Chapter 48: Emergency Zone - No Stopping

When I walked inside, I found out that the gift was a little kitten. Lucille had decided that the house was lacking a cat. Thankfully the cat was litter-box trained, so Lucille had bought a plastic litter-box and a big bag of litter. Inside of ten minutes, I knew that cat wasn’t for me or for the house. It was really for Sandy and Lucille. When they’d played with the kitten for a while, then it had eaten, they put it in a cardboard box with an old cloth and although it had fussed for a short time it finally curled up and fell asleep.

That’s when Lucille heaved a heavy sigh and started to cry. In only a second, Sandy and I were on either side of her, holding her gently and wondering what was wrong. Once she’d had a short cry, she managed to tell us that she’d had a very rough day, then explained why she felt worn out.

She’d been on duty about five that morning, when the ambulance had brought Ray Smithies and Sid Parker into the emergency room. They’d both been shot in the butt and thighs by a twelve-gauge shotgun loaded with ground rock salt. She didn’t know who had done it, but the police said that a farmer on the east side of town had seen them sneaking around his barns. Since he’d been losing stock rather mysteriously for the last while, he’d shot first and asked questions afterward. What bothered Lucille was the fact that the hospital had to deal with the result.

It had taken the doctor, an intern, and two nurses almost four hours to remove all the pellets of salt they could find, then wash out each wound with saline solution. However the doctor was going to have to x-ray the pair’s butts again in the morning to be sure they got all of the salt and bits of cloth that had been driven into the wounds. Since Lucille had been on duty as a trauma nurse, she’d been one of the nurses in the operating room working with the intern and staring at Sid Parker’s ugly butt for four hours.

Then, only a few minutes after they’d finished and wheeled the Smithies/Parker duo to recovery, one of the women who’d been in the maternity room had gone into labour. She had a rough delivery that took another three and a half hours, but the doctors and nurses had saved both the mother and the baby.

Lucille should have been off shift and gone by then, but just as she was taking off her scrubs the ambulance came back with another emergency patient. They had a five-year-old girl who had been scalded badly on the lower half of her body. There was no burn ward at the local hospital so they needed someone to ride in the ambulance while the little girl was rushed off to another hospital. Although Lucille wanted to go she was so tired that she was afraid she’d make mistakes. Since the hospital was short staffed because of the holidays she subbed for the nurse who did go and had put in another six hours, doling out pills and soothing distraught patients.

Needless to say when she finished that second shift she’d booked out and at the matron’s insistence she was on a forty-eight-hour break. When Lucille had gotten home she was met by a friend who was waiting for her, the friend was carrying a kitten that Lucille had talked about wanting to get for the cabin. She was so tired that she’d called Carissa and asked her to come over and look after it so she’d be able to take a two hour nap. When she woke from her nap, she had something to eat then had driven out to deliver the cat only to end up in the snow bank.

It was no wonder she was crying. Sandy and I decided she needed to be pampered, so Sandy ran upstairs to fill the tub and I followed carrying Lucille. As soon as the tub was full we eased her into a hot bubble bath. Then Sandy stayed with Lucille to keep her company while I went back to the kitchen and made a cup of hot chocolate. Once Lucille had been bathed and had drunk the hot chocolate I carried her to the bed, tucking her in the middle. Sandy and I slid in to cuddle her from either side and she was asleep in minutes.

Sandy and I weren’t as lucky.

Just about then the kitten awoke from its nap and decided that since no one was around it was positive that it had been abandoned. Instantly, it began to complain about the situation. I’m not sure if there is anything in the world that sounds more pitiful, or has a more plaintive lament than an eight-week-old kitten that feels lonely. On top of that kittens have been graced with a wail meant to carry for miles, probably in order to alert the kitten’s mother of its plight. In this case the kitten was trying to wake mama cat, a cat that lived in a town which was probably about thirty miles away.

