working instead of one.
‘Let’s get you somewhere more comfortable,’ she told the woman. She had a jacket draped over her shoulders. ‘Is this Doc Denver’s jacket?’
‘I … yes. His phone’s in the pocket. It keeps ringing.’
You didn’t think to answer it? she thought, but she didn’t say it. What was the point now? But if Emergency Services were trying to verify their location …
‘I want you to sit in Doc Denver’s truck,’ she told Margaret. ‘If the phone rings, can you answer it and tell people where we are?’
‘I don’t …’
‘We’re depending on you, Margaret. All you have to do is sit in the car and answer the phone. Nothing else. Can you do that?’
‘If you save Horace.’
‘Deal.’ She propelled her into the passenger seat of the SUV and there was a bonus. More ballast. With Margaret’s extra, not insubstantial, weight, this vehicle was going nowhere.
‘I think you’re stable,’ she yelled down the cliff, while she headed back to the verge for Hugo’s bag. She flicked it open. Saline, adrenaline, painkilling drugs, all the paraphernalia she’d expect a country GP would carry. He must have put it down while he’d leaned into the truck, and then the road had given way.
How to get it to him?
‘What do you mean, stable?’ he called.
‘I have nice strong ties attaching the truck tray to your SUV,’ she called. ‘The SUV’s parked at right angles to you, with Margaret sitting in the passenger seat. It’s going nowhere.’
‘How did you tie …?’
‘Girl Guiding 101,’ she called back. ‘You want to give me a raise on the strength of it?’
‘Half my kingdom.’
‘Half a country practice in Wombat Valley? Ha!’
‘Yeah, you’re right, it’s a trap,’ he called back. ‘You know you’ll never get away, but you walked in of your own accord, and I’m more than willing to share. I’ll even include Priscilla Carlisle’s bunions. They’re a medical practice on their own.’
Astonishingly, she giggled.
This felt okay. She could hear undercurrents to his attempt at humour that she had no hope of understanding, but she was working hard, and in the truck Hugo would be working hard, too. The medical imperatives were still there, but the flavour of black humour was a comfort all on its own.
Medical imperatives. The bag was the next thing. Horace had suffered major blood loss. Everything Hugo needed was in that bag.
How to get the bag down?
Lower it? It’d catch on the undergrowth. Take it down herself? Maybe. The cab, though, was much lower than the tray. There were no solid saplings past the back of the tray.
She had Hugo’s nylon cord. It was useless for abseiling—the nylon would slice her hands—but she didn’t have to pull herself up. She could stay down there until the cavalry arrived.
Abseiling … A harness? Nope. The nylon would cut.
A seat? She’d learned to make a rope seat in Abseil Rescue.
Hmm.
‘Tie the cord to the bag and toss it as close as you can,’ Hugo called, and humour had given way to desperation. ‘I can try and retrieve it.’
‘What, lean out of the cabin? Have you seen the drop?’
‘I’m trying not to see the drop but there’s no choice.’
His voice cracked. It’d be killing him, she thought, watching Horace inch towards death with no way to help.
‘Did you mention you have a kid? You’re taking your kid to the beach for Christmas? Isn’t that what this locum position is all about?’
‘Yes, but …’
‘Then you’re going nowhere. Sit. Stay.’
There was a moment’s silence, followed by a very strained response.
‘Woof?’
She grinned. Nice one.
But she was no longer concentrating on the conversation. Her hands were fashioning a seat, three lines of cord, hooked together at the sides, with a triangle of cord at both sides to make it steady.
She could make a knot and she could let it out as she went …
Wow, she was dredging through the grey matter now. But it was possible, she conceded. She could tie the bag underneath her, find toeholds in the cliff, hopefully swing from sapling to sapling to steady her …
‘Polly, if you’re thinking of climbing … you can’t.’ Hugo’s voice was deep and gravelly. There was strength there, she thought, but she also heard fear.
He was scared for her.
He didn’t even know her.
He was concerned for a colleague, she thought, but, strangely, it felt more than that. It felt … warm. Strong.
Good.
Which was ridiculous. She knew nothing about this man, other than he wanted to take his kid to the beach for Christmas.
‘Never say can’t to a Hargreaves,’ she managed to call back. ‘You’ll have my father to answer to.’
‘I don’t want to answer to your father if you’re dead.’
‘I’ll write a note excusing you. Now shut up. I need to concentrate.’
‘Polly …’
‘Hold tight. I’m on my way.’
IT NEARLY KILLED HIM.
He could do nothing except apply pressure to Horace’s shoulder and wait for rescue.
From a woman in a polka dot dress.
The sight of her from the truck’s rear-view window had astounded him. Actually, the sight of anyone from the truck’s rear-view mirror would have astounded him—this was an impossible place to reach—but that a woman …
No, that was sexist … That anyone, wearing a bare-shouldered dress with a halter neck tie, with flouncy auburn curls to her shoulders, with freckles …
Yeah, he’d even noticed the freckles.
And yes, he thought, he was being sexist or fashionist or whatever else he could think of being accused of right now, but he excused himself because what he wanted was a team of State Emergency Personnel with safety jackets and big boots organising a smooth transition to safety.
He was stuck with polka dots and freckles.
He should have asked for a photo when he’d organised the locum. He should never have …
Employed polka dots? Who was he kidding? If an applicant had a medical degree and was breathing he would have employed them. No one wanted to work in Wombat Valley.
No one but him and he was stuck here. Lured here for love of his little niece. Stuck here for ever.
Beside him, Horace was drifting in and out of consciousness. His blood pressure was dropping, his breathing was becoming laboured and there was nothing he could do.
He’d never felt so helpless.
Maybe he had. The night they’d rung and told him Grace had driven her car off the Gap.
Changing