Free The Children's Ward by Patricia Wallace Page B

unconscious…how long he’d been without air.
    Kneeling beside him, she unbuckled the harness and put her ear to his chest while searching for a pulse in his throat. His pulse, mercifully, was present.
    She hyperextended his neck and opened his mouth. Pinching his nostrils to prevent the air from escaping, she breathed quickly and forcefully into his mouth. His chest rose slightly.
    “Please, Russell,” she said before lowering her mouth to his a second time.
    Her face was wet and she realized she was crying.
    The next time up she gasped for air.
    “Please, God…make this my miracle.” She looked down at the boy’s thin chest.
    It moved.
    He was breathing.
    She sat back on her heels, reluctant to leave him alone while she called for help.
     
     

Thirty-two
     
    “What it is,” Tucker Smith said, “is a big magnet and a computer.” He looked at Abigail. “The field strength of the magnet is 0.6 Tesla…I don’t expect you to understand that…I’m not sure I understand it entirely, but one tesla is equal to ten thousand gauss. But then…you wouldn’t know what that is either.”
    Abigail waited, watching him intently.
    “Gauss…the earth’s magnetic field is one half to one gauss, so you can imagine how strong this magnet is.” He patted the outside of the imaging chamber.
    “The way it works,” he continued, “is that the magnetic field excites the hydrogen nuclei in the body which send off radio signals…the scanner receives the signals which are converted into two-dimensional images by the computer.” He gazed fondly at the scanner.
    “This room was built of stainless steel, wood and copper…which are non-ferromagnetic. And the windows between the imaging room and the operator console are shielded by copper screening.”
    “How long will this take?” Abigail asked.
    “Oh…sorry.” He looked at her sheepishly. “I always forget that the patients aren’t as fascinated by all of this as I am. Okay, let’s get on with it.”
    He helped her up onto the examination table, his fingers cold on her neck as he positioned her head into the molded headrest.
    “Now the table will move until you’re partially inside the chamber…you’re not claustrophobic, are you?”
    “No.”
    “That’s good. I’ll be in the other room, behind the windows. I’ll be able to see you from the console. If you have any problems, just raise your hand, and I’ll come in to help you. Okay? Any questions?”
    “No.”
    He pushed a switch, activating the table which moved slowly into the imaging chamber.
    Inside the chamber, Abigail closed her eyes.
    At the console, Tucker Smith logged on and began recording the images of Abigail Ballard’s brain. Dr. Fuller had ordered both sagittal and transverse studies which Tucker programmed, watching the images with total absorption. He pushed the view select button for transverse after the sagittal views were completed and glanced through the window at Abigail…or what he could see of her.
    It was going well.
    Abigail felt it in the little finger of her right hand; a warm, tingling sensation. Like before, only stronger. It moved along the outside of her hand, up her arm to the right side of her neck. Growing warmer, it spread across the right side of her face and scalp.
    She smiled, hidden from view.
    “Almost done,” Tucker said, turning from the console to see who had come in.
    No one was there.
    Perplexed, he looked back at the video screen and then beyond it into the imaging room. He was certain that he’d heard a door open and close; there were only two doors that it could be.
    That door was closed too.
    “Hearing things,” he said to himself.
    The last transverse slice was digitized and filmed and he logged off the computer and shut down the magnet.
    As he finished he had a sudden strong feeling that someone was standing behind him and he whirled around.
    Again, no one was there.
    He helped Abigail down from the table and walked with her back to the radiology