“Hello, Abigail. It’s Emma.”
“Finally. I’m up to my elbows in egg salad. You need to come over.”
“I’m sorry, but we need you here right away. Captain Harris is having a seizure, and we don’t know what to do.”
“Don’t do anything,” she calmly replied. “Don’t try to restrain him. I’ll be right there.”
The line went dead, and Emma ran back to the great room. “She’s coming, but she said not to restrain him.”
Her father let go of the captain’s shoulders and sat back on his heels. Sheer black fright rooted Emma to the spot as she watched the captain convulse on the floor, his eyes rolling back in his head. He didn’t even seem present in his body. It was as if he’d gone somewhere else.
After a moment or two, the convulsions slowed, and he went still, eventually slipping into unconsciousness.
Emma was breathless and terror struck. “Is he okay?”
The kitchen door flew open, and Abigail swept inside from the storm. She ripped off her coat, tossed it over the back of a chair, and strode purposefully toward them.
“Move back.” She knelt down beside the captain.
“The seizure stopped a few seconds ago,” Emma told her.
Abigail pressed two fingers to the pulse at his neck.
“Is he alive?” Emma’s father asked.
“Yes.” Abigail pulled the captain’s eyelids back, checked both pupils, and looked up at them. “Was he complaining of any pain before it started?”
“In the Jeep, he told me he’d been knocked in the head when the lifeboat capsized. He thought he might have lost consciousness in the water for a few seconds.”
Abigail ran her fingers through the captain’s thick black hair and felt around his scalp. “Yes, yes, here we are. He’s got quite a goose egg. That must have hurt like the dickens. I’m surprised there’s no bleeding.” She leaned directly over his face and tapped his cheeks. “Captain Harris, can you hear me?”
He failed to respond, so she tried again, slapping harder and speaking firmly. “Captain Harris. Can you open your eyes?”
He managed to open them briefly, but it seemed to take great effort, and his eyes rolled back and he fell into a state of unconsciousness again.
Emma, frantic with fear, laid her hand over her heart. She didn’t know this man. He was a stranger to her, but the thought of him dying, after everything he’d been through over the past twelve hours, was horrendous, too dreadful to contemplate. He must have people somewhere who loved him and would mourn for him. He was someone’s son, or perhaps a child’s father. The idea of his death in her home, the finality of it, cut her to the quick.
“This is unbearable,” she said. “Will he be all right?”
“I’m not sure,” Abigail replied. “It depends what happens in the next few hours. It could just be a concussion. There might be some swelling under the skull that caused the seizure, and once that swelling goes down, he’ll recover.” She rose awkwardly to her feet and turned to Emma’s father. “But it could be worse than that. He should go to a hospital. Can we get him to the mainland tonight?”
“It’s unlikely,” her father said. “The storm hasn’t let up, and Frank said it’ll be at least a day or two before the coast guard can get here.” He looked down at Captain Harris. “Why isn’t he waking up?”
Abigail cupped her forehead in her hand. Her stress was evident in the set of her jaw. “It could just be a postictal state after the seizure. If he wakes up and starts to regain strength over the next few hours, that’ll be a good sign.”
“So, there’s still some hope,” Emma said, aching and yearning for it to be so.
“Yes, but I’ll need to keep a close eye on him.” Abigail directed her next question to Emma’s father. “Can we get a few staff men over here to bring the stretcher and move him to the sickroom at my house?”
“I’ll call Joseph right away.” He hastened to the phone in the kitchen.
“Emma,” Abigail said. “I’ll need you to finish the sandwiches and deliver them to the men at the staff house. Everything is on my kitchen table.”
“I can do that.” But something held her in a tight grip. She couldn’t seem to pull herself away from the captain before he woke up. She needed to know that he was going to be all right.
“Gonow,” Abigail snapped, wrenching Emma out of her stupor.
She moved quickly to don her slicker and venture outside to brave the storm again.
