The Doctors of Downlands

by Claire Rayner

  And I agreed wholeheartedly, and thanked him, and went back to David in the waiting room.

  The next hour was misery. It took a long time for David really to understand what had happened, but when he had, he sat there beside me, leaning forwards with his elbows on his knees, interminably turning his gloves in his hands.

  “Fiona’s all right,” he kept repeating. “She’s all right. And if she can forgive me, I’ll make it up to her, somehow. We’ll get married, won’t we? Yes, we must. And we’ll get by, and one day we’ll have babies. We’ll never forget this one but we will try again, and I can only pray it will be all right for us - tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow - “

  And I sat beside him, and murmured the most encouraging words I could, while David sat and grappled with his own failings, his own problems, and made a huge and painful step towards the true maturity he had always lacked.

  About fifteen minutes before we could expect Fiona to be ready to see us, there was a small scurry of activity in the waiting room, and several patients came in. I looked up, only vaguely interested, so involved was I with my own problems, and surprised, saw Mrs Higgins and her baby. It was odd seeing her again, for ever since the night I had first seen them, I had practically forgotten the whole episode. Seeing her again made me wonder what was going on with her, and what had happened to her husband, for I’d heard no more about him either.

  David had fallen into a shallow exhausted doze, and on an impulse I got up, and went across the now busy waiting room towards Mrs Higgins. But as I moved past the crowded benches she turned - not having seen me - and went out again, the baby cradled in her arms.

  I followed her, and stood for a moment on the dark courtyard outside the entrance, straining my eyes, but she seemed to have melted into the shadows. And then I saw a movement, and heard footsteps moving away, and I shrugged and turned back to the brightly lit Casualty waiting room. She must have gone, I thought.

  But she hadn’t, for as I made my way back towards David, I heard her come in behind me, and turned back to her with as friendly a smile as I could manage.

  “Hello, Mrs Higgins! How are you? I haven’t seen you for a long time. How’s Gary?”

  “Er - he’s fine, thanks,” she said, and looked at me, and then let her glance slide away. “Fine - I just came up to get some more of his special medicine. I broke the bottle at his last feed, so I had to get some more - I’ll just pick it up, and be on my way - “

  She seemed anxious to get away from me, but I persisted. I really wanted to know what was happening with her.

  “Have - have you heard from your husband?” I asked as gently as I could. “Since - since he - er - left the hospital?” I could hardly say “ran away”, I felt.

  “No!” She said it so violently that I jumped, and that made her speak more softly. “No - I haven’t. I’ve no idea where he is. I hope he’s - I hope he’s OK, because for all his faults he’s my man, and he can’t help being the way he is - he’s ill, see? That’s why he goes on like he does. He can’t help hating women doctors, after what he’s been through, one way or another. You can’t blame him for the way he was that night - “

  “I don’t,” I said. “Of course I don’t! I realize he’s ill. That’s why I wish he’d come back to hospital and get the care he needs, instead of hiding away like this. He needs help - and the sooner he comes back to us and gets it, the sooner you can all be happy together again. If you do see him - “

  And I spoke very deliberately, for I was sure, from her nervous manner, and the violence of the way she had denied seeing him during the past months, that she knew exactly where he was.

  “If you do see him, or hear from him, try to get him to come for treatment. I promise I won’t be part of it - he can see Dr Lester, and Dr Lester will make sure to send him to a man specialist, I’m certain - and everyone will be on his side. I am - we all are, really we are - “

  She looked at me very intently, shifting the baby from one arm to the other, and opened her mouth to speak, but just then a nurse came across to me.

  “Dr Fenwick?” she said. “You can see Miss Matheson, now, if you’ll come with me - “

  Immediately, all thoughts of the Higgins family and their problems evaporated, and with a swift smile and a pat on the shoulder I turned away from Mrs Higgins, and went across to rouse David.

  Together we went into the lift, and up to the ward, and I held David’s hand very tightly as we went, for he was pale and sweating with anxiety.

  The nurse took us to a single-bedded side ward, alongside the gynaecological ward, and I walked in in front of David.

