Cast a Pale Shadow(11)

"Jesus Christ, Jack! What'd you do to her?" the driver shouted as he charged from his car toward him.

"Nothing. She's hurt."

"Shit, I can see that! What? Did she change her mind once you got her up here? Goddamn exasperating that way sometimes, ain't they? There's been a time or two when I've been tempted--"

"Tom," cautioned a woman's voice from the car.

Tom waved off the warning. "You look like you been in a cat fight, both of you. Feisty one, hey? What say we trade? Mine's a little too willing if you know what I mean."

"I haven't time for your nasty innuendoes," Nicholas said with tightly restrained anger. "Tris... my wife has been hurt and I need to get her to a hospital fast." He wasn't sure why the word wife had sprung so readily to his tongue, sister would have worked as well to cut off the crude comments of this *. But it didn't matter. Explanations could come later if they were needed.

"Wife? Oh yeah, sure, sorry, man. I didn't mean to -- Come on, I'll take you. Judy, get in the back." Once motivated to think beyond his crotch, Tom proved to be a man of decisive action. He settled Nicholas with Trissa on his lap into the front seat, backed out of his parking place and peeled off down the road with the urgency of an ambulance driver. "St. Andrew's okay?"

"What?" asked Nicholas.

"Hospital? St. Andrew's is the closest, don't you think?"

"Yeah, sure, I guess." Nicholas took a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed at the welling scrapes on Trissa's face. He worried that she hadn't wakened yet. Her hands seemed so limp and pale against the dark blue of her skirt.

"What really happened?" Judy asked from the back seat.

"She -- uh, we were walking along the railroad track and the train..."

"Lord, you were hit by a train?"

"Tom, don't be so stupid," Judy said.

"No -- I mean, almost. We had to jump out of the way and we fell down the gravel embankment. She must have hit her head."

"What were you doing on the railroad track?" Judy asked.

"Walking. Just walking."

"Yeah?" Judy scooted forward in her seat and asked the next question right at his ear. "Well, then, where's her coat? What else do you do for fun? Play in traffic?"

Nicholas answered her probing with silence. He held Trissa closer trying to warm her with his own body. God, he wished he knew where her coat was. Or what had driven her out without it to embrace death with such grim determination. God, please, let me help her. He rubbed his cheek against her soft, frigid one. Don't let it be too late.

Judy wouldn't quit. "You two have a fight or something? She was running away from you, wasn't she? You beat her, don't you, you bastard?"

Now it was Tom's turn to warn, "Judy, watch your mouth. It ain't none of our business."

"I'm just speaking the truth. All men are bastards, ain't they, dearie?" Judy reached out to pat the top of Trissa's head but Nicholas fended her off by raising his shoulder and casting her a warning scowl. "Sure. Now, you're looking out for her. Bet you ain't that sweet when you got her alone," she hissed and slid back. Soon the only sounds from the back seat was the flare of a match and Judy's soft puffs as she lit a cigarette.

"Don't mind her," Tom said. "We were having some words, if you know what I mean, when we seen you coming out of the woods."

"How much longer?"

"A few blocks is all."

Trissa stirred a little, and Nicholas feared that she would come to and say something to further arouse Tom and Judy's suspicions. He worried, too, that getting help at the hospital would not be all that easy. She might look too young for them to believe she was his wife, and without any proof, how could he convince them he was? An ambulance with its lights flashing but no siren sliced passed them, and Nicholas peered beyond it to see the hospital. The neon of the emergency room sign glowed a welcome.

"This is it," Tom said as he pulled the car to a stop behind the ambulance. "Need some help carrying her?"

"No, thanks. I wish I could pay you but I don't--"

"That's okay, Jack. The doctors will be picking your pocket soon enough. Glad to be of help. Hope everything turns out all right."

"Thank you. And I didn't beat her, Judy. I would never."

"Right," snapped Judy, slipping back into her rightful place in the front seat as he left it. "And she looks young enough to believe in Santy Claus, too."

The sudden brightness of the reception area dazzled him and before he had sorted out the bustle of activity there, Nicholas was relieved of his burden by a brawny man in a white coat. Nicholas' arms served as safety net beneath his until he deposited Trissa on a waiting gurney.

"What happened?" the man asked as he began examining her, taking her pulse, and gently lifting her eyelids to check her pupils.

"She fell and hit her head." He would leave out the train for now. The train would be hard to explain.

"How long has she been out?"

"Twenty minutes." It seemed like a lifetime. "Yes, it's been about twenty minutes."

"And these bruises? They're all from the fall?"

For the first time, in the bright light of the emergency room hallway, Nicholas could see them clearly, angry red and darkening bruises on her arms and on her cheek, neck, and jaw. Some showed the clear outline of fingers. "My God, Trissa," he whispered, his heart seething to know someone had mistreated her so.

"Well?"

He had to be a doctor. No intern or assistant could muster such imperious authority into one cold syllable. Nicholas had had enough experience with doctors to both respect and resent their power. "Yes. I guess so. We both fell, tumbled down a gravel embankment. She got pretty banged up."

"You're not such a pleasant sight yourself. Check her in at the desk. I'll take care of her here. I might need to ask you some more questions later, so don't run off," the doctor advised.

"I won't. I wouldn't."

"Yeah." An equivocal frown creased the doctor's brow as he studied Nicholas through black, unreadable eyes. "You called her Trissa?"

"Yes. Yes, Trissa." It might be best not to tell this skeptic that her last name was Brewer in case she came to and told the doctor otherwise. Nicholas wondered if it might be better if he fulfilled the doctor's expectation and did run off. Sooner or later more questions would be asked, and his jumble of lies and truth and half-truth seemed so unbelievable that he would clamp himself in jail if he were a cop.

He watched until they wheeled Trissa out of sight, then approached the desk warily. Torn between his concern for Trissa and his growing apprehension for himself, he replied to the admissions clerk's questions with a recital of what he knew.

"First name?"

"Trissa."

"Last name?"

"Brewer," he lied.

"Age?"

"Eighteen." It was a guess

"Relationship to the patient?"

Nicholas glanced toward the room where they had taken Trissa and was startled to see a policeman loitering at the door, his hat under his arm, chatting amiably with a nurse.

"Sir, your relationship to the patient?"

"Husband." Nicholas's voice cracked on the lie. It seemed to be one he was stuck with. He watched the policeman out of the corner of his eye while the clerk typed the lie into fact.

"Religion?"

"Uh. Mine or hers?"

"The patient's."

"Catholic." She traveled with a Catholic college crowd, so it was a safe assumption.

"Insurance?"

The policeman moved off at last toward the waiting room area where he sat down with the nurse. Nicholas relaxed a little and turned his attention back to the clerk.

"Pardon?"

"Do you have insurance?"

"Yes. Uh, well, I have it. From work. But it doesn't cover her. Don't worry, I'll pay. I don't have a lot with me tonight, but--" He could sell his car if he had to. Whatever was needed, he would get it for her, if only he could help her.

"That's all right, Mr. Brewer. Arrangements can be made. Your wife is in good hands. Dr. Edmonds is one of our best residents. If you will just sign this treatment permission and release." The clerk handed him a pen and the completed forms.

Nicholas glanced over them then signed below the line that read "I attest that the above information is true and accurate to the best of my knowledge." There was a loophole there, he guessed. What little truth he had given was the best of his knowledge. That his knowledge didn't cover all the pesky details they asked for was not really his fault. Still, his hand shook slightly as he finished his signature.