Either Sandy or I had to go find some way to shut down that caterwauling little monster’s shrieks of anguish and I drew the short straw. Okay, I’ll be honest, I was dumb enough to volunteer so Sandy could be there in case Lucille needed more comfort. By now, you may have guessed that I am not really a cat person and if I’d been given a choice, I would have chosen any of several other small animals for a house pet. However, I’m a softhearted fool when it comes to the wishes of the women in my life, so I drowsily went downstairs to attempt to calm the little intruder.

Now, I’ve never had much to do with cats. To me, cats are beasts of prey that you allow to live in the barn in hopes that they will help control mice and other small vermin. I had no idea what would calm the kitten, but in a short while that skinny bodied, ball of fluff taught me what it wanted. I soon discovered that it demanded complete attention and nothing but. It virtually demanded that it had to be cuddled and petted until it fell asleep. However, if I attempted to put the sleeping kitten back in its bed in order to try to get some sleep myself, it awakened instantly. Then as the night wore on, I discovered that the kitten hadn’t been well cared for previously, so it had several far more serious problems than just being lonesome and homesick.

When Sandy and Lucille came downstairs in the morning they found me dozing in my recliner, with that animated flea trap lying on my lap. I awakened to hear one of them saying something like “Ohhhh, isn’t that cute? Don’t they look just darling like that?”

That was the wrong thing to say since I hadn’t really slept all night. Instead I’d spent most of the night, just caring for and cleaning up after that obnoxious beast. The shortage of sleep hadn’t left me in a good mood either. I sat up and handed the cat to Lucille with a growl.

“This beast has diarhea and has shit all over the floor in the kitchen. It managed to get into my office, where it pissed and shit on the rug my mother made me for Christmas. It suffers from projectile vomiting and has thrown up in my lap and on my shirt. It’s coat is riddled with fleas. There are worms in its stool that are so big they can damn near carry away an elephant. In other words, it desperately needs veterinary care. Needless to say, it’s not welcome in this house or anywhere on this ranch. It wore out that welcome several hours ago.

“You’ll notice that I feel strongly about this, but that’s because this is a ranch. On this ranch there are hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of purebred animals that are the whole point of our being here. Those animals are our chief means of making the money that pays the bills. Before we bring any animal onto this ranch we always have it thoroughly checked by a veterinarian to be certain that it is healthy. We have enough problems with wild animals bringing in sickness. We do not need to import sick animals ourselves.

“I intend to wash very thoroughly and fully change my clothing, perhaps I’ll even burn them, just in case that beast is carrying some sickness that could infect the other animals. Only after I am completely positive that I am clean from head to toe will I dare to go out to the barns. Otherwise I might inadvertently carry some illness to my costly livestock; illness that may have been brought here on that mewling sack of festering pestilence. Please dispose of that thing, somewhere off the ranch, but preferably at the veterinarians where it can be disposed of properly. If it was my choice I’d have it put out of its misery and have the corpse tested for pathogens so I can properly immunize my animals and myself. Once that beast is gone we will need to clean and disinfect the whole house, or at least every room we have entered since that beast arrived.”

Both Sandy and Lucille were staring at me as I marched upstairs to the shower where I scrubbed clean, then changed my clothes from the skin out before going out to do the morning chores. I didn’t talk to them before I went out, nor did I take the time to have a coffee like I normally would have done. I didn’t dare. I was still furious.

I felt I had a good reason. When I was about eight or nine years old, Dad had gone to an auction and had brought home a small female weaner pig to add to our small herd. Inside of a week, all the pigs and chickens we’d had on the farm were sick and we’d had to destroy them. Since the buildings they’d been housed in were old and couldn’t really be disinfected, we’d had to destroy those too. As a result we lost the value of all the animals we’d had, then we had to pay for new animals as well as new buildings to replace what we’d lost, so that one sickly piglet had cost my family several thousands of dollars. From that time on my family has always had newly purchased animals checked over by the veterinarian before we brought them home.

While I was doing the chores I made up my mind that if Lucille wouldn’t take that kitten to the vet, I would, but before I got back to the house her car was gone. She’d left, taking the kitten with her. When I walked into the kitchen, Sandy was scrubbing the floor with a strong mixture of pine scented cleaner and crying softly. She looked up at me, her face woebegone, then got to her feet and poured me a coffee and set it at the kitchen table before sitting down to face me.

