It had to be a heart attack. Nothing else would fit.
Unless the oysters Lizzy had given them were so poisonous that they had affected the heart. There were poisons that caused paralysis…
Surely not, Fern thought frantically, the nightmare image of the whole island collapsing with heart pain flitting through her head and being thrust away as unthinkable.
‘Phone Dr Gallagher,’ she snapped back to her uncle. ‘Tell him Maud’s had a cardiac arrest and I need him here now. Go!’
This was a dreadful way to treat the uncle she loved-to treat any frightened relative for that matter-but there was no time now for reassurance or niceties. Fern’s medical equipment was all still in Sydney. She needed Quinn’s doctor’s bag and she needed it now!
There were some things she could do without equipment. She had to get oxygen to Maud’s brain. Fern took her aunt’s face between her hands and blew in her first breath.
Then she let Maud’s face go, dropped her hands onto her aunt’s chest and linked them.
And shoved down hard.
One, two, three…
Cardio-pulmonary massage was almost instinctive in Fern by now. She could do it in her sleep. How many times had she done this in an emergency situation?
But how many times had it worked? What were the statistics? Something horrible…Less than twenty-five per cent of those…
Don’t think of that. Don’t. It had to work now. It must…
Please, please, please…
This was her beloved Aunt Maud. Maud was only in her sixties. It wasn’t her time to die…
Fern shoved down hard, again and again, pausing only to fill her aunt’s lungs with air before beginning the relentless rhythm again. In the hall below she could hear her uncle shouting desperately into the phone and then she heard his feet pounding upstairs again.
‘He’s on his way,’ the farmer gasped. Fern didn’t stop her rhythm for a moment. Al stared down at his wife and seemed almost to shrink against the wall. ‘Oh, God, Fern, is she…?’
Fern didn’t answer. She couldn’t. Breathe, push…Push…Push…
Come on, Maudie…
They’d done so much for her, Albert and Maudie. What was the use of Fern’s medicine if she couldn’t save her aunt now?
Breathe, push…
She needed a defibrillator. The cardiac massage wasn’t working.
Where was Quinn with the defibrillator? Electric shock was the only way that they could jolt this heart into starting. How far away was he? How long would it take for him to get here?
Quinn Gallagher was the only one who could save Maudie now.
And then Fern heard a car’s tyres screeching, a car door slam and someone was shouting below stairs. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply into her aunt’s lips-a breath of gratitude. Quinn…
Her uncle dragged himself from his misery against the wall and managed to yell back-and ten seconds later Quinn burst through the door at a run.
He had what she needed. Fern glanced up and saw the defibrillator in his hands. One part of her prayer had been answered…
She went straight back, breathing and pushing. She had eyes only for Maud.
There was no laughter in Quinn Gallagher now. There was no space for anything.
Quinn wasted no words. He left Fern doing what she was doing, instinctively trusting her professionalism, and worked round her, ripping Maud’s gay wedding dress apart as if it was tissue and attaching electrodes with the swiftness of an expert.
Her first impression of competence had been absolutely right, Fern thought fleetingly. Quinn Gallagher was attuned to emergency medicine with the skill of years of training behind him. His hands wasted not a second.
Leads attached, Quinn squatted back on his heels and pulled Fern back with him.
‘Now.’
He put his hand on the switch and Maud’s limp body jerked in spasm. Before she was still Fern was back breathing into her lips. Breathe, pump, one, two, three…
‘Again.’ Quinn pulled her back.
Breathe…
“Again…’
It wouldn’t work.
Please…
Fern breathed deeply once more into her aunt’s lips but then Quinn was hauling her back, his strong fingers holding Maud’s wrist and the defibrillator put aside.
‘We have a pulse,’ he said softly. ‘Give it a minute, Fern…’
Fern stared wildly down. Her own breath had stopped. She was scared to take the next breath.
‘Please…’
She said the word aloud. It echoed round and round the crowded room and suddenly there was an answer to her plea.
Maud took a rasping, ragged breath that was painful to hear but it was the sweetest sound that Fern had ever heard. She stared down as Maud’s chest heaved, hardly daring to hope.
Maudie breathed again, and again, and her breathing settled into a harsh but steady rhythm.
‘We have life,’ Quinn said with quiet satisfaction.
Without pause, he turned to the oxygen cylinder he’d dragged up the stairs with him and started to join a mask to the tubing. The next priority was to get as much oxygen into Maud’s starved bloodstream as he could. ‘How long without oxygen, Dr Rycroft?’
‘How long…?’
Fern bit her lip. There were tears streaming down her face and she wiped them away with a lace-trimmed sleeve. How long? Quinn was asking how long Maud hadn’t been breathing.
She didn’t know. Her uncle knew…
Strange how hard it was to get her voice to work. She had to…
‘Uncle…Uncle, how long was Maud unconscious before I arrived?’
Albert was still staring down with horror at his unconscious wife. He didn’t hear her.
Fern stood with difficulty and somewhere beneath her a piece of white satin caught and ripped. Her knees seemed to have turned to water. She crossed to where her uncle stood and gave him a swift hug, then stood back with him at arm’s length. She gripped his hands hard. ‘Uncle, we have Maud breathing again. It’ll take a while, though, before she regains consciousness…’
Depending on how long Maud’s brain had been starved of oxygen…
Fern didn’t say that. There was no use scaring her uncle even more than he already was.
‘How long was she unconscious before I came?’ she asked her uncle again, and Albert hauled himself together with a mammoth effort.
‘Only…only seconds,’ he stammered. ‘She was sick and then she slumped to the floor and I thought, what am I going to do, she’s dying, and then I heard your car…’
‘Then she might have only been ten minutes not breathing,’ Fern whispered across to Quinn. ‘Maybe even less. And I was breathing for her most of that time. You were so fast…’
‘Frank Reid’s place is just past here,’ Quinn told her. ‘I was almost outside the front door when your uncle phoned.’
‘Thank God for that.’
The oxygen mask was firmly in place now and Maudie was changing colour. The awful blue-white was fading to pink.
Then Maud’s body moved almost imperceptibly once and then again. Finally, the woman’s hand moved slowly up to touch the mask and her eyes tried to open.
‘It’s OK, Auntie.’ Fern sank quickly to her knees again, ignoring the ripping sound of satin, and gathered her aunt’s hands to her. ‘You’ve had a heart turn but you’re OK. Dr Gallagher has an oxygen mask on your face. Don’t try to fight it. Just rest and let us do the work.’
Maud Rycroft gave a feeble moan. She fought to free her hand from Fern’s grasp and her eyes rolled. Her lips moved as she tried to speak and Quinn lifted the mask a fraction.
‘What is it, Mrs Rycroft?’ he said gently.
‘Fern’s wedding…’ A tear of weakness and despair rolled down Maud’s wrinkled cheek. ‘My Fern…’
Quinn replaced the mask and touched Maud’s cheek. He was kneeling beside Fern but he didn’t look at her. His dark eyes held those of his frightened patient and they exuded reassurance.