The Moment She Left

by Susan Lewis

  ‘We weren’t sure what time you’d be back,’ Pamela explained, ‘and that dear dog needs more exercise than a flimsy little thing like you can give it. So where have you been and why didn’t you take your car?’

  ‘I told you earlier I was going to see Jamie Flood,’ Rowzee replied, ‘and I get into such a flap about parking around his offices that I decided to take a taxi. What are you doing home? Aren’t you supposed to be running Bill’s campsite?’

  ‘I shan’t be taking over officially until the week after next. Meantime, I’m only going in for a few hours a day to learn the ropes. What’s that book you’re always carrying about with you?’

  Spotting it at the top of her bag, Rowzee tucked it in more tightly saying, ‘I’m making notes for a novel, if you must know.’ What a good answer and right off the top of her head! Somehow it had escaped the mental tangles it might have encountered.

  Pamela’s eyes widened. ‘What’s it about?’

  ‘I haven’t quite decided yet, but don’t worry, you’ll be heavily disguised as someone who’s never nosy or bossy or shamelessly overbearing.’

  ‘Then it’ll be based on the new me. How lovely. Does she have a sister who’s hopeless at trying to hide things, even though she thinks she’s very good at it?’

  Alarmed, Rowzee said, ‘What do you think I’m trying to hide?’

  ‘Shall we start with the fact that you’ve been to see Jilly Ansell without telling me?’

  Even more alarmed, Rowzee said, ‘How do you know?’

  ‘I ran into Julia Granger who works at the pharmacy. She saw you come in with a prescription and wanted to know if you were all right. So are you?’

  ‘You know I am.’

  ‘I know nothing of the sort. So what did Jilly say about all the headaches and dizzy spells? I hope you remembered to tell her how forgetful you can be too.’

  ‘Oh, funnily enough I forgot that.’

  ‘Ha ha.’

  ‘She said it’s normal for a woman of my age to have memory lapses and to feel a bit under the weather sometimes, but if things haven’t got better in a couple of weeks she’ll send me for tests. Does that satisfy you?’

  ‘No. I think you should be going for tests now, and I’d have told her that if I’d been with you.’

  ‘I’m sure you would, and I’m equally sure that she knows her job better than you do.’

  ‘I wouldn’t disagree, provided she’s working with all the facts. Did you fess up to getting lost when you were out with Teddy yesterday?’

  ‘I didn’t get lost. We were just having a lovely time so I decided to stay out for a bit longer.’

  She had got lost, and it had been rather worrying for a while, until she’d started recognising the landscape again and it turned out they weren’t so far from home. However, it would probably be safer to stick to the Burlingford Estate and dog-friendly beaches from now on, because no one would ever forgive her – nor would she forgive herself – if anything happened to Teddy.

  Glancing at her watch she saw that there were still ten minutes to go before her appointment, provided Mr Mervin was running to time, so she took out her notebook to try once again to find a reminder of what she needed to tell Andee. She felt certain it was about Gina and her great-grandmother being Amish, or at least she was sure it had entered her head while she and Andee were talking about that. The trouble was, they’d been in the car at the time so Rowzee hadn’t been able to jot anything down. And now here she was probably connecting the wrong dots . . . Speaking of which, she hadn’t had any before her eyes for a couple of days, which was a blessing indeed, and her headaches weren’t seeming to last as long, so maybe the steroids were properly out of the starting gate now and beginning a nice smooth run.

  Radiotherapy. Mr Mervin would undoubtedly try to persuade her to have it, but once she explained about Sean, and how Norma wouldn’t take her money unless it came through a will when she’d have no choice, he might understand why she was so keen to go on her own terms. In other words, sooner rather than later.

  Suspecting Mr Mervin might not find that a very good argument, she decided to try and think of another, but there was no time now because his secretary had just told her to go in.

