The Surgeon’s Family Miracle

CHAPTER THREE

BEN woke at dawn, and five minutes later he was striding into the original hospital, looking for Lily.

For she was gone. The first thing he’d done had been to check her stretcher-bed and the sight of its neatly folded blanket had made him feel ill.

Hell, he’d slept six hours and he’d needed that sleep. She’d had little more than that and she’d had a lot more to catch up on.

‘Where’s Dr Lily?’ he snapped at the first person he saw. It was Pieter. The big nurse assessed Ben’s face and nodded, as if he now understood something that had been worrying him.

‘You’ll be Dr Ben Blayden?’

‘Yes.’

‘I should have realised yesterday,’ the nurse told him. ‘I’m afraid I wasn’t thinking.’

‘You should have realised what?’

‘That you’re our Lily’s Ben. That you’re our Benjy’s father.’

It took the wind out of Ben’s lungs, so much so that he felt as if he’d been punched. After seven years…

‘Where is she?’ he managed, and Pieter shook his head, troubled.

‘She came in here about four a.m. I wasn’t here. One of your men said she should go back to sleep but I doubt she followed instructions. Her son is missing.’ Pieter’s voice softened. ‘If I’m not mistaken, your son is missing.’

Ben flinched. He stood, stunned, letting the words sink in.

Last night there’d been room for doubt. Lily’s words had been almost incoherent, the desperate words of a woman who’d gone past the point of sense. But now… ‘She’s told you about me?’

‘She told me that Benjy was the son of a man she met at medical school. That you’d elected to be an emergency doctor with the SAS. That she’d chosen to come home, to raise your son alone because your worlds could never meet. And then yesterday…while Lily was scouring the island she went to my wife. She sobbed to her that you were here and how could she tell you about a son when she didn’t know if he was alive?’

‘She never told me,’ Ben whispered, trying to rid himself of this sense of unreality, not sure whether he was angry or confused or just…bereft. He should be angry, he thought. The appropriate emotion should definitely be anger, but bereft was winning.

He had a son.

Where the hell was he?

‘She’d only just learned she was pregnant when she came home,’ Pieter was saying, watching his face. ‘This island is a very easy place to raise a child without a father. In a sense we’re a huge family where parenting is done by all. She wouldn’t have seen the need…’

He had it now. Anger in spades, sweeping through him with a ferocity he found breathtaking.

‘She wouldn’t have seen the need to tell me? She didn’t think I had the right to know?’

‘She said you feared relationships,’ Pieter said, ‘But she also said you were a moral man who’d want to do the right thing by your son. She said her decision was not to load you with that responsibility.’

‘But even you know…’

‘Lily and I have worked side by side for almost seven years,’ Pieter said, reassuringly, as if Ben was a little unhinged and he had to settle him. Which maybe wasn’t far from the truth. ‘I’m the cousin of her mother. There’s little about Lily I don’t know.’

‘So she told you and she didn’t tell me.’

‘I believe she thought you wouldn’t want to know.’ Pieter looked grave. ‘This is a conversation you should be having with Lily, but this is maybe not the time for considering feelings. Lily’s in desperate trouble. She needs all the help she can get.’

‘Where is she now?’

The big man’s face clouded. ‘I don’t know. Maybe that’s why I’m telling you this. I should be out looking for her. She should be here helping with our wounded. As I need to be. There are shoulds everywhere.’

‘There’s been no word about the hostages?’

‘No.’

‘And this Jacques?’

‘He will be fine, that one,’ Pieter said, and his expression grew even more grim. ‘He must be a hostage but if he is…maybe he’ll be the first one to talk his way out. He is not an islander, you understand. Jacques came here when the oil was found. He helps us with our administration.’

‘You don’t like him?’

‘He’s not one of us.’

And there it was, Ben thought grimly. The reason Lily had said she could never leave the island. The islanders were family.

But even though Jacques was an outsider, Lily had agreed to marry him. He must have something.

If I’d come to her island maybe she would have married me, he thought suddenly, but it was a dumb thought. He’d never have wanted to come here, and he had a lot more to think about right now than a seven-year-old romance that had gone astray.

