Under Alaskan Skies (2 page)

The ship’s doctor was old. He was sweet. When he heard her story he was also sympathetic. He agreed that the situation was serious and she needed a medic. But there was nothing he could do. His contract required him to stay on the ship.

“Wait a minute,” he said, scratching his bald head. “There’s a doctor aboard. Two of them in fact. Father and son. Came down and introduced themselves. Baker was their name. Now, I don’t know if they’d be willing to go with you. They’re on vacation you know. You say you’ve got a plane?”

Carrie’s heart skipped a beat. Two of them. Surely one of the two… “Yes, a plane. We’re only a half hour away. How can I get in touch with the doctors?”

The kindly old G.P. called their cabins, and after what seemed to her an eternity of pacing back and forth in the waiting room, along with several sick crew members, two men walked in. One was probably in his sixties, wearing slacks and a windbreaker, the other, thirty-something in jeans and a jacket.
Dark eyes, strong features. They were obviously father and son.

She rushed to meet them before they’d barely come through the door. “Dr. Baker?” she asked, her eyes traveling from one to the other.

“Eugene Baker,” said the older man.

“Matt Baker,” said the younger doctor.

She didn’t know which one to approach first. Eugene, the older, silver-haired, dignified one or Matt, the one who looked like he came right out of central casting—tall with dark hair, brown eyes and an air of competence. More than competence. More like, I’m here and everything’s going to be all right. They called it a bedside manner, even though there wasn’t even a bed in sight. She had the strange feeling she’d seen him before. She probably had. Because, although he wasn’t wearing a white lab coat, he definitely belonged on TV in a show like
E.R
. or
Chicago Hope
or…or a soap opera like
General Hospital
. He was altogether too good-looking to be real. Forget the looks. Forget everything but convincing one of these Drs. Baker to come with her back to the small village of Mystic.

She took a deep breath. “My name is Carrie Porter. I’m from a village about a half hour by floatplane from here. There’s been an accident and we badly need a doctor. You’ve got to come. You just have to.” The words gushed out faster than oil from the Alaska pipeline.

“Calm down, Ms. Porter,” the older doctor said. “Surely there are local doctors who could help you.”

“I called around but didn’t find anybody. I could have kept calling, but I didn’t have the time. Every
minute counts. When I heard the cruise ship was due in port, I just got in my plane and headed this way, hoping, praying…” She looked at Dr. Matt Baker, got lost in the depths of his dark-brown eyes for a moment. She was looking for sympathy and she saw it. She saw that and something else. Something she couldn’t identify. Emboldened, she rushed on before he had a chance to say no. “I know you’re on vacation. I know I’m imposing but…”

“Why don’t you tell us what the problem is,” Matt said. The sound of his deep voice made her feel better. She knew in an instant if she was sick she’d want him to take care of her. Just being in his presence made her feel better. If she had a choice, she’d choose him. But she couldn’t afford to be choosy. She’d take either one. Once they realized how serious the situation was, they’d be willing to help. They just had to.

“Yes, of course.” She should have told them immediately what the problem was. How could they agree to go with her when they didn’t even know what had happened. She made an effort to clear her mind and speak slowly. “This morning a young boy in our town was riding on his dad’s three-wheel all-terrain vehicle. It tipped over and threw him into a post. He landed on his back and he can’t move from the waist down. He’s in terrible pain. He must have broken something. I don’t know much about medicine but I know that it’s serious and that he needs to see somebody right away. I didn’t know what to do except keep him still. I would have flown him out but everyone I talked to said not to move him. Now I’m afraid—”

“Where is he now?” Matt asked

“He’s at home in bed. Oh, you mean where—He…we…live in a small village called Mystic at the tip of a fjord.”

“You say he’s paralyzed?” Eugene Baker asked.

“Partly, yes.”

Matt and his father exchanged glances. She didn’t like the way they looked at each other.

“You shouldn’t have moved him at all,” the older doctor said sternly.

“But we couldn’t leave him out in the rain and the cold,” she said.

“Is he having trouble breathing?” Matt asked.

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Lucky he didn’t land on his head. He could be paraplegic. There’s no telling how serious the injury is without a good workup,” Eugene said.

