The Best Of Times

by Penny Vincenzi

  “Well… he’s stable. Serious, but stable. And if he’s stable then he’s coping. But still quite ill. So what happened? Were you there?”

  “I was in the car with him,” he said. “We were going to his wedding.”

  “That was you, was it? How awful. I’m so sorry.”

  “Yes. Look, I’d better go and tell his parents. They’re in a terrible state.”

  “I’ll come and tell them if you like,” she said. “People always prefer to hear from doctors directly.”

  She went in, smiling her professional smile.

  “Hello, again. Well, the news isn’t too bad. He is seriously ill, lost a lot of blood, and the wound to his leg is quite extensive, but he is stable.”

  “Oh, thank God,” said the man. He blew his nose rather hard. “There you are, darling, what did I tell you?”

  “Can we see him?” asked Mrs. Weston.

  “Well… not yet. Sister says she’d rather you waited for another hour or so. Then you can see him, but only for a few minutes. And he may not be properly awake even then. Oh, and I should warn you, they’ve fitted his leg with an external fixator: that’s a sort of cagelike frame outside the leg, with pins going through to the bone. It may look a bit alarming, but don’t worry.”

  “We don’t mind,” said Mrs. Weston, wiping her eyes. “We don’t mind anything. We just want to see him. Thank you so much… er-”

  “Dr. King,” said Emma, smiling.

  “You don’t look old enough to be a doctor,” said Mr. Weston.

  Emma smiled at him determinedly; that was the variation of not looking like one. It usually came from older men.

  “’Fraid I am,” she said. “Anyway, I’m leaving now. I’m off duty tomorrow, but I’ll be back on Sunday and I’ll see how he is then. Try not to worry. It sounds like he should be OK.”

  “Thank you so much,” said Mrs. Weston.

  “I think I might come down with you,” said the young man, “if that’s all right. I… well, I could do with a bit of fresh air. I won’t be long,” he said to the Westons.

  “You take your time, Barney. We’re not going anywhere.”

  “What I could really do with,” he said to Emma once they were in the lift, “is a fag. I expect you think that’s terrible.”

  “Of course I don’t. I still smoke myself occasionally. When I’m out.”

  “Yeah?” He grinned at her. “Well… I plan to give up one day. Very soon.”

  “Great. Right now I should think you need one. So what happened? Or don’t you want to talk about it?”

  “I… don’t have that clear an idea,” he said. “This lorry suddenly swerved in front of us. Went right through the barrier. And we… we had a… a blowout. I think. Trying to stop. And then… well, then it’s all a bit of a blur. We finished up embedded in another car. I don’t know why I didn’t catch it as well. I… Oh, shit sorry.” His voice quavered; he dashed his hand across his eyes. “It was pretty bloody scary. The whole thing.”

  They had reached the ground floor; she ushered him to the main door; he stood leaning against the glass, taking deep breaths.

  “Look-sit down here for a bit. You’re obviously pretty shattered.”

  “Yeah. I feel a bit… sick actually. Sorry. I-”

  He bolted for some bushes, was gone for a while, came back looking shamefaced.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said, sinking down beside her on the steps. “Not very cool.”

  “Don’t be silly. I’ll get you some water; stay there.”

  When she came back, he still had his head in his hands.

  “Thanks,” he said, “you’re very kind.”

  “All part of the service.”

  “What sort of a doctor are you, then?”

  “I’m going to be a surgeon, I hope. An obstetric surgeon.”

  “Sounds very impressive. Did you see Tobes when he arrived?”

  “I did, yes, but only very briefly. It’s been a nightmare day.”

  “I bet.” He held out his hand. “Barney Fraser.”

  “Hi, Barney. Were you going to be the best man?”

  “Yup. I was.”

  “How’s the bride; how’s she coping?”

  “Pretty badly, I think,” said Barney. His tone was dismissive. “She’s too upset to come tonight, apparently.”

  “I see. Well, I’d better go. I’m quite… tired.”

  “I bet you are. Thanks so much, Dr. King.”

  “Emma, actually. Bye, then, Barney. Good luck. And… I know it’s nothing to do with me, but you should take it easy for a couple of days. You’ve had an awful shock. Don’t expect to just feel fine because it’s over.”

