booked herself and her young son onto a crocodile hunt—a search by moonlight for the great creatures that inhabited the local estuaries. Thy hadn’t found a crocodile but they’d met a real live crocodile hunter and CJ’s wide-eyed enjoyment of his stories had helped ease the ache in her heart. They’d taken a tour out to the Great Barrier Reef and had tried not to be disappointed when the weather had been wild and the water cloudy.
Then she’d heard about the Gunyamurra Rodeo. CJ’s passion was for horses. There’d been a coach going via the rodeo to the airport, and the last day of the rodeo was a short one, so they’d decided to spend their last morning in Australia here.
CJ had loved it, so maybe it hadn’t been a total waste of time, but now the thought of leaving was overwhelmingly appealing. Crocodile Creek was three hundred miles away. She was never going to see Cal again. Their coach was due to leave to take them back to Cairns Airport, and it was over.
All she had to do was get her son from behind his rock.
‘CJ, hurry.’
‘I can’t do anything here,’ he told her with exaggerated patience. ‘There’s a baby.’
‘There’s no baby.’
CJ’s imagination was wonderful, Gina thought ruefully, and at any other time she encouraged it. Her son filled his life with imaginary friends, imaginary animals, rockets, battleships, babies. He saw them everywhere.
Not now. She couldn’t indulge him now.
‘There’s not a baby,’ she snapped again, and, dignity or not, she peered around CJ’s rock.
There was a baby.
For a moment she was too stunned to move. She stood and stared at the place between two rocks—the place where her son was gazing.
This was a birth scene. One fast glance told her that. Someone had lain here and delivered a baby. The grass was crushed and there was blood…
And a baby.
A dead baby?
She moved swiftly, stooping to see, noting his stillness and the dreadful blue tinge of his skin. He was so pale under his waxy birth coating that she thought he must be dead.
She touched him and there was a hint of warmth.
Warmth? Maybe.
He wasn’t breathing.
She fell to her knees and lifted him against her. His tiny body was limp and floppy. Where was his pulse?
Nothing.
Her fingers were in his mouth, trying frantically to clear an airway that was far too small. She turned him over, face down, using her little finger to clear muck from his mouth and then using a fold of her T-shirt to wipe his mouth clear.
Then she pulled him up to her mouth and breathed.
She felt his tiny chest lift.
Yes!
Heartbeat. Come on. There had to be a heartbeat.
Her backpack was where she’d dropped it, and CJ’s wind-cheater was drooping out of the top. She hauled it onto the grass and laid the baby down on its soft surface. It was almost one movement, spreading the windcheater, laying the little one down and starting cardiopulmonary resuscitation.
She knew this so well. Cardiology was her specialty but to practise CPR here, on a baby this small…
She wanted her hospital. She wanted oxygen and suction equipment. She wanted back-up.
She had to find help. Even if she got him breathing, she needed help. Urgently.
CJ was standing, stunned into silence. He was too young to depend on but he was all she had.
‘CJ, run to the side of the parking lot and scream for help,’ she told him between breaths.
Breathe, press, press, press…
‘Why?’ CJ seemed totally bemused, and who could blame him?
Could she take the baby and run for help? She rejected the idea almost before she thought of doing it. How long had the baby been abandoned? How long had he not been breathing? Even if she got him back…Every second without oxygen increased the chance of brain damage.
She needed every ounce of concentration to get air into these little lungs. She breathed again into the baby’s mouth and continued with the rhythmic pumping that must get the heart working. Must!
‘This baby’s really ill,’she told CJ, fighting to get words out as she concentrated on CPR between breaths ‘You have to get someone to come here. Scream like there’s a tiger chasing you.’
‘There’s not a tiger.’
‘Pretend there is.’ She was back to breathing again. Then: ‘Go, CJ. I need your help. You have to scream.’
‘For the baby?’
‘For the baby.’
He considered for a long moment. Then he nodded as if he’d decided that maybe that what his mother was asking wasn’t too crazy. Maybe it even appealed to him. He disappeared around the other side of the rock. There was a moment’s silence—and then a yell.
‘Tiger. Tiger. Tiger. There’s a tiger and a baby. Help!’
It was a great yell. It was the best. He’d put his heart into it, and it sounded for all the world like a tiger was about to pounce, and a baby, too. But the end of his yell was drowned out.
The coach they’d come in was huge, a two-level touring affair. It had a massive air-conditioning unit, and even when idling it was noisy. Now, as it started to move and went through its ponderous gear changes, it was truly deafening.
Gina heard just one of CJ’s yells before the sound of the coach took over. The second and third yells were drowned out as the coach turned out of the parking lot, growing louder and louder until nothing could be heard at all.
Gina made to stand—she made to get herself out in front of the coach to stop it—but then there was a tiny choking sound from the baby. Her eyes flew back to him. Was she imagining it?
No.
If he was choking…His airway must still be slightly blocked. She had to get his trachea clear.
Once more she lifted the baby and turned him face down, and her fingers searched his mouth. The coach was forgotten. She desperately needed equipment. There might well be liquor or meconium stuck in his throat or on his vocal cords. How to clear his tiny airway without tracheal suction?
She shook him, carefully, carefully, supporting his neck as if it were the most precious thing in the world.
He choked again.
Something dislodged—a fragment of gunk—and she had it clear in an instant.
She