“Not likely to get one where he is,” Matt said. “You say you have no doctor in town?”

She shook her head. “We had a nurse but she left last year.”

“What do you do in emergencies?” Matt asked.

“Try to get advice by phone. Call the med evac people if it’s serious.”

“At the very least he ought to get started on steroids to reduce the swelling,” Eugene suggested to his son.

Matt nodded. “What about putting him in traction.”

“Probably. But what can you do without braces or weights or a harness?”

“I have splints in my cabinet here,” said a voice from behind them. “And a cervical collar. In case that would help.”

Carrie and the two doctors turned around. Neither of them realized the ship’s doctor had joined them in the waiting room and had obviously heard most of the conversation.

“You’ve got a supply of steroids, of course,” Matt said.

The old G.P. nodded.

Carrie was afraid to speak. Afraid to ask again, Will you come? Will you come now? Afraid to push too hard. Afraid to upset the momentum, though she was sure time was of the essence. As three medics stood there looking at each other while the precious minutes ticked away, something in her head snapped. She lost her cool.

“Someone has to come. I don’t care which one of you,” she said heatedly. “I have my plane here at the dock. I’ll have you back, I promise, before the ship leaves port today. But we have to leave now.”

The men looked at her, obviously surprised at her change in attitude. She was no longer asking, she was telling. She didn’t care what they thought of her, unless there was a danger of scaring them off. The older man turned to his son.

“I’ll go, Matt,” Eugene said. “There may be nothing I can do on my own, without a CAT scan, an MRI or an X ray, but the least I can do is take a look at him.”

“No, Dad. You stay here. I can handle it,” Matt said firmly. “We can’t have you isolated somewhere just in case…”

Carrie’s head turned from father to son. Not only did she have one volunteer, they both wanted to come. She couldn’t believe it. She felt like jumping
up and down and grabbing Matt’s arm and running down the gangway to the dock before he changed his mind. He said he’d go. They both said they’d go. At last, she’d found someone.

“You’ll miss the helicopter tour of the bald eagle preserve,” his father said. “But if you’re going, she’s right, you’d better leave now. The time between the accident and treatment is critical.”

“I can take you over the preserve,” Carrie said to Matt. “We’ll pass right by it.” She’d take him over glaciers and gorges and waterfalls. She’d give him a tour of Alaska like nobody had ever seen. Anything. She was so grateful her heart was spilling over.

“See, Dad? I won’t miss a thing,” Matt said calmly. “And I’ll be back by evening, right?”

“Yes, right,” Carrie said. “Oh, thank you. I can’t tell you how relieved I am.”

“Better take along extra supplies, drug samples and equipment, if the doctor here can spare them,” the elder Dr. Baker said, with a nod at the ship’s doctor. “You never know what you may run into. I just hope you can do something for the boy. He may be paralyzed for good, there’s no telling, and you won’t be able to do a thing about it, except raise false expectations. But you’ve got to try.”

“I will,” Matt said. “If I can do anything at all to help, it will be worth taking a chance.”

Carrie held her breath and closed her eyes so she wouldn’t look at her watch again.
Let’s go. Let’s go
, she said to herself.

“He’s right,” Matt said to Carrie. “You have to realize I can’t perform miracles. It may be he’s permanently
paralyzed. On the other hand, he might get well by himself without me. But I’ll do what I can.”

“That’s all I ask,” Carrie said. “Now if you’re ready…”

“Let me see what the doctor has that I can take with me,” Matt said, following the ship’s doctor into his office.

Matt’s father sat on a bench, but Carrie was too nervous to hold still. She paced back and forth in the waiting room.

“You’re a brave young lady flying around these parts,” Eugene said. “I assume you have a reliable pilot with you.”

“I’m the pilot.”

Eugene raised his eyebrows in surprise.

She hoped she looked capable of flying a plane and trustworthy, dependable and reliable. After a long, searching look, he pressed his lips together and nodded, no doubt wishing he’d known this when he’d volunteered to go into the bush. Now his son was flying off into a remote region with a woman pilot. Men of his generation were often surprised at her occupation. Heavens, men of almost any generation were surprised when she showed up to pick up the freight, especially if they were expecting her father. She wondered what Matt’s reaction would be. Maybe she should have told them this before she asked if they’d come.