‘Ben,’ a voice called from the end of the corridor, and it was Sam, wearing theatre gear again.

‘Yes?’

‘They’ve released three of the hostages,’ he said. ‘Or at least they opened the front doors and shoved them out. Each of them has gunshot wounds. We need all hands in Theatre and that means you.’

Which meant another six hours operating. Six hours where they somehow managed to stabilise the injured islanders.

‘But things have settled,’ Ben was told by the sergeant in charge when, with surgery completed, he’d made his way to temporary headquarters. ‘We’ve done a comprehensive sweep of the island. There are no more injured.’

‘Have you seen the island doctor?’

‘Lily,’ the sergeant said. ‘Yes. She’s working in the original hospital. She knows you guys are thorough, but most of the families want to talk to her.’ He hesitated. ‘They’ve had a succession of English teachers on the island and English is spoken by everyone. But maybe if my kin had been shot I’d want my family doctor to talk me through it.’

Damn. Ben had just come from the field hospital which was next door to the original building. He turned to leave but then he remembered. It wasn’t just Lily he was concerned about.

‘The hostage situation?’

‘We’re negotiating,’ the sergeant told him. ‘They want transport out of here.’

‘Do we know who’s in there?’

‘Ten islanders. The most badly injured they’ve tossed out. Ten fits with the number of islanders who remain missing. We don’t know how many rebels.’

‘Is Lily’s son there?’

‘Yes,’ the sergeant said, and Ben felt suddenly light-headed.

‘We know he’s alive?’ he demanded.

‘One of the injured men saw him. Yes.’

‘And you’ve told Lily?’

‘She was here when we heard. She’d been everywhere on the island, checking with each search team as they came in, checking herself. We were almost as glad as she was when we heard the kid was alive.’

‘And…Jacques someone?’ he ventured, and there was a nod.

‘We assume so. He wasn’t seen by the guy we talked to but he said he heard him talking.’

‘So they’re both safe. And you’ll negotiate transport in exchange for the hostages?’

‘We don’t know yet,’ the sergeant said. ‘These guys are dangerous. We need to get permission from higher up the line. Our politicians are talking to the only people here who are fit to speak. That’s the deputy head of council and the finance councillor, and they’re both still in a state of shock. But the decision to negotiate isn’t up to us.’

‘It has to be.’

‘You want to storm the place?’

‘No, but…’

‘Then…’ The sergeant was watching him curiously, sensing his tension. This was the team sent in as a front line at every crisis, and he knew Ben well. Ben usually worked efficiently, with little emotion. He was emotional now.

He couldn’t stop being emotional.

‘I need to talk to Lily.’

‘We need your written assessment by dusk,’ the sergeant said mildly.

‘You’ll have it. But the priority is Lily.’

He found her sitting outside the hospital, under a group of palms in the hospital gardens. There were three islanders with her-an old woman and two children. The old woman was keening her distress while the children looked on in incomprehension. Ben hesitated, but then he walked close enough to listen.

Lily glanced up as he approached. He gave a slight shake of his head. The hope that had flared in her eyes faded, and she turned again to the old woman, pulling her into her arms and hugging her close.

‘Hush. Kira died instantly, Mary. You know that.’

‘My only sister.’

Lily didn’t speak again. She simply held her, not hurrying, waiting until the woman had sobbed the worst of her grief out, waiting until she raised her head of her own accord, waiting until she was ready to talk.

‘Do you want help to look after the children?’ she asked her at last. ‘I can find someone if you need to be alone.’

The old woman glared and pulled away as if Lily had said something obscene. She put out her arms and the children, a girl of about five and a boy of about three, scooted in and were hugged tight.

‘They’ll stay with me until their mother is well enough to care for them again. Or until their father can get here.’

‘Here’s Dr Blayden. He’s here to help me with the injuries. He helped operate on your mother last night, kids. He’s a hero, right when we need him.’

The kids looked up at him, doubtful, looking for a real-life hero. Ben smiled and crossed to the little group, squatting down beside them and delving in his pocket for sweets. He carried them everywhere, for just such an emergency as this.

‘Tell me your names,’ he said, folding the sweets into their hands before they had a chance to draw back.

