Chương 4
At four seventeen, Earl called.
Claire answered on the second ring.
“I found her.”
“Where?”
“East terminal, women’s restroom.”
“Is she conscious?”
“Yes.”
“Is she confused?”
“She says no, which isn’t an answer.”
“Headache?”
“Yes.”
“Visual changes?”
Earl asked the question away from the phone. Lena replied with irritation, then admitted the overhead lights had halos.
“Call an ambulance now,” Claire said.
“She says she won’t go.”
“Put her on.”
There was muffled argument. Then Lena’s voice came through.
“I’m not going back there just so Hal can stand over me while somebody decides I’m unfit.”
“Your blood pressure was one seventy-eight over one twelve before you left,” Claire said. “You are at risk of seizure, stroke, organ injury, or death.”
“I feel fine.”
“You have a severe headache and visual disturbance.”
“I haven’t slept.”
“That does not make your symptoms safe.”
Lena started crying, but quietly, as if she were embarrassed by the sound. “They’ll take her.”
“If you die in a bus station restroom, you will have removed every other possibility.”
Silence followed.
Claire regretted the bluntness but not the truth.
Earl came back on the line. “Ambulance is six minutes out.”
Lena cursed at him.
“She’s mad,” he said.
“Good. Keep her sitting down.”
“I know.”
“Not on the floor. On the bench if she can stand safely. If she becomes unresponsive or starts seizing—”
“I know.”
Claire lowered her voice. “I believe you.”
That stopped him.
After a moment, he said, “Hal there?”
“Yes.”
“You tell him anything?”
“I told him the baby is stable.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“He told me about the fire.”
The line held only terminal noise for several seconds.
Then Earl said, “Of course he did.”
“He believes you were responsible.”
“I was.”
The plainness of the answer unsettled her more than denial would have.
“Mr. Ransom—”
“The ambulance is here.”
He ended the call.
Lena returned through the emergency department under police escort because a missing-patient report had been filed. Her blood pressure had climbed above two hundred systolic. She was admitted to intensive care for postpartum preeclampsia and treated with intravenous medication and magnesium sulfate.
Earl came back with her but was not permitted into the medical ICU. He sat in a plastic chair outside the family waiting area, elbows on his knees, hands trembling between them.
Claire found him there after her shift ended.
“You should go home,” she said.
“So should you.”
“I am.”
“You’re still wearing your badge.”
Claire looked down. She had removed her stethoscope but forgotten the badge clipped to her scrub pocket.
Earl noticed the paper cup in her hand. “That coffee?”
“Technically.”
“How many?”
“Technically?”
He looked away, and for a second she saw the beginning of a smile. It did not survive.
“Lena’s being treated,” Claire said. “She came back before the worst happened.”
“Because you scared her.”
“Fear has medical uses.”
“So does shame. People use that one more.”
Claire sat two chairs away. “Hal said the fire was your fault.”
“He’s right.”
“He said the wiring was unsafe.”
“It was.”
“And you knew.”
Earl rubbed his palms against his trouser legs. “An electrician gave me an estimate. I had eleven men in the house, three sleeping in a converted dining room because the county shelter was full. If I closed the place for repairs, they went outside. If I paid for the panel, I couldn’t cover the roof leak. I told myself I’d get through winter.”
“Did Jonah live there?”
“He worked there. Nights mostly. He was trying to finish a counseling certificate.”
“What happened?”
“You writing a report?”
“No.”
“Then why do you need to know?”
Claire considered lying. “Because I don’t know whether to trust you around that child.”
Earl nodded once. He seemed to respect the answer, though it hurt him.
“The breaker tripped twice,” he said. “Jonah told me to shut down the upstairs bedrooms. I told him we’d lose the building if the fire marshal came. We moved one heater. Somebody plugged it back in. Nobody ever admitted who.”
“Was it you?”
“I don’t remember.”
“That isn’t the same as no.”
“No.”
His hands were shaking harder. He clasped them together.
“The wall caught behind a cabinet,” he continued. “Smoke alarm on the second floor had no battery. I’d taken it out after false alarms and forgot to replace it. Jonah found me in the office. Ceiling came down. He dragged me through the hall.”
Earl’s breathing changed. Not dramatically. Just shallower.
Claire waited.
“He got me to the landing,” Earl said. “Then somebody yelled that Deacon was still upstairs. Jonah handed me to another man and went back.”
“Was Deacon there?”
“No. He’d gone to work early.”
Claire looked at the waiting-room television. A morning anchor smiled beneath silent captions. Outside the windows, snowplows scraped the hospital drive.
“Jonah lived for three days,” Earl said. “Burns, smoke inhalation. He couldn’t talk much. Lena was there. Hal and Ruth were there. Everybody took turns pretending not to look at me.”
“And the promise?”
“Jonah knew Lena was pregnant. She hadn’t told his parents yet. He made me promise I’d make sure they were taken care of.”
“Why you?”
“Because he was angry at his father. Because he thought I knew how to fix things. Because dying people are allowed one bad judgment.”
Claire turned the paper cup between her palms. “Have you supported Lena?”
“I sent money.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
His eyes hardened. “You done?”
“Almost.”
“You think you’re subtle because you whisper the accusation?”
“I think you left a grieving pregnant woman alone and came running only when she was unconscious in an ambulance.”
“She told me to stay away.”
“Did you ask why?”
“I knew why.”
“That’s convenient.”
Earl stood so quickly the chair legs squealed. For a moment Claire felt the full force of his size. Her body responded before her mind did; her shoulders pulled back, ready.
May you like
He saw it.
His anger vanished into something flatter.
