Free Silent Fear, a Medical Mystery by Barbara Ebel Page B

me.”
    “Okay, Danny.” Casey slammed the doors shut while a bolt of lightning peeled across the skies and Danny rushed inside.
    ----------
    Danny could tell the radiology department napped on weekends when he walked through the front room. Although they took films and advanced imaging for trauma and more emergent requests, a skeleton crew and one radiologist manned the place. Danny spotted Bill and the radiologist, John, in the first dimly lit room and walked in.
    “Danny,” Bill said. “John was nice enough to walk me through this, especially with my limited expertise with head imaging.”
    The MRI films went from left to right on the viewing boxes and slices went from top to bottom. Danny methodically examined the images starting with the outside – the skull. The meninges was the layer closest to the skull, the membranes between the skull and brain. Danny knew it consisted of three layers called the dura, arachnoid, and pia mater, but on film it wouldn’t be like they were huge delineated layers.
    Danny shuddered. These were Harold’s images - someone he shared his practice and specialty with, someone who often looked up to him for advice, someone who knew the sweat and tears it took to earn a neurosurgery degree. He wished he saw differently. Harold’s meninges on his MRI were inflamed, suspicious for meningitis.
    John tapped his finger right where Danny stared. “Significant inflammation,” he said, “but also look at these high signals in the temporal lobes.”
    The men took a step to the right as Danny leaned forward, also scrutinizing the hippocampus and frontal lobes. He glanced at Bill, who swiped the back of his hand along his forehead.
    The double whammy hit Danny just as Bill piped in. “Inflammation of the brain, too,” Bill said, taking his bow tie off and shoving it into his pocket.
    “Encephalitis,” John said.
    “Worse than that,” Danny said, “meningoencephalitis.”
     
    Chapter 7
     
    Danny tried to leave the radiology department quicker than he got there, but Bill lagged. He waved for Bill to follow him into the staircase, but Bill took a deep breath and hit the elevator button.
    “We have to talk and make a plan,” Danny said, “but first I’m going to go do a stat spinal tap on Harold. It’ll give us more information. Although we should call in a neurologist as well, we don’t have time to wait for them to do it.”
    “I agree, and James, the scrub nurse from this morning put on the vent, is in a coma.”
    Both men stepped into the elevator and Bill leaned against the wall.
    “Are you all right?” Danny asked.
    “I’m feeling hot and sweaty, but never mind about me. I’ll go get whatever lab results are back on Dotty.”
    “Why don’t we meet in the doctor’s lounge at about six o’clock?” Danny suggested. “And after the spinal tap, I better go track down Lucy Talbot.”
    “Lucy Talbot?”
    “Yes, an anesthesiologist who’s fallen prey to something, too.”
    Bill got off on the third floor and Danny continued on to the ICU. He weaved past a group of family members in deep discussion about a loved one’s care which sidetracked his thoughts. He went into intensive care with only his ex-wife on his mind. He’d get his procedure done but he gave himself the liberty of thinking only of her.
    Danny grinned as he visualized Sara’s habit of talking with her hands. His eyes twinkled as he thought about her peppered blonde hair dramatically stopping in the middle of her cheeks and her subtle smell of orange-ginger. But her mind was as powerful as her looks; and her wisdom and strength underscored the loving quality she possessed for everyone and everything. That is, unless she was betrayed, but Danny still hoped to gain her forgiveness.
    Harold’s nurse was in his cubicle so Danny went straight in, thoughts of Sara ebbing away. He looked at the nurse’s badge. “Marsha,” he said. “I’ll need your help straight away, if that’s possible.”
    She turned down