"Nancy Kress - Stinger" - читать интересную книгу автора (Kress Nancy)

be pretty intense. A thin, wiry brunette with large
glasses, she looked fifteen, although common sense
told him that she must be at least twenty.
тАЬWould you like a Coke?тАЭ He heard the flat vowels
of the Midwest.
тАЬThank you. Now, why donтАЩt you show me your
graphs.тАЭ
They were in three colors, each bar drawn with a
ruler. Nervously, Rachel Pafford went over the same
information sheтАЩd given Cavanaugh on the phone,
with embellishment. тАЬIn a stroke case, you only have
about three hours before several million brain cells
disintegrate. But before we can do anything, we
need to know if the stroke is ischemic, which means
itтАЩs caused by a blood clot, or hemorraghic, which
means a blood vessel burst inside the body. Because
if itтАЩs a clot, either a thrombus or an embolus, you
want to administer medicine to break it up; but if
itтАЩs a hemorrhage, the same drug will only increase
the bleeding.тАЭ
She stopped and looked at him quizzically;
Cavanaugh nodded to show he understood. On his
notepad he doodled a large blood clot fleeing from
three small bottles of medicine. He always doodled
while listening; it helped him concentrate.
тАЬSo we did CTs, and thatтАЩs how I know the clots
were all the same: cerebral thromboses. Of the nine
patients, seven died. One is in a coma and will
probably have severe permanent brain damage, and
the last one is in critical condition. Here, IтАЩve
indicated which is which, with ages, race, and home
addresses.тАЭ
She handed him a chart to match the graph.
Christ, Nurse Pafford was more organized than half
the agents heтАЩd known.
He said, тАЬDonтАЩt I remember reading somewhere
that African Americans are more susceptible to
stroke than whites?тАЭ
тАЬWell, yes. ThatтАЩs true. But not to this extent!
Anyway, I took all this data to my supervisor. She
told me it wasnтАЩt important, I was too young and
ignorant to know that cases came in unpredictable
clumps, and maybe next month itтАЩs be a bunch of
heart attacks or car crashes.тАЭ
Rachel Pafford bit her lip. Cavanaugh guessed
that the supervisorтАЩs disdain had wounded her. But
not to the point of giving up.
тАЬI went next to the director of the hospital. She
said the same thing, only in nicer words. When my
supervisor found out IтАЩd seen her, she was a real