Stone Dreaming Woman (31 page)

“How is he, then?”

“Aboot the same.” His Scots burr always deepened with stress.

Automatically she drew on a gown and gloves, then came to the opposite side of the bed and leaned on the rail. After watching for a few moments, she lifted Shane’s hand, counted his pulse, and merely held his limp hand for a long time.

“I love him so,” she sighed. “I’d not tell anyone else this, but if he had asked me to marry him I intended to say yes, until Father came along and started all this ruckus. He’s still adamant that I marry Phillip, even though Phillip let something slip to Paul that leads me to believe his father faces financial ruin unless he marries me.”

“Paul explained the whole rotten mess. You have to stand up to him.”

“I can’t, at least not right now. If I do, it will bring down Northtown Surgical Clinic. Phillip’s father, all questions of solvency aside, is the Chairman of the Board.”

“Is it worth your life, then?”

“It will cost lives if it happens.”

“Nae, lass. There may be a rousing grand catfight, but hospitals survive, and so do patients.” At that moment their attention was wrenched back to Shane. His breath seemed to stop for a moment, then he caught up, gasping. Her heart seized with a pang, but to her relief, his breathing evened out.

“I don’t like that apnea at all.”

“Me either.”

“Father is probably right. He said forty-eight hours.” And as they watched, he quit breathing again. Jenny was expecting the onset of Cheyne-Stokes respiration, the so-called “death rattle” that signaled the shutdown of the brain, but once again Shane fought his way through it and started to breathe regularly again. She checked his pupils, and to her relief they were unchanged, if still uneven.

Eventually her father returned. This time, to her surprise, he entered the room without the gown he had ordered everyone else to don.

“How is the patient, then, Doctor MacBride?” he asked.

“You’re not observing sterile procedures, Doctor Weston?”

“No. I don’t think there’s any more need. If he were going to catch something we’d have seen it by now. Instead…” As if Shane heard him, he went through another apneic spell. John checked him over. Then he draped his stethoscope around his neck and shook his head. The gesture said it all. He raised the head of the bed a fraction more and they settled in to wait.

“Jenny, I am going to order you and Doctor MacBride to go to the cafeteria and eat,” John said, consulting his pocket watch. “It’s already four o’clock. I don’t think you’ve had a bite since the accident. You’re not going to help my patient by making yourself sick. Oh, don’t worry. He’ll hold his own for the next few hours. Low tide here won’t be until about midnight.” It was on the tip of her tongue to refuse, but Angus stepped in.

“Please come with me, lass. He’s right. I’m a tired, hungry old man, and I need the company.”

“All right, Angus.” She dragged herself to the doorway and peeled off her gown and gloves. Her father took in the black traveling outfit and gave her a disapproving look but, mindful of Angus’s presence, said nothing.

“What did he mean by low tide?” Angus asked as they walked down the antiseptic-smelling hallway.

“People like Shane, who are…who are declining slowly, almost always seem to pass away at low tide. If you’ve never lived around the ocean, you probably never had reason to make that connection. I’ve lived on the Atlantic coast all my life, and I’ve seen it time and again.”

“Well, well. Learn something new every day, they say. And no, I’ve never lived near the sea. I’m strictly a Highlander.” He opened the cafeteria door for her and stepped back to let her precede him.

“Angus, I’m actually sorry I didn’t compromise myself with Shane and force us to elope. Then there wouldn’t have been any question.”

“I’ve always prided myself on being a broad-minded man, but that is a little too forward-thinking, even for me.” He pulled out a chair and seated her at a small table. “But things will come right yet, you’ll see.”

Half a bowl of vegetable soup and two soda crackers later, she was back in Shane’s room, counting down the hours as the afternoon grew long.

Evening came, though it was hard to believe that it arrived with the same rapidity as every other evening in her life. She noted there had been no change in Shane for several hours. Outside the night quieted, save for the usual city sounds: an occasional horse on the street, the cry of an insectivorous hawk, the yapping of a bored dog in the distance. Finally she grew tired of gazing out the window. She walked past her father, who sat primly with his knees crossed European fashion, reading an AMA journal. A glance over his shoulder turned up nothing interesting. She leaned against the bed rail and studied Shane’s face. His complexion had become so pale that for the first time she noticed the merest track of an ancient scar parallel to the top of his left eyebrow. She found his right hand beneath the cover, counted his pulse, then simply held his hand.

