Acid Row
Page 8
The man looked unhealthily pale in the gloom of the hallway, where his face hung like a moon in the shadows. Unwilling to catch his eye, she looked down the corridor and was therefore unconscious of the way he assessed her. He thought her as small and slim as a prepubescent girl, and shrank against the door in a desperate attempt to avoid contact. Why had they sent a woman? She stood with her back to him, waiting for directions, but he was tongue-tied by the narrowness of her hips and the glossy plait that hung between her shoulder blades. It would be easy to mistake her for a child if it weren’t for the confident way she carried herself or the adult expression in her eyes when she turned on him impatiently and asked him to lead the way.
‘You’re new patients,’ she reminded him. ‘I don’t know which room your father’s in.’
He opened a door to the right, where the curtains were drawn and a table lamp offered scant illumination. The atmosphere was fetid with body odour from the elderly, overweight man who lay gasping for breath on a sofa, his constricted throat wheezing with the effort to draw in air, frightened eyes bulging from his head through fear that each breath would be his last. Oh, good grief! thought Sophie impatiently. Was the son subnormal? Or a father-killer? God knows, it didn’t take Einstein to work out that asking an asthmatic to breathe in an oven was a bad idea.
She squatted beside the sofa. ‘I’m here to help you, Mr Hollis,’ she said encouragingly, placing her case on the floor and releasing the catches. ‘My name’s Dr Sophie Morrison. You’re going to be fine.’ She spoke to ease his fear and inject a sense of normality into an abnormal situation, then gestured briskly to the son to pull back the curtains. ‘I need more light, Mr Hollis, and perhaps you could open the windows to let in some fresh air.’
The father raised an anguished hand in protest.
‘He doesn’t like people looking in,’ said the son, switching on the overhead lamp. ‘That’s what started this attack . . . seeing a face at the window.’ He spoke hesitantly as if unsure how much information to impart. ‘He has an inhaler,’ he told the doctor, pointing to a blue plastic tube in his father’s fist, ‘but it’s worse than useless when he’s in this kind of state. He can’t hold his breath long enough for the drugs to take effect.’ He could smell the scent of her skin over the stench of his unwashed father. Apricots, he thought.
‘How long’s it been going on?’ asked Sophie, touching the old man’s face. Despite the heat in the room, the skin felt clammy and cold, and she knelt beside the sofa, reaching into her case for her stethoscope.
‘An hour on and off. He was beginning to calm down till the children started shouting—’ He broke off.
‘Has he complained of pains in his chest or left arm?’
‘No.’
‘When did he last use the inhaler?’
‘When he was calmer. Thirty minutes, I’d guess.’
‘Any other medication? Sedatives? Tranquillizers? Anti-anxiety drugs?’
He shook his head.
The old man was dressed in a loose white shirt which someone – presumably the son – had had the sense to unfasten, exposing fleshy, hairy breasts. With ironic thoughts about inappropriate touching, Sophie released the waistband of his trousers to make space for his diaphragm, then placed the stethoscope among the curls on his chest. It was like listening for a heartbeat beside a pneumatic drill. All she could hear were the grating rasps in the throat. She smiled into his panic-stricken eyes. ‘What’s his Christian name?’
‘Franek. He’s Polish.’
‘Does he understand English?’
‘Yes.’
She placed both hands on the man’s jawline and gently massaged behind the neck, breathing deeply through her nose and encouraging Franek to do the same. She spoke softly while she did it, calling him by name, soothing fears, instilling trust, and slowly but perceptibly the frantic, hyperventilated breaths began to lengthen and a calmer pattern prevailed. It was a piece of pantomime, a learnt technique to relax a patient, but a drop of water slid from Mr Hollis’s right eye as if kindness were a rarity in his life.
‘He won’t do that for me,’ said his son bitterly. ‘All he ever wants is a doctor. I suppose he doesn’t trust me enough.’
