Read Online Comes a Time for Burning by Steven F. Havill - Free Book Online

summon Howard?” Bertha asked, and Thomas regarded her with affection.
    “I am in your debt, you know. As is Carlotta Schmidt.”
    “I think not.”
    “I had not noticed the lesion,” he explained to Hardy, and the other physician’s eyebrow shot up. Thomas couldn’t tell if Hardy was reacting to his admission, or the failed observance, or his expression of gratitude to his nurse. “Nor had I looked for it. She visited for a separate issue.” He hesitated and watched his nurse, who busied herself changing the rinse water.
    “We depend in large part on the patient to guide us,” Hardy said with a shrug.
    “But I should have seen it. We can make all the excuses we like, but that’s the simple truth. I have been preoccupied with other things. But I should have seen it.”
    “A questioning of procedure is healthy, sir,” Dr. Hardy said.
    “You sound just like Dr. Roberts,” Thomas laughed. “So…tell me. Should she go to Portland?”
    “Now that’s unfair, my good man,” Hardy said. “I’ve been inside your clinic door for what, ten minutes? What I think should hardly matter.”
    “Ah, but…” Thomas interrupted. “I want to know exactly…
exactly
… what you think. Always.” He nodded at Berti and Alvi. “Just as I expect a frank opinion from each of you.”
    Bertha Auerbach took a long breath, her dark brown eyes unwavering. She folded her hands over her stomach, looked as if she wanted to speak, thought better of it, then again thought better of any reticence. “Were I Carlotta Schmidt, there would be no choice. I would have the surgery done here.”
    “There you have it,” Hardy said, and it seemed to Thomas that he detected a slight flair of irritation in the physician’s tone. Perhaps he was of the older school whose contention it was that nurses should be seen, but not heard.
    “Sonny Malone might argue with you,” Thomas said.
    Bertha laughed abruptly, and covered her mouth with her hand as if embarrassed by the outburst. “There is no parallel with the two cases, Dr. Parks. We accept what we can do, and move on.”
    “Now I obviously know nothing of this Mr. Malone of whom you speak, but I’ll say this…Mrs. Schmidt has but a fifty-fifty gambler’s chance of surviving the surgery,” Hardy said. “Fifty-fifty, here or anywhere else. And not to put too fine a point on it, without surgical intervention, she has
no
chance.”
    “And here we all stand, dithering.” Alvi frowned. “It’s Carlotta’s decision, not ours.” Thomas grinned at his wife, who suffered no compunction about speaking her mind.
    Berti started for the door. “Shall I fetch Mr. Deaton?”
    “Thank you. Yes. Dr. Hardy and I will be in the office for a few moments. I want to review my notes.” He reached out and took Hardy by the elbow. “You may find that instructive as well.” He turned to Alvi. Despite the walk down from 101 Lincoln, or perhaps because of it, Alvi looked radiant…and enormous.
    “You shouldn’t walk back up the hill,” he said. “Did you leave word with Horace to fetch you, or…”
    “I shall make myself useful here until you and Dr. Hardy are ready to take some refreshment. We haven’t offered the poor man so much as a glass of lemonade since his arrival. And then
you
shall escort me back to One-oh-one,” she said. “Is Nurse Whitman upstairs with the Snyder child?”
    “The child’s parents are with her, I believe.”
    “Then I shall ride the wonderful Otis and speak with them.” She reached out and touched her husband’s cheek, a familiarity that prompted an instant blush.
    The office beside the main examining room was anything but Spartan, thanks in large measure to the late Dr. John Haines, Alvi’s father. Thomas settled back, cradled by the enormous leather chair, the journal open on the desk in front of him.
    Hardy surveyed the comfortable room, the huge bookcase, the locked cabinet that included a significant pharmacy. Thomas let him explore uninterrupted while