was already moving to the second stretcher as she did her job of triage.
‘Who’s Danni?’ Kate queried.
‘This is. Danielle.’ An older woman was standing beside a policewoman. She had a pale face and a bloodstained bandage on her head. She was holding a wailing toddler. ‘She’s Helen’s baby.’
‘Is she injured?’
‘They didn’t think so at the scene,’ the policewoman responded. ‘And Florence insisted she was OK to come with her.’
Kate eyed the older woman. ‘You know these children?’
‘Yes. I’m the housekeeper up at the Castle.’
‘Great. You’ll be able to help me with the information I’ll need.’ Kate was all too aware of the need to start gathering that information and filling in paperwork before it got out of hand with this influx of new arrivals.
Another paramedic was handing a new case to Judy, just behind her.
‘Wally’s twelve and he was KO’ed. Unconscious for possibly ten minutes. Responsive, but his GCS is down to thirteen. Repetitive speech pattern and some nausea.’
‘Wally?’ Judy crouched beside the boy, who lay flat on his back with a hard collar protecting his neck. ‘Do you know where you are, love?’
‘We’ve been at a party.’ A white grin appeared in a very dark small face. ‘Christmas. Da-da-da … Da-da-da …’
It was a tuneless rendition of what sounded like ‘Jingle Bells’. Judy caught Kate’s glance and they smiled.
‘Resus 4,’ Judy directed, with another glance at Kate, who nodded. Resus 1 needed to be kept free in case more seriously injured victims arrived.
Helen was still sobbing, and the ambulance crew were unsure of whether to increase her distress by separating her from her child.
Kate crouched down, which was no easy task these days. She had to catch the bar on the side of the stretcher to keep her balance.
‘The doctors need to take care of you,’ she told the girl. ‘And we’re going to take very good care of Danni for you.’
‘Is she all right?’ Helen grabbed Kate with her uninjured hand. ‘Oh … God! I couldn’t hold onto her, and I tried … I really tried …’
‘I know, sweetheart,’ Kate said. ‘We’ll check her out thoroughly. Try not to worry. You need to trust us.’ She squeezed Helen’s hand. ‘Can you do that, do you think?’
There was anguish in the girl’s eyes, but she nodded. What choice did she have? The poor girl was hardly more than a child herself, but the bond she had with her baby was palpable. It wasn’t helping either of them to be hearing the other sobbing so miserably.
‘Good girl.’ Kate smiled. ‘Now, take a deep breath for me. And another one.’
Helen complied, controlling her sobs with difficulty. ‘I—I’m sorry.’
‘You don’t have anything to be sorry for.’ Kate gave her hand another squeeze before heaving herself upright again. ‘Let the doctors take care of you, and we’ll have you back together with your little girl just as soon as we can, OK?’
Helen nodded again, her lips clamped shut on another sob as she was wheeled away. Wally was still singing as he was taken to the team waiting to assess and treat him.
‘Could you put Florence and Danni into a cubicle, please, Kate?’ Judy was writing furiously on the big whiteboard, putting the names of the patients into boxes that would track where they were and what treatment was underway. ‘I’ll find a doctor to come and see them. Oh, and could you check on Mrs McCulloch? Do her vitals if you get a chance. I think her nurse is caught up in resus now. I’ll try and get someone in to cover the paperwork.’
An empty stretcher was on its way back to the desk. ‘You can expect the next ambulance in about ten minutes,’ a paramedic said. ‘Possibly longer. The driver and another child were still trapped when we left. The fire service is working on getting them out.’
It wasn’t so much of a shock being close to Rory this time. Her skin still prickled, and there was that odd feeling deep inside her belly that had nothing to do with any movement from all those tiny limbs in there, but Kate could cope.
She had to.
She fitted a clean earpiece to the tympanic thermometer. ‘So, your mother’s Italian?’
‘Yes.’
‘I never knew that.’
‘Why would you?’
Why indeed? But the curt response was unnecessary. Unkind. Kate concentrated on her task and inserted the earpiece as gently as she could, but Marcella stirred and moaned.
Rory said something to his mother in Italian. Something so soothing that Kate could feel the words rumbling into her bones. No wonder his mother’s eyes drifted shut again.
‘Temperature’s thirty-eight point four.’ Kate reached for the chart on the end of the bed. ‘It’s coming down.’
‘Good.’
Kate carefully wrapped a blood pressure cuff around the elderly woman’s arm, trying not to wake her. She felt for a pulse, keeping her eyes firmly on what she was doing, because she really didn’t want eye contact with Rory. He was giving the impression that he considered this to be her fault.
Fair enough—to a point—but, unlike many, she had never chased this man. Never let him know even by a glance how she felt about him. She’d certainly never, ever expected to share her bed with him. And, yes, it was her fault as much as his that they hadn’t used any protection, but the possibility of pregnancy had seemed as unreal as everything else about that night.
Kate pumped up the cuff and let it down slowly, listening for a pulse to reappear. She took her time, because she would have to look up when she’d finished and she could feel Rory staring at her.
Sounds from the adjacent cubicle were muffled, but still audible. A junior doctor was talking to Florence.
‘How old is she?’
‘Nearly two.’
‘And she lives at the Castle?’
‘Yes. Her mum, Helen, came when she was fourteen and pregnant. She’s still living there. She helps with the other kids and gives me a hand with the cleaning and so forth.’
Kate unhooked the stethoscope and wrote down the blood pressure. Then she put her fingers back on Marcella’s wrist to time her heart rate.
‘How many children at the home at present?’ the doctor was asking Florence.
‘Nine—if you count Danni, here. Ten if you count Helen—and she’s still a child, really, poor lamb.’
‘And you were at a Christmas party?’
‘Yes.
