Rescue - By Anita Shreve Page 0,72

jobs.”

“Really? I didn’t know that. Seems like we’ve all had budget cuts.”

“Yeah, but the town can’t cut too far back on Rescue. The high school budget has been slashed to pieces over the last few years. Finally, they voted to reinstate the reading program. They needed a teacher.”

“Don’t know Dunstan. I’m riding with the probie.”

“The guy with the ears?”

Webster nods. Koenig moves in closer and lowers his voice. “The guy’s obsessed with blood pressures. He cuffs everyone he comes across. He even tried to do me.”

Webster glances over at the probie, who’s sitting in a corner with a manual. He smiles. Maybe it’s time to let the kid off the hook.

“Probie,” Webster says, walking toward him.

The probie stands, and Webster thinks he’s going to salute. “Webster,” he says.

“How you doing on those BPs?”

“Pretty good.”

“OK,” Webster says, rolling his sleeve. “Take mine.”

The probie sets up the cuff. He seems confident. “One forty-two over eighty-six,” he says when he’s finished.

“You sure?” Webster can’t believe the number. “Take it again.”

The probie, nervous now, repeats the procedure. Webster notes how shiny the guy’s shoes are.

“Same,” says the probie.

“Precisely the same?”

“One forty-six over eighty-six.”

“Koenig, come over here,” Webster calls.

Koenig stands and walks to where Webster is. “Boss?”

“Take my blood pressure.”

The probie gives Koenig the cuff. Again, the ritual is repeated. “One forty-two over eighty-eight,” says Koenig. “Little high, don’t you think?”

Webster groans. “Thanks,” he says to Koenig.

“You’re off the hook,” Webster says to the probie. “I’d better make an appointment to see my doctor.”

Webster, shaken, sits in an armchair. He should get back on the treadmill at the workout center in the next room. Cut out the pies and the pasta. He’s always had low blood pressure and because of that hasn’t given it much thought. Age, stress, or lifestyle? he wonders.

He’s asleep in the armchair when the tones come and he misses the beginning of the call. He sits upright and looks for the probie, who’s already by the door.

“What is it?” he asks the guy standing next to him. Maybe it’s the new transfer, Dunstan.

“Two females, seventeen and eighteen, at Gray Quarry. One’s not breathing, suspected drowning. The other’s not conscious, but breathing.”

Webster springs out of his chair. His eyes find Koenig’s.

“I’ll be right behind you,” his old partner says.

“I’m driving,” Webster yells to the probie as he crosses the room. He runs to the rig.

Webster pulls out, siren wailing. The probie, alert, is pale.

Webster takes the rig right up to seventy and blows through the two intersections in Hartstone. “Do as I say, not as I do,” he yells at the probie. A hundred yards behind him, he can see the lights of Koenig’s rig, following.

Webster refuses to form a picture. Instead, he recites acronyms in his head. As good as a prayer in this case.

Webster speeds down 42, cars scurrying onto the shoulders. He knows precisely where the marble quarry is. When he was a kid, he used to swim there. He remembers, early in his career, when he was only a probie, saving a boy who nearly drowned in the dark water.

Two girls in the water at night. They wouldn’t have been able to see a thing.

The rig bounces over the ruts of the road leading into the quarry. Ahead of him, Webster can see light from a wood fire.

He’s out of the rig before the probie even has the door open. A boy who’s been kneeling beside one of the girls stands up.

It’s Tommy.

Webster’s stomach falls to his shoes.

Webster straddles his daughter. Her eyes and mouth are covered in blood. He can see that someone—maybe Tommy—has tried to wipe it away.

“She went up on a dare,” Tommy says. “I begged her not to. She wasn’t breathing when I got her back on the ledge,” Tommy says, “but I checked her airway and did CPR until she coughed. She vomited, too.”

Webster bends his head in close to Rowan’s mouth and counts. Ten respirations a minute. His daughter reeks of alcohol and vomit.

“Ten respirations,” he shouts to the probie. “ETOH. Get the radial pulse and BP. I need the c-collar.”

The probie hands it to him. Webster applies the collar. He whips out his flashlight and checks Rowan’s pupils. Equal and responsive. He yells, “Rowan!” He checks her ears. No cerebral spinal fluid from the ears. He feels a pair of hands on his shoulders.

“I’m treating,” Koenig says.

“It’s Rowan,” Webster says, refusing to move.

“I know it’s Rowan, Webster. Stand up!”

Webster stands and moves to one side. He watches as Koenig kneels beside