  ‘Ah, Rowzee,’ David Mervin greeted her warmly, getting up from his desk to come and show her to a chair. He was a tall, elegant man in his early fifties with a shock of silvery hair and the kind of laughing blue eyes she wouldn’t have expected of someone with such a serious job. However, she always felt welcome and safe when she was with him, which was what counted. Such a shame he couldn’t operate on her. She was sure if anyone could make a success of it he could. ‘I hope I didn’t keep you waiting too long,’ he smiled as she sat down.

  ‘Oh no,’ she assured him, ‘my early arrival is just a measure of how keen I am to see you.’

  Laughing, he returned to his chair and folded his hands on the blotter as he looked at her. ‘So how are you?’ he asked, sounding as though he really wanted to know. Well, she supposed he did, after all it was the point of her being here.

  ‘You mean apart from fed up about being on my way upstairs?’ she joked. ‘I’d say I’m not too bad. How are you?’ Funnily enough she’d really like to know. It would be quite interesting to find out whether he was married and had a family; what sort of things he enjoyed when he wasn’t being a top surgeon.

  However, he seemed to be having none of it, because after a brief ‘Very well thank you,’ he swiftly moved on. ‘Jilly Ansell tells me that you are in touch with Dignitas, and that you would like me to provide the necessary medical proof that you are an acceptable candidate.’

  ‘If you don’t mind. That would be very kind of you.’

  He nodded thoughtfully. ‘Jilly also tells me that you haven’t discussed this decision with your family.’

  Feeling herself colour, she said, ‘That’s correct. They would only try to stop me from doing it, so I’ve decided it’s best to make it a fait accompli.’

  Sitting back in his chair, he made a bony steeple with his fingers. ‘Everything I hear about you, Rowzee, tells me that you’re a very loving and considerate woman. I also know how courageous you are.’

  Courageous enough to die, that was right, except she was terrified really, especially of doing it alone, but it was the only way, and she mustn’t cry or he’d think she was weakening.

  ‘I understand,’ he continued, ‘that it takes an enormous amount of courage to carry through the decision you’ve made, and I believe you have that courage. Yet you don’t seem able to find it to share the decision with your loved ones.’

  Startled that he should see it that way, she tried to think how to correct him, but wasn’t sure that she could given that he might have a point. ‘I told you,’ she said, ‘they’ll try to stop me and I don’t want to be a burden to them. It’s not fair on them or me.’

  ‘But don’t you think they should be allowed to speak for themselves? You might find that they are willing, after some discussion, to respect your wishes.’

  She was suddenly finding it very hard indeed to hold back the tears. It was the thought of Pamela and Graeme being with her, holding her hands and saying a final goodbye. She couldn’t bear the idea of not seeing them again.

  Attempting to gather herself with the reminder that Victor and Edward would be waiting for her, she accepted a tissue from Mr Mervin as she said, ‘If they do respect my wishes they’ll want to come with me to Switzerland and I’m afraid when we get there that I won’t be brave enough to leave them so it would be a wasted journey and I’ll end up hating myself for putting them through it, and then we’ll all have to come home again and we won’t be any better off than we were before, but I’ll still have the tumour and before you know it I’ll start talking gibberish, or shouting at them and falling over in the street. I already have difficulty staying focused, I keep forgetting things that I know are important, and I can’t find a way to bring them back.’ Time to take a breath, Rowzee, she told herself. />
  Turning his computer terminal around, he positioned it so she could see the screen. She realised right away that she was looking at MRI scans of her brain – unless it was someone else’s and this was all a big mistake.

  Dream on, Rowzee.

  ‘As you know,’ he said, enlarging one of the images, ‘your tumour is on the left-hand side of the brain.’ Did she know that? Probably someone had told her, but if they had she’d obviously forgotten. ‘This is it.’ He was pointing to a fuzzy sort of mass that didn’t look all that bothersome to her. ‘Because it’s up against the middle cerebral artery,’ he continued, ‘there’s a grave risk of causing damage to this artery during surgery, which could trigger a major stroke. If this happens it would leave you paralysed down the right-hand side of your body and it would also affect your speech. This is the reason, together with it being a secondary cancer, that we’ve decided not to operate. However that doesn’t mean it’s untreatable. I know that’s already been explained to you, and I know you’ve started taking dexamethasone . . . How are you finding it so far?’

