Miracles in the ER (17 page)

Jody Bridgers had been one of the first officers to come to the department. Now he walked up behind me and put a hand on my shoulder. “I know you’re busy, but it’s going to get worse. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it.”

I turned and looked at the sergeant. He was sweating profusely, his blue uniform plastered to his chest and arms. Sweat poured down his face and he tried unsuccessfully to stem it with a small towel.

“We might need some help here shortly, once more of the injured get here. Lori already told me the waiting room is full and getting rowdy.”

Jody stuffed the towel into his pants pocket and shook his head. “I
know
you’ll be needing some help
there
, but the fact is, we have every available unit at the scene. We’ve called in everyone we could find and still don’t have enough officers. As soon as we get one group under control, another fight breaks out down the street or behind the building. It’s like that game…What do you call it?”

“Whack-a-mole.”

“That’s right—whack-a-mole. Just like that.”

The officer stepped out of the way of two lab techs. They hurried to
the side of the stretcher and prepared to fill several rubber-stoppered tubes with my patient’s blood.

“I just wanted to stop by and check on things. I came in with the guy next door—the gunshot to the chest—and saw you in here. We’ll do what we can about getting some officers over here. But it’s gonna be awhile.”

He spun around and was gone. And I was nervous. There had been fights in the waiting room following high-school football games and minor rumbles in town. But this was something worse—something bigger than any of that.

“I’m here if you need anything, Doc.”

I looked at the doorway and there stood Willis Barber, our nighttime security guard. Willis was a great guy, but he was at least seventy, skinny as a November stalk of corn, and unarmed.

Now I was
really
nervous, but I was able to force a nod and a smile.

“Seems to be getting a little out of hand in the waiting room.” He shifted his weight from one foot to the other and stroked his gray, stubbled chin. “I’ll go see what I can do.”

Willis stepped into the hallway, turned to his left—the opposite direction from the waiting room—and disappeared. We didn’t see him the rest of the night.

The OR crew came for my patient and wheeled him out of the department. I had just reached the nurses’ station when the ambulance-entrance doors blew open and EMS 3 brought two stretchers into the ER.

“This one’s cut up pretty bad,” one of the paramedics gasped, breathing hard. “And the other has a stab wound of his belly. He thinks butcher knife.”

“Take the stab wound into major,” Virginia commanded from the triage entrance. “And the lacerations back to minor trauma.”

The paramedic nodded without a word and the stretchers sped smoothly past us.

Virginia stepped over to my side. “It’s pretty tense in the waiting room. I’ve moved as many of our regular patients and their families as I could to the back hallway, but we’re running out of space. No police officers, and the fight looks like it’s spreading this way. There’s something going on in the parking lot, right outside the entrance. A lot of yelling and pushing. I’ve got a three-year-old with fever and an earache that I need to get back. He’s scared to death.”

She paused, adjusted her bifocals, and chuckled. “Have to admit, I’m a little worried myself. This powder keg could explode any minute.”

Twenty minutes later, it
did
explode. Whatever had been going on in the parking lot spilled through the ER entrance and into the waiting room. Four young men were swinging at each other—fortunately no guns were involved—and chairs were flying. They weren’t doing much damage to each other, and the altercation quickly flowed back through the entrance and out into the parking lot again.

“Anything I can do, Dr. Lesslie?”

I turned around and was face-to-face with Ansel Pardee. Ansel worked with the hospital’s housekeeping department and was a kind, generous, soft-spoken man—a friend to everyone. Part of his assignment tonight was the ER. Amy must have called him for major trauma. It was still a mess.

“Thanks, Ansel. Maybe in major.”

Ansel was a little taller than me—probably six-two—and solid as a rock. He was leaning on a broom and smiling at me.
What had he told me about retiring? He was almost sixty-five and getting close.

“Dr. Lesslie, we’ve got a problem.”

What now?

Behind me stood Alberta Fleming, one of our overnight registration secretaries. She worked out front, separated from the waiting area by a low, narrow desk.

Her eyes were open wide and she was trembling.

“About twenty men—maybe twenty-five—just came in, demanding to see their cousin. I think they’re talking about the young man with the gunshot wound of his abdomen. I’ve asked them to have a seat or wait outside, but they’re just standing there milling around. It’s getting ugly. They won’t leave, and say they’ll just find a way to get back here.” She stopped, leaned close to me, and whispered. “And Dr. Lesslie, I’m pretty sure a couple of them have guns.”

I spun around to Amy. She was standing behind the counter, phone pressed to her ear and her hand covering the mouthpiece. “I’ve got Sergeant Bridgers on the line but he can’t get anyone over here for twenty or thirty minutes.”

“Let me step out there.” Ansel Pardee’s voice was calm, measured. Before I could say anything he disappeared through the triage door.

I turned back to Amy. She still had the phone pressed to her ear. She shook her head and didn’t say a word.

“Heaven help us.” Alberta spun around and scurried back to her front desk.

“Dr. Lesslie, I need you in here, right now.” Virginia disappeared back into major. I recognized the tone of her voice and bolted after her.

Fifteen minutes later, our butcher-knife patient was stabilized and I walked over to the nurses’ station.

“Amy, can you get the OR on the phone? We need to let them know what’s next.”

I grabbed a piece of paper, scribbled a few notes, and froze.

