“No more questions, Your Honor.” The lawyer, deflated, turned away.
“Thank you, Mrs. Nelson,” the judge said in a gentler tone. “We'll recess for lunch and reconvene at two o'clock.” He gathered his robes about him, preparing to leave.
A woman officer in uniform came to help Maggie from the witness-box. She stumbled on the way out. As the guard led her to her seat, she seemed dazed. I raised my hand to wave but let it fall back in my lap. She wouldn't have seen it anyway.
I had told Maggie I couldn't stay for the afternoon session. I had office hours. I was sorry because I knew she would have to face the prosecutor and a grilling much worse than this morning's. I got a lift back to the motel with one of the spectators who happened also to be one of my patients.
The motel parking lot swarmed with half-naked tattooed bruisers with beer cans that seemed to be soldered to their hands. The way they joshed and roughhoused together reminded me of a bunch of junior high school kids, only bigger, as if they'd sampled some of that magic potion in Alice's Wonderland.
As I edged my way through the lobby, carefully dodging them, Paul Nelson called me over. “Hey, Jo!”
He looked tired. Already worn out worrying about Maggie, he now had to deal with this hoard of noisy, brainless, unwashed bums that had descended on him.
“Could you do me a favor?” he asked.
“You name it,” I said.
“Keep an eye on Mag. I have to go up to the city for some supplies.” (“The city” always meant Philadelphia, not Bridgeton.) “I don't like leaving her here with ⦔ he said, and nodded at the crowd.
“I'll watch her like a hawk,” I assured him. He didn't ask how
her testimony had gone, I noted. He had shut himself off from that aspect of her life, as if it didn't exist. I wondered how Paul kept this up at home. Could he actually sit through a whole meal with Maggie without asking about her dayâor his son? But my knowledge of married life was skimpy, as I'd been raised by a single parentâmy father. My mother died when I was four. I was totally ignorant of the games, the little subterfuges, the lies, and the silences employed by husbands and wives.
“Thanks,” Paul said. “How do you like our new guests?” He winked.
“Nothing like a full house!” I gave him a thumbs-up.
Ignoring the whistles and catcalls, I threaded my way through the throng. If I kept my gaze straight ahead and my mouth shut, maybe I could make it to the door without incident. There were only twelve of them, Jack had told me. But because of their size and the racket they made in the small lobby, it seemed more like twenty. It wasn't until I reached the parking lot that I broke my vow. I was revving my bike when this bruiser on a gorgeous midnight blue Harley rolled up beside me. From under droopy lids he eyed my sad little secondhand Honda, grinning.
“What's so funny?” I snapped.
“Nothin'.” He cast another pitying glance at my bike.
“Up yours!” I took off in a spray of gravel, hoping some of it hit him in the eye.
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I was headed for the Blue Arrow and a bite to eat before office hours. But when I arrived, there were three Harleys parked out front. I decided to skip lunch and turned my bike toward home. My office was located in a wooden cabin to one side of the modern concrete hulk of a motel. There were three cabins, throwbacks to the days when the Oakview Motor Lodge was “Oakview Cabins” and the automobile was a novelty. When I'd first arrived, Paul had offered cabin number “1” to me for an office, as part of his lure to get me to stay. The cabin had been in terrible shape. But, with a little
carpentry and a lot of paint, I had rehabbed it into an acceptable office and waiting room. I even had a steady trickle of patients that helped my main source of incomeâthe motel trade. I provided health care to the guests of a number of motels in the area and made my calls on my motorbike. The locals called me Motel Doctor, but I preferred to think of myself as a general practitioner. When I had practiced in New York with a swanky group at an elite big-name hospital, I had been a pediatrician. But the death of a child, due to my misdiagnosis, had humbled me and sent me packing to the wilds of south Jersey. I still hadn't come to grips with my guilt over Sophie. But I was working on it. Maybe one day â¦
Bayfield lay in a remote part of rural Jersey, on the Delaware Bay. Isolated and thinly populated, it had a distinctive beauty all its own. In the spring, the fields turned a shade of green that rivaled the Emerald City of Oz. And in the fall, instead of the flashy reds and oranges of New England, the trees turned softer shades of rose, lavender, and gold.