  Thinking about him as she drove her car out of the hospital, she reflected that he was really rather good-looking, with his spiky brown hair and sort of hazel eyes with darker flecks in them and that gorgeous smile. She wondered if he had a girlfriend; and then mentally slapped herself. Emma, you’re obsessed. You’ve got a perfectly good boyfriend of your own. Get a grip.

  ***

  Linda was just going to bed when she decided she couldn’t ignore the fact any longer that Georgia might have been caught up in the crash that had filled the evening news.

  With some reluctance and a strong feeling of dread, she called the Linley household, bracing herself for the worst.

  “Bea, I’m sorry to call so late. Linda Di-Marcello here. I wonder… if you’ve heard from Georgia.”

  “Oh, hello, Linda. Yes, she’s arrived home safely. Bit weary. And very disappointed she didn’t get the part, of course. But I’ve told her there’s always another time, and I’m sure you’d say the same. She’s asleep, but I’ll tell her you called. It’s very kind of you, thank you so much.”

  ***

  Georgia was lying under the covers, her pillow over her face to smother the sound of her weeping. It was a terrible thing she’d done: so terrible. And how was she ever going to put it right?

  Part Three. Next

  CHAPTER 14

  “Where are you going now?”

  Laura tried to keep the exasperation out of her voice, but it was difficult. Jonathan had hardly spoken to her since he had come in, just after nine the night before.

  He had walked in, white faced, his eyes dark with exhaustion, dropped his overnight bag on the hall floor, and stood there, as if he didn’t know where he was.

  “Hello,” he said rather vaguely. “Sorry to be so late.”

  “Don’t apologise, Jonathan. Come in and sit down; tell me all about it. What would you like, tea, scotch, water…?”

  “Water’d be great. Thanks, darling. But could you bring it through to the study? I really need to check my e-mails.”

  “What, now?” she said, surprise making her stupid.

  “Yes, now,” he said. “Sorry, but it’s important. I’ve been out all day and I don’t know what’s going on at the clinic-or the hospital.”

  “But I want to know all about it, what happened.”

  “Laura, I really don’t want to talk about it. Not yet, anyway. I’m all in.”

  His voice shook slightly; she told herself he had had a day of such horror that few people would be able even to imagine it, and that she must be patient.

  She took a bottle from the fridge in the kitchen, and when she walked into the study, Jonathan was sitting staring blankly out of the window. The sun was setting, a great red ball etched out of the brilliant turquoise sky.

  “Lovely sunset,” she said, setting the water down.

  “What? Thanks, darling.”

  “I said, lovely sunset.”

  “Yes, very lovely. I’ll be finished soon, Laura. I’ll come and find you, all right?”

  “All right. I’ll be in the kitchen, waiting to have supper with you.”

  “Darling, I don’t want any supper. I still feel sick.”

  “But, Jonathan, you haven’t eaten-or have you; did you get something at the hospital?”

  “What hospital?”

>   “The hospital handling the casualties.”

  “What on earth makes you think I’d go there?”

  “Well… I just thought you might. As you’d been helping the… the crash victims.”

  “Christ, no. Plenty of people to do that, once they got there.”

  “I see. Well… what have you been doing all this time then?”

  “All what time?”

  “Jonathan, it’s after nine. You called me at five, five thirty. Said the ambulances were coming. Did you stay on after that, helping there? Or were you talking to the police or something?”

  “Laura, what is this, an inquisition? I finally got under way at about seven. They had to check my car-”

  “Your car? Why?”

  “Oh, to make sure it’s mechanically sound, brakes OK and so on. Apparently it’s standard procedure these days, if you’re involved in a crash.”

  “I thought you weren’t involved?”

  “Laura, I was there, for Christ’s sake. And then the traffic was still appalling. And I gave some bloke a lift. Young chap, got caught in it all, desperate to get to London, almost in tears, missed some crucial meeting. I dropped him off in the Cromwell Road. There were a lot of people like that, lives just thrown into the air. Thanks for the water. I’ll see you later.”

  At ten thirty he was still in the study. She knocked rather nervously; he was sitting staring at his laptop screen.

