Vital Signs

“I think I saw a small article about him in the paper, but it didn’t give his name or anything.” Nicole frowned. “How could a mother leave a little kid alone for three days?”

It was more a sad statement than a question. Nicole heard too many horror stories to be surprised by much.

“She’s seventeen. She’ll probably insist she didn’t plan to be away more than a few minutes.” He’d heard it so many times before. “David’s now in the care of the ministry, so she’s gonna have to jump through hoops to get him back.”

Unless some idiot judge decides otherwise. Four-year-old Scotty Sieberg had begged to stay with his foster family, and Roy had petitioned the court to leave him there. But Scotty had been handed back to his birth mother. And her boyfriend had shaken the little boy for not picking up his toys, and Scotty had died.

Rage boiled in Roy as he pulled into the lot beside the medical center. He knew he had to shove the Sieberg case into a mental file drawer marked Don’t go there unless you have to.

“Mind if I come in with you?” Nicole asked.

“Well, I was really planning to leave you out here sweltering in the car,” he teased. “But maybe you can come, as long as you cling to me and do that swivel-hip thing you babes do in heels. Nobody here knows that you’re my sister, and it’ll get me a whole lot of respect from the male members of the staff.”

“And here I thought it was the females you wanted to impress. Is there something sensitive and personal you want to tell me, big brother?”

“Only that I need help fighting off the hordes of rabid women after my body.”

“In your dreams.”

The pediatrics ward was behind a locked door on the fourth floor. Roy presented ID, and the security guard let them in. There was no one at the nurses’ station, but they could hear children’s excited voices and loud laughter erupting from the playroom at the end of the corridor, so Roy headed that way.

“Sounds like a party,” Nicole remarked. “We’ve come to the right place.”

On the floor of the playroom, a group of children sat around a young woman with short, fiery-red curls. Huge, gray rabbit ears were secured to her head by a yellow ribbon. She was wearing a pink T-shirt patterned with garish sunflowers over a pair of green uniform pants, and she was sitting cross-legged, her head bent over a book she was reading aloud.

On the floor beside her, a live rabbit in a wire cage munched on a lettuce leaf, a bored expression on his face. The room was overly warm, and there was a pungent odor of children, antiseptic, urine and rabbit turds.

There was also the ripple of children’s laughter, and Roy smiled with pleasure and surprise. A hospital wasn’t usually a place where kids enjoyed themselves, and it delighted him to hear them having fun.

The sound of laughter died as one after another of the kids caught sight of Roy and Nicole. The woman stopped reading and turned toward them.

“Hi,” she said in a voice that was husky and filled with what musicians called blue notes. “I’m Hailey Bergstrom. What can I do for you?”

She was no beauty. Her nose was long and thin, her mouth too wide in a decidedly square face. Roy noticed those things, but he also noticed that she had unusual eyes, large, tilted, widely spaced. They were a peculiar color, like dark honey.

She made no move to get up. The tag pinned to her chest said she was an RN.

“I’m Roy Zedyck, David Riggs’s social worker. This is Nicole Hepburn.”

“Hi, Roy. Hello, Nicole.” She gave Roy a questioning look. “How can I help you?”

“I wondered if I could see David, and also whether Dr. Larue is around? I’d like to speak to him.”

She turned to the kids. “Sorry, you guys, I’ve gotta go.” She rose to her feet, rabbit ears flopping, and the kids sent up a protesting howl. She held out the book to an emaciated girl in a pink tracksuit. The child was bald, and her eyes had immense brown circles under them.

“Brittany, you finish the story, please.”

“Noooo, nooooo, we want you, Hailey, pleeeeeze,” the kids chorused.

“Brittany can read every bit as well as I can. Stop the noise or Skippy will freak out and have heart palpitations, and we’d have to call Doc Benson.”

Her voice dropped to a whisper. “And you know how grumpy Doc Benson can be.” She pretended to shudder and then stood tall and held her hand to her forehead in a salute. “When duty calls I must obey, or I will live to rue the day.”

