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“I’m afraid I can’t do that, Vanessa. Not without getting David’s approval first.”
The nurse returned with a syringe. She gave Vanessa an injection in her thigh.
“You’ll get better faster if you relax and let us take care of you,” George told her gently.
“What’s wrong with me? Has the baby come yet?”
Jayne Gaston looked across to Dr. Allan. “Poor thing. She thinks she’s still pregnant.”
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George nodded grimly.
“My baby,” Vanessa sobbed. “Have you got my baby?”
“Let’s leave so she’ll rest now.”
“No, please,” Vanessa rasped. “Don’t leave me. You all hate me. I know you do. What aren’t you telling me? My baby’s dead, isn’t he?”
Dr. Allan signaled the nurse to follow him from the room. Mrs. Gaston quietly closed the door behind them.
Vanessa struggled to remember something. It was important, but she couldn’t quite grasp it. She had to think, had to remember. There was something she should remember. What was it?
Then a moan spiraled up from deep within her. She remembered the lifeless body she’d lifted from the crib. She heard echoes of her own screams, exactly as they’d reverberated down the hallways of the White House that night.
“My baby,” she sobbed. “My baby. Oh, God. I’m sorry.”
Rather than debilitate her, the anguish galvanized her. She was unclear as to her goal, but she knew that she couldn’t lie here helplessly any longer. Unaware of the pain, she ripped off the tape securing the IV needle to the back of her hand. Once it was out of the way, she swallowed her nausea and pulled the small catheter from her vein.
When she tried to sit up, she felt as if an anvil were on her chest, anchoring her to the bed. Calling upon every ounce of reserve strength she had, she finally willed herself into a sitting position. The room tilted. The trees she saw through the window appeared to be growing out of the ground at a forty-five-degree angle. She retched, but dryly.
Her brain seemed incapable of telegraphing messages to her legs. It took her five minutes and an incredible amount of effort to drag them over the side of the bed. Then her feet dangled above the floor while she staved off nausea and incessant waves of dizziness. Eventually she worked up enough courage and stamina to slide down the edge of the mattress and place her feet on the floor.
Her legs didn’t support her. She collapsed in a heap beside the bed, then lay there sobbing, breathing heavily, too weak to stand, too weak even to call out for help. She wished for death.
No. She’d be damned if she would make it that easy for them.
Determined, she inched along the floor like a crude life form, using a hand, a foot, a shoulder, a heel like a pseudopod, propelling her forward in minute increments.
When she finally reached the door, she was bathed in sweat. Her hair and nightgown were plastered to her skin. She curled into the fetal position and rested, shivering now as her perspiration cooled.
At last, she raised her head and looked up at the doorknob. It appeared as unreachable as the moon. She tried pounding on the door, but her hands made only weak slaps against it. So she pressed her palms against the cool wood and crawled up the door, straining the muscles of her arms and chest, until she could get one leg beneath her, then the other, until she was on her knees.
Then she seized the doorknob with both hands and managed to turn it, at the same time slumping against the door. It burst open, and she fell out into the hallway, landing hard on her shoulder and sending rockets of pain down her arm.
“Mrs. Merritt! Oh, my God! Dr. Allan!”
Shouting voices. Running footsteps. Hands cupping her armpits, lifting her.
Limp, spent, she swayed between two Secret Service agents as they carried her back to the bed.
George Allan elbowed the agents aside. “Thanks, gentlemen.”
“Should I call for an ambulance, Dr. Allan?” one of them asked.
“That won’t be necessary.” He listened to her heart through a stethoscope. “Mrs. Gaston, will you get another IV line going, please?”
The other agent asked if he should call the President or Mr. Martin. The doctor said he would make the call himself as soon as Mrs. Merritt was stabilized. The two agents withdrew.