Ansel Pardee! What had I been thinking? He was out in the waiting room all alone.

I hurried through triage and opened the waiting-room door. There was Ansel, standing in the middle of the room with his broom, sweeping some loose pieces of trash. Two or three people sat quietly in chairs, watching the wall-mounted TV.

He looked up and gave me a big grin.

“Ansel, what did…how did you…?”

He chuckled and motioned me over to his side. Leaning close, he whispered, “Doc, I came out here, saw all those hooligans, and picked out the one I thought was the ringleader. I walked up to him and got right in his face. Just stood there for a while, starin’ at him. Then I said, ‘Son, I know your momma.’ And that was that.”

Ansel winked at me, grabbed his broom, and started sweeping again.

I heard him whistling as I walked back through the triage door.

On Silent Wings They Come

“What do you think? We’re only two minutes away.”

Paramedics Mike and Sharon Brothers were in the ambulance of EMS 3, returning to Rock Hill on Highway 161. Their police scanner had buzzed to life—the dispatcher calling for any available unit to respond to a forced breaking and entering.

“She didn’t mention any personal injuries,” Sharon answered her husband. “They probably don’t need us. If they do, they’ll call.”

“Yeah, but we’re close. Let’s check it out.”

A few minutes later, the ambulance turned off 161 and onto a well-kept graveled road. A final curve, and there was the house—well-guarded by clumps of pine trees and cedars. A county sheriff’s patrol car was parked on some patchy grass, its blue lights still flashing.

A loud blast from behind the stopped ambulance startled Sharon.

“What in the world! I think I wet my pants!”

She jumped out the passenger door and waved a fist at the approaching fire engine. Andy West was driving and he laughed, shaking his head and pointing at the paramedic.

He blew his horn once more, just for good measure, and brought the unit to a stop.

Deputy Lou Warner walked over to the ambulance and stood beside Mike.

“These poor folks. This is the worst I’ve ever seen.” He pointed toward the house and to a man and woman who stood near the front door, talking with another officer. A little girl, probably four years old, stood by her mother’s side and clutched one of the woman’s legs with both arms.

“What happened?” Sharon stepped over to the two men, glancing over her shoulder at the parked fire engine, lest Andy let loose another blast.

Lou shook his head and jammed his hands into his coat pockets. It was a week after Thanksgiving and the temperature was close to freezing. “Somebody broke into the house while they weren’t at home. The whole family was across town at the Walmart and was only gone for a couple of hours. When they got back, this is what they found. Come on, I’ll show you.”

Mike and Lou headed toward the newly constructed vinyl-sided house. Sharon hesitated. She was only a hundred feet away and just now noticed the front door.

Odd. It’s freezing out here, but the door is wide open. Wait—

The door wasn’t just open—it had been ripped from its hinges and stood leaning against its splintered wooden frame.

Mike looked over his shoulder. “Come on, Sharon.”

She quickly caught up to the two men and stepped onto the small cement stoop. Lou’s partner was a few yards to her right, still talking to the couple and their daughter, making notes on a small flip pad.

Sharon wiped her feet on a rubber doormat. Its Christmas greeting—NOEL—was almost completely obscured by the red mud of the sparsely grassed front yard. She was about to follow Lou and Mike into the house when she noticed the little boy standing under a window twenty feet from the stoop.

He was by himself, bundled against the cold December air, with his bright-red stocking cap pulled low over his ears. His mittened hands hung limply by his side and he was staring at something on the ground.

It was a pumpkin—smashed into sad, pulpy pieces. In spite of the biting cold, Sharon’s face flushed a bright red.

“Are you coming?” Mike called out again.

The small living room was completely destroyed. The remains of a few wooden chairs were scattered on the floor and the one lonely piece of furniture—a dark brown and worn Naugahyde lounge chair—had been turned on its side and repeatedly slashed.

“Whoever did this meant business.” Lou was pointing to a far wall, next to the kitchen. The Sheetrock had been ripped off and was scattered in dusty pieces on the floor. “They knew what they were doing. This is a new house, and they were hoping to find copper pipes. Same thing in the bathrooms. The whole place is a wreck.”

“Why the chair?” Sharon glanced at the floor behind her. “Why would someone cut it up like that?”

“Just plain meanness,” Lou answered.

“I’m just glad nobody was home.” Mike shook his head and stepped into the small kitchen.

“Yeah, somebody might have gotten hurt.” Lou glanced through the open front door at the small family.

“Looks like they took everything in this room.” Mike kicked away some debris from where the refrigerator had once stood. Any appliances—anything of value was gone. “How did they do this in only a couple of hours?”

“We’ve seen it happen before,” Lou answered. “They drive up in a truck and start ripping stuff out and loading it up. They don’t waste any time.”

Sharon thought about the smashed pumpkin. Someone had taken the time to make
that
statement.

Gary and Kimberly Fields had finished talking with Lou’s partner. He motioned to Deputy Warner and they headed for the patrol car.

“See you guys later,” Lou said to Mike and Sharon.

He stopped beside the couple and their little girl. “I’m really sorry about this. We’re going to do everything we can to find the people who did it.”

Gary Fields nodded slowly, glanced at his ruined home, and quickly looked away.

“Thank you, Officer.” Kimberly managed a pained smile and called to her son. “Mark, come here. You and Hannah need to start cleaning up your rooms.”