Roy noted that she was very tall in her flat sandals, probably five-eleven like Nicole.

“C’mon, David’s in 4B.”

Brittany’s clear, high voice followed them down the corridor.

Roy figured that Hailey Bergstrom was oblivious to the fact that she had a huge, furry bunny tail pinned to the seat of her uniform pants. It swished as she walked, emphasizing narrow hips. She was thin rather than slender, with long arms and legs, but there was a vibrancy about her that was almost palpable. She seemed to give off sparks. He wondered idly whether getting too close to her might result in an electric shock.

“David just came up from intensive care this morning. He’s my patient. I thought his case worker’s name was Larissa Mott.”

So she’d done her homework, Roy thought. Good for her.

“Larissa’s father died, and she’s off on bereavement leave. David’s got me now.”

She nodded and narrowed her eyes at him. “Any sign of his mother yet?”

Roy shook his head. “Police are watching out for her, but so far no luck. How’s he doing?”

“He’s a pretty sick little guy. His electrolytes are all out of whack and he won’t drink yet. We’ve got him on IV. There’s been a lot of phone calls about him. People saw the article in the Province.”

“I’m sure Larissa already covered this, but I’ll be leaving written orders of my own that David not be released to anyone, and if anyone tries, I’m to be notified immediately.”

Hailey nodded and opened the door to a two-bed ward. One of the cribs was empty, but in the other a tiny figure wearing a blue pajama top and a diaper lay sprawled on his back, deeply asleep, his curls dark against the white pillow. A stuffed dog, filthy and much the worse for wear, was clutched to his face, and an IV tube was attached to his foot with strips of tape. There were deep, dark circles under his eyes.

Roy looked down at the sleeping child and his heart contracted. Children were fragile and precious, their lives dependent on the adults whose job it was to care for them. This one had been betrayed, and it tore at his gut. It always did. The discouraging thing was that it happened all too often in big cities like this one.

“Were there other visible signs of abuse?” Roy knew he’d get the report, but he wanted to know now.

Hailey held up a cautioning hand, frowned and shook her head at him. “We can discuss that outside the room.”

“He’s so sweet, so very small.” Nicole’s voice was husky, and when he looked at her, Roy saw tears shimmering in her eyes. Her gaze was on the baby. “He can’t even tell anybody what hurts. That must be awful.”

“You’re gonna talk a blue streak when you wake up, though, aren’t you, David?” Hailey leaned over the crib and in a crooning voice added, “You’re such a beautiful, smart boy. We’re gonna be great friends, aren’t we, little one?” Her hand lightly touched the boy’s curls, one finger stroking his cheek. She checked the IV drip and carefully covered his legs with a blanket.

The boy turned his head restlessly to the other side and slept on, and Hailey led the way into the hall, her rabbit ears flopping around her neck.

“No matter how little they are, no matter how deeply asleep or unconscious, they hear us talking, and even the smallest ones pick up on what we’re saying,” she said to Roy in a ferocious tone. “He was seriously dehydrated when he came in, he arrested down in the ER, he’s gaining a little ground, but he’s still really sick.” Her tone turned sarcastic. “And in answer to your question, other than being alone for three days without anything to eat or drink, he doesn’t seem to have been abused. He’s well nourished, no bruising or old scars, no broken bones. Real fortunate little guy, wouldn’t you say?”

Roy felt like an idiot. “I’m sorry, Hailey, that was stupid of me. I should have known better than to talk in front of him.” He was embarrassed, but he also couldn’t believe he was being lectured by a woman wearing rabbit ears and a tail.

“Does he have anything of his own, any toys or clothes?” Nicole asked. She was still looking through the glass door at the small figure in the crib.

“The stuffed dog he’s clutching is all that came in with him. It’s his security blanket. It needs a wash, but there’s no way I’m taking it from him right now.”

“Maybe I can bring him some things?”