Practice Makes Perfect

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Grabbing a handful of his anorak, she pulled the child back to the bank and hauled him up the edge, slipping and sliding as she went.

His skin was a bluish white, his lips almost purple, and there was no sign of breathing at all.

Oh, God, no!’ she muttered to herself, and just because she couldn’t give up without trying, and because there was always an outside chance that his sudden immersion had triggered the diving reflex, she forced her frozen limbs into action.

Tipping the child on to his front, she gently depressed his chest to squeeze water from his airways. There was very little, backing up her guess, and when she laid her ear against his chest, she could detect a faint heartbeat every few seconds.

‘Severe bradycardia, pulseless, no breathing apparent,’ she recited, and, flipping him on to his back, she gently tipped his head back and, covering his nose and mouth with her lips, she breathed carefully into his tiny lungs. After two breaths she crossed her hands over the bottom of his breastbone and pumped steadily fifteen times, then gave two more breaths and pumped again.

After a few minutes she heard scrambling behind her, but she was too busy counting to pay attention.

‘For heaven’s sake, woman, you’ll freeze to death!’ a man’s voice said, and Lydia became aware that she was still dressed only in her underwear, and the biting wind was chilling her body rapidly.

‘Press here, like this,’ she said, and while the man took over she dived into her clothes and then pushed him out of the way, continuing the massage.

‘She’s wasting her time. Anyone can see he’s dead—look at him!’ one of the other bystanders said in an awed voice, and Lydia shot him a black look.

‘Not yet, he isn’t. Not until I say so. Go and look out for the ambulance, please, so they don’t waste time trying to find us.’

She turned her attention back to the child, counting fifteen pumps, then two breaths, fifteen pumps, two breaths, until suddenly a pair of large warm hands closed over hers and a reassuring voice murmured, ‘Take over the top end. One to five.’

Lydia had never been so glad to see anyone in all her life.

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_47c3bd37-4d2d-5f1d-8a03-df64741db800)

THEY worked well as a team, Sam pumping the child’s chest, Lydia breathing gently into his lungs during the pauses. It was much easier with two, and Lydia was able to use the intervals between breathing to strip off David’s wet clothes and wrap him in her coat.

Someone produced a car rug, and they tucked it loosely round him to prevent any further chilling, although he was beyond the point where he could warm himself up. His only hope was that his body had gone into the primitive diving reflex as Lydia had supposed, and that his body’s need for oxygen had been drastically reduced as a result. All they could do was keep his blood oxygenated and circulating until the ambulancemen arrived.

‘We’re not getting him back; he needs atropine,’ Sam muttered. ‘Can you take over while I give it to him?’

She nodded and went back to the fifteen-two rhythm while Sam drew up and administered the injection; then they paused to reassess the boy’s condition.

Sam’s eyes closed in relief as he picked up a heartbeat with his stethoscope, and as they watched the boy’s chest lifted slightly with a spontaneous breath.

‘He’s alive!’ someone called, and a great cheer went up.

Sam gave them a grim smile. ‘Don’t get too excited. We could still lose him, but at least he’s fighting now.’

Slowly, as if he was calling himself back from a great distance, the child recovered consciousness and stared around him in bewilderment.

‘Mum?’ he said shakily, and Sam smoothed his hair back from his face and spoke quietly to him. He obviously knew the boy well, and Lydia wondered how often he had had to deal with him in the past. She had noticed the fresh sutures in his hand under a filthy, tattered dressing, and there were other scars and bruises on his skinny little body that worried her.

If he survived this crisis she resolved to discuss him with Sam, because she was sure there was more to his history than met the eye.

She watched silently as Sam undid his coat, then wrapped the boy up more firmly in the blanket and lifted him on to his lap, one arm cradling him securely against the warm, hard expanse of his chest as he rubbed the frozen little limbs firmly with his other hand.

Lydia felt a sudden painful rush of memory. She knew from recent and poignant experience how good it felt to nestle there in the shelter of his arms.

A shudder ran through her, and Sam narrowed his eyes and looked at her keenly.

‘Are you OK?’

She nodded. ‘Just cold. The water’s freezing.’

A quick frown creased his brow. ‘Did you go in?’

She nodded again. ‘He was floating near the far side. There was no other way to get to him. It’s very deep.’ Once again she was struck by the horror of the cold water closing in and squeezing the air from her lungs, and she shuddered with reaction. ‘I thought … for a moment … it was so hard to breathe,’ she whispered, and shut her eyes tight.

She felt his hand grip hers, and his warmth and strength reached out to flow into her, filling her with courage. Must hang in there a little longer,’ he murmured reassuringly, and she wrapped her arms around her chest and tried to keep warm until the ambulance came to take David away.

She heard Sam outlining the treatment given, including the point three milligrammes of atropine IV, and from his questioning of bystanders she gathered that he had been given resuscitation for at least twenty-five minutes—most of it by her, alone—before he had regained consciousness. It hadn’t seemed that long, and yet in a way it seemed as if they had fought for him forever, she thought wearily.

David’s mother had arrived, almost hysterical with worry. Sam calmed her down and then the ambulance was off, siren going, speeding the child to hospital and leaving an aimless gaggle of villagers, unsure what to do next.

They parted like the Red Sea, murmuring praise and thanks as Sam put his arm around her shoulders and led her, shivering violently, out of the gravel pit and over to his car. Her filthy coat he flung in the boot, and then he pushed her, protesting, into the front seat.

‘But I’ll wreck the upholstery—I’m all muddy!’ she wailed, and he grinned.

‘So am I. So what? Damn the upholstery. We just saved a child’s life.’

His grin was infectious. ‘We did, didn’t we?’ she replied, her mouth curling at the corners. ‘How about that?’

Sam’s laugh was warm and wonderful, almost as wonderful as the blast of warm air from the heater. Snuggling down into the seat, she closed her eyes and let her teeth chatter all the way back to the house.

It was only as Sam swung in and slammed on the brakes that she remembered the wall.

‘What the blazes—where did that come from?’ he asked, his voice abrupt with amazement. Lydia slid further down the seat and dared a sideways look at his stunned face.

‘I’m afraid I did it.’

He turned to her in astonishment. ‘But why? That’s ridiculous! I need to be able to get in and out——’

‘You could always reverse,’ she offered helplessly, and hid a smile at his snort of contempt.

I suppose you’re going to build a wall all down the garden, too?’

She shot up in her seat at that. ‘Did he leave you part of the garden?’

Sam shrugged. ‘I really don’t know. I haven’t bothered to find out.’

Then perhaps I should,’ Lydia commented thoughtfully, and then added, with a sideways look, ‘You may not, of course, be entitled to the drive either. That would make life interesting. You’d have to rig up a catapult to get the patients in and out!’

‘I think you’ve got hypothermia,’ Sam said drily, and, swinging his lean body out of the car, he came round to open Lydia’s door and help her out.

As she stood the events of the past twenty-four hours caught up with her and she swayed against him, clutching blindly at his arms to steady herself.

‘Dizzy?’ he asked, his breath warm against her ear, and she nodded and continued to cling to him, headily conscious of his rough cheek brushing her temple. Her nose was buried in the soft hollow at the base of his throat, and as she breathed in her senses were teased with the heady mixture of soap and warm male skin.