by Roger Curtis
The receptionist had that prim early-twenties hauteur that could comfortably accommodate whoever approached her desk. Whether delight that the client had had the wisdom to choose Rosedale Clinic, or sympathy with an aggrieved relative whose loved-one had died unexpectedly overnight, the versatile red mouth worked independently against the same expressionless face. It was one of the drawbacks of private medicine, this hypocrisy at reception. What she had seen in embryo in the NHS flowered with vigour in this rarefied atmosphere. Why, Sarah wondered, in an abortion clinic of all places, did they have to choose a girl whose fulsome blouse-and-skirt, no-nonsense sensuality seemed only to belittle the unfortunates passing through: they for whom that decision – that wretched decision signifying the ultimate in waste – is nothing if not the renunciation of the essence of womanhood.
‘You will have the rest of the morning to relax in comfort and Mr Prandesh will examine you at twelve. If all is well the procedure is scheduled for four-thirty. There’s a room available should you wish to stay an extra night, but I’m afraid payment will be required in advance.’ She lowered her voice. ‘Please sign this form.’
No memory could match the loneliness of that cold white room. Why didn’t she bring Alfonso, to share her tears and remind her how glorious the new beginning was going to be. She would have given anything to be in a ward with other women, to see her plight in a human, not dishonourable, perspective. And they would have known about Mr Prandesh through the eternal grapevine. She, silly creature, had not even looked him up in the Medical Register. And why, in the cause of anonymity, had she thrown away the advantage her own medical qualification might have given her.
Prandesh reminded her of the barman in Irmkutz. Having examined her, he stood at the sink washing his hands, lazily resolving Chinese puzzles with his soapy fingers. He paused with towel raised to ask if the father would be visiting.
‘You can’t have a father if there’s no child.’ It was a stupid remark, but what prompted it – the identity of the foetus – was still important to her.
‘No, quite. Then – how shall we say – the person responsible for your condition.’ He smiled serenely, obviously having been here before.
‘I don’t know who it is.’
‘But you’re married, are you not, Mrs Macdonald. That’s what I was told.’
‘In a manner of speaking.’
‘And you don’t wish to know? Who this person is?’
‘I expressly forbid the retention of any sample that might make that possible.’
‘I see. Well, of course, that wish will be honoured.’
‘Thank you, Dr Prandesh.’
‘Mr Prandesh.’ Again the serene smile that he must have practised with the receptionist. ‘Until four-thirty then.’
Sarah buried her head in the pillow as the door closed. She had already begun to hate her own kind.
She woke the following morning feeling wretched. There was a nurse in uniform beside the bed with a tray in her hand.
‘It’s a good thing you’re staying another night, Mrs Macdonald. You lost a little blood yesterday so we need to build you up a bit.’
‘You did destroy it, didn’t you?’
The girl was puzzled and looked around the room for guidance. ‘Destroyed what, Mrs Macdonald?’
‘The foetus, of course.’
‘Of course, if that was your wish. Look, I’ll pull the curtains. See, the sun’s shining. If you look outside you’ll see the ducks playing on the pond. That’ll cheer you up.’
Staying away the extra day had made her apprehensive. One night allegedly spent with her mother had been a safe excuse; two offered scope for being found out. Having called a taxi, she telephoned Betty Potter.
‘Mum, you haven’t tried to contact me, have you?’
‘No dear, why?’
‘Oh, only that our phone’s been out of order. So you haven’t heard from Mark either?’
‘No. But someone called Alice rang.’
‘You know Alice is… Did she say what she wanted?’
‘No.’ There was a pause. ‘But Tom asked after you yesterday. He said he was surprised he hadn’t seen you lately. He was pleased to hear your face will be alright again.’
Sarah put the phone down. ‘Jesus Christ!’
She redirected the taxi to Putney, parked outside the front door and walked through the silent house to the terrace. The sour smell of an unsuccessful bonfire hung in the air.
Alice was sweeping leaves and loading them into a wheelbarrow. ‘Bitter isn’t it,’ she said, banging the palms of her gloves together and stamping with her boots on the flagstones. ‘Don’t let it get to your cheek, Sarah. I must say it doesn’t look too good. Come to think of it, neither do you.’
‘I’m all right, really. Mum told me you phoned.’
‘I tried you at home first. Mark said that’s where you were.’
‘Did you let him know I wasn’t?’
‘Would I do such a thing?’ Alice’s giggle was suppressed by something she seemed to have on her mind. ‘You don’t exactly look as if you’ve been enjoying yourself.’
‘I needed to get away to think. So why did you ring?’
‘I suppose I shouldn’t have. But Brian’s back and wants to see you.’ She paused, not knowing what to say next.
‘Yes, go on.’
Alice was fighting with herself now. And with something that was too difficult for her to handle, because it was too big for her to comprehend. She blurted out, ‘I don’t like what’s happening to Mark.’
‘Yes, it’s a puzzle.’
‘Is it? Sarah, while you were abroad they put him through hell.’
‘It was stressful, but he’s getting treatment now.’
