day. It will help keep the germs out. You get that leg infected and June will have to do all the work on her own.’
Noah stood up abruptly. ‘Which cubicle next, Sister?’
Cate gave him a questioning look. Her answer was even shorter. ‘Four.’
As he stepped out of the cubicle he heard her give instructions on when to return for the removal of sutures. Hell! He should have done that, but he was out of practice. He was whistling down the tunnel of medicine and mayhem again and all the old demons were laughing at him. The lack of staffing was bringing it all back, the disbelief and anguish when he’d found out there hadn’t been enough doctors to save his own wife. And the guilt. The only thing he’d been thankful for had been that Donna had never known that her own husband was the doctor who hadn’t been able to save her. Would she ever have forgiven him?
Noah shook his head and briefly he resented Cate. How had that woman managed to get him here? If he could just get through this one night, he’d make damn sure that Riverbank had more doctors than they could possibly need. And he’d keep his distance from the patients.
In cubicle four an old lady sat stoically on the chair with her hands in her lap. Her face was the map of an interesting life and, white-haired and tiny, she reminded Noah of his grandmother. He could tell she was in pain but nothing obvious stood out. Until she lifted her hand from her lap. Her thumb was red from the base to the swollen tip that stuck out at a bizarre angle.
‘Ouch!’ Noah pulled a chair gently up beside hers and cradled her wrist in his hand to see the thumb up close. ‘I’m Noah Masters, the doctor, and I can see you’ve dislocated your thumb. It must be very painful.’
When she didn’t reply Noah wondered if she was deaf, but then she looked down at the offending digit and shook her head. ‘It bloody well hurts.’
Noah bit back a smile. Maybe not so similar to his grandmother. ‘We’ll take an X-ray, but I’m fairly sure it’s not broken, then I’ll have to put some local anaesthetic into the base of your thumb and block the nerves. The good news is that all the pain will go away for a while and when I put it back in alignment most of the pain will fade even when the anaesthetic wears off.’ He heard Cate enter the cubicle and she held an X-ray up for him to see. Mrs Gorse’s!
Cate was too efficient and perversely he felt the prickle of his resentment again. ‘Don’t doctors have to order these before you can get them done?’ He knew he was being testy but she was making him feel threatened with her capability.
‘Mrs Gorse came in just as the evening staff were leaving. I had the resident sign the X-ray request before he left.’ She didn’t poke her tongue out but he had the feeling she’d have liked to. Instead, she handed him a silver kidney dish with two strengths of local anaesthetic and a syringe—and left.
The old lady cackled at him and suddenly he smiled.
‘That’s better,’ she said, and her eyes nearly disappeared into the creases in her face. ‘Thought you had a poker up your bum. You’ve met your match in Cate.’
Noah nearly dropped the dish. He looked at her from under his brows and gestured to her thumb. ‘How did you do this?’
She snorted in disgust at herself. ‘I was moving the bull and caught my thumb in his nose ring.’
‘I should have known.’ Noah waited for the local anaesthetic to take effect and then manipulated the joint back into place with a soft click. He glanced at his watch. ‘You moved the bull in the dark?’
She shrugged her unaffected shoulder. ‘The river won’t wait for the morning.’
She still looked a little like his grandmother even if she didn’t sound like her, and again he felt like chatting. ‘So where are you going when we get it fixed for you?’
Mrs Gorse looked at Noah as if he were mad. ‘I’m goin’ home. There’s a flood on, you know.’
Cate breezed in. ‘You two seem to be getting on well.’ She smiled at Noah and then bandaged the old lady’s thumb to give some protection. Noah assumed she realised that Mrs Gorse would be back at work as soon as she got home. He stood up and looked down at the two formidable women before he left the room.
So Mrs Gorse reckoned he’d met his match, did she? Now, that sounded more like his grandmother. He stifled the brief moment of loss he always felt when he acknowledged that the woman who had cared for him most of his childhood was gone. Nina Masters had been a strong woman and hadn’t hesitated to tell him he was a fool for marrying Donna. She probably would have appreciated Cate. Most likely because she wouldn’t have bored her to death like Donna had. He hadn’t thought of Nina for ages and now just wasn’t the time. He moved to the next cubicle.