  “Are you nearly through? I’d like to go to bed soon.”

  “Well, go to bed. I’ll be up later.”

  “I want to be with you. I’d rather wait.”

  “Well, I’d rather you didn’t. Laura, you just go ahead. I’ll be a while yet.”

  Finally at eleven she had gone up to bed herself, and stayed awake a long time, thinking that any moment he’d appear, saying, “Sorry, darling, sorry, sorry, sorry,” as he so often did when he knew he’d kept her waiting. But at midnight he had still not appeared and she finally fell asleep.

  And now here he was, wearing his cycling clothes, for heaven’s sake, at seven in the morning.

  “I’m going for a bike ride,” he said in answer to her question. “Try to clear my head. I’ve got my morning round to do at the clinic. I’ll see you after that.”

  “Breakfast?”

  “I still don’t feel very hungry.”

  “Jonathan, you must eat.”

  “I’m not one of the children, Laura; I can decide for myself when I need food.”

  “Oh, please yourself,” she said, allowing irritation to break through for the first time. “And don’t forget we’re going to lunch with the Edwardses.”

  “I really don’t think I could face a barbecue today,” he said. “I feel absolutely shattered, I’ve got a clinic to do, and it’s going to be bloody hot again.”

  “Well, I think you’re going to have to face it,” she said. “It’s Serena’s birthday; there are several couples going, and-”

  “If there are several couples, would it really matter if I wasn’t there?”

  “Yes, it would. She’s my best friend and she’d be very hurt. Oh, just go out on your bloody bike, Jonathan. I’ll see you later.”

  “OK,” he said, and he was gone.

  “He’s being really weird,” said Charlie. He had come down the stairs and heard most of the conversation.

  “Just a bit.” She went into the kitchen with Charlie and started doing the scrambled eggs he loved; she felt confused and upset. She needed to talk to Jonathan, needed him to tell her about it; and while they were about it, she needed to know why he had been on the M4 and not the M40. She tried to crush the notion that he was avoiding her because he didn’t want to tell her.

  ***

  Russell woke horribly early; he hurt all over. Not just his heart, which felt physically sore, but his head, his stomach, his limbs. It was as if he had been beaten up.

  He got up, walked over to the window, and opened the curtains. It was going to be another lovely day; at a little before six, the sun was shearing down through the trees; the sky was the slightly hazy blue that spoke of staying power. Russell sighed heavily and turned away; he would have looked for rain, for greyness, for cold: the weather of disappointment.

  What had happened to Mary? How could she have failed him like this? Why hadn’t she somehow got a message to him? He had told her where they would be staying: at the Dorchester, the American home away from home. Even if she hadn’t been able to send a message to him at the airport, she could have surely have rung there.

  He had arrived at the desk there breathless, convinced she had been delayed, somehow, and had gone straight there, looking round wildly in reception on his way, half expecting to see her there, small and neat and smiling; only to be told that no, so sorry, there was no message, and no one had arrived asking for him either. And he had gone up to his room and ordered a martini and then another and sat in a chair, staring at the telephone, and after a while he began to weep, as he had not since he had been a young soldier leaving England on his way home at the end of the war, sitting in the lavatory in the troop train, thinking of Mary and wondering how he was going to get through the next eighty years or whatever without her.

  And then, slowly but very surely, he started to get cross.

  Russell was a very nice person, kind, caring, and for the most part thoughtful. But he was rich and successful; and like all rich and successful people, he was spoilt. All his life, from his earliest childhood, he had had everything he wanted: the toys, the outings, the fun. And, as he grew up, the girls.

  Losing Mary had been the worst and greatest shock of his life; but once he had begun to recover from that and was returned to the world he knew, that of money and worldly success, he forgot any lessons he might have learned from her. He worked hard, to be sure, but for considerable rewards. He lived in both style and comfort-first one wife and then another ran his home and did what they were told-his children were brought up in awe of him, and his reputation as one of New York’s most generous philanthropists assured him further admiration. And now, in the senior compartment, as he called it, of a gilded life, he was rarely crossed, never criticised, and had his every demand almost instantly met.

