Chapter 4: Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen
.
"9-1-1, what's your emergency?"
"Uh …"
"Sir? Can you tell me what's wrong?"
" … lotta blood."
"Are you bleeding?"
"I dunno."
"All right, sir, where are you right now?"
"At home."
"What's your address?"
"It's the same as always."
"Okay, but I don't know it. Tell me, so I can send you some help."
"Oh. It's, uh, 5225 Parker Ave."
"Five two two five Parker Avenue?"
"No, fifty-two twenty-five."
Sam shook his head. He'd obviously be sending paramedics for this one. "All right. Can you tell me your phone number?"
Several second passed.
"Sir? Can you tell me your telephone number?"
"Uh … I don't think so."
"Sometimes it's written on your phone, above the dial or the keypad. Is there a number there?"
"Oh. Yeah."
Sam rolled his eyes at himself, and decided not to ask this one any more yes/no questions. "What's the number that's written there?"
"Uh, 555-5972."
Sam repeated back the number, and still wasn't sure if he had the right information. "Don't hang up, sir, please. Help is on its way, but I'd like you to stay on the line."
"All right." Click.
Shit.
Sam dispatched paramedics and a Mayfair rig to the address, and then sent law enforcement as well, since it appeared that the person might not be of sound mind, and it wasn't clear what had happened. Except that there was blood.
Sam keyed in the callback number, and the phone rang twice.
"Hello?"
"This is the 9-1-1 dispatch center. Did I just speak with you?"
There was a pause of several seconds. "Uh, maybe. I was talking on the phone, I think."
Yep. Right guy. "Let's just keep talking for a few minutes. What's your name?"
"Bill. Uh, something happened. There's a lot of blood."
"All right. Are you injured?"
Pause. "I don't know."
"Is there anyone else there with you?"
"No."
"How old are you, Bill?"
"Thirty four."
"What's your last name?"
"Schmidt."
"What's your address?"
"5225 Parker Ave."
"Is that where you are now?"
"I think so. I feel strange."
"Do you know what happened?"
A long pause—long enough that Sam thought Bill had passed out. "No. My head hurts, and there's a lot of blood."
"Bill, I want you to sit down, all right?"
"Okay. I'll just sit on the floor."
"That's fine."
"I don't feel well."
"I know. Bill, in just a minute, some firemen are going to come to your door. They're going to help you."
"Okay." There was a long pause. "I'm really dizzy."
"Bill, do you know if you had any alcohol, or drugs, or anything like that?"
"I don't think so."
"All right. Let's just talk a little more."
As he kept the fellow on the line, just making small talk, Sam thumbed through his dog-eared reverse-lookup phone book, and looked up the number the caller had given. It matched the name and address. So as long as the guy was where he thought he was, Squad 51 would get to him, any second now. He needed to keep the caller on the line, though, in case he wasn't where he thought he was.
"Bill, I want you to keep talking to me. Tell me what you see in the room you're in now."
"Just my furniture. And some stuff. And a lot of blood on the rug."
"Can you see out the window?"
"Yeah."
Damn. Yes/no question again. "What do you see out the window?"
"I dunno—I think there's something going on, because there's flashing red lights. Oh—sorry—I gotta go. There's someone at the door. Bye."
The line went dead. Sam let out a long breath, and turned his phone line off. He needed a break.
~!~!~!~
Roy pounded on the door for a second time. "Fire department!" he shouted.
"I hope we don't hafta break in," Johnny muttered. "Remember how mad that last lady was, when—"
The door swung open.
Standing in the door was a young man, his face and clothing covered in blood.
"Can I help you?" he asked.
Johnny and Roy struggled to keep their faces impassive. The man's calm, normal tone was a complete mismatch with his appearance.
As was their routine with patients with altered mental status, Roy stepped forward. "Uh, sir, it looks like you hurt yourself. You're covered with blood. Can we come in and help you out?"
"Oh. Yeah. Are you the firemen? The guy on the phone said you were coming. Come on in."
Roy and Johnny stepped into the foyer, and noted a large amount of blood at the bottom of the stairs leading up to the second floor.
"I'm Roy DeSoto, and I'm a paramedic with the fire department. What's your name?" Roy asked, as Johnny started unpacking the equipment he knew they'd need: oxygen, bandages, the biophone, an IV set.
"Bill Schmidt."
"Is this where you hurt yourself?"
"I don't know. Did I get hurt?"
"Yeah. You have a big cut on your forehead, up into your scalp."
Bill reached for his forehead, and frowned at his hand when it came away bloody.
"I don't remember anything."
"You called 9-1-1 for help, though. That's good. Why don't you sit down, right over here, and we'll take a look."
"All right. I don't feel so good."
"How are you feeling?" Roy asked.
"Uh, kind of dizzy, sick to my stomach. Tired. What happened, anyhow?"
"We don't know. What's the last thing you remember?"
Bill frowned, which turned into wincing, and his hand went to his forehead again. "I remember having dinner. I think I washed the dishes. Oh yeah—I splashed water on myself, and I had to go upstairs to change. That's it, though. I don't remember anything after that."
"Do you know what time you had dinner?"
"Uh, well, I was watching the news, so …"
"Probably six o'clock, or around there. And it's just after nine now. Any idea what you've been doing during those three hours?" Roy asked.
"No. This is really weird," Bill said. At the same time as his speech was becoming more coherent, he started to realize how odd his situation was.
Johnny stepped in with his BP cuff and stethoscope. "Bill, I'm John Gage, another paramedic. I'm just gonna get your BP and pulse, and then I'm gonna talk to a doctor on that radio phone there."
"All right." He looked at Johnny. "What in the world happened? I mean, I see all the blood, and I guess it's mine."