“Oh, Shane, I wish you’d wake up,” she whispered. “You’ve come this far. It’s not like you to quit. I know you’ll not stop fighting as long as there’s any strength left in your body, but you have to win this battle soon, or you won’t win it at all. Please, darling. Just a little more effort. Live, Shane. I know you can. I’m right beside you. I promise I won’t desert you when you need me.”

She entered the second night at his bedside, wondering if he would see another morning. He rested all too quietly, still teetering on the edge between life and death. It seemed that he struggled as Jacob was said to have wrestled with the angel, until he won by degrees. It was nothing dramatic, but as midnight came and went, his breathing and his heartbeat stabilized until even her father relented and allowed he had a chance.

She grabbed another few fitful hours of sleep, and in the early afternoon she was back in his room again. She walked up to his bedside and took his hand, and to her surprise, she felt return pressure on her fingers.

“Shane, did you do that on purpose?” she asked. “Do it again, Shane. Squeeze my hand.”

His fingers tightened again. Angus looked at her with a question on his face.

“He did it, Angus,” she whispered. “He did it!”

“He’s obeying commands, then?” her father asked.

“Watch. Shane. Shane, squeeze my hand. Now, Shane. Squeeze my hand like you did before.” They watched as his fingers contracted obediently.

“See if you can get him to open his eyes,” John said. “He’ll probably do it for you quicker than for either of us.”

Chapter Seventeen

Shane was dreaming. He was in some sort of maelstrom where colors without names and languages not yet invented swirled around him. The hot, pebbled earth beneath his feet alone seemed real. He looked up to see the sky crawling with fire. A burning desert wind tore at his hair and seared his eyes. He rubbed them, and when he opened them, he stood in a barren, burned-over forest where the hot wind stirred clouds of dust and ash. He glimpsed his grandfather across a clearing, but when he tried to run after him, his legs were leaden. He drew breath to shout, and immediately his lungs were choked by burning dust. He fell to his knees, and then footsteps next to him made him look up. A doe stood on nearby rocks, regarding him thoughtfully. He reached toward her, and a voice speaking Iroquois told him to close his eyes.

“You will be well now, but do not follow me,” the doe said, speaking in Jenny’s voice. There was a touch against his forehead, and he opened his eyes again to see Jenny running away through the dusty fog, following his grandfather.

“Jenny! Come back!” he shouted as she disappeared into the mist.

The dream became physical, and by degrees he realized the voice he heard through the forest was real. Additionally, it was not leaving him alone.

“Shane, can you wake up for me, please? Shane, it’s Jenny. Open your eyes for me? Come on. Wake up. I know you can do it. Open your eyes, Shane.” Through growing awareness he heard her words and felt the hand that rubbed his shoulder. The effort of waking up was a physical struggle. He tried to speak, hearing his own slurred whisper echoing painfully through his brain.

“Shane, speak English, please. English or French, Shane. Nobody here speaks Iroquois.” Oddly enough, it was having to choose among the layers of language in his mind that woke him completely. He opened his eyes just a crack, then just as quickly closed them again, squinting against the afternoon brightness in the room.

“That’s good, Shane. Now do it again. Look at me, please?” The hand that caressed his naked shoulder smelled of the wonderfully familiar Honey Almond Cream. He could not deny her presence. In his fogged mind he was back in the North Village schoolhouse, where once she’d covered him against the cold and touched his shoulder in much the same way.
She needs me
, he thought.
No matter how tired I am, I have to help.

“Jenny,” he breathed.

“Open your eyes, Shane. Look at me.” He forced his eyes open again. They would not exactly focus, so he saw her outlined in a blur of green light. She wore the black of deepest mourning, she had combed her hair back severely, and a look of concern puckered her forehead.

“Jenny? Who died?” He turned his head toward her, trying to bring his eyes into line, and was rewarded by a blaze of pain that started at his right temple.

“Nobody died, Shane.” Her tone sounded puzzled. “How do you feel?” He could dredge up no answer for her. Instead he looked around, trying to fathom his unfamiliar surroundings. “You had an accident. Do you remember?”

“Accident? No. I…don’t.” His left hand wavered in the air, and Angus restrained it.

