Blue Smoke Read Free Page A

out.
    ‘No,’ Keely said slowly after a moment. ‘No, I think we’ll be going up to the hospital.’
    Tamar’s right leg was bent between knee and ankle at a very unnatural angle. The white of bone protruding through torn and bleeding flesh elicited a muffled groan of horror from one of the helpers.
    ‘Right!’ Keely declared authoritatively as she stood and brushed dust and dirt off her knees. ‘Find a flat board, a door would be ideal, and we’ll get her onto it. We have to move her now. If we …’
    She was cut off in mid-order by another ominous rumbling. They all froze as if playing some sort of children’s game, legs straddled against the movement of the earth and eyes wide with fear. Then, mercifully, the tremor subsided.
    ‘Aftershock,’ someone said nervously.
    Keely squatted down again and spoke quietly. ‘Mam, your leg is broken, quite badly. We need to get you to the hospital. It needs setting. Can you hang on until then?’
    Tamar nodded, although she wasn’t so sure she could hang on. She was starting to feel rather faint, her chest felt constricted and the pain there was worsening, and there was a loud and disconcerting ringing in her ears.
    She would be all right with Keely, she knew that, but Tamar wanted Kepa to be here as well. He would know what to do, he always did. And she needed him very much.
     
    Keely sat holding her mother’s limp hand, waiting patiently for her to regain consciousness after the operation to set her leg.
    Most of the buildings at Napier’s public hospital had been destroyed in the earth quake; sailors from the navy warship HMS Veronica , currently berthed at Port Ahuriri, were still digging through the ruins, including the nurses’ home, for survivors. Instead, an emergency hospital had been set up at the Greenmeadows race-course on the outskirts of town.
    It was here that Keely waited. Tamar had been moved from the makeshift operating theatre beneath the main grand stand to one of several large, hastily erected tents on the track itself. Every hour that passed brought more supplies and medical equipment from the ruined public hospital, piling up where it was unloaded. Wounded people lay everywhere, reminding Keely horrifyingly of the nursing work she and Erin had done over seas during the war. But she knew she could help here, and she would, as soon as her mother’s condition had stabilised.
    The surgeon had confirmed that the fracture was nasty, that several of Tamar’s ribs had indeed been broken, and that he’d had to suture quite a number of small but deep lacerations on her head and hands caused by flying glass. But he felt that her prognosis would be satisfactory, providing that none of the post-surgery complications that could often beset the elderly developed. Keely hoped that her mother had been sound asleep when he’d said this — she would be very annoyed to hear herself described as ‘elderly’.
    She looked up as someone entered the tent.
    ‘Christ, she looks terrible!’ exclaimed Owen from the doorway. He was still in his work clothes and had clearly come straight in from Kenmore. ‘Are you all right?’ he asked. He was shocked both at the sight of Tamar, and at the dishevelled state of his wife.
    Keely stood and let herself be enfolded in his tanned arms.‘Her ribs are broken and she has a compound tib and fib. But the surgeon says she’ll be all right.’ She buried her face in his chest. ‘Oh God, Owen, it was absolutely terrifying!’
    Owen nodded, his chin resting on the top of her dusty head. ‘I know, darling. It was pretty frightening out at the station too.’
    Keely jerked back and looked up at his kind face. ‘The children?’
    ‘They’re fine. The school wobbled a bit apparently, but nothing collapsed. They’re at home with Mrs Heath. We telephoned the post office here in town as soon as it happened but we couldn’t get through.’
    ‘No, they say the lines are all down. I tried to ring you too, as soon as we got Mam