“Lucille didn’t know the cat should have been taken to the vet before bringing it here. I wouldn’t have thought of it either though. Actually, since neither Lucille nor I had ever thought of anything like that we thought you’d overreacted, so I called your mom. She told me that when you were young, your family had lost all the pigs and chickens on the farm because of one sick animal. When Lucille heard about that, she grabbed that damn kitten and all the junk she’d bought for it, phoned the vet to see if he was going to be there for a while, then got in her car and left. All the time she was packing up she was cursing about the woman that gave her the cat. I think someone is going to get an earful and I wouldn’t blame Lucille one bit if she chews the woman’s ear right off.”

“Oh my. I guess I should have gone easier on her,” I sighed.

“I wouldn’t worry about that. It was a shock for both of us, but we know how you feel about your animals. So since that cat had something wrong that might have infected them, it needed to go, at least it needs a veterinarian’s care. A contagious disease can spread the same way in people, so I wouldn’t worry about having gotten upset about that. Lucille is a nurse and she understands contagion. If Lucille hadn’t been so tired last night I doubt if that cat would have ever shown up here, at least not in the condition it was in. Even I should have seen that it was sick and flea ridden.”

“Maybe, but I should have had more patience with Lucille this morning,” I sighed.

“Chris, you’d just sat up all night with that animal, trying to care for it. You were probably as tired as Lucille had been the night before so don’t feel bad about being curt when you saw us. If you think you were rough you should try talking to a doctor after he’s been operating on a patient for eight hours or more. When you’re tired, I don’t know anyone that has much patience with stupidity,” Sandy argued. “Now, talking about tired, if the chores are done, why don’t I make you some breakfast. After that you can go to bed for a few hours?”

I really was extremely tired so that’s what I did.

When I awoke several hours later Lucille was sleeping beside me, but she awakened as I got out of bed to go to the bathroom. After I came back into the bedroom to put on my clothes both of us tried to apologise, but in the long run it was obvious that we’d each blundered and we agreed to try to put it behind us.

Since we were both hungry, we headed downstairs to find that the house was spotless and had obviously been cleaned from top to bottom.

Sandy hadn’t done the cleaning all on her own though, Mom and Beth were there too. It only took a few minutes for Sandy to make lunch and soon we were all sitting at the kitchen table. Then while Lucille and I ate lunch, the three women who’d been up and around made sure that we were caught up on the local gossip.

The farmer who had shot Sid and Ray was one of the Hungarian immigrants who had come to Canada after the Hungarian revolution in 1956 and was a bit touchy about his property. He had used a double-barrelled twelve-gauge shotgun to do the deed, and had emptied one barrel at each of the intruders as they were trying to scale an eight-foot fence, but they were climbing over it from the inside. The police estimated that he was at just the right distance to do the most damage to the two of them, but they were astounded that so much salt had penetrated both their clothing and their skin. They had to charge the farmer for shooting the pair, but our lawyer, Cyrus Ambrose, had posted bail and was going to defend the guy in court. Since the dolts were on private property that had been posted with no trespassing signs and surrounded by an eight foot page wire fence with barbed wire on the top, I didn’t think he’d have that much work to get the old fellow off the hook. Since they were on the inside of the fence they’d already trepassed and were definitely guilty of breaking and entry.

We all felt that Sid and Ray were in a lot worse trouble than the farmer was and if they weren’t, they should be. Since their trial hadn’t come to court yet over the time they’d been trapped on the top of my pig sty, I wondered if both charges might be levied at the same time. If they were it would be a very interesting trial and I definitely wanted to be there.

From talk about the shooting, the gossip drifted to a discussion about the little girl who had been scalded. It seemed that her mother had been cooking and the little girl had tried to help, but had pulled the pot over and accidentally spilled the boiling water on herself. Luckily it had only splashed on her legs. Then her mother had done the right thing by scooping up the girl, stripping off her clothes and running outside to dunk her in a snow bank. Not only was the little girl going to survive, but she’d probably only have minimal scarring on her legs.