  Fiona was lying flat, her face almost as pale as the pillow against which she was lying. She was staring up at the bottle of blood dangling from a stand at the head of the bed, but she turned her head as I stood beside her, and looked at me.

  “Hello, Phillipa,” she whispered. “You’ve heard, I suppose? I - won’t have to bother you any more.”

  My eyes filled with tears. She looked so very young and frail lying there, and I hated myself for letting this happen to her.

  “I’m sorry,” I said simply. “I - I’m truly sorry, Fiona. I wish with all my heart it hadn’t happened.”

  She raised her eyebrows in an oddly dismissive sort of way.

  “No point in apologies, is there?” and then she managed a smile, a weak smile that almost broke my heart. “I guess it just wasn’t meant, hmm?”

  And then her face changed, as her eyes moved so that she was staring over my shoulder. David was standing there, his face ghastly as he looked down at her.

  For one brief moment, I thought she was going to turn her head away from him, and refuse to look at him, but then David spoke - and said the only thing that could have made Fiona even consider speaking to him.

  “I love you, Fiona. Very much. I thought you were going to die, and I wanted to die too. Tell me you still love me - “

  I stepped back, slipped away, leaving them to stare at each other. I had no place in this room any more, no place at all. These two would have to sort things out for themselves, have to come to terms with their feelings for each other, learn to face the tragedy in their lives in their own way. They had somehow to find a way through the unhappiness of the past weeks, find a new strength in each other.

  The last thing I saw as I closed the door gently behind me was Fiona’s hand as she lifted it from the bed, and David’s as he reached down and took it in both of his.

  “They’ll be all right,” I whispered to the closed door. “They’ll be just fine - “ and moved wearily away towards the lift to go back to Casualty and wait there for David.

  But when I got there, the clerk at the reception desk beckoned me over.

  “There’s a call for you, Dr Fenwick, from the telephone exchange. You can call them back from here, if you like - “ and she indicated the telephone beside her.

  The telephone supervisor sounded very self-important as she delivered her message, and I listened to her thin voice come clacking from the earpiece with a sinking heart. I was desperately tired and the thought of coping with work right now made me feel even more exhausted.

  “Langham’s Farm, Doctor. Do you know it? About three miles along the lane that runs off the main road to Besterrick. It’s a bit of a rough road but there hasn’t been much rain lately so you should get through all right.”

  “What’s the trouble there?”

  “Ooh, I’ve no idea,” she said. “There was this man who called - I picked up the call here of course, and he just said to ask Dr Fenwick to come right away, it was urgent, there’d been an accident.”

  “He asked for me by name?” I said, puzzled. “How odd - “

  “I suppose he knows you,” the girl said. “I never thought to ask his name - “

  “Oh, well, I’d better get going, I suppose,” I said wearily, “if it’s as urgent as that. Take any further calls that come in, will you? Dr Lester should get back to Downlands fairly soon - and then you can
give him any further calls that come in - “

  “He won’t,” the girl interrupted. “He called in just after you, said he’d been back to Downlands but had to go out again on a maternity call, and didn’t know when he’d be back. He said to ask you, when you called in, to hold the fort - “

  I groaned. “That’s all I needed tonight. I’m dead on my feet, and I’ve got to hold the practice on my own! Oh, well, can’t be helped - “

  I left a message for David with the casualty clerk, telling him to take a taxi back to Downlands, and that I’d find him a bed for the night when I got back.

  Though what time that will be, I thought, as I made my weary way out to the car, and started the engine, heaven only knows. It was already close on ten and there was still this emergency call to deal with, some nine miles out into the country, and anything else that might come in in the next few hours. And experience told me that when one person was on call for the whole practice, it was odds on that there would be a rush of work.

  I sighed, and shook myself, and then slipped the car into gear and swung out into the main road. The sooner I got there, I told myself philosophically, the sooner I’d get back to Downlands. And I settled down to the long drive to Langham’s Farm.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  I felt curiously unreal as the car sped through the dark leafy lanes, changing gear and turning corners, feeling the car pull as it climbed steadily, without really being aware of being at the controls. I was quite desperately tired, and when I remember I had done a very full day’s work, a day that had culminated in the highly emotional time I had spent with Fiona and David, it wasn’t really surprising.

