Free Judgement By Fire by Glenys O'Connell Page A

he
turned the keys and set the gear lever. The powerful engine roared to life and
the big vehicle moved slowly along the dirt trail through the brush, leaving
Lauren once more watching its disappearing red taillights.
    Shaking her
head, wondering at the sense of loss that made her shiver, Lauren trudged back
towards her cottage.  A glance at the big schoolhouse clock over the kitchen
door told her that she had better take her own advice and get back to the real
world.
    She quickly
slipped into smooth black woolen dress pants and a deep forest green sweater that
accentuated the red highlights of her hair and skimmed lovingly downwards over
her full breasts.
     Lauren
applied a scant amount of lipstick and mascara, grabbed a black woolen blazer
from the closet, slipped her feet into black low-heeled dress boots and headed
for the door. She just had time to visit Lucy at the hospital, snatch a bite to
eat, and return home to put in a full afternoon’s work. Then, with luck and no
further interruptions, she’d have the final piece for the exhibit completed and
ready for shipping the next day.
    Alex was
organizing framing and hanging at the Harrison gallery, so she’d have little to
do after that but swan around on the big night, dressed up to the gills and
making nice to the customers.
    Little, that
is, except spend a day in the city adding final touches to limited edition
prints and signing them, as well as a couple of hours caged in her accountant’s
office going over the business plan Alex insisted she develop in order not to
wind up a penniless artist starving in a garret.
    And then there
was all the work still to be put in the Art Before Commerce committee. Lauren
sighed and turned her thoughts to color and technique for completing her bobcat
portrait, seeing in her mind's eye how various colors and textures would work.
    With practiced
ease, she kept her eye on the rapidly thickening traffic on the six lanes of
Highway 401 as she approached Kingston, the historic town where Lucy had been
admitted to the hospital affiliated with the university. Lauren loved visiting
the old university town—once historically the top candidate for capital until
Toronto flourished as provincial capital and Ottawa took over the reins as
national capital. She loved the wide streets and sedate buildings that provided
a dignified backdrop and vivid contrast to the students who flowed through the
streets, filling the town with their youthful vibrancy.
    With a twinge
of sadness, she noted the gaps on the sidewalks where so many of the big old
trees that had lined the streets had had to be taken down, victims of the
once-in-a-century ice storm of the winter of ‘97 – ‘98.
    The storm had
paralyzed most of Ontario and Quebec, freezing rain coating everything in ice
several inches thick. The weight of all that frozen water had brought down
power lines, destroyed pylons, and been the death of many majestic old trees
including those which had sheltered generations of students along Kingston’s
streets.
    Passing
through the bright entrance lobby of the hospital, Lauren paused to check the
directions board for Lucy’s ward and had to sprint for an elevator. A little
breathless, she finally reached the nurses’ station on the correct floor, and
asked for her friend.
    The nurse, a
pretty blond with a round face, gave her a long look, then a big smile.
    “Of course! It’s
Miss Stephens, the artist lady from West River! Go right ahead in, dear,” and
she pointed to a door across the corridor.
    Lauren was
taken aback to be recognized, but assumed Lucy or Paul had left a message at
the nurses’ station that she’d be a visitor.
    She promptly
forgot the incident as soon as she saw Lucy, face white against the hospital
pillowcase, eyes closed, looking impossibly fragile and small in the narrow
hospital bed. An IV drip was attached by clear plastic tubing to the back of
her left hand. The skin there pinched around the ingoing valve and looked