I was having a second cup of coffee and probably looking bored by then. I really wasn’t into sticking my nose in other people’s business unless it concerned me, my family or my frieds. Mom saw the look on my face and obviously recognised it for what it was. She suggested that she and I should go over the ranch’s books since we both had some time on our hands. I think I surprised her when I jumped on the idea. Although I liked going over the books almost as much as I looked forward to visiting the dentist, even that was a good excuse to get away from a gossip session.

Besides, I thought I’d been doing a fair job of keeping the books and records for the ranch, but Mom soon disabused that notion. In the next couple of hours, she pointed out several small problems and discrepancies that a tax audit would find. Needless to say she decided that I needed a few lessons in accounting and bookkeeping. She said she had better records of what I’d done than I did, and she called herself the second line of defence for the tax man. Her main argument was the cardboard box of bills that I called miscellaneous expenses. She came close to screaming when she saw that pile.

I was actually relieved when Mom had to go home to make supper for Dad and Wil, but then I had to go do chores as well. However, I spent the whole evening going through the ranch’s small miscellaneous bills for the last six months. At least Sandy, Lucille and I were on good terms by bedtime.

After chores the next morning, I packed up the clothes and personal gear I’d need for the next few weeks, then hit the ranch’s books again until lunch. Just a short time later, Matt arrived with his brothers and I walked around the place, showing him the things that had changed and what he’d have to do to care for the place.

As we were walking back toward the house, I realized that all in all it had been a very strenuous week and I felt I needed a break. I hoped that going to Olds to study would be a relief from the pressure I’d been under, but I wasn’t counting on it. Actually, since it was a cram course there was very little chance that I’d get anything of a break, in fact I’d probably be under even more pressure.

Sunday, the 5th of January, 1969, began to develop complications on the ride down to the family farm for Wil’s and my ‘good luck’ lunch with the family. Lucille, Sandy, Matt and I all planned on going, but only Sandy and Matt would be returning to the ranch that afternoon. I was leaving from the home farm with Wil to enter our respective courses and we were taking his new truck to Olds. Lucille was going to go head for town right after lunch since she had to work a shift at the hospital. Both Sandy and Lucille insisted on driving their own vehicles, but since Matt had been brought out by his brothers in their monster truck I felt the road would be open enough to be no problem. However, I was surprised when Lucille asked me to ride with her, leaving Matt to ride with Sandy.

Once we were underway, I asked if there was a reason for the switcheroo, and was surprised at Lucille’s response.

“Yeah, there is,” she snapped. “Matt has a huge crush on me and it can be a pain in the ass. I’d rather not be alone with him right now. Not after New Years Eve.”

“What happened on New Years, other than Matt getting sick?”

“Well, after helping him clean up when he barfed over the porch rail, I was helping him back to bed. He pulled me into bed with him and was damn insistent. I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but he’s bloody strong and I’m not nearly as big as he is,” she sighed. “If you’re wondering, he didn’t rape me, but he came damn close. The problem is that he doesn’t want to take no for an answer. Don’t worry though, I don’t want you to get involved. I’ll handle it my way.”

“I can’t do that Lucille, and you know it,” I sighed. “First of all, Sandy is going to be alone with him on the ranch. They might even be snowed in for weeks at a time. If he tried to force you, what makes you think he won’t do the same thing to Sandy?”

“He has no attraction to Sandy.”

“Rape has nothing to do with attraction. It’s about conquest and control,” I growled. “Even I know that much.”

“That’s why Sandy is safe and I’m not. Sandy reminds him of his father. I’m the one who reminds him of his mother.”

“What has that got to do with it?”

“It’s the way he was raised. His father insisted on complete control of the family, bossing everyone around. His mother was subservient and gave in to his old man. For some reason Matt thinks I’m subservient, while to him, Sandy is strong. When you guys were walking around the farm this morning, I spoke to Sandy about it and she isn’t worried. She said if he ever forced her in any way, she’d cut off his balls, then feed them to the old sow and force him to watch. In fact, she asked me to arrange for you to ride with me in order to be alone with him. She plans to tell him the consequences of him harming either of us in any way.”