Sophie smiled at him sympathetically while she warmed the stethoscope’s chest piece between her hands then placed it over the old man’s heart. She listened with relief to the steadying beat then rested against her heels. ‘It’s not that he doesn’t trust you,’ she said, watching her patient drift into exhausted sleep like a toddler after a tantrum, ‘just that he knows doctors have alternative remedies if relaxation fails.’ She folded her stethoscope and packed it away in her case. ‘Does he often have attacks like that?’
‘Once in a while. Normally he can control his asthma with the inhaler but when he starts to panic—’ He gave a helpless shrug. ‘That’s when I have to call a doctor.’
‘You said it was a face at the window that brought it on,’ she reminded him. ‘Why? Is he worried about being burgled?’
There was a small hesitation before he ducked his head in a nod.
Sophie pushed herself to her feet and took a surreptitious glance at her watch. She needed to be home by 3.30 if she had a realistic chance of meeting Bob in London by six. ‘Have you been burgled before?’
‘No, but he’s frightened of shadows. It’s a rough area.’
There was no arguing with that, thought Sophie wryly. Even her beat-up old car was a target when she wasn’t in it. In daylight hours, she parked outside the homes of her elderly ‘Friendship Calling’ women patients in the hope that they were nosy enough to stand by their windows to see whom she was visiting and watch over her car at the same time. Today’s guardian was Mrs Carthew – mild dementia and rheumatoid arthritis – although Humbert Street, usually lined with bolshy adolescents, had been strangely quiet today and she’d been sorely tempted to park outside the Hollises’ front door. Only the caution of experience had stopped her.
‘Is there a place we can talk without disturbing him?’ she asked, reaching for her case. ‘I’ll write a prescription for a mild sedative to help him through the weekend, but I suggest you bring him to the surgery on Monday so we can go through his medication. Also I can teach him some breathing techniques that might help.’
The son looked resigned, as though he’d heard it all before. ‘There’s the kitchen.’
She followed him down the corridor and sat herself at the table. ‘How long have you lived here?’ she asked, opening her case again and taking out her prescription pad.
‘Two weeks.’
‘Where were you before?’
‘Portisfield,’ he said reluctantly.
Sophie was immediately curious. ‘Did you know this poor little kid who’s gone missing – Amy Biddulph? It’s been on the news all day. I think they said she lived in Allenby Road.’
‘No.’ He had an Adam’s apple which leapt uncontrollably about his throat. ‘We were in Callum Road . . . about half a mile away.’
‘Some parents are so irresponsible,’ said Sophie unsympathetically as she filled in the prescription. ‘According to the radio, she vanished yesterday morning but the police weren’t alerted until the mother got home. It makes me mad. Who’d allow a ten-year-old to wander the streets these days?’
There was a beat of silence. ‘Her father was on the television earlier. He was in tears, begging whoever has Amy to let her go.’ The Adam’s apple made another violent lurch. ‘It’s not always the parents’ fault,’ he said in a rush. ‘There’s no way you can control every minute of a child’s day.’
He sounded as if he knew what he was talking about and Sophie wondered if he had children of his own. If so, where were they? ‘What made you move to Bassindale?’
Another hesitation. ‘We were getting on each other’s nerves in Portisfield and the council said we could have more room if we agreed to move here.’
‘You’re lucky not to have been given a maisonette. They’re awful.’
&nbs
p; His eyes roamed towards the window. ‘We said we wouldn’t come if it was likely to be smaller. But this is all right.’
She only half-believed him. The tone of his voice suggested nothing about the place was ‘all right’. Certainly, Bassindale wasn’t the sort of estate that anyone moved into voluntarily. ‘I’m sorry,’ she murmured with genuine sympathy. ‘Adult men rate low on the housing list. I suppose you were ousted for a family with school-age kids?’
He was grateful for her naivety. ‘Something like that.’
