Besides, why would you want to keep something like this secret? Gordy added. The first child born to anyone in our group, let alone to two of us? It ought to be something to cheer about.
I grimaced. And what about the telepath shield? Should we cheer about that, too?
There was a slight pause, and I felt Gordy's enthusiasm deflate a bit. Ouch, he said.
At the very least, I agreed with perhaps an unnecessary touch of sarcasm. Word leaks out about that and we're going to be right back where we were with Ted Green last month.
They thought about that for a long moment. Maybe we can still keep it private knowledge within the group, Calvin offered doubtfully. Colleen doesn't have any real commitments she can't bow out of for the next few months, does she?
Her doctor knows she's having headaches, I pointed out. If she's at all competent she isn't going to drop it just because Colleen says everything's all better now.
There was another moment of silence. We'll think of something, Gordy said at last. For the moment the main job is to keep Colleen and the baby healthy. Is there anything we can do to help?
Not that I can think of, I told them. If I come up with anything, I'll let you know.
Okay, Calvin said. You think we ought to set up some regularly scheduled contact time when you'll be outside the shield?
Maybe later we'll need to do something like that, I said. For now, I don't think it's necessary. I'll have to leave in a couple of days, anyway, if I'm going to get the van back to Des Moines before the rental period runs out.
You want me to fly in to stay with her while you're gone? Gordy offered.
A brief surge of jealousy flashed through me before I could suppress it. Absurd, of course-Gordy was nothing more to Colleen than a good friend. Let me see how she's doing when she wakes up, I suggested. If she feels like she'd like company, I'll let you know.
Unless you'd rather I not even offer...?
So he'd caught the flicker of emotion. No, of course not, I said, feeling my face flushing with embarrassment. Sorry-Nelson must have taken over for a minute.
There was a short, awkward silence, and I realized my apology had made things worse instead of better.
Neither Gordy nor Calvin had made any secret lately of the fact that they thought my close-approach with Nelson had become altogether too convenient a catch-all excuse for me. Sure, Dale, Gordy said at last. Anyway, let me know what she says.
Right. Well, I suppose I'd better get back. See if she's woken up yet and find an out-of-the-way corner to hook the big shield up in.
Okay, we'll leave you to it, Calvin said. Take care of her, Dale, and keep in touch. Maybe on your drive back to Iowa we can hold a round table on just how we're going to keep all of this quiet.
And who all we're going to keep it quiet from, Gordy added. Say hi to Colleen for us, okay?
Sure, I said, turning the van's ignition key again. And don't worry about it. We've got plenty of time to come up with a workable plan.
And I really believed that as I broke contact and turned around to head back to Colleen's. Really believed that we had weeks-even months-to come up with a good story.
If I'd only known that I had, instead, exactly four minutes....
I saw the flashing red lights two blocks away; but it wasn't until I got past a camper parked on the wrong side of the street that I realized the ambulance was pulled up directly in front of Colleen's house.
I bounced the van half up on the curb right behind it and scrambled out, banging my shin on the door in the process. I hardly noticed, my full attention on trying to see into the slightly ajar ambulance doors.
There was no one inside, which meant she was still in the house. Racing across the lawn, I threw open the front door and dashed into the living room. "Colleen?" I called.
"Over here," her voice said from my right. Skidding to a halt, I turned to find her sitting calmly on the couch, a stethoscope-armed woman seated beside her and a group of three men standing in a loose circle around her.
All of them, at the moment, looking at me. And doing nothing else.
"What's going on?" I asked when I got my voice back.
"This is Dr. DuBois," Colleen told me, indicating the woman beside her. "She tells me-" she swallowed-"that I may have lost my baby."
I stared at Colleen, then at the doctor, then back at Colleen. "I don't understand," I said. "What-I mean how-?"
I was interrupted by a loud beep and a flurry of unintelligible speech from one of the paramedics' belts.
"Doctor...?" he asked, pulling the radio from its holder.
He nodded, acknowledging the call with some kind of number code as he and the other two men brushed past me and left. I closed the door behind them and watched as they hurried across the lawn, my thoughts a swirling mass of utter confusion. Only hours earlier I would have sworn the baby was perfectly fine; and now this....
"How?" I asked the doctor again.
DuBois opened her mouth; but it was Colleen who answered. "Because the headaches have stopped,"
Colleen answered for her.
I frowned at her, saw the tight look in her eyes. As if she was pleading silently with me to understand....
And abruptly, I did. Somehow, probably through all the tests Colleen had been taking, DuBois had discovered she was pregnant and realized where the migraines were coming from. But with the headaches now stopped-and with no way to know about the telepath shield-she had come to the only conclusion possible, that one of the two conflicting minds had ceased to exist.
Relief washed over me. Relief that the baby was not, in fact dead; relief that now we didn't have to think up some story about the migraines to get the doctor off Colleen's back.
All of that assuming, of course, that DuBois was indeed thinking the same way I was. "You mean that the headaches were because-?" I asked, trying to draw her out.
DuBois nodded, the eerie hint of flashing red fading from her face as the ambulance outside drove off.
"Because Colleen and her baby were far closer together than two telepaths can safely be," she explained.
She looked at Colleen. "Is this-?"
"He's a good friend," Colleen told her. "He understands about telepaths."
DuBois nodded and turned back to me. "Then you must understand that both of them were in great danger," she said gently. "In fact, that's why I brought an ambulance here this evening, to get Colleen to the hospital for an emergency abortion. As it happened-" she shrugged slightly-"in this case Nature provided her own solution."
I shivered, memories of my own close-approach with Nelson flashing to mind. DuBois saw, misunderstood. "Don't worry-I'm sure Colleen will be all right," she assured me. "We'll make sure tomorrow. Unless-?" She looked back at Colleen, eyebrows raised.
Colleen shook her head. "Tomorrow will be early enough. I'd rather not start a full examination right now."
"Okay." DuBois reached over to squeeze Colleen's hand, then stood up. "I'll see you tomorrow morning, then-ten sharp. But don't hesitate to call before then if you have any problems."
She pulled her stethoscope off her neck and dropped it into her bag. Picking up her coat, she got into it as she walked to the door. I opened it for her, she nodded her thanks And suddenly her eyes widened, and her mouth fell open, and the whole thing went straight to hell.
"You're Dale Ravenhall," she breathed, staring at my face as if seeing a ghost. "You're one of-" She spun to look at Colleen, twisted back to stare at me. "You can't be here."
And suddenly her eyes widened, and her mouth fell open, and the whole thing went straight to hell.
"You're Dale Ravenhall," she breathed, staring at my face as if seeing a ghost. "You're one of-" She spun to look at Colleen, twisted back to stare at me. "You can't be here."
DuBois mustn't find out about it. At all costs, she mustn't find out.