Chapter 39

For the next two weeks of perceived shipboard time MacPherson would have no responsibilities. The Ark would make its own way through worm space, completely unresponsive to control even if he wished to exert it, which he of course didn't. Left to its own devices it would in due course emerge at the point in the Earth's home system predetermined by the manner in which the ship's computer system had opened the wormhole, and his own role would be wholly redundant until then.

Up to now he'd scrupulously kept away from Meiersdottir's bedside, knowing he'd not be welcomed by her grandson, and perhaps his wife as well—although Heisinger's attitude toward him had been distinctly less hostile than Igwanda's since his re-accession to command. But with the tension of the time-pressured outbound journey from Eden now lifted his thoughts immediately turned to his seriously ailing friend, and in short order he made his decision.

T'hell wi' i', he thought. Th' worrs' tha' can happen is tha' he thrrows me oo'. Bu' I woul' si' wi' herr, hol' herr han' an' talk t' herr a wee bi', if he'll allow. She's me guid frrien', an' i' is no' rrigh' tha' she shoul' mayhap die and me no' therre because I didna trry.

And so he found himself knocking timidly at the door to her cabin. It was opened, to his considerable relief, by O'Bannion, who appeared to be the only one present at the moment. The doctor greeted him politely and moved aside easily to allow him admittance.

Although he'd been mentally braced for the sight, Meiersdottir's appearance still came as something of a shock to the captain. He'd seen sick people before, as have most of us, but her dreadful pallor was still alarming. Even more so was the dismaying array of tubes connected to her body—the oxygen feed taped to her nose, the IV extending into a very bruised-looking hand, the additional tube snaking from under her coverlet to a bag hanging from the side of her bed, which he knew was hooked to a catheter lodged in her bladder, other links to a fingertip O2 saturation monitor and to readouts measuring her blood pressure and pulse rate.

"She's hanging in," O'Bannion told him. "The return to normal gravity has been a big help. But it's still not looking good."

Briefly the doctor took him through her medical problems. "The precipitating factor is of course the broken tibia," she said. "We've set it, but there's still some residual infection. But we've got that under control with antibiotics and it's much less a problem now than the overall insult to her system. Everything's been shutting down gradually—her liver, her kidneys, her oxygen absorption, even her heart's showing some strain. The reset of the gravity compensators seems to have at least stopped the deterioration, but we're not seeing any rebound yet. It's pretty iffy."

"I'll stay wi' herr awhile, if I may, doc'orr," said MacPherson. He took in O'Bannion's own appearance, which seemed desperately weary. "Ta'e yersel' some rres', if ye like. I'll be herre."

Thankfully the doctor quickly agreed. After briefing the captain thoroughly on what to look for—"and call me immediately, I mean immediately, if there's any change at all"—she moved through the connecting door to the next cabin and its inviting bed. She'd been forcing herself into extended wakefulness for the past ten days to look after her patient and was exhausted.

For more than two hours MacPherson simply sat there beside the bed, holding Meiersdottir's limp and chilly hand and talking softly to her. He told her first of their successful establishment of the wormhole and passage through it, and then went on to other things, whatever occurred to him. Long ago, at the bedside of a dying friend, he'd been told by one physician that hearing was generally conceded to be the last of the senses to fail, and if all he could offer her was this one feeble link to life, it was what he chose to do. He spoke on and on.

Abruptly there was a light knock at the door, which opened with scarcely a pause and Igwanda stood in the entrance. MacPherson braced himself for an explosion of hostility, but to his considerable surprise it wasn't forthcoming. The younger man simply stood for a moment in the doorway, took in the scene, and then nodded slightly. "MacPherson," he acknowledged the captain's presence in an uninflected tone.

MacPherson began to rise, offering his place by Meiersdottir's side, but Igwanda merely waved him away. "Any change?" he asked in the same voice.

"Nae. 'Tis the same as when I came."

"How long've you been here?" Igwanda asked.

The captain shrugged. "Twa hours, perrhaps a li'le mair. I've been talkin' t' herr, perr­haps she hearrs, perrhaps she doesna, bu' i' canna hurr'."

"You're right. Sometimes I sing to her, she used to like it when I did. I came to do it again. But you go on."

"Nae, 'tis yer gran'mitherr," said MacPherson. "Yer voice'll be fairrer t'herr than mine, an' besi'es me throa' is ge'in' drry. Ye si', an' I'll ge' a glass o' wa'err."

Neither man met the other's glance as Igwanda took MacPherson's place and began to croon softly. As MacPherson helped himself to not one but two full glasses of water from the nearby sink he was slightly surprised that the younger man's choice of songs was an old favorite, "Barbary Allen," a centuries-old Scots folk tune. Igwanda, he noted idly, had an agreeable tenor voice.

The captain lightly joined in the final refrain in his own rather rough baritone, and the song came to its end. For a moment there was silence.

"Why are you here, Captain?" asked Igwanda; but his tone wasn't challenging, merely curious.

"She's me frrien'," MacPherson replied simply, noting only afterwards that it was the first time the young man had addressed him by his title since Meiersdottir had restored it.

"Why?"

"In th' lang days afterr ye discoverr' me betrrayal," began the captain, deliberately referencing the event that had brought about the breach in their relationship, "she werre th'only ain who woul' talk t'me. We spen' many hours t'githerr, an' they werre grran'. I come t'know herr, an' she come t'know me, an' we come t'be frrien's. Me frrien' shouldna gae t'herr grrave, if tha's wherre she mus' gae, wi'oo' knowin' me feelin's."

"Mmm," said Igwanda. He hesitated briefly. "I talked to Cromartie a little while back. Or, more like it, he talked to me. He said you'd worked a miracle, getting us this far. Did you?"