A young girl had just been brought in with a raging chest infection and her hacking cough made Noah wince as he shook hands with her worried parents. Cate appeared beside him and handed over the chart with Sylvia’s vital signs. Her temperature was elevated and her oxygen saturation was way down from what it should be.
Cate smiled reassuringly at the mother. ‘This is Dr Masters, Gladys. Tell him what you told me.’
Gladys squeezed her daughter’s hand and looked up with tired eyes. ‘She’s just not getting better, Doctor. Sylvia’s been sick since she had the flu a week ago and tonight I noticed her fingernails were blue. Now she’s got pains in her chest when she breathes.’
Noah nodded. ‘She’s certainly not well. I’d like to listen to your chest, Sylvia.’ He looked at Cate who lifted the little girl’s jumper up so he could place the stethoscope against her chest. ‘How old are you, Sylvia?’ Noah asked, and his voice seemed to soothe the frightened child. Cate was glad to see he wasn’t trying to freeze the child out, as she’d noticed he’d tried to with the adults.
‘I’m six.’ The little girl looked at her mother as if to check she was right, and then sat quietly as Noah tapped with his fingers on her chest wall and listened.
‘Can you make big breaths in and out? Big as you can, without hurting yourself, please, Sylvia.’ Noah leaned forward with his stethoscope and listened to the child’s air entry at the front and back of her chest, before standing back.
He spoke to her mother. ‘We need to take an X-ray in the morning, but I think Sylvia has developed early pneumonia on both sides of her lungs. She’ll need to stay in hospital for a couple of days, maybe more. Are you able to stay with her?’
Gladys turned to her husband and when he nodded she looked relieved. ‘Yes. I can stay tonight at least and then we’ll see how the flood goes. Normally it wouldn’t be a problem but if the river comes up too far I’ll have to help out with the cattle.’ She looked pleadingly at Cate. ‘But Sylvia has Cate and if I have to leave she’ll make sure she’s right, won’t you, Cate?’
‘You know I will, Gladys.’ Cate nodded, and ruffled Sylvia’s hair. ‘Let’s hope the rain stops, though.’
Noah frowned but he didn’t say anything against more work for Cate. Instead, he spoke to Gladys and her husband. ‘Sylvia is a sick little girl. It was a good choice not to leave her any longer. She’ll be right in a few days.’
And so the night wore on. He heard tales of past floods from the older people, most of whom seemed to have had a relative almost washed away in the 1949 flood. Apparently the hospital had saved many lives. From the younger folk he heard of the sandbagging operations that were going on through the night. Never having been involved in this sort of crisis before, Noah couldn’t help being caught up a little in the air of urgency. The one thing he didn’t hear were complaints.
At five a.m., Cate came in with two mugs of coffee and sighed as she sat down beside him at the nurses’ station. She looked more tired than he felt and Noah stifled the wave of tenderness she stirred in him. Suddenly, care was needed, or she could easily slip under his guard. He had been through enough with Donna, and the tragic consequences of their marriage, and he just wasn’t ready to ge
t involved with another woman. He was beginning to wonder whether the only way to avoid that was to leave town as soon as possible.
Cate sipped her coffee and stifled a yawn. ‘Well, that was the last from the backlog. If you want to put your head down, I’ll phone your room if anyone comes in who can’t wait for the morning staff.’
Typical of her, he thought. She needed the sleep more than he did but already he knew better than to mention it. Noah shook his head and stirred his coffee thoughtfully as he settled back in the chair. What did make this woman tick? ‘You seemed to know most of the people that came through. I gather your family have lived here a long time?’
Cate smiled and there was contentment in her voice. ‘My great-grandfather settled at Riverbank just after the turn of the last century and we have a lot of relations in the valley. My parents and I work the original farm.’