‘Nicki,’ the little girl whispered, staring down at her lolly, while the boy huddled behind his grandmother, keeping his hand closed over the precious sweet. ‘And my brother is Lanie.’

‘Is your mother’s name Louie?’

‘Yes.’

‘I did help fix her last night,’ he told them.

‘Nicki and Lanie were with their mother when the men came,’ Lily said briefly, and Ben thought Lily knew what she was doing. Traumatised kids had to talk about what happened. ‘Louie ran with them. She ran to her mother’s.’

The bullet had pierced Louie’s shoulder as she’d run. Ben winced. What sort of criminals shot at a mother, fleeing with her children?

‘I think these men are very, very bad and very, very stupid,’ he told the children. ‘But our soldiers have them all in one place now and they can’t hurt anyone. And your mother is getting better. You can visit her now if you like.’

‘I was just coming to tell them that,’ Lily said.

‘She’ll feel much better after she’s seen you,’ Ben said, and he smiled at the old lady. ‘And after she’s seen her mother.’ He delved back into his pocket and brought out six more sweets. They were sold as Traffic Lights, round, flat shining discs, red, green and yellow. ‘Choose one more each,’ he told the children. ‘And then I want you to choose two each to take to your mother. Can you do that?’

The children nodded and the old lady stood. Her face had cleared a little, some of the horror fading.

‘My daughter truly will be well?’

‘She truly will be well,’ Ben said, and he and Lily stood and watched as the little family bade them farewell and went to do their hospital visiting.

Ben was left with Lily.

She looked a thousand per cent better than the night before, he thought. She’d showered and changed. She was wearing a tiny denim skirt, a T-shirt and leather sandals-hardly the attire of a doctor about to do her rounds-but he could see nothing amiss with it. Except that her legs were covered with scratches. A couple of them were deep and nasty.

‘Let me see to your legs,’ he said, and she gazed down as if wondering what he was talking about. Seeing the bloody scratches, she merely shrugged.

‘They’ll be fine. Trivial stuff.’

‘Not so trivial if they get infected.’

‘I have more to worry about than infected legs.’

‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘But legs come first. You want to come voluntarily or do you want to be carried? I’m a lieutenant, you know. I have authority in this place.’

She managed a feeble smile. ‘I’d rather be bribed with sweets,’ she said, and he shoved a hand in his pocket and produced a handful.

‘Eat one,’ he said, and she shook her head.

‘When did you last eat?’

‘I can’t remember.’

‘Then eat a sweet,’ he told her. ‘I’ll bathe those legs and then you’re going to be fed.’

‘But-’

‘Don’t argue, Dr Cyprano. As of last night your deputy head of council gave us authority in this place. I’m therefore representing the occupying force and what I say goes. You eat.’

She opened her mouth to protest. He’d been unwrapping a sweet while he’d talked and he popped it in.

‘No protests.’

‘No, sir,’ she told him with a mouth full of red sweet. ‘Or, yes, sir. I don’t know which.’

He dressed her legs. She stayed silent throughout, which suited his mood. There were things that had to be said but he didn’t know where to start. Bathing her scratches, applying antiseptic and dressing the worst of them gave him time to think. It was as if he was getting used to her all over again.

She lay passively on an examination trolley while he worked. She stared straight ahead, seemingly oblivious when he had to scrub, though he must have hurt her. Then he took her to the mess tent, waved away anyone who would have talked to them, sat her down and watched as she mechanically ate the pasta he brought her, as she drank coffee, and as she pushed her mug away and rose and said, ‘Thank you very much, I need to go now.’

‘I’m coming with you.’

Unless there were new developments Ben wasn’t needed now in the hospital. The uprising had been quelled so fast that maybe they could have managed with less manpower. But the fact that they’d come fast and hard had maybe averted a greater tragedy, he thought.

But for now there were enough medics to cope with medical needs. There was no more organisation for Ben to do. He could stay by Lily’s side. For she intended to go back to the roadblock in front of the compound. He knew that without asking. That was where negotiations were taking place. If he had been Lily, that was where he’d want to be.