  The road levelled out, curved gently westwards, and I turned the headlights to full beam and peered through the windscreen to see if I could spot the opening to the narrow road that led to Langham’s Farm. It couldn’t be far now -

  A rabbit ran across the road, almost under my wheels, and I swerved - and the sweep of the light showed the mouth of the lane I was looking for, almost hidden by overhanging leaves. I turned into it, and felt the engine complain as the wheels hit the very rough surface.

  It was a deeply rutted road, with widely scored peaks of dried mud that from time to time hit the underside of the car with a violence that made my whole body shudder, and as the car bucketed and rocked along, I cursed softly. Why couldn’t the farmer invest in a little macadamming for his road? I thought resentfully. Driving in these conditions is absolute hell. I hoped very sincerely that the patient, whoever she or he might be, wouldn’t need to be transported back along it. It was rough travelling for the fit, let alone the injured -

  And then I saw it. Far ahead of me, twinkling with a fitful gleam, was a light. A torch, or a lantern, I diagnosed, being waved by someone who was obviously waiting for me.

  I couldn’t see anything apart from a hulking blackness, only marginally blacker than the sky beyond, when I reached the light which was in fact a bull’s-eye lantern being slowly waved from side to side.

  Gratefully, I stopped the car, and sat for a brief moment as the silence of the summer night washed over me. But then I moved, swung my legs out of the car, and with my surgical bag in one hand peered at the dark shape in front of me.

  “Hello!” I called. “This is Dr Fenwick - you’re waiting for me?”

  “That’s right - “

  The voice was low, almost a whisper, and I had to strain my ears to hear it. The figure moved backwards, and then the voice came again.

  “This way - they’re waiting for you over this way - “

  I moved forwards gingerly, trying to see where to put my feet on the treacherous road, and said a little irritably, “Shine that light this way, will you? I can’t see a thing. I won’t be much use if I fall and break my neck - “

  Obediently, the light moved, and came and lit the ground in front of me, and I moved forwards carefully, following the jerk of the light as my guide led the way.

  The way the light led was off the road, and I paused as I found myself stepping over a narrow ditch into what seemed to be a patch of woodland.

  “Where on earth are we going?” I called. “I thought the accident had happened at Langham’s Farm?”

  “It’s up at the quarry,” the husky whisper came. “Through here - across the copse. Not far. Follow the light.”

  And the light moved away, and I was forced to follow it, but not feeling very happy about it all. If there had been a severe accident at a quarry, heaven knew what state I’d find the patient in. They should have explained more about it when they phoned, I thought angrily. Then I could have laid on a rescue team of some sort.

  “Why didn’t you say when you phoned that it was at a quarry?” I called after my leader. “I may not be able to do much to help if the accident is a bad one.”

  “Oh, you’ll be able to help all right - “

  The voice was louder now, coming back to me through the heavy twisted trees, and for a moment I thought - “I know that voice - “ But then I tripped and almost fell headlong, and swore under my breath as I felt my stockings tear against the rough bark of an outstretched branch.

  I had just about decided to quit, to turn back to the road and go back to Fenbridge to call out a rescue team, when the darkness thinned a little and I could see the sky, a thinner greyer blackness above the trees.

  We had reached a little clearing of some sort, I realized, for I could just see, now that my eyes were fully accustomed to the darkness, the trees start again a few yards away. But between those trees and me was a huge yawning blackness, and I knew we had reached the quarry.

  “Well?” I called, my voice sharpened by nervousness, for I was undoubtedly bothered by the darkness and the silence broken only by the sounds of my own breathing, and the crack of the footsteps ahead of me. “Well? Where’s the patient? What happened here? He was surely not left alone, was he?”

  “Over here,” came the voice, a husky whisper again, and the light swung invitingly.

  I moved carefully, trying to see where I was putting my feet, and then my wrist was grabbed and held in a firm clasp.

