Sanctuary(90)

Noting the look of distress on Annie's face, Yirby smiled, touched her arm. "He'll be fine, Annie. The three of you are in for a couple of tough weeks, but I don't foresee any complications. I'll go over everything with you before you take him home."

"I just ... could I talk to you for a minute?"

"Sure. Hey, Yancy." Yirby removed the stethoscope from around her neck and slipped it around his. "You want to hear your heart go thump?" she cased the earpieces in place, guided his hand. His tired eyes went big and bright. "You listen to that for a minute while I talk to your MOM."

she led Annie into the hallway, leaving the door open. "Yancy's a strong, healthy, completely normal four-year-old boy," she began. "You have nothing to worry about. Chicken pox is inconvenient, irritating, but it's very rarely complicated. I have some literature if you'd like."

"It's not. . ." she bit her lip. "I took one of those home pregnancy tests a couple of days ago. It was positive."

"I see. Are you happy about that, Annie?"

"Yeah. Jerry and me, we've been trying to make another baby for the best part of a year now. But ... is it going to be all right? Is it going to get sick?"

Exposure to the virus during the first trimester carried a slight risk. "You had chicken pox when you were a child?"

"Yeah, my mother put cotton gloves on me to stop me from scratching and scarring."

"It's really unlikely you'd contract it again." If she did, I(Yirby thought with a tug of worry, they would deal with that when it happened. "Even if you did contract the virus, the odds are the baby will be fine. Why don't you let me run a backup pregnancy test now, just to confirm? And give you a quick look. We'll see how far along you are. And go from there."

"It'd make me feel a lot better."

"Then that's just what we'll do. Who's your regular OBI went to a clinic over to the mainland for Yancy. But I was hoping you could take care of things this time."

"Well, we'll talk about that. Irene Verdon's in the waiting room. Let's see if she can keep an eye on Yancy for a few minutes. Then I want the two of you to go home and get some rest. You're going to need

"I feel better knowing you're looking after us, Doc Kirby." Annie laid a hand on her stomach. "All of us."

By one o'clock, Yirby had diagnosed two more cases of chicke pox, splinted a broken finger, and treated a bladder infection. Such, she thought as she grabbed a jar of peanut butter, was the life of a general practitioner.

she had thirty minutes before her next appointment and hoped to spend it sitting down and stuffing her face. she didn't groan when her door opened, but she wanted to.

This was a stranger. she knew every face on the island now, and she'd never seen this one. she tagged him immediately as a beach rover, one of the type who popped up on the island from time to time in search of sun and surf.

His hair was streaky blond and skimmed his shoulders, his face was deeply tanned. He wore ragged cutoffs, a T-shirt that suggested she sun her buns in Cozumel, and dark-lensed Wayfarer sunglasses.

Late twenties, she judged, clean and attractive. she set her sandwich aside and returned his hesitant smile.

"Sorry." He dipped his head. "Have I got the right place? I was told there was a doctor here."

"I'm Doctor Fitzsimmons. What can I do for you?"

"I don't have an appointment or anything." He glanced at her sandwich. "Should I make one?"

"Why do you need one?"

"I just have this, ah. . . " He shrugged his shoulders, then held out a hand. The palm was badly burned, with a red welt across it oozing with blisters.

"That looks nasty." Automatically she stepped forward, taking his hand gently to examine it.

"It was stupid. Coffee was boiling over and I just grabbed the pot without thinking. I'm down at the campground. When I asked the kid at check-in if there was someplace I could get some salve or something, he told me about you."

"Let's go in the back. I'll clean and dress this for you."

"I'm horning in on your lunch."

"Goes with the territory. So you're camping," she continued as she led him back to the examining room.

"Yeah, I was planning on heading down to the Keys, doing some work. I'm an artist."

He sat in the chair she indicated, then frowned at his palm. "I guess this will put the skids on work for a couple of weeks."

"Unless you want to paint left-handed," she said with a smile as she washed up, snapped gloves on.

"Well, I was thinking about hanging out here longer anyway. Great place." He sucked in his breath as she began to clean the burn. "Hurts like a bitch."