And it was where he wanted to be. For it was his son held hostage. The concept was so overpowering he didn’t know what to do with it, but all he knew was that he needed to go with her.

The roadblock was half a mile from the hospital, across the beach road. It was mid-afternoon and the heat was getting to him. Lily was lightly dressed but Ben was wearing fatigues, and he was feeling it.

‘Walk on the beach,’ he suggested, and Lily diverted her footsteps without saying a word.

Her silence was starting to scare him. This wasn’t the Lily he remembered. She’d been bright, bubbly, fun and startlingly intelligent. Her professors had described her as smart as paint, and more than one had said it was a shame she wasn’t staying in Australia to specialise. But Australia’s loss would be Kapua’s gain. They had all known that, and she’d never questioned her destiny.

He hadn’t questioned her destiny either.

‘Lily, we need to talk,’ he said as they walked through the fringe of coconut palms to the beach beyond.

‘What good is talking?’ she whispered dully, and he heard how close to breaking point she really was.

‘He’ll be fine, Lily,’ he said softly. ‘The men and women doing the negotiating are the best. We flew them in as soon as we realised how serious the hostage situation was. They’re never going to blast their way in. I’ve watched these people before and seen the way they work. They have all the patience in the world. It might take days but they’ll get them out alive. They know their stuff.’

But Lily had only heard the one word. ‘Days,’ she choked. ‘With those murderers? He’s six years old. What he must be thinking… I should have taken him to Kira’s myself. But the woman I was treating…she’d have bled to death. I couldn’t. Dear God, I couldn’t.’

‘You had medical imperatives,’ he said gently. He’d talked to the finance councillor by now-the woman was recovering in hospital-and he’d seen the wound Lily had somehow pulled together. Lily was right. If she’d taken the time to take care of her son before she’d treated her, the woman would be dead. ‘You saved her life, Lily.’

‘But I should have kept Benjy with me,’ she whispered. ‘He’s my son. I’m all he has.’

‘Doesn’t he have Jacques?’ he asked, and she looked blindly up at him, uncomprehending. ‘Your fiancé’s in there as well, isn’t he?’

She steadied a little at that. ‘Jacques,’ she said, and then more strongly, ‘Jacques. Maybe that’s why he’s there. Maybe he went to Jacques.’ But then she shook her head. ‘But he’d have had to come past the hospital to reach Jacques.’

‘Jacques is in administration?’

‘He’s in charge of finance,’ she told him. ‘Oh, we have a finance councillor but Louise isn’t exactly smart. She does what Jacques says. Except for selling oil. Louise dug her heels in over that. So did we all.’ She fell silent. She was trembling, Ben saw, even though the day was hot. She was walking in the damp sand near the water’s edge. Here the water was a turquoise blue, clear to the bottom. Ben could see fish feeding on weed drifting in and out in the shallows. The beach was wide and golden. This place was indeed a tropical paradise. That such tragedy had come to it…

Lily must have been thinking the same. A tremor ran though her, and Ben took her hand.

‘He’ll be OK, Lily.’

‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered.

‘There’s no-’

‘I mean I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about Benjy.’

He didn’t answer. He couldn’t.

‘He’s such a…such a…’ She took a deep breath. ‘He’s very much like you. Ben, if anything happens to him and you haven’t met him…’ She hiccuped on a sob and then seemed to regroup. ‘I thought I had the right,’ she told him. ‘I thought… It was me who was pregnant, not you, and I knew you’d be appalled. But seeing you here… He’s your son, Ben, and I should have made the effort. Even if you didn’t want him.’

‘Why would I not want him?’

‘What were we, Ben?’ she demanded, suddenly angry. ‘Babies ourselves. We were young for med school. We were young for life. You were so lit up about joining the army. You were off to save the world. Armies are used for peacekeeping, you told me, but it was excitement that was in your heart. Action. Drama. Sure, you didn’t want to fight, but you did want to go wherever there was action. And me…all I wanted to do was come home. My mother had sold everything she owned to send me to med school, and the islanders helped because everyone here needed a doctor. I was as excited as you were-but I was excited at coming home to help my people.’

‘Did it work out?’ he asked, and she took a deep breath. There wasn’t a trace of colour on her face. She looked sick.

