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Page 196
work along the way, like in Georgia at a lumber mill, but to tell you the truth, I don't know what he'd do there. 'Cause of the hook, Miz Cullen," he said. "I never seen a thing like that before."
"You have lived all your life in happy land, Bobby Lee." Irene Cullen had all but lost her Russian accent. Only when she grew agitated did she drop articles and speak in the cadences of her native Odessa.
"The way he talked, he sounded the way you used to when you was the school nurse," Calhoun said. "It's crazy, but all at once I remembered the way you sounded the day I blew my knee out, remember? In the Abbeville game. I just couldn't see taking him to jail. He might be off a Russian ship, asking for asylum. I hope you don't mind my bringing him here."
"You did the right thing, Bobby Lee."
The deputy looked at the wall clock. It showed 1:40. "I have to get back on my rounds," he said doubtfully. "If he worries you, I can still take him in."
"I can handle him. You go along."
"I'll look in again when I go off watch. And I'll check that telephone number."
"That will be fine, Bobby," Irene Cullen said, patting him on the shoulder. She was intrigued by the worn-down, exhausted man in the ward, muttering incoherencies in Russian. What fascinating story would he have to tell, she wondered. The sight of him brought back all the fears of her flight from Russia. Once a refugee, always a refugee.
There were no other patients at Spatha Station Hospital at the moment, and the night staff consisted of Tom, the janitor (called a maintenance engineer these days), and Clarissa Washington, a practical nurse acting as her assistant, presently sleeping in the small alcove behind the closed admission desk.
Nurse Cullen watched Deputy Calhoun depart into the storm. When his cruiser could no longer be seen from the hospital entrance, she walked back to the door of the ward, opened it, and looked in on Arkady Karmann. "For the time

 
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