Her eyes crinkled as she thought of her home, and Noah wondered what it would feel like to have such a network of family and friends surrounding you. He realised he envied her. ‘So you’re a real country girl.’
She met his eyes. ‘You could say that—yes. Though most of us have it easier here on the coast than those further inland. I really admire the women out west who teach the kids and run the house and the shearing sheds, plus the admin side of farming as a business.’
He realised he was doing what he’d just told himself not to do. He shouldn’t be so interested. His voice became more flippant. ‘Well, I’m a city boy and mean to stay that way. It would feel strange to know the people you treat all the time. I’m afraid I like a bit of distance from the patients.’
Cate gave him a level look. ‘I noticed.’ Her voice was dry. ‘Is that why you chose to go into administration? Because you don’t want to get involved with patients? I heard you used to be a surgeon. You have special skills, Noah, and what you do now seems to me a waste of your training.’
His face closed. ‘I’ve chosen not to work as a practising doctor any more. I can do more good where I am at the present and I believe that. And there are other reasons.’
‘Which you’re not going to share?’ Cate didn’t have high hopes but wasn’t afraid of asking.
His eyes hardened. ‘That’s correct. So don’t expect me to work in Emergency again.’ He smiled but she could tell he meant it as he stood up. ‘I think I will go to my office. You can ring me there.’
‘Certainly, Doctor.’ Cate nodded and watched him leave. Whatever his reasons, they seemed to be very heavy baggage—and she had a strange urge to try and comfort him.
CHAPTER FOUR
Thursday 8 March
THE night finally ended. Cate headed for bed after handing over to the morning casualty staff. She could sleep at least until after lunch, but there was still her afternoon shift as supervisor to cover, which she’d swapped with Amber.
The supervisor’s office was in full use through the day but Cate had been offered an empty patient room in Maternity until they needed it. She didn’t stir until lunchtime and when she woke to the sound of a baby crying, she turned on the patient’s radio beside her bed. The river and bridge level updates were on and her eyes snapped open. All but the last of the upriver bridges were closed. A minor flood on the Macleay, at least, was a reality.
She tossed and punched her pillow but couldn’t recapture the dream she’d been enjoying. She was too wide awake. Cate climbed out of bed. If she hurried, she could make sure those who wanted to go home before the last bridge closed made it out in time.
Cate showered the mist from her brain in the private bathroom and smiled to herself as she wondered where Noah was showering. Then she frowned with unease as she remembered her reaction to a half-dressed Noah. And tried not to imagine how devastating he’d be entirely naked…
An hour later, she ran into a bleary-eyed but immaculate Noah in the cafeteria as he made himself a coffee. She couldn’t help the small smile about her private thoughts and suddenly all her senses felt amazingly alert.
Cate bounced over to him. ‘I’ve sent the rest of the upriver staff home that wanted to go. The last bridge to cross upriver will be closed in an hour. If it keeps raining they mightn’t get home for a week.’
‘You should have kept them in case you needed them.’ He was obviously not happy about his lack of sleep. He glared at her. ‘What are you doing? You don’t start until three.’
She grinned. ‘I’ve had five hours. It’s enough.’
He grunted but didn’t disagree. ‘So the flood is closer?’
Cate nodded. ‘We’ve had two hundred and sixty-six millimetres of rainfall up at Point Lookout today. It looks that way.’
He gestured with his hand to ask if she wanted a cup of coffee, but she shook her head. ‘No, thanks. By the way, we’ve had a few calls from women at the outlying villages who are due to have their babies. They’re worried they’ll be unable to get in when they go into labour. How do you feel about the really overdue women coming in?’
Noah shook his head. ‘Don’t weaken. We don’t have the staff for extra patients but if they want to come into town they can stay with friends or relatives.’
Cate didn’t like the coldness of the answer and she frowned. ‘What about the ones that don’t have either of those in town?’ Cate thought of Michelle and Leif and how their timing had worked for them. Others wouldn’t be so fortunate and some could panic. ‘I don’t want people taking risks either if they feel they have to stay home until the last moment.’
