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meningitis?’
    ‘I remember.’
    ‘He’d been discharged,’ Kate continued, speaking fast because she knew they were needed elsewhere, but this was somehow important. ‘The houseman had filled him up with paracetamol to get his fever down and decided his rash was due to fleabites. You ran after them. Stopped them driving out of the car park. Made the parents bring him back.’
    ‘I remember,’ Rory repeated, grimly enough to let Kate know she wasn’t wrong in assuming the importance she was assigning to this part of their history. ‘It was why I had to leave.’ He was moving again, his hand on the doors. He didn’t want to talk about this.
    ‘But you   saved   him.’
    Her words were quiet. A thought that was spoken aloud unintentionally. But Rory turned his head.
    ‘It wasn’t enough,’ he growled. ‘Not that day. Come on, Katie.’ He pushed open the swing door. ‘We’ve got work to do. There’ll be plenty of time to talk later.’
     

CHAPTER FIVE
    T HE CASUALTY DEPARTMENT   of St Bethel’s Hospital had gone from being ‘restful’ to completely chaotic.
     
    A nurse was walking up and down in front of the central desk, holding the toddler who’d come in with the first wave of patients. Danni was still crying.
    ‘Someone needs to check that child again,’ Rory said.
    Other patients had come in while they’d been involved in the resuscitation area drama. Cubicles were full and staff were flat out. An ECG machine was being wheeled to one bedside. Someone was having a seizure in Cubicle 6 and a very inebriated person in a Santa costume was yelling for attention in Cubicle 5.
    And there seemed to be children everywhere they looked. Cubicle 1, beside the woman they were assigned to see, had a thin, worried-looking girl peering out.
    ‘Rhys?’ she called nervously. ‘Alex? Come back here!’
    A small girl, maybe four or five years old, was tugging on an older child’s arm.
    ‘Lucy? Why is Father Christmas shouting? I want to go   home !’
    ‘Are you all right?’ Kate asked as they got closer.
    The girl nodded. Then shook her head. ‘I can’t see the boys and I’m supposed to be looking after them.’
    ‘What’s your name, sweetheart?’
    ‘Lucy.’
    ‘And how old are you?’
    ‘I’m eleven.’ Lucy was looking past Kate now. ‘Are you a doctor?’ she asked Rory.
    ‘Yes, I am.’
    ‘Did you…? Is…?’ Lucy’s inward breath was a gulp. ‘We saw Michael being taken away and…’
    Her face crumpled. The face of the smaller girl, who had been staring upwards, was like a mirror. Both girls burst into tears simultaneously.
    Kate’s gaze flicked automatically to Rory. Would she see the man she’d fallen in love with so long ago?
    Yes.   Her breath escaped in a sigh of what felt like relief as she saw the softening in his face. The compassion that had always made him go the extra mile for any young patient.
    He bent down and scooped up the smaller girl. He put his free arm around Lucy.
    ‘Come with me,’ he directed, drawing them back into the cubicle. He sat on the bed and patted the space beside him, and without hesitation Lucy climbed up to sit beside him.
    ‘Michael got hurt in the crash,’ he said quietly. ‘And he was very sick for a while.’
    Lucy nodded, tears streaming down her face. ‘I know. He…he couldn’t breathe properly. I saw them with the football thing.’
    ‘That’s called a bag mask,’ Rory said in the same calm tone. ‘It’s scary, but it’s very useful. All it does is collect air inside the football bit, and when you squeeze it, it helps people to breathe when they can’t manage very well on their own.’
    ‘Did it help Michael?’ Lucy had inched closer, her gaze glued on Rory’s face.
    ‘Yes, it did. But then we had to do some more to help him. He needed a little tube inside his throat to make sure the air could get where it was supposed to be.’
    A glance towards Kate included her in this inter change. Gave them that link again of