  ‘Yes, good, I think. I mean, I still have odd moments of not quite being myself, but the headaches aren’t as bad.’

  ‘Jilly’s told you that a course of radiotherapy will also help?’

  ‘Yes, but I don’t want to go through all that. I really don’t. Treating it is just putting off the inevitable, and we might as well get on with it or it’ll be too late and Dignitas won’t take me.’

  Swivelling his computer back to its original position, he regarded her steadily before finally saying, ‘It might come as a surprise to you to hear me say this, but I’m afraid I’m not at all convinced that you’ve thought this through. Being the kind of person you are I’d have expected you to be out there fighting while you can for the right to die, not running straight to it without a thought for those you love.’

  Her face fell. ‘But I do think about them,’ she protested, appalled that he could think she hadn’t. ‘They’re the reason . . .’

  ‘Yes, I understand that you don’t want to be a burden . . .’

  ‘They have their own lives. I don’t want them to put everything on hold for me.’ Should she tell him about Sean and Norma now, and how eager she was for Norma to have some proper backup, and for young Jason to go to uni, or find himself a good apprenticeship? The sooner she was dead, the sooner they’d inherit, and they couldn’t argue with an inheritance, could they?

  ‘Rowzee, don’t you see that you’re playing straight into the hands of those who don’t believe in the right to die? One of their biggest fears, and it’s justified, is that people will feel obliged to go before their time . . .’

  ‘But it’s not before my time. The tumour proves that. You said yourself that it’s inoperable, so that means I’m going to die.’

  ‘But not for at least another six months provided you have the radiotherapy, and is that so very long to ask your family to take care of you when you know in your heart that they’ll want to do everything possible to make the time you have left as special as they can?’

  Rowzee was staring at him, dumbfounded. She only had six months to live? She’d assumed, based on heaven only knew what, that she was going to fumble on for a year or two at least, getting progressively more dependent and annoying and smelly and disgusting . . . If she only had six months, did that mean she was heading for that dreadful state as soon as the next week or two? She needed to ask.

  ‘I shouldn’t think for one minute that you’ll be incapacitated by the end of the month,’ he replied gently. ‘In fact there’s nothing to say that you’ll become incapacitated at all. If you’ll just let us treat you . . .’

  She wasn’t listening; she was shaking her head, trying to catch up with the thoughts that seemed to be going off in all directions. In the end, she said, ‘You’re right, I need to think about this some more. I hadn’t realised my time was going to be so short. I guess it changes things, but I need to work out how and what’s best to be done.’ After a pause, she went on. ‘I should be doing something to help people in my position, not turning tail and running away from it. Did you already say that?’

  With a smile, he said, ‘I want you to come and see me again in a week, and I hope by then that you’ll be ready to bring someone from your family with you, so that I can explain things to them in a way that will help them and you to come to the right decision.’

  It was Monday evening when Charles drove past the Coach House where Bill and Pamela were tending some colourful urns of flowers, and carried on along the drive to Burlingford Hall. He wondered if they thought him rude for not stopping. Should he go back to say hello? Though he was in no mood to be sociable, he felt he ought, considering how long he’d known them. However, his foot remained on the accelerator, taking him on through the leafy arch of limes, over the humpback bridge and around the mermaid fountain, only moving to the brake as he reached the Hall’s front steps.

  Suddenly deciding he didn’t want to go in that way, he drove on to the back and pulled up next to Bill’s quad bike outside the garages.

  The place was as deserted as he’d expected it to be. The housekeeper was away until tomorrow, and there were no garden tours on weekdays. There was nothing, no one, to disturb him, apart from the face, the guilt that followed him wherever he went. Whether he was asleep or awake, talking to someone on the phone, attending a meeting, travelling in a taxi, or standing at a window staring at nothing, the face was there. A hideous flash of shock and terror, followed by a scream and the kind of noise that made him feel as though he was drowning.