  He was finding the present situation extremely difficult. Whatever it was that had happened to Mary, this was the twenty-first century, for heaven’s sake. Even if she was unwell, she could have rung the hotel, or got word to him somehow. Or somebody could. It showed a lack of consideration as well as courtesy. He had gone to enormous trouble to make everything perfect for her; had anticipated her every need, answered her every question in advance. He had given her all the numbers: the hotel, his mobile…

  Sorrow turned to self-pity turned to resentment turned to outrage. Mary had, not to put too fine a point on it, stood him up.

  And now the damn sun had the nerve to shine…

  ***

  “Mrs. Connell, are you all right?”

  Maeve struggled to sit up; she had been asleep on the sofa in the ITU corridor.

  A doctor was looking down at her; he had a lot of dark hair and very kind dark eyes. He looked about forty-five, possibly more; that was reassuring. Maeve felt that doctors should be old.

  Certainly well into middle age.

  “Yes, I’m fine,” she said, “thank you.”

  “I’m Dr. Pritchard. I admitted your husband last night. I’m the A and E consultant. Specialist doctors and surgeons have been looking after him, but I wanted to come and see how he was doing, say hello. And to see how you were.”

  “Never mind how I am-what about Patrick?”

  Dr. Pritchard was silent. That’s it, she thought, he’s died, he’s gone, and they’ve sent this person with his kind eyes to tell me. He was probably specially trained, maybe even chosen for those eyes…

  “He’s died, hasn’t he?” she said.

  But: “No, he’s holding on. It’s amazing, but he is. He must be very strong, Mrs. Connell.”

  “I s’pose he is, yes. I d
on’t know why; all he ever does is sit in that cab. So-”

  “But he is still dangerously ill, I’m afraid. There were abdominal and chest injuries; his spleen is ruptured; we’ve had to remove one of his kidneys and part of his large intestine. None of which is necessarily fatal. And he’d lost a lot of blood, of course, but that’s fairly easily dealt with. He also had some injury to his heart: contusions, we call them-that is, blood collecting in a sac round it-but we put a needle in and drained it.”

  “And… is he conscious?”

  “Semi. Actually, we decided to keep him asleep last night, to make sure he was stable. Lot of drugs, of course, going round his system. He has a tube in his trachea-his throat-and he’s on a ventilator; it’s doing his breathing for him.”

  “It sounds so dreadful,” she said.

  “I know. But we would hope to extubate him quite soon now-”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Turn off the anaesthetic drugs and wean him off the ventilator. Take out the tube. He’ll start to breathe on his own and wake up. And then, of course, he’ll be given plenty of painkillers. He’ll be pretty out of it for a day or two.”

  “When can I see him?”

  “Oh, fairly soon. But you have to be prepared for a shock, Mrs. Connell. His face and hands are cut, his head is swollen and a bit out of shape, and there are all these tubes coming in and out of him. Not the prettiest sight, I’m afraid. And he’ll be very confused, but he’ll want to talk; people always do.”

  “You’re very kind,” said Maeve, and meant it. People said the NHS was falling apart these days, but as far as she could see it was absolutely wonderful. Fancy a busy doctor finding the time to talk to her like this…

  ***

  Time was actually not a problem for Alex Pritchard that day. He should have been at home-he was not officially on duty-but he had come in partly to check on the condition of the more serious victims of the crash, partly to get out of the house, the lovely big Edwardian house where he and Samantha had lived for fifteen years and raised two children. He felt sad and outraged that it was to be sold, and the proceeds were to buy another more than adequate house, as far as he could see, for Sam and the children and a rather inadequate flat for him. He was to lose the children he loved so much, apart from every other weekend; he was to lose quite a large proportion of his income; he was going to be extremely lonely-and all so that Sam could pursue her own life and her new relationship. OK, he hadn’t been the greatest husband; he’d been bad tempered and difficult, and absent a lot of the time, and yes, Sam had to bear the brunt of running the house, caring for the children, going to parents’ evenings and nativity plays on her own, all that stuff; but did he really deserve this… exile? Yes, he had had an affair, albeit a brief one, born of retaliation rather than desire, and how happy for Sam that he had, for her lawyer had been able to add it to the sins of omission and absenteeism that had lost him his family.