It was the sky that hooked me. Growing up around Manhattan, I hadn't seen much of it. Here, instead of snatching little peeks of blue between buildings, you had sky to spare. It spread around you like a huge shawl, changing color according to the weather. In Manhattan, the Chrysler Building had been my weathercock. On gray days it was a dull pewter and when the sun shone it sparkled like a jeweled crown. I still missed it. Bayfield, however, has a serene quality with a healing power that I needed right now. At least it
did
haveâuntil the Satan's Apostles arrived!
When I came in the office there were three patients waiting. The first was Esther Lockweed, the local gossip. As healthy as a horse, and weighing about the same, she had probably dreamed up some bogus ailment in order grill me about the trial. I determined to keep her visit short.
When she was seated, I asked, “What seems to be the trouble?”
“Oh, the usual aches and pains. My left knee is swelled up something terrible.” She yanked up her skirt, revealing a plump knee that was slightly swollen.
“I've told youâ”
“I know; I know I should lose weight. But you don't know how hard it is when you love to cook and eat as much as I do,” she whined.
“Are you taking your
Voltarin?”
She nodded. “But it doesn't do much good. Can't you give me something stronger?”
I opened a drawer at my side, drew out her file, and studied it.
“You've been over to the courthouse?” she asked.
I gave a brusque nod.
“How's Maggie doing?”
“She's doing fine. I think we can increase yourâ”
“Has she taken the stand yet?”
“Yes. We can increase your dose toâ”
“When will
he
be taking the stand?”
I put her file down. “You know, Mrs. Lockweed, the trial is open to the public. You could go and see for yourâ”
“Oh, I couldn't do that. Go and gawk at my neighbors when they're in trouble?”
“Maggie's not in trouble.” I bristled.
“No, but her sonâ”
I slapped Mrs. Lockweed's file folder shut and scribbled a prescription. “Fill this at your local pharmacy.” I handed it to her and stood up. “And have a nice day.”
Sarcasm was lost on Mrs. Lockweed.
“Do you think he really did those awful things?”
I turned away, intent on replacing her file in the drawer.
With a sigh, she lumbered out.
The next two patients were menâfarmers who only spoke when spoken to. What a relief. I was through with them in a jiffy. As I was cleaning up, I heard the outer door open.
Damn.
I thought I was finished for the day.
“Gotta a cure for lovesickness?” Tom Canby poked his handsome head around the door.
I laughed. “Hi, stranger.” I hadn't heard from him for three days. Very unusual.
“It's archery season. I got me a deer.”
I had once been put off by his hunting habit, but that was before I knew how destructive deer could be.
He grabbed me by both shoulders and gave me a long, deep kiss.
“Hey!” I broke free. “I'm still working.”
He glanced around the empty office.
I looked at my watch. “Office hours are from two to four. It's only three forty-five. Somebody might drop in.”
He slid into the chair opposite meâthe one reserved for patients or drug salesmen (although very few of the latter found their way to Bayfield). “Well, Doc, it's this way,” he began, giving a good imitation of a local redneck. “I cain't sleep, I cain't eat, and my heart goes pitter-patter so fastâ”
“That's called palpitations.”
“Whatever.” He frowned. “Why aren't you takin' notes, Doctor?”
“Idiot.”
Undeterred, he went on, “But the worst thing is my feet.”
“Huh?”
“Every time I think of you my feet itch.” He pulled off his shoes and socks and wriggled his bare toes at me. (They were nice toes.) “Like right now, for instance.”
“Maybe you have athlete's foot.”
He shook his head. “I'm no ath-a-lete. The only sport I know is archery, and my feet don't get involved much in that.”
“Maybe I have some foot powder here ⦠.” I made a pretense of rummaging in my medicine cabinet.