  Going to let himself in through the kitchen, he moved quickly through to the library, poured himself a Scotch and went to open the French windows. He needed the alcohol as much as the air, and yet neither felt soothing. Nothing ever would again. He’d made such terrible choices, had done something no decent human being ever would, and no saint or God could ever forgive.

  It was as impossible for him to live with himself as it was for him to confess, yet how could he end his life without giving Gina and Lydia a reason why? What kind of man would shatter their world with an unexplained suicide? A better man, maybe, than one who’d force them to live with the truth. He should just go, and leave them in what they’d never realise was blissful ignorance. He could do it now, tonight, not here in the house, but out there in the distant reaches of the estate, the swamp in Valley Woods, invisible from the fields and from the jagged clifftop above. No one ever went there, most didn’t even know it existed, so no one would ever find him.

  How could he even be contemplating disappearing without a trace, the way Jessica Leonard had? How much did the blackmailer actually know? Would he or she come forward afterwards to tell what Charles Stamfield had done? Having no way of knowing the answer to that was what kept him alive. The dilemma was terrible and all-consuming. For his own family’s sake he couldn’t admit to what he’d done, and yet he couldn’t allow Blake Leonard and his family to carry on suffering the way they were.

  Taking out his mobile he scrolled to Andee’s number, but didn’t press to connect. There was nothing she could do to save him from this; maybe she wouldn’t even want to try.

  Andee knew very well that she had to tell the police about Gina’s Amish great-grandmother, and Charles’s blackmail situation, and she would, just as soon as she’d spoken to Charles and/or Gina. However, in spite of saying, independently of each other, that they were coming to Kesterly, she’d still not heard from either.

  Earlier in the day Leo Johnson had called to let her know that new CCTV footage had apparently come to light in London, showing Jessica going into a garage at the back of the Holland Park residence leased by Yoder. (Had anyone told Blake that, yet? She needed to check.) According to those examining the footage it wasn’t possible from the camera’s angle – apparently it was affixed to a neighbouring property – to see if there was a car in the garage, and the door had closed behind Jessica without revealing signs of anyone else being inside. H
owever, Jessica’s response as she’d walked in – clasping her hands to her face in what? Joy? Shock? Laughter? It was impossible to tell, apparently, because her back was to the camera – strongly suggested that someone was there. Whoever it was, whatever had been happening, there was still nothing to give them a link to Kim Yoder or his/her identity – unless more video turned up of a car leaving the premises that they might be able to trace.

  Putting her hands to her head, Andee tried to think what to do next. She knew she wouldn’t be hesitating at all if Charles and Gina weren’t friends, or if Gina hadn’t said on the phone that she had something to tell her.

  Getting up from her computer where the name Yoder was displayed large on the screen, she went to pour herself a glass of wine and started at the sound of the doorbell. She wasn’t expecting anyone – unless it was Gina, arrived in Kesterly at last. Had she given her this address?

  ‘Hi, it’s me,’ a voice at the other end of the entryphone told her.

  Andee’s eyes closed as she released the door, then remembering what was on her computer she returned to the sitting room to shut down the screen.

  It was early on Tuesday morning. A damp, silvery mist was rolling across the countryside turning it into a kind of Elysian paradise, Rowzee thought, as she and Teddy started out on their walk. It was hard to see much beyond twenty yards ahead, and as though sensing the need to stay close Teddy was holding on to his ball instead of urging her to throw it. However, the spotting of a deer as they crossed into the estate soon sent him hurtling off into the bushes.

  Knowing he’d give up the chase soon enough Rowzee kept going, enjoying the way sunlight was sparkling through the haze, making it seem as though the cobwebby grass was littered with diamonds. The air was still, yet invigorating, the birds were chirping merrily. She could hear a woodpecker somewhere close by, but was unable to spot it through the mist. On mornings like this she and Victor had always enjoyed getting up early for a stroll, and on a level she was finding easier to connect with now that her own life was soon to end, she could feel him with her today.