Читать книгу The Boy Who Gave His Heart Away: A Death that Brought the Gift of Life - Cole Moreton, Cole Moreton - Страница 11

Marc was not going to make it down the corridor. He could not survive being moved out of the ward in a swarm of medics, trailing drips, monitors and machines. If he did then he would die in the lift on the way down to the specialist ambulance or somewhere out on the City of Edinburgh bypass in the night. There was no way he would get to the airport alive, his mum and dad were convinced of that, although neither of them dared say so. They were both hoping and praying to be wrong. Linda was weeping and keening as the bed was loaded into a big, boxy white ambulance. Marc lay at the centre of an octopus of tubes and wires. The ventilator was helping his lungs, the mechanical assist relieving his heart. All of this was tricky to get into the vehicle and it was going to be even harder to move out and into the aircraft without a slip that could mean a broken connection and a nasty death. They had to get there first, though. One of the medics, a stubbled Scot who might have had a son of his own about the same age, flashed Norrie McCay a sympathetic look. Norrie hoped he would talk to Marc on the way, even though the boy was unconscious. He didn’t want his son to feel alone.

‘Come on, son, let’s do this,’ Norrie said to himself as he got into the back of the police escort car, as if he was talking to Marc. But when they pulled up on the apron at Edinburgh Airport, he could see a problem. A really serious one.

‘Is that the plane for our Marc?’

‘Aye,’ said his driver. ‘Think so.’

Norrie had imagined a transporter plane that would open up at the back and allow the ambulance to drive right in – but this was just a small light aircraft, nowhere near big enough for the equipment, Marc and the medics. It was horrifying.

‘I’d no get in that door myself. What the hell’s going on? My Marc’s dying here!’

‘Calm down. We’ll get this sorted.’

The police officers looked uncertain as they went into a huddle with the ambulance crew on the tarmac. Norrie listened with the window of the police car wound down then called his oldest child, Leasa, on his mobile. ‘They’re saying the plane’s too small, hen.’

He was beginning to panic now. The one per cent chance of survival he had grabbed so thankfully and desperately was vanishing. ‘They’ve got tae take us by road. No, I don’t understand it either.’

Norrie remembers being told there was only enough battery power in the ambulance to keep the life-saving machines in the back going without a recharge for another two hours. The Freeman Hospital in Newcastle was at least two and a half hours away by the usual route, down the A1 through Berwick, Seahouses and Alnwick and into the city from the north. There was not enough time, even at night. This was hopeless, but the driver had a plan. They could go a more direct way, cross-country down the A68, shaving off miles. This might be a rollercoaster ride over the border hills, but if the police car went ahead to clear the way they hoped to drive smoothly enough to keep from hurting Marc. They might just make it before the power in the medical systems began to run out, or at least get near enough to transfer the patient if a Newcastle ambulance came up to meet them. Marc might not be able to survive the vibrations of a high-speed cross-country race for more than 100 miles, but then he might also have a heart attack here at the airport. There was no alternative. This was his only chance.

‘Okay, son, here we go,’ said Norrie aloud, looking back at the ambulance through the rear window of the police car as it led the way out of the airport. ‘Hold on tight!’