“Don’t touch your head, lad. You’ve had a bad concussion.” Shane looked toward him, realizing for the first time that the right side of his head hurt.

“Angus?”

“It’s all right, Shane, lad. Everything’s going to be fine now. Dinna’ worry.” As he looked up at Angus, his eyes escaped his control and closed of their own accord. It took some effort to force them open again. This time he noticed the man standing next to his friend.

“Richard? What are you doing here?”

“That’s not Uncle Richard, Shane. That’s my father, Doctor John Weston. How do you feel? Does your head ache?”

He looked toward Jenny, seeing her more clearly this time. “It’s… Yes. What happened?” He reached back into his memory to dredge up the last image he could find, but it was too much effort, and he did not have the strength for it.

“A horse kicked you. Father had to operate. You’re going to be all right. Now do something for me, please? Squeeze both my hands? She lifted his hands in hers and he tried his best to cooperate. “Good. Now move your toes.” Obediently he moved his feet beneath the light cover. “Thank you, Shane. That was exactly what I was hoping for. Now, do you know what day it is?”

“Christmas.” The word came from somewhere out in the remote reaches of the ether.

“Well, not really. You were unconscious for a while. Do you know where you are?”

“In bed.” He moved his legs fretfully. “My head…hurts.”

“We’ll give you something for the pain. You’ll be all right, Shane. But I need to check one more thing before I quit bothering you. Tell me how many fingers I’m holding up.” It took him a moment to make his eyes focus.

“Three.”

“Good.” Her palm moved to cover his right eye. “How many now?”

“Three again.” Then she occluded his left.

“Now how many?”

“Two.”

“Thank you. Sometimes when a person gets hit in the side of the head like you did, it can damage your eye. But you’re all right. You’ll get well, Shane. Just give it time.”

“I’m thirsty,” he whispered. John nodded to the nurse. She handed Jenny a half-full glass. She steadied his head and held the glass to his lips.

“Just a little at a time. We have to be sure it won’t make you sick,” she cautioned. Though the glass was far from full, he did not have the strength to finish it.”

“Thank you,” he breathed, exhausted.

“You’re welcome. Don’t worry about anything. Just let us help you, for a change.” He managed to bring his hand up toward her. She took it in both hers.

“Just don’t go.”

“I’ll be right here. I won’t leave you. Now Father is going to give you an injection. It’ll take your pain away, and you can sleep.” His exhausted mind withdrew into Iroquois; her words made no sense at all to him. There was a slight sting, followed by a deep pressure in the muscles of his upper arm, and then he felt himself drawn down into a whirlpool that took his consciousness with it. The last thing of which he was aware was the dark, sweet scent that clung to Jenny’s hand as she stroked his cheek.

The next few days were hellish. He was only semi-conscious, going confusedly from nightmare to nightmare, not knowing at any given time whether he was awake or dreaming, recognizing people only part of the time. The common denominator of all those days was pain. Even though he could not always distinguish the thin border between reality and his tortured phantasms, he knew when Jenny stood beside him, coaxing him to drink or merely holding his hand. There were days when he was incapable of a coherent thought, but gradually he sorted out the scrambled memories. They became clearer as the pain subsided and he no longer needed as much medication.

In the middle of one of the interminable nights, he woke by degrees from a troubled dream to find all about him dark and silent. The night felt friendly after the surrealistic corridors his mind had been wandering. He had been improving steadily, so the last few nights Jenny had begun leaving him in the care of one of the nurses. Since he did not want anyone to bother him, he lay feigning sleep as the steady tide of pain ebbed and flowed inside his head.

The tendrils of the last dream still enmeshed him, drawing him backward toward his childhood and the long, quiet nights in the sturdy North Village cabin. A pang of nostalgic loneliness pierced his chest when he thought of the peace and security he had known, lying in a pile of musk bear pelts by the banked fire, his arm slung loosely over the warm neck or flank of Lupi, the great white wolf hybrid that had been his constant companion. Laughingly Grandpère had given the dog his name: Lupi, short for Loup Garou, the French for werewolf. Shane had learned to walk clinging to Lupi’s ruff while the dog slowly circuited the cabin, occasionally plying a wet tongue over whatever parts of Shane’s anatomy he could reach.