“You’re fortunate you found us,” Eugene said. “My son is a fine doctor. He’ll do whatever he can to help you. He’s just starting an internship in plastic surgery with a brilliant career ahead of him. He has everything it takes, courage, intelligence, drive and
ambition. I’m very proud of him.” He beamed as he spoke of his son’s abilities.

“You should be,” Carrie murmured. She could almost hear her own father touting her to friends and neighbors. It used to embarrass her to hear him describe how well she’d done at school. What a good pilot she was. How she could handle the plane as well if not better than he could. It was a universal trait, bragging about one’s children. Dr. Baker seemed to have plenty to brag about.

“Of course, it would be better if you’d found a local doctor,” Eugene continued, “someone who could follow up on the patient and give the boy long-term care he needs.”

“I know. I wish we had more doctors up here. I appreciate your both volunteering to step in like this at the last minute.”

Ten minutes later Matt was on the dock, carrying a bag filled with all the emergency equipment and medicine the ship’s doctor could spare. He was standing next to the floatplane he’d observed such a short time ago. If he had been told he would be taking off with a stunning redheaded pilot that morning, he wouldn’t have believed it possible. He thought he’d be taking off for a bird’s eye view of the local scenery in a sight-seeing helicopter, instead he was going on a mission with a flying angel.

The look in her lovely luminous eyes, the tremor in her lower lip, the catch in her voice all combined to make it nearly impossible for anybody to turn her down. But even if she’d been old and ugly, somebody’s gray-haired grandmother in army surplus overalls and combat boots, he still would have gone. He
was a doctor and someone was sick. It was as simple as that.

What was not simple were his feelings about the woman. From the first moment he’d spotted her with his binoculars, he’d felt a quickening of his pulse, a flash of recognition. Which was as baffling as it was true. Why her? Why should a big-city doctor feel connected to a bush pilot? It made no sense at all. Was it less than an hour ago he’d envied her, fantasized about flying with her? And now his fantasy had come true. Be careful what you wish for, he cautioned himself. He might be in way over his head and in an impossible situation—both medically and personally. On the other hand, he was used to holding his emotions in check. He had what some might call an overdeveloped sense of self-discipline.

“I’ll need your help,” she said after they’d tossed his bag in the plane. She wasn’t talking about his medical help this time, she was talking about helping her cast off from the dock. While she started the engine, he followed her directions and untied the ropes, then at the last minute, quickly jumped through the open door and crawled into the jump seat of the plane.

“Good work. Thanks. You’re a natural,” she said. “Have you done this before?”

He shook his head. He almost said,
But I saw you do it an hour ago
. Ridiculous how her praise made him feel like a hero, all out of proportion to the words she spoke. She was only being polite. It was the smile she gave him that made him feel as light-headed as if he’d had a glass of champagne for breakfast instead of orange juice. He just hoped he could do something beyond casting off, something for the boy.

Fascinated, he watched her rev up the motor, point her tiny plane toward the bay and do her pretakeoff checks. Moving the flaps, pushing on the rudder pedals, throwing switches. He knew plenty of gutsy women. Classmates of his who were training to be surgeons who could wield the knife as skillfully as any male. There were women who blazed the way for others in orthopedics, who’d taken verbal abuse from professors and fellow students. But he didn’t know any female pilots. He certainly knew none who looked like this woman. While he watched her go through the motions, she turned on her radio and shook her head as static filled the air.

“The VH won’t work till we get airborne,” she said. “Above the hills.”

He nodded. He watched her hands on the throttle. She had long slender fingers and short fingernails. The roar of the engine filled the air as she accelerated to full power.

He followed her gaze as she looked right and left out the windows to see that the flaps were fully down. She looked like an expert and exuded confidence. Fascinated, he couldn’t take his eyes from her. He decided she actually looked like an advertisement from some outdoor magazine in her navy jumpsuit and leather ankle boots. But no photograph could have captured the fire in her eyes when she was determined to get something.