  “Over here,” the voice said again. “He’s down here. Hold on - I’ll help you down - “

  And I found myself moving down a narrow twisting path, covered with needle-sharp flints and pebbles that made my feet slide terrifyingly, for the path ran at an incredibly steep angle. I could feel rather than see the huge yawning gap before my feet where the quarry plunged away heaven knew how many hundreds of feet, and even in the darkness the thought made my head spin.

  “Step to your right,” the voice above me commanded sharply, and obediently, I did, and found my feet on a narrow flat ledge. The hand holding my wrist from above let go, and a few pebbles slithered on the path as my guide clambered up the path.

  “Hey!” I called protestingly. “Where are you going? Is this the place? Where’s the patient?”

  The voice came from directly above me now. “There isn’t any patient, Doctor. And the only one there will be is you, because that’s the only way you’ll ever be stopped from your busy bodying ways - “

  I peered upwards into the darkness, trying desperately to see the face of the man above me, but then I shrank back as something heavy slithered over the top edge of the quarry, and with a heavy roaring lurch went careering down the sloping path beside me.

  It was a lump of heavy rock, and as it went, the path seemed to fold up under its weight, sending a shower of flints and pebbles and lumps of the earth that underlay them rattling deep into the quarry. I heard the distant clunk and clatter as the rock and pebbles landed far beneath me, and shivered in sick terror as I realized just how far below me it was.

  I moved a little sideways, trying to find the path again, meaning to climb back up it, somehow. And then realized that the path had gone, that the rock that had been pushed down it effectively had destroyed what little surface it had.

  There was a peal of laughter above me, and I strained my head upwards, but all
I could see was the dark shape of the head silhouetted against the sky.

  “Who are you?” I cried. “You must be out of your mind! What sort of silly game do you think you’re playing? For heaven’s sake stop being so stupid, and pull me up, and we’ll say no more about it - “

  The man laughed again, and the light swung, as he pulled it forwards. I heard the scrape of metal as the shutter moved, and then the light suddenly splashed wide, and was directed upwards, so that it lit the face of the man who was holding it.

  I don’t think I was really surprised. I think I had suspected, ever since I had heard the voice more clearly back in the woods, the identity of the man who was sharing the darkness with me.

  It was Higgins, peering down at me above the light, and laughing again as he stared at my face.

  He stopped laughing then, quite suddenly, and begun to talk in an almost conversational tone.

  “You’ve always been fond of busy-bodying, have you? Or is it something you just do to those that hate it most - people like me?”

  “Please, let me get up,” I pleaded. “I won’t do anything about this - won’t tell anyone, I promise, if you’ll just help me up - “

  “Or is it something all you bloody women doctors do? Bad enough you set yourself up to do men’s jobs - you have to go and meddle in what’s none of your concern, shutting up better people than you are, and interfering with their wives and kids - “

  “Look!” I cried desperately. “I’ve no wish to interfere with you in the least - you’re Dr Lester’s patient, not mine! I’ve had nothing to do with you or your wife or your baby for months! There was just that one time, when your wife sent for me - and I knew nothing about what was going on! Now, look, please, be sensible. Help me up, and you have my word I’ll never meddle, as you call it, again. But this is crazy, shoving me down here - “

  “Nothing to do with them? Nothing to do with them?” His voice was suddenly high and shrill. “So you’re a liar too! I saw you, you know, saw you tonight up at the hospital there, meddling again, talking to my wife! I saw you - so don’t tell me any more of your lies! I made up my mind right then, I did, made up my mind I’d put a stop to it once and for all! If I get you shut up for good then I’ll go home and no one else’ll ever meddle with me again. Do you know what? All because of you, and the way you got me locked up in the hospital again, all because of you I’ve had to live up here at the quarry like some bloody animal! I got out of that hospital, I did - there’s no hospital’ll hold me no matter how many busy-bodying women try - and here I’ve been ever since. And I’m sick of it, do you hear me? Sick and tired - so when I saw you down there at the hospital tonight, the first chance I’ve had to see my wife in all these months, when I saw you, meddling away again, I made up my mind. It’s going to stop, do you hear me? I’ve had enough and so has everyone else. You’ve had your knife into me all this time, and I won’t stand it any longer - and now no one else’ll have to put up with you either - “