command. "No, but she's in a shock or a coma. Use the phone in the kitchen. Call the hospital. The number is taped beside the phone. Tell them we're bringing in two poison victims." He picked Robin up, cradling her in his arms. "I'll start the car."
"Shouldn't we call for an ambulance?" There was no time to feel hurt. Yet later, she knew, there would be too much time.
"This will be faster." He kissed Robin's forehead, moving for the door. "Now do as I say."
Angie and Bert wanted to come, but since they felt fine, Park told them to contact Sol and Lena, and to wait by the phone and keep the line open. He also suggested they sniff the glasses and mugs they had used during the party for suspicious smells. Unfortunately, Angie had washed them all before going to bed. Angry, Park told them to look around, anyway.
Park held Robin and they laid Kerry in the backseat. Shani drove like a fiend and ran a red light, picking up a flashing highway patrol car. After explaining the situation to the officer, they had a police escort. At the hospital, the doctors were waiting. Kerry disappeared on a stretcher through swinging doors while the officer carried Robin inside. Park got on a pay phone to Angie. She had found a half-empty bottle of Insect Death in the refrigerator. Park copied down the insecticide's ingredients and gave the paper to a nurse, who hurried through the door where Kerry and Robin had gone. The two of them sat down to wait.
Ten minutes later - showing no adverse symptoms - Sol arrived. Ten minutes after that, Lena and her parents showed up. Lena was silent. Mrs. Carlton was heartbroken. Mr. Carlton was furious. He called the police and told them to get to Angie's house and begin a complete investigation before any of the evidence could be tampered with. Kerry's mom and dad came next. Together, the four parents comforted each other.
A nurse brought them news. Kerry's stomach had been pumped and she was feeling better. But, although Robin had been revived, her condition was critical. She was vomiting blood, and flirting with circulatory failure. Later, a young internist updated their conditions. Given her symptoms, Kerry had in all probability ingested a small amount of the insect killer. Robin, however, had definitely swallowed at least three ounces of the poison. Two ingredients in Insect Death, phosphorous and mercury, were particularly toxic to the kidneys and were therefore endangering her heart.If Robin made it through the night, there was a chance - looking back, the doctor must have known that it was more likely - that she would suffer permanent damage.
Shani took a seat far away from the others. At the end of the corridor, through glass doors, she saw an orange glow in the east. But the way she felt, the night could have been just the beginning.
Kerry made a swift recovery, though she would often afterwards complain of stomach-aches. Robin did not leave the hospital till two months later, twenty pounds lighter and a ghastly yellow with a slightly damaged liver and two all but useless kidneys. Unless she had a successful transplant, the doctors said, she would be tied to a dialysis machine the rest of her life. And that life would not be nearly as long as average.
Two pairs of fingerprints were found on the bottle of Insect Death: Angie's and Bert's. Of course, they had both studied the bottle when Park had called them from the hospital to see if they had located a source of the poison. Mr. Carlton blamed them all, even Lena. At his insistence, the police gathered them in Robin's hospital room three times and tried to re-enact the sequence of events that had led to the fateful drink. The police ended up with eight different stories, not always the same one from the same individual. All of them had gone in and out of the kitchen all night long. Who could remember when and why and with whom? Everyone agreed that Sol had given hera beer, but who had given it to him, and was it the same person who had initiated the prodding to have Robin drink the beer, and had she actually drunkhis beer? For a while, Sol was on the burner, but he had made himself too obvious a suspect to be a suspect. Too much alcohol had blurred their memories,