The Last Surgeon

CHAPTER 7

The scene as comatose Mike Campbell was carried to the aft examining room of the Helping Hands Mobile Medical Unit would most certainly not have made the final cut in any Norman Rockwell selection process. Everything in the RV was wet-either with rainwater, mud, coffee, or blood.

Seated at their spots by the table, the two remaining students from Nick’s small class looked considerably more sanguine than Phillip MacCandliss, who was slouched in the driver’s chair, wrapped in a blanket that Junie had probably provided for him. His jaunty cap was gone, and his thinning, razor-cut hair was matted with mire. Janus Fielding stood to his right, leaning against the window, his expression appearing as if he might have dropped from the sky and landed in the Emerald City of Oz.

Comfortable with Junie’s ability to handle this, or almost any other medical situation, Nick paused as he was about to head to the rear of the van.

“Sorry about that,” he said to MacCandliss. “You okay?”

“No, I’m not okay. Do I look okay?”

“Nope. Now that you mention it, you don’t look okay at all. Sorry I asked.”

“Mr. Fielding is taking mental notes on all this, Garrity. He’ll be filing a report on the bush league operation you two are running here. He knows, as do I, that every one of these unfortunate men and women would be better off in an emergency ward or a city-run clinic. I don’t think that even in the weakest ER in the city you would find a doctor chasing his patients out into the street. You could have gotten any number of people killed. And for what? To save that… that cave dweller.”

“Well, we can talk about this another time. I’ve got to get back there and see what I can do for our patient.”

“What you can do, Garrity, is what you should have done when that wretched fellow first walked into this sad excuse for a clinic-you should have called nine-one-one.”

Nick took several steps toward the rear of the RV, then paused and looked back over his shoulder.

“You know, that’s an excellent idea, MacCandliss. I’m glad my nurse did it as soon as we realized how bad off the man was.”

At that instant, the heavy night was pierced by the sirens of an approaching rescue squad and police cruisers.

“WELL, DOC,” Junie said, “these Steri-Strips will hold until we can get you to a surgeon-maybe even a plastic surgeon. That is some impressive gash you gave yourself.”

“Nonsense. This mug needs a plastic surgeon like a warthog needs a beautician. Let me dismiss my class and check on the people who stayed around in the bus stop. Then we can talk about whether or not I need to be sewn up.”

“It’s still oozing. Look, do what you want. There’s just too much testosterone floating around here for me.”

As usual, the paramedic and EMT had done a stellar job under difficult circumstances. In what seemed no time at all, they had gotten Campbell onto oxygen, cleaned up his old IV and redressed it while simultaneously starting a second one, evaluated and dressed the wound in his side, and begun treatment to raise his blood pressure and oxygen saturation.

“We’re not going to have to intubate him at this point,” the paramedic said. “I think you saved his life by getting the Narcan and flumazenil into him when you did.”

“Aw, shucks,” Nick said.

“And I agree with you that the wound doesn’t look too bad.”

“Stand over here and say all that again,” Nick responded, gesturing toward the front of the RV where MacCandliss and Fielding were preparing for the arrival of a cab. “Nice and loud.”

By the time the police finished at the accident scene and entered the van, the cab had arrived and the two men were gone. The cops, grateful that no one had been seriously hurt, and citing that they had more than enough statements to type up already, agreed to have Nick and Junie stop by the precinct house on their way to the hospital.

The eventful stop at Jasper Yeo’s auto lot was almost over.

The van would be significantly late for the last two scheduled stops of the evening, but their patients would probably be waiting.

With no particular place to go, Nick’s three students, Thompson, McBean, and Riddick, sprayed and wiped down the interior of the Fleetwood while Nick and Junie worked their way through the patients who had chosen to remain in the bus stop waiting room. Outside, the rain had finally begun to taper off, and inside, the tension generated by MacCandliss, Fielding, and Campbell had begun to dissipate. Lost in the pleasure of taking care of patients, Nick felt the unique, almost indescribable rhythm of the van settle back in. Finally, with the last of the cases tended to, and Junie readying the exam room for the trip across town, he came up to the front and sat down with his class.

“If we had tuition, I’d offer to refund it,” he said, pouring himself a mug of coffee.

“If we had tuition, I’d double it,” McBean said. “It was worth the price of admission just to watch that jerk try and shake you down.”

“Don’t ever underestimate MacCandliss; people who do end up with fang marks on their butts.”

“No need to tell me. I know the man from way back.”

Nick felt his interest immediately perk up. He knew that MacCandliss had not been the one who rejected McBean’s request for increased benefits.

“What do you mean, Matthew?”

“I had a buddy named Ferris-Manny Ferris. You might have run into him.”

“I don’t think so.”

“I’m a little surprised because he had-has-PTSD like the rest of us. MacCandliss rejected his petition for an increase in his benefits. Ol’ Manny was depressed in the best of times. The ruling sent him onto the street and into the bottle. He went from a little room to a flophouse, and finally to a cardboard village. I used to visit him there from time to time. Then one day, after a couple of months had passed, I stopped by. The guys told me Manny was a new man. He had cut way back on his drinking and left the village. Kept talking about how the Marines had called him back and were planning to activate him for some sort of top-secret covert mission. Then he vanished.”

Top-secret covert mission.

The words hit like a missile. Umberto had been sitting right there at that table when he said them to Nick. He was a man reborn, his countenance beaming.

I’ve been called back by the Marines for a top-secret covert mission.

That’s what he said. Maybe those exact words.

Not long after that, like Manny Ferris, he disappeared.

“Matthew,” Nick said, “has Manny resurfaced since then?”

“To tell you the truth, I don’t know for sure, except that once, maybe a couple of years ago, one of the guys said that Manny was back on the street. I’m embarrassed that I never tried to find him, but for me life had changed. First I managed to get a job, then I met a terrific woman and we got a place together. Then I got into that eye therapy for my PTSD. I just sort of let Manny slide.”

“Listen, don’t be so hard on yourself. Life is all about living.”

“I suppose.”

“So tell me, how long has it been since you actually saw him?”

“Manny? A while. Let me think.”

Four years, Nick was thinking. It’s been four years.

“I know when,” McBean said. “It was right after I got the job at the body shop. Four years. Give or take a couple of months, it was four years ago.”