“Tried that. Don't work,” he said. “The only cure is a house call to my placeâat, say, eight o'clock?”
“How's that going to help your feet?”
He grinned. “That's for me to know and you to find out.”
“Well ⦠if you've discovered some new antidote?”
“Oh, I can't say it's
new.
But it's tried and true. Very effective.”
“FDA-approved?”
“Oh, yeah. For years.”
“Hmm. Let me think about it.”
“Shall I give you a sample?”
“Uh ⦔
He bounded around the desk and grabbed me.
By the time he left, it was four-thirty. As I locked my office door, it occurred to me that bikers weren't the only people in Bayfield who acted like junior high kids.
Before going to my room to change, I checked the lobby to see if Maggie had dropped by. Jack was on desk duty and said he hadn't seen her. When I got to my room I called her at home. She answered, sounding exhausted.
“How did it go?” I asked.
“Not good, I'm afraid.”
“What happened?”
“The prosecutor only questioned me for about five minutes ⦔
That could be a good or bad sign. Good if it kept Maggie from putting her foot in it again. Bad if the prosecutor thought she had done enough damage to the defendant and no further testimony was needed.
“ ⦠and my lawyer hardly spoke to me afterward. I think he was disgusted with me.”
From what I'd seen of Mr. Maxwell, Esq., that was probably indifference, not disgust. “He may have had other things on his mind. Have you eaten?”
“I grabbed a burger on the way home.”
“Well, go to bed early.”
“Yes, Doctor.”
A glimmer of humor? A good sign. “When will Paul be home?” I asked.
“I just heard him drive up.”
“Take care, Mag.”
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I arrived at Tom's place a little after eight. He was sitting on the screen porch nursing a beer when I pulled up. Registering no surprise, he continued to sit while I dismounted. He had been expecting me. As I came up the steps, he rose and headed for the fridge.
“Make mine a soda. I'm on call tonight,” I said.
Tom's porch ran east to west along one side of the house. You could catch the sunrise or sunset by just turning in your chair. He'd planned it that way when he built the house. It was a simple frame house, with two large rooms, a kitchen, and a bath. When I'd first met him, he had told me modestly that he was a carpenter. But he was really an architect. He made his living rehabbing old houses in south Jerseyâbreathing new life into them.
He brought me a frosty Coke. I took the other chair. There were only twoâboth wicker rockers badly in need of paint. We sipped and rocked and watched the sun go down. By this time of day it had run out of steam and was taking its quiet leave with pale streaks of pink and gold. The fields darkened quickly. It was hard to tell where the fields ended and the sky beganâuntil the stars popped out.
I told Tom about the trial, Nick, and Maggie.
“Poor Mag,” he said. He had gone through high school with Nick, was a close friend of the family, and knew the whole sad story.
Then I told him about the bikers.
“Ohmygod!” he slapped his forehead. “You'd better move in with me.” He had been prodding me to do this for some time now. I wasn't ready.
“It's not
that
bad,” I said.
“Thanks.” He feigned insult.
Again we fell silent and I felt his gaze on me in the darkâas if it had form, texture, and warmth.
“What about this foot cure of yours?” I spoke lightly.
“I thought you'd never ask.” Setting down his beer, he knelt at my feet. He removed my boots and both socks. “Up we go!” He pulled me up and led me to a corner of the porch. This was where he kept his bed in summer, a mattress and a pillow, covered with a patchwork quilt. The quilt was the genuine article, made by his great-great-grandmother, he'd told me. Folding it carefully, he hung it on the back of one of the chairs. He fluffed the pillow once and said, “Lie down.”
I lay down.
Gently he began to message my right foot.
“But you're the one with the itchy feet,” I protested feebly.
“It may seem strange, but it helps
my
feet to massage yours,” he said. “It's a new treatment, called âpedlepathy.'”
“Never heard of it.” I closed my eyes.