‘I guess it did,’ she said slowly. ‘But there was a cost. My mother died just after I got back. She had cancer. She’d known for two years but she hadn’t told me because she hadn’t wanted to interrupt my studies.’

‘Oh, Lily…’

‘You see, when I found I was pregnant I was just as shocked as you would have been. We were so careful but, then, our lecturers used to say the only sure-fire contraception is a brick wall. We’re proof of that. So what could I do? You’d made it clear you never wanted a family. I couldn’t burden you with one, against your wishes.’ She steadied then, forcing her voice to sound neutral. ‘I had to come home. As it is, I’ve made a life for both of us here. Every islander loves Benjy. Every islander is his uncle or his aunt or his cousin, by traditional ties if not by blood.’

‘And he has Jacques?’

‘He has Jacques,’ she agreed, though it took her time to respond. Her voice was uncertain now, as if he’d touched a nerve.

‘They don’t get on?’

‘Why would you ask me that?’

‘It is my business if he’s my son.’

‘He’s not your son. I won’t burden you with him. He’s-’

‘Lily, I want him to be my son.’ The words surprised them both. They stopped, and a wave, higher than usual, washed in over their feet. Lily’s sandalled toes were washed clean. Ben was wearing tough army boots. The water receded and they hardly looked damp.

It was dumb to be looking at boots, Ben thought. The whole thing was dumb. Maybe Lily was right. Maybe he should back off right now.

But he had a son. By Lily.

And she looked distraught.

He reached out and touched her face. There was a fine coat of dust over everything, courtesy of setting up the field hospital on land where the grass had withered during the dry season. Dust was on Lily’s face, streaked now by tears, and he tracked a tear with his finger.

I wonder what this place is like in the rainy season, he thought inconsequentially.

Lily didn’t move. She submitted to his touch without comment.

‘I think I loved you, Lily,’ he said, and she managed a ghost of a smile.

‘Benjy was conceived in love,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve always believed that.’

‘It’s the truth.’

‘Just lucky we’re older, eh?’ she said, but her voice was strained to breaking point. She brushed his hand from her face, turned determinedly northward again and started walking. ‘Just lucky we’ve found sense.’

‘And you’ve found Jacques.’

‘As you say. Do you have anyone?’

‘No.’

‘You’re still running from relationships?’

‘I don’t run.’

‘No.’ She hesitated, and then glanced sideways at him. Cautious. ‘You’re angry?’

‘Maybe I am.’

‘Because I didn’t tell you about Benjy?

‘Yeah. But maybe you’re right,’ he said bleakly. ‘Maybe seven years ago I wouldn’t have wanted to know. I was dumb.’

‘We were both dumb.’

‘Mmm.’ He kicked some more sand and tried to think of other things besides how close this woman was, and how bereft she looked, and how he wanted to…

He couldn’t want. She had a life here and a son and a fiancé and he was here with a job to do.

He should be working. He should go back to the hospital and organise paperwork for the evacuations. He could help treat the minor wounds of islanders still cautiously presenting.

His team were doing that. He wouldn’t be needed again unless there was a blast-out in the hostage situation.

A blast-out. Benjy. His son.

Think of something else, he thought fiercely. They were nearing the headland where the compound lay and the strain on Lily’s face was well nigh unbearable. She was staring ahead as if she was willing herself to see through walls. He had to distract her.

‘Lily, there’s a couple of things bothering me.’

‘I don’t have time to-’

‘Not about us,’ he said gently. ‘About this situation. Can you help?’

She took a deep breath and steadied. ‘Of course.’

‘You told me seven years ago that this island was like a huge family. Everyone knew everyone and no one locked their doors. Is that right?’

‘Yes, but-’

‘But what?’ he asked. ‘The insurgents were forced to leave the hospital alone, and we’ve been wondering why. We’ve been told there’s been a drug problem on the island, so you’ve trained orderlies to act as security guards. Is that right?’

‘Yes, but-’

‘Do you know these drug users? Are they locals?’