"We're not sure yet, Bill. Just sit quietly for a second, all right?"
Johnny inflated the cuff, and listened to the artery with his stethoscope as he let the pressure out slowly. He wrote the readings down in his notebook, and took Bill's pulse, while Roy put an oxygen mask on him and explained what he was doing as he started to bandage the wound.
Johnny went around behind Bill and Roy, and activated the biophone.
"Rampart, this is Squad 51; how do you read?"
"Loud and clear, 51. Go ahead."
"Rampart, we have a male patient, approximately thirty-five years old, conscious, alert but disoriented, and breathing. Pupils are equal and reactive. He has a six-inch laceration extending horizontally from mid-forehead, over his right ear, and into the right side of his scalp, with evidence of significant blood loss. Bleeding has slowed to an ooze at this time. The patient does not remember injuring himself, and does not remember anything from approximately the last three hours. Pulse is ninety and regular, BP is 100/70, and respirations are 20. He states he's dizzy and nauseous."
"Copy, 51. Bandage the wound, apply high-flow oxygen, start an IV with D5W, TKO, and transport."
"10-4, Rampart. Bandage, O2, IV D5W TKO, and transport. The ambulance is arriving now; ETA approximately ten minutes."
Roy started the IV, while Johnny packed up the equipment. The Mayfair attendants entered with their gurney, with Vince Howard trailing them.
"Roy, John. What's going on?"
"Howdy, Vince," said Roy. "This is Bill Schmidt. He has a pretty significant head wound, and doesn't remember how it happened."
"I see," said Vince, pulling out his notebook. "Mr. Schmidt, is it correct that you have no recollection of how you got injured?"
"Yeah. This is totally weird."
"Is anything missing from your house, as far as you know?"
"Uh, what do you mean?"
"We need to make sure this was an accident, and that you weren't assaulted and robbed."
"Uh. Geez. Should I look around?"
Roy looked at Vince and shook his head.
"No," Vince said, "we can take care of that later, when you're feeling better. For now, I'll just have a look around really fast, and let's make sure we lock up when you leave. Are these your house keys, here? If so, I'll lock up for you, and bring them to you at the hospital." Vince pointed to a bunch of keys on a table in the foyer.
"Yeah. And, uh, does someone know what happened?"
"No," Roy replied patiently. "You don't remember, and nobody else was here. All right—I'm going to help you onto the stretcher."
Roy and the attendants loaded Bill onto the gurney, and took off in the Mayfair rig.
Johnny picked up some of their medical debris, as Vince looked through the house.
"Looks normal to me, except for the blood at the bottom of the stairs, here. Though I'll need to get a statement from you, Gage, and I'll see DeSoto and the patient at Rampart."
"Sure, Vince. We didn't go beyond the foyer here—not at all. We figure you might want us to keep out of the place, once we realized the guy had no idea what happened."
"Sure looks like maybe he took a tumble down his stairs, though, doesn't it," Vince said.
"Could be." Johnny shook his head. "Man, that's a weird one. The worst thing is, he's probably never gonna remember what happened. For the rest of his life, he'll look in the mirror, and see that scar, and wonder what—"
Vince looked down at Johnny, who'd stopped what he was doing.
"What, John?"
"I just realized something. The cut was on the middle of his forehead, into the right side, but you know what? The top of his forehead, and all his hair, were bloody too. I mean, the top of his head was totally caked with coagulated blood. So he must have been lying on his back, maybe even with his head tipped back a bit, for some time."
Vince wrote the information down. He went over to the stairs, and looked carefully at the edge of each step, and the railings.
"Hey, Johnny, come look at this."
Vince shone his flashlight on the handrail. There was a screw head protruding ever so slightly from the rail, where it attached to the bracket that held it to the wall. On the screw head, there was a small piece of skin, some blood, and a few hairs.
"I'll be right back," Vince said. He went out to his car, and came back with a plastic bag and some tweezers. He removed the gory bit from the screw, and wrote something on the bag.
"Looks like maybe you found the culprit, huh?"
"Yep. If the blood type on this sample here matches your patient, I think the Sheriff will be satisfied this was an accident. Especially if there's nothing missing."
"Makes sense to me," said Johnny, as he packed up the last of their equipment. "And look here—I'm no expert, but the amount of blood here looks like it could've come from that wound over a period of some minutes. I bet he was lying right here at the bottom of the stairs, unconscious, for a few minutes."
"Could be," Vince said, nodding. "Well—I'd better get to Rampart. I'll see you there, huh? And I'll get statements from you and Roy, just in case."
"All right."
~!~!~!~
Three days later: Rampart.
"Hey, Johnny, Roy?"
"Yeah, Dix?" Roy answered.
"Remember on your last shift, you two brought in a guy with a head wound? The guy who didn't remember anything?"
"Oh, yeah! I'll never forget that one," Johnny said. "Why? How'd he turn out?"
"Oh, just fine. They admitted him for a couple days, and couldn't find anything wrong. He went home this morning, and asked me to let you guys know he was doing okay."
"Oh," Johnny said. "That's weird that he remembered us."
Dixie shook her head. "He didn't—not really. He knew someone must have helped him out. So he just said to say thanks to whoever did."
"He's entirely welcome," Roy said. "Did he ever remember anything?"
"Not a thing. But the police were satisfied that it was an accident, and not an assault. But he'll have a hole of a few hours in his life, probably forever."
"To match the hole in his head," Johnny said.
Dixie glared at him, and Roy just rolled his eyes.
"What?" Johnny said. "I'd never say that in front of a patient. You know that."
"Yeah, Junior. We know. Come on—let's get back to it."
"And hope for no more 'unknown type rescues.'"
TBC
A/N: Of course there will be more, Johnny! But not until probably the second week in January, because it's that time of year.