He switched to the left foot. “Did you know,” he said in a low, confidential tone, “that the nerve endings of the feet can affect every part of the body?”
“Reflexology ⦠.” I was drifting off.
“But eventually,” he continued, “you have to leave the feetâand move on.”
“Umm ⦠what's that called?”
“Never mind.” Slowly his hands moved up my ankles, over my calves, grazed my thighs, and paused at my waist. He was searching for the snap on my jeans when my cell phone rang.
“Damn.”
I sat up.
“Don't answer it,” he said.
“I have to. I'm on call.” I dug out my cell and listened to the message. “An accidentâat Possum Hollow and Gum Tree roads,” I repeated the message. As I scrambled for my socks and boots, I said, “I'm sorry.” And I was.
From the porch he watched me mount my bike. When I started the motor he shouted over the roar, “Next time I'm falling for a librarian!”
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Every now and then I wished I
were
a librarian. Someone with regular hours who could count on time for herself. But I also liked the rush of the emergency call. The sudden jerking alive. The surge of adrenaline. The risk and the challenge. Something I had in common with those bozos back at the motel.
Another thing we had in commonâI loved to ride. And I especially loved to ride at night. Next to flying in an open cockpit, this must be the closest you can get to becoming one with the universeâfusing with the wind and stars. As the soft air caressed me and the stars sparkled above me, I wished for the second time that I wasn't on call. I wished I could ride all night.
Up ahead, the red lights of an emergency vehicle whirled. Parked nearby was a state police car and another car. I pulled over and reached for my medical kit.
“Dr. Banks here,” I told the first medic. He was bending over a small mound by the side of the road.
He looked up with an expression of deep relief. “He's bad, Doc. We were afraid to move him.”
I knelt by the small figure lying on his side, eyes closed. A bicycle lay on its side a few yards away. The red lights revolved, washing the boy's face with crimson, over and over. He looked about twelve. I bent, listening for a heartbeat and feeling for a pulse at the same time. There was a faint beat, and a fainter pulse. The kid was unconscious. Severe concussion, I diagnosed. I said, “We've got to get him to the hospital. Move him, but take it easy. I'll follow behind.”
The two medics went carefully to work. The whole time I was examining the boy, I had heard a male voice raving on the other side of the road, “I didn't see him. He didn't have any lights. I didn't see him ⦠.”
My heart went out to the poor bastard. One of my greatest fears was that I might hit a child while driving at night. How could you ever forgive yourself? Even if it wasn't your fault.
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A CT scan revealed a subdural hematomaâa collection of blood between the layers of the thick protective coverings of the brain. A neurosurgeon was brought from Wilmington by helicopter, removed the fluid between the dura and the skull, and went back to Wilmington. The boy remained unconscious. There was nothing to do now but wait. The parents had been brought in by a neighbor; they were too boozy to drive. They'd been drinking and playing poker on the back porch. Had no idea their boy had gone for a ride â¦
Why not?
⦠but they were ready to sue the driver who sat hunched at the other end of the waiting room, his head in his hands. Around 2:00 AM I took him a cup of coffee. “You should go home. You can't do any good here.”
“I wasn't going fast. Honest to God. It was dark.
I didn't see him!
”
The parents were staring at us. “You should go,” I said again. “I'll call you if there's any change.”
He stumbled to his feet, sloshing coffee on the floor.
“Where can I reach you?”
He fumbled for a pen and paper and scribbled his phone number.
“Try to get some sleep.”
Sure. And turn into a pumpkin while you're at it.
I hung around all night, checking with the nurse for vital signs. Not very professional. But losing a child is hard on any doctor, and especially hard on me. Although this case was not similar in any way to the one that had led me to Bayfield, and certainly not my fault, the feelings about Sophie came rushing back.
The boyâhis name was Bobby Shoemakerâwas still unconscious at 6:00 AM. I told his parents to go home. The hospital would call them if there was any change. When the morning shift arrived, I knew it was time for me to go, too. Way overtime.