‘No,’ she said slowly, and he knew she was having trouble concentrating, but she was determined to try. ‘We’ve had three break-ins over the last two months. None before. Down south there’s a surf camp. The surf here is fantastic and devotees come to train, but for the last couple of months there’s been guys there who are worrying. They just lie around and drink, and the break-ins started at the same time they arrived. They’ve had three-month visas. Our local policeman couldn’t find evidence to deport them, so he trained and armed our orderlies and we let it be known.’ She gave a rueful smile. ‘Our orderlies are the most peaceable of men, but it acted like a deterrent. The break-ins stopped.’

‘So where are these men now?’

‘Maybe I heard they were to go to one of the outer islands. I’m not sure.’

‘You never thought to get a profile on any of them?’

‘I’m a doctor. I didn’t think anything.’

‘But you-’

‘It’s not my responsibility,’ she flashed. ‘Ben, if you knew how hard I work… There’s no other doctor on any of these islands. Kapua’s the biggest in the chain but there’s twenty inhabited islands. The health service is me. No one wants to fly to Australia for treatment. Hardly anyone will leave their own island. Pregnant mothers are supposed to fly out to Fiji to give birth but hardly any do. Elderly islanders won’t leave, no matter how sick they are. I fly by the seat of my pants, doing what comes next, and policing isn’t on my list. Sure, our policeman should have investigated more, and maybe if I’d thought of it I would have reminded him, but I didn’t. I was just grateful the break-ins stopped.’

‘I’m sorry,’ he said, startled by her anger, and she stooped and picked up a shell and tossed it into the sea with such savagery that she came very near to knocking out a seagull. The gull rose with a startled shriek and Lily stared at it for a moment and then sighed.

‘Sorry, bird,’ she said. And then, ‘Sorry, Ben. It’s just…during med school everyone-including you-assumed I was coming home to an idyllic island existence. But this place…We need a full medical service, with helicopter evacuation, with at least two doctors and a set-up where I can do operations that involve more than me cutting frantically while I’m instructing Pieter in the niceties of anaesthesia.’ She broke off, turned her face to the council compound again and winced.

He tugged her against him. For a moment she resisted, staying rigid in his grasp, but he on kept holding her, willing some of his strength into her.

‘I promise we’ll keep your son safe,’ he said softly. ‘I swear.’

But what sort of dumb promise was that? How could he make it good?

But she finally gave in and let herself lean against him. His arms held her and he smelt the citrus fragrance of her hair. Memories flooded back of the Lily of seven years ago and he thought, She’s the same Lily, my Lily. And with that thought came self-knowledge. If there was a choice… If he could walk into the compound and say let the boy go, take him instead, he’d do just that.

For Lily.

But it wasn’t just for Lily. For things had changed. The child in the compound wasn’t just Lily’s son. He was his own son.

He had family.

The thought was incredible. His world had changed, he thought, dazed. It had shifted on its axis, leaving everything he knew unaligned.

And suddenly, desperately, he wanted to kiss this woman, properly, as she needed to be kissed, as he ached to kiss her, taking her lips against his mouth, possessing the sweet core of her. Loving her…

But he knew that if he did that, she’d pull back. She was terrified for her son. She was taking strength from him and he wanted her to keep doing that. So hold yourself back, he told himself fiercely, though God only knew what effort that cost him.

But somehow he managed it, kissing her hair, but lightly, as one would have comforted a distressed child. He stood, holding her as she leaned against him. Warmth flowed between them. It was as if she was admitting finally that she needed help; she needed him.

But with that thought came an answering one. He needed her.

Lily.

He couldn’t pull her tighter into him. He mustn’t. What was happening here was too precious to be destroyed by stupid impulses, no matter how strong those impulses might be.

‘Let’s go,’ he said gently, and somehow he put her away from him and smiled gently down into her strained-to-exhaustion face. ‘Let’s go and find our son.’

‘Of course,’ she said dully. ‘If we can.’

‘We will,’ he said. ‘We’ll do this together. We’re together until we find him.’

‘Ben…’

He pulled her against him once more, but gently, as one would have comforted a friend. She was his friend. She was the mother of his child. He hugged her and then he linked his hand in hers and led her forward.

‘You’re not alone, Lily,’ he told her. ‘I’ll be here for you for however long it takes.’