Free Fire And Ice by Paul Garrison Page A

man?"
    "He should be in hospital," she said automatically. In fact, he appeared to be gaining strength. But her best hope was still to convince them he could not survive on the ship.
    "It ain't going to happen, Doc. Better get used to it." She was frantic for Michael and missed him terribly. The three days felt like weeks. She missed him beside her in bed and longed to hear his voice. To live together on the small boat, they had developed habits over the years that insured each other's privacy. Yet his presence, if only a silhouette in the corner of her eye, was a constant she took for granted. Now she felt as if the air had grown thinner.
    But she at least had Ronnie—an active presence and a piece of him—while he was desperately alone. Assuming he had repaired the little lagoon canoe, he was far at sea, perhaps as much as a hundred and fifty miles from Pulo Helena. She tried to close her mind to the danger. Every time Ronnie asked how she thought he was, she whispered that he was a splendid sailor, and if anyone could sail a wooden canoe across two hundred and fifty miles of open Pacific it was Michael Stone. Ronnie would nod, bravely, but she knew as well as Sarah that was an enormous if, on an unforgiving ocean. The dispensary contained the ship's meager medical supplies and a single hospital bed. On it lay Ah Lee, his face battered. His eyes were blackened, his lips bloody. His nose looked broken, and one of his teeth had pierced his cheek. When she leaned over him, the boy flinched.
    Sarah laid cool fingers' on the back of his hand, and lowered her voice to soothe him. "It'
    s all right, Ah Lee. It's only Doctor Stone. I'm going to help you." Angrily, she motioned the captain into the corridor. "Who did this to him?"
    "Took a header down the companionway."
    "The devil he did. He's been beaten. Who did this—Moss?"
    "The sooner you fix him up, the sooner you get back to the kid, Doc." She examined the boy's eyes first. When she shone a light into the left, both pupils constricted simultaneously. Good. He probably hadn't suffered a head trauma. "This will hurt just a moment," she whispered, opening a disposable needle and gently injecting local anesthetic around his nose and the pierced cheek. Ah Lee followed her movements with tears in his eyes. .
    She stitched up his cheek, removed a broken tooth, set and taped his nose, and draped surgical gloves filled with crushed ice around his nose and over his eyes. Then she gave him a tetanus shot and penicillin.
    "Have someone replace the ice when it melts. I'll look in on him later." She touched Ah Lee's hand good-bye.
    The captain was watching from the doorway. "Handled yourself well, Doctor. Lotta class." The captain walked her to the elevator. "I've noticed you Africans know who you are. Problem with our blacks is they don't know and they don't give a damn." This was not the first of the captain's pronouncements. He had found it difficult at first to believe she was what he called a "real doctor," and seemed to admire her powers as something she had acquired in a jungle.
    "Have you discussed your racist insights with Mr. Moss?"
    "Moss is different."
    "You mean you're afraid of him."
    The captain seemed unperturbed. "I'm a seaman, Doc. I steer around heavy weather. And no storm lasts forever." A potential ally? She wondered. She smiled. The captain moved a little closer. "You're a good lookin' gal, Doc."
    "Thank you, Captain. But as I've told Moss, I am married."
    "Well, hell, I'm married too."
    Sarah fingered her cross. "I took my vows in church." The captain pressed the elevator button for the bridge deck.
    "Moss wants to see you."
    He led Sarah through the curtain. Moss was at the helm, hunched over the big OMBO
    monitor. "Leave us," he said to the captain.
    "No rough stuff," said the captain.
    "She'll get what she asks for," said Moss. He rose to his full height and stepped close to Sarah. "Leave us," he repeated, and the captain backed out through the curtain. Sarah