‘Yes… well. The point is it hasn’t stopped, has it? I may not be as intelligent as you, Sarah, but I’m not blind. I’ve no evidence, but Brian has passed odd remarks. They saw each other regularly before you got back. I wouldn’t be surprised if he wasn’t at your place now.’
‘Because he’s concerned?’
‘They’re supposed to be friends, aren’t they?’
‘Then you’d better come with me,’ Sarah said.
Can a desperate act shed an aura of malice that persists after the event? It seemed the only way to explain how Alice and Sarah looked at one another as the car drove into the Dell.
‘I just know something’s wrong,’ Alice said. Sarah stared at her, her mouth set, not doubting.
The scene as they turned into the gate was familiar. To Sarah, it seemed only weeks had passed since her own trauma. An ambulance backed to the door and a police car – its blue light still flashing – parked a respectful distance away.
They found Brian first, sitting at the dining room table with head in hands, a policeman opposite. He looked up sharply. There was no doubting the pain of loss in his expression. ‘They think it’s an overdose. There’s nothing you can do, Sarah. It was a shock for me to find him.’
The stretcher was coming down the corridor. Mark’s face was ashen and still under the oxygen mask. She held his hand and walked with them to the ambulance. ‘It’ll be the Beckenham hospital, Miss,’ the paramedic said.
Sarah returned to Brian. ‘You found him?’
‘In the conservatory. I looked around because the car was outside.’
‘He seldom went to the conservatory.’
‘Elephants will travel to die.’
‘That’s facetious!’
‘It wasn’t intended.’
‘I feel so guilty,’ Sarah said. ‘Leaving him alone.’
‘You needn’t. I doubt whether you could have influenced him.’
‘Why not? He still had everything to live for.’
‘Perhaps he didn’t see it that way.’
; Brian rose and placed his arm around her shoulders. ‘Come. I’ll take you to the hospital.’
She struggled free, but not in an unkind way. ‘Take Alice, I’ll follow in a moment.’
Believing herself alone, Sarah went first to the conservatory. The chair by the fountain – the one in which she had so often played with Esmeralda – was still on its side where it had fallen. Beside it, fragments of a broken tumbler lay in a drying pool of spilt liquid. She dipped her finger into it and tasted alcohol. There was nothing else unusual.
‘If it’s the pills you’re looking for, Mrs Preston, we’ve already searched everywhere.’ Guthrie must have been watching her from the shadows. He was oblivious of the butterfly landing on his hair.
‘It’s a sad house, isn’t it Inspector?’
‘An unfortunate house, Mrs Preston. There could be a difference.’ He came up to her. ‘Before you go would you mind showing me where your husband kept his sleeping tablets?’
‘He didn’t take sleeping tablets.’
‘He must have, though. Mustn’t he?’
‘He used to say that he rowed himself to sleep on a river of scotch. I was never aware of anything else and I got rid of mine before I went abroad.’
Guthrie looked at her long and hard. Then he pursed his lips and sniffed. Only the twinkle in his eye showed he had exonerated her. ‘Now you’d better be after them.’
But while Guthrie went ahead, Sarah hesitated, held back by a distant memory from happier times. But Guthrie was holding the door open for her, and the moment passed.
Brian was sitting on a low wall beside the hospital steps, staring at the ground, waiting for her. From the depth of the tragedy in his face she had underestimated the strength of his relationship with her husband. His eyes seemed withdrawn into their orbits. The doves inside – how they must be fighting to escape!
‘It’s over, Sarah. He died in the ambulance. Do you want me to come with you?’
‘No… no, thank you.’
‘Shall I wait for you? Alice was too upset to stay. I sent her back with a driver.’
‘Yes, wait for me.’
When she emerged an hour later he was still there, in the same position. She doubted if he had moved.
Guthrie called later to question them both, and would leave no wiser.
‘I found him exactly as you saw him,’ Brian repeated. ‘There’s nothing more I can add.’
‘I’m grateful for your involvement in this matter, Sir.’
That night Sarah lay awake trying to decide if she had been right in sensing irony in Guthrie’s remark.
Eventually Mark’s same healing river carried her away, still not knowing.
It was a delight to find that Esmeralda had survived the winter. She alighted on Sarah’s arm, resplendent as ever, coquettishly rotating, and opening and closing her wings.
Being in here is the only treat I looked forward to, you know, when I was… well… away.’ Sarah brought her arm to Jack’s to transfer the butterfly. It clamped its wings shut, reluctant to move, then slowly obeyed. ‘It’s difficult for you all to understand, isn’t it? – why I’ve avoided my friends until now.’
Jack preferred to transfer his attention to the insect. ‘Don’t worry about it,’ he mumbled.
There was a tap on the glass and Marcus Repton’s head appeared around the door. ‘Your mother’s sent me to tell you tea is on the table. My goodness!’
‘What?’
He drew closer, searching her face. ‘That’s incredible. It looks as if your Brian’s made a rather good job of it. You really are beautiful, Sarah. I’d never really appreciated that. Somehow it was always…’
‘… hidden behind a veil of laziness, arrogance and downright bitchiness. Right?’
‘Not right!’
‘Don’t contradict the lady,’ Jack said.