‘Then I’m not surprised your father has panic attacks. It can’t be easy for either of you.’
Her kindness unsettled him. ‘It’s not all bad,’ he said defensively. ‘At least we have a garden here.’
She nodded, studying him properly for the first time. He was one of those nondescript people who lack anything out of the ordinary for the eye to seize upon – except the bobbing Adam’s apple – and she wondered if she’d recognize him again if she met him in the street. Even his hair lacked colour, a faded ginger which bore no resemblance to the thickly sprouting tarry curls that covered his father. ‘What’s your name?’ she asked.
‘Nicholas.’
She gave him a friendly smile. ‘I was expecting something Polish.’
‘I was christened Milosz.’
‘Is that Polish for Nicholas?’
He nodded.
‘So where does Hollis come from?’
‘My mother. It was her maiden name.’ He spoke curtly, as if he found her curiosity intrusive, and Sophie was left to wonder why he and his father eschewed a Polish surname in favour of an English one. Easier for people like her to pronounce, perhaps?
She tore off the prescription and handed it to him, advising him to leave his father to sleep as long as possible. ‘If you can persuade him to have some windows open, it’ll help,’ she said. ‘Fresh air will do him more good than that oven he’s in at the moment.’ She prepared to stand up. ‘When he wakes, you might think about moving him to a back room.’
He glanced at the prescription, then placed it on the table. ‘Don’t you have drugs in your case?’
‘We never bring them into Acid Row. We’d be jumped every time we opened our car doors.’ She watched as he darted nervous glances along the corridor. ‘What’s the matter?’ she asked.
‘Can’t you hear them?’
She listened to the sound of distant voices in the road outside. ‘It’s a bit noisy,’ she agreed, ‘but it usually is round here. The kids have nothing better to do with themselves than yell at each other, particularly on a Saturday afternoon when they start drinking at midday.’
He didn’t say anything.
‘It’s the school holidays,’ Sophie reminded him. ‘They’re bored.’
He drew breath as if to argue the point, but instead gave a dispirited shake of his head and retrieved the prescription from the table, tucking it into his trouser pocket. There was no point keeping her any longer. ‘I’ll see you out.’
She closed her case and stood up. ‘One of my colleagues will be on call throughout the evening,’ she told him, ‘but if your father has another episode then you might do better to phone for an ambulance. In normal circumstances their response time is quicker than ours. The only reason I was able to come so quickly was because I was round the corner.’ She felt sorry for him suddenly. ‘But I don’t think you’ve much to worry about. Fear’s exhausting. He’ll probably sleep through the night and by tomorrow, when the street’s quietened down, he’ll wonder what all the panic was about.’
‘I expect you’re right.’
‘If he takes a sedative before he goes to bed, I honestly don’t think you’ll have any trouble,’ she assured him, leading the way from the room. She checked her watch again. ‘The chemist in Trinity Street stays open till six o’clock so you’ve plenty of time to get there before it closes.’ With an impulsive gesture she stopped before the front door to offer her hand in farewell.
It was like a little bird alighting in his palm and Nicholas stared at it with a strange fascination. He wanted to hold on to it, fill his nostrils with the scent of someone clean, but his hand trembled under hers and he pulled it away. ‘Thank you for coming, Dr Morrison,’ he said, reaching past her to open the door.
There was a moment, Sophie always thought afterwards, when she could have walked out of that house as innocent and undamaged as when she went in. But the time for thinking was so brief – a heartbeat to make a decision that she didn’t know she needed to make. A fraction of silence as the door opened, when she should have walked out but didn’t – because a patient’s son said thank you and she paused to smile at him.
