Project Hannibal by Kathryn Hoff (good english books to read TXT) 📗

None of the mammoths had bred naturally before, they’d always segregated females in season for implanting with Anjou’s engineered mammoth embryos. Luis should be documenting this, taking notes.

But at the moment, Pearl was crashing through underbrush, determined to make Di prove his stamina before claiming his prize. And Luis was clinging to Pearl’s back for dear life.

CHAPTER 14

Mudslide

Estelle joined the dozen or so individuals running up the hill through the rain. An ugly scar marred the cliff where the dirt anchoring rocks and evergreens had given way. Below it, where the four newest houses of the village had backed onto the hillside, there were now only two. A pile of mud, rock, and fallen trees almost obscured the edge of a shingled roof that had been pushed perilously near the rushing river and terrifyingly close to the ground.

Men and women, all dirtied to a uniform brown, dug with shovels, bits of torn metal, and bare hands to clear whatever was under that roof. Even the village dogs were there, digging away.

Estelle feared there might be nothing living left to find.

One of the village women held her back. “You stay here, Doc Dupris, let others do the digging. Your turn will come when they find them.”

“Who?” Estelle demanded. “Whose houses are they?”

“Lonnie and Joan Dean. Rufus Handy.”

Sweet Jesus. Estelle shut her eyes. Rufus was a frequent patient, a tough old bird who railed against the inevitable advance of years. And Joan? She’d seen Joan just that afternoon. She had a two-year-old and her second was due within weeks.

Sera thrust the medical bag into Estelle’s hands and, without a word, joined a chain of young people piling mud and rocks onto toboggan-like cargo sleds to be hauled away by ATVs.

A shout went up. “Here’s Lonnie!”

Many hands pulled out a dazed man, coughing and sputtering. As a neighbor led him away, he cried, “Joan . . . Hannah!”

The diggers shoveled more frantically.

Estelle followed as Lonnie was led out of the rain to a neighbor’s porch. Twittering friends washed his hands and face with clean water and placed a blanket over his shoulders. His thin frame shook as he coughed, but his gaze never wavered from the drama taking place at what had been his house.

One shovelful after another, dirt and stones were dug out and tossed onto a sled to be dragged out of the way.

“Wash your mouth out, but don’t swallow,” Estelle advised. “Keep coughing.”

“Don’t you worry.” A woman Estelle thought might be a sister patted his shoulder. “They’ll find Joan and Hannah, God willing.”

Amen. “Keep him sitting up and let him lean forward when he coughs. If he needs to lie down, put him on his side or his stomach, not his back.” And hope he doesn’t get pneumonia after inhaling water and dirt.

Another shout went up. Lonnie pushed away restraining hands to stand, craning to see.

“We’ve got them!” someone called. “Both of them alive!”

Thank you, Lord. Estelle ran to where people clustered in the driving rain.

The two-year-old was crying in the arms of some cousin or auntie, her eyes wide in a filthy face. Her unh-unh-unh sobs were cries of weariness and fear, not screams of pain. She could wait.

The woman huddled in the mud was another story: half her face swollen and bloodied, lips white, the uninjured eye rolling, lid half-closed. Shock, possibly a concussion.

Her breathing seemed all right, pulse light and rapid.

A helpful neighbor held an umbrella over her. Someone tried to sit her up.

“Leave her be,” Estelle snapped. “Don’t move her further until I can see how bad she’s hurt.” She knelt in the mud. “Joan, look at me.” The eye turned her way. So far, so good. “Tell me your name.”

“Her name’s Joan,” someone volunteered.

Estelle waved him away. “Tell me your name.”

“Ju . . . Joan.” Good, able to respond verbally.

“Where are you hurt?”

Joan mumbled but her words were unintelligible. Estelle ran practiced hands over her head and neck. Just like that year in the emergency room in Chicago, except there she’d dealt with far too many gunshot wounds and DOAs.

Touching Joan’s collarbone brought a cry of pain. Limbs seemed sound otherwise. It was too noisy to listen for the fetal heartbeat, but Estelle placed her hand on Joan’s bulging belly.

No kicks, but the baby might simply be too big to squirm much. Then there was a ripple of muscle and Joan groaned.

A contraction.

“Get something to use for a stretcher,” Estelle called. “She’s in labor. We need to carry her to the clinic.”

Someone brought a sled, the kind used in winter to drag a load behind a snow machine or dog team. Guided by Estelle, the helpful neighbors rolled Joan onto her side and slipped the sled under her, using a tarp like a blanket to shield her from the rain. With neighbors walking alongside to steady her, an all-terrain vehicle slowly dragged Joan toward the clinic. Another ATV carrying Lonnie sped ahead.

Estelle paused in the rain long enough to give the child a once-over. Nothing seemed broken but she directed the aunt-or-cousin to bring her to the clinic for a more thorough exam.

She was about to follow when a hand clutched at her arm. “Doc Dupris? We found Rufus. You better come.”

Estelle followed a villager through a now-silent crowd to the scene of the disaster. Someone handed her a flashlight and directed her into a cave, barely big enough to crawl into, excavated in the pile of mud. Bits of roof and broken furniture shored up the passage, but Estelle was very aware of the weight of rock and mud overhead.

A seven-foot-high sitting room had collapsed to three feet, with portions of the ceiling now resting on the cast-iron stove. Beyond, the