His face hardened. ‘Not our problem.’ Cate frowned harder but he ignored her. ‘If they’re that worried they could stay at a motel.’ He headed for the table. ‘If the worst comes to the worst, I’m sure the state emergency services will get them in here.’
Cate could feel her temper rise as she followed him. Didn’t he know these were real people he was talking about? ‘That’s a big ask for the state emergency services. What about women with fast labours or first babies who don’t know how long they have in labour?’
He waited for her to sit down and then did so himself. He shook his head. ‘It’s not your job to take the worries of the world on your shoulders. If a labouring woman needs to come in and can’t, that’s when I’ll worry about her. We are not having pregnant women taking up beds “in case” they go into labour. We might need the beds. Do you understand?’
Cate couldn’t believe this guy. How dared he speak to her like that? She stood up again, aware that she’d better leave before she got herself into real trouble. ‘Right’ was all she allowed herself and marched away. All the things she should have said ran through her brain as she stomped up the corridor but it had still been a good idea to leave then. She liked her job.
Cate screwed up her nose. Amber would probably wax lyrical about Noah at shift handover. Lately, she seemed to bring Noah Masters into every conversation she could, dwelling on his good points, as if he had any, and today Cate wasn’t in the mood. Maybe she could divert Amber with Brett, the only other person Amber seemed to want to talk about.
Noah watched her stomp away and ran his hand through his hair. The first thing he had to do was get a few more doctors to help with staffing. He’d have to check supplies were adequate in the kitchen if the highway shut, and he had an appointment with the SES controller in half an hour. Now, there was another strong woman, he thought with a grin.
He just didn’t have time to think about the look of contempt Cate had flung at him before she’d left or why it bothered him. But it did.
Much later in the evening when he caught up with her, he wondered if she’d cooled down. It might be politic to mend fences. It might even be fun. Fun was something he hadn’t had much of the last two years, and for some reason Cate seemed to amuse him.
‘So how many disasters have you dealt with so far, Sister Forrest?’ She was at her desk when he dropped in, ostensibly to look for the nurse manager who hadn’t been in her own office.
She looked up but she didn’t smile. ‘We don’t have disasters here, M
r Masters. We have moments of unusual interest.’
‘Ah.’ Noah nodded sagely. He saw that she was alone and decided to put off his search for the nurse manager for a few minutes. He rested his hip on the corner of her desk and looked down on the top of her head. All he could see was blonde-to-the-roots thick hair that sprouted up at him and made him want to brush it to see if it was as silky as it looked. She continued to be absorbed in her paperwork. Or pretended to, he’d wager. He cleared his throat. ‘Cate, truce.’
The pen in her hand was thrown down on the desk and she tipped her head back to look at him. It was a nice angle.
‘How can I help you, Mr Masters?’ Her blue eyes were doing their police siren thing again. At least he didn’t bore her.
How could he explain what he was trying to say when he really didn’t know himself? ‘Cate, I know we can both do our jobs while running a cold war between nursing and administration, but it’s much more pleasant to be in sync. As far as our discussion from this afternoon goes, I don’t believe we’ve reached the stage where we need to encourage people to be admitted before they are genuinely required to be here. I need your support on this. We can’t let the public abuse our resources at this early stage.’
She pushed her chair back. ‘What you don’t seem to realise is that the public around here don’t abuse resources like you seem to expect them to.’
Noah smiled—at least she was talking to him. ‘I admit you have more experience with these people but, believe me, if someone needs to come in urgently, we’ll get them here.’ He put out his hand. ‘Truce?’
At least he was listening to her. Cate looked at his hand and thought of the last time she’d touched him. She rolled her fingers in hesitation but then forced herself to shake. His hand was warm and firm and there it was again, a frisson of awareness zapping from his fingers to hers, and Cate pulled her hand away. She glanced at her watch and stood up. ‘I’m going for tea.’
‘Then I’ll come with you.’ He was laughing at her. She could either get angry or laugh back. She chose the latter.
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