‘Oh, I almost forgot,’ Marcus said. ‘Congratulations on your new appointment at the hospital.’
Sarah was content, or so she told herself. Mark, against all expectation, had left her financially secure and the severe debts she supposed had hung over him had not materialised. To her relief the for-sale sign had gone from the roadside. Her face was restored, almost, and she had a job, a proper job bringing with it interaction with real people amongst whom she was only mildly exalted. Those close to her, like Marcus and Brian, were accessible, but generally at a comfortable distance. Only Jack was nearer; but there was still that thin barrier of mutual shyness there that she considered prudent to leave intact for the moment. In a nutshell life was bland. She wondered seriously if she could live with it. At least she knew she had to try.
Funny how, positioned in this same spot on the sofa, knees in the foetal position, aimlessly staring at the ceiling, she seemed once again to be inviting the hand of providence to point a finger. In her state of do-nothingness, it took no thought to reach out to the button of the CD player, Mark’s last gift to her and not touched since he died. It didn’t matter what it was, classics or pop. She would take what came, like someone else’s juke-box choice in the pub of her teens.
She smiled to herself, hearing the first few bars. Three Coins in the Fountain. One of Mark’s. She could hear him telling her: one for me, one for you and one for good fortune. That was in happier times, when together they’d contemplated that perfect, enclosing, concealing film of water. Which even the police, with all their experience, had not thought to violate.
Alone in the house, the beat of the longcase clocks sounding louder than ever, as if driving her on, Sarah entered the conservatory and quietly closed the door. In a gloom scarcely relieved by the shifting moonlight the fountain glowed white under its dark canopy of vegetation. It was how, as a child, she had imagined a magician’s cave holding a secret for which she must find a key. She sat next to the quiet luminescent dome, which no-one had thought to turn off. She thought back to that bright and wonderful morning when she had committed herself to Mark and to this house – and to her retrieval of his ring from within the cascade. The message of his music became clear. She placed her hand horizontally into the flow and felt with her other hand deeper inside. The empty pill bottle was expected and for a moment she was inclined to leave it there. But then her fingers touched the edge of the paper wrapped around it, secured with a rubber band. She withdrew them carefully, so as not to wet the paper. The light from the dome was just sufficient to make out Mark’s message.
My dearest Sarah
If you are reading his alone, I thank God for it. Not seeing you for one last time is now my biggest hurt. I hoped and believed that we would meet last night, but you were not to be found. I wanted desperately to say goodbye. But not only that, you deserve an explanation for what I am about to do.
You have witnessed my demise since your return from Hatomi. It’s not your fault if, with your poor face – and this may not even have been the case – it has taken second place in our scheme of things. It’s become clear to me that without knowing the cause of my plight, its progress is unstoppable. And this in spite of the best medical attention – or what I have supposed it to be. Yesterday came new signs which I will not burden you with, except to say that new and horrific things are happening in my head and my vision is beginning to go. This decided me. Reason enough, I think.
I do not know what has been behind it all but I have little doubt that MF has had a hand in it. Besides yourself, only our domestic lady has had regular access to me, but that is so far-fetched as to be unbelievable. It could be in the air, or in the water – or even in my mind. Brian has been a great support but, as he says, he is not a medical man and has never been able to throw light on it. I called him to come for one last talk, but got only a recorded message. In the end I decided not to wait.
Try to be kinder to my memory than I have been to you.
Your loving
Mark
21
A well-meaning receptionist in the undertakers’ office had told Sarah that you only finally got to know someone when you saw how they were mourned. The remark was intended to be comforting. It had the opposite effect because the handful of distant relatives in the crematorium chapel only confirmed the truth of the assertion. But that much had been expected: besides herself Mark had had no real friends, unless Brian could be counted as one.
Alice was unwell, so it was only Brian approaching the chapel steps. She watched him, with his thoughts elsewhere, skipping delicately between puddles to avoid soiling the polished uppers of his fashionable black shoes. The performance smelt of clients in waiting. As he drew level they exchanged smiles that held back stacked-up thoughts best left unspoken. Sarah took his arm and led him towards the seats at the front. She counted twelve grey heads – all female and few recognised – and one young man towards the back, kneeling, his dark head bent as if in prayer. All were on the left side of the aisle; the seats on the other side were empty and unlit.
The undertakers had assured her that the priest was one who could overlook any lack of religious conviction on the part of the deceased. After two mumbled hymns, cheerless prayers and a regurgitation of the notes she had given him over coffee at Hightower the red curtains finally parted. With a click that suggested slipping into gear the coffin lurched forward into the glimpsed flames and the curtains closed. Brian looked at his watch. ‘Twenty minutes, not bad.’ She imagined him saying much the same thing to theatre staff after a particularly slick surgical procedure.
Approaching the rear of the chapel she looked again at the figure still seated there, willing him not to open old wounds by raising his face. But there was no doubt it was the Massingham driver, Pierre. She looked back at Brian for signs of recognition, but none came. On the steps outside he asked, ‘Who was that young man? He looked awfully out of place.’ ‘Probably just a business acquaintance,’ she replied. But for once it seemed better to secure the lie. ‘I really don’t know,’ she added.