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Police Message to all stations
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EMERGENCY LINES AT FULL CAPACITY
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28.07.01
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14.35
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Bassindale Estate
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EXTREME URGENCY
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Anonymous call – mobile telephone – reports 200+ crowd entering Humbert Street
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Armed with stones & bottles
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Possibly Molotov cocktails
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NO ACCESS
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SITUATION OUT OF CONTROL
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EMERGENCY LINES AT FULL CAPACITY
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28.07.01
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14.37
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Police helicopter airborne
Ten
Saturday 28 July 2001
23 Humbert Street, Bassindale Estate
THERE WAS NO preparing for what happened next. No defence against the blast of sound that beat against them like a tidal wave as a hundred throats let out a howl of triumph. No protection from the sharp-edged flint that scythed through the air and sliced the skin on Sophie’s right arm. It was so unexpected, so shocking, that her automatic reaction was to slam the door and lock herself inside a prison.
She could hear herself swearing but the words were drowned by a hail of stones which thundered against the wooden panels and sent her into a scrambling crouch as she backed away from the danger. She saw the door shiver under the assault and shouted at Nicholas to run. He stared at her, his mouth working as if he were trying to say something. For an awful moment she thought he was going to pass out before instinct kicked in and he scurried crabwise towards her. They evinced the most visceral reflexes, hunching their bodies like animals, reducing themselves as targets, heads down, facing the predator beyond the door. Even if either of them had had time to rationalize what was happening, the sound of the fusillade beat against their ears and numbed intelligence.
Sophie looked to the open doorway of the sitting-room as sanctuary, failing to recognize that the windowless corridor was a thousand times safer. With heart thudding, she pushed herself upright and spun into the room, ready to slam the door behind Nicholas. She was aware that Franek was on his feet, she was even extending a supportive hand towards him, when the window exploded inwards and shards of glass ripped through the flimsy curtains to let in dappled streaks of sunshine. It happened in a split second of time, but she saw it with such clarity that the tableau became indelibly printed on her mind. Beautiful in the way the light pierced the room. Tragic in the inevitability of what must happen next. An old man’s murder.
She remembered it as bloody in her dreams because the terror of anticipation created a more powerful memory than the reality. But it was a false memory. Even while she was screaming a high-pitched warning – ‘Get away, get away, get away!’ – and Franek was turning to look at her, the glass daggers were falling harmlessly to the floor, their momentum absorbed by the cloth of the curtains. He must have been visible to the crowd outside because they raised their voices again and this time individual words were recognizable.
‘Animal . . . !’
‘Fucker . . . ! ’
‘Pervert . . . ! ’
Nicholas
caught him by the arm and bundled him into the corridor, calling to Sophie to close the door. ‘The kitchen,’ he told her, herding his father past the staircase. ‘There’s a phone in there.’
It was all happening too fast. Sophie’s reason clamoured that they were running into a trap, but the impetus of the frightened men swept her towards the kitchen. Franek slumped to the floor beneath the sink, shouting at his son in Polish and gesturing angrily towards Sophie. Nicholas answered in quick, rasping phrases, motioning to the old man to move away from her. He grabbed at the telephone, rattling the receiver rest for a dialling tone, then abandoned it to barricade the kitchen door with the table.
‘What are you doing?’ Her voice shook with nerves.
‘The phone’s dead.’
She gestured towards the door. ‘Yes, but I don’t understand what’s going on. Why are the people outside? Why were they shouting at your father?’
Another burst of Polish from Franek.
‘What’s he saying?’
‘That there’s no time for talking,’ said Nicholas, shifting a small microwave to the table to add some weight to the flimsy obstruction. ‘We need to make the barricade stronger.’
Franek spoke from the floor, this time in English. ‘This keeps us safe till help comes, yes?’
‘I’m not sure.’ She struggled to control her voice. ‘Why are they there? Why isn’t the phone working?’
Nicholas gave an uncertain shrug. ‘I suppose they’ve cut the line.’
‘Why?’ She reached for the receiver herself, pressed it to her ear. ‘Why would they do that?’
‘Why? Why? Why?’ said the old man from the floor. ‘You ask too many questions. Be useful. Help Milosz block the door.’