There was a long pause. ‘Do you mean you don’t have trouble with your boyfriend,’ he asked at last, ‘or that you don’t have trouble because you don’t have a boyfriend?’
‘I don’t have trouble because I don’t have a boyfriend.’ Adele bit her lip. Why did even thinking of it cause a wave of misery to wash over her? She should be over it now after all this time.
‘I find that very hard to believe.’ He had taken his eyes from the road, albeit briefly, to stare at her in apparent amazement.
‘I don’t see why,’ she retorted.
‘I would have thought they would have been beating a path to your door—hordes of them,’ he added.
‘Hardly.’ She gave a little snort of derision. Turning her head, she gazed out of the window. They were travelling out of the town now into a heavily populated residential area.
‘So are you saying there’s no one?’ He was nothing if not persistent and, irritated, she turned back.
‘No, there isn’t—not now.’ She wasn’t sure why she added the rider and immediately wished she hadn’t. He, of course, seized upon it.
‘So there was someone, is that it?’
What was the point in denying it? Talking of it might be painful but it was no secret. ‘Yes, there was someone,’ she admitted.
‘Recently?’
‘Until six months ago.’
‘Husband? Live-in lover? Boyfriend?’ His gaze was straight now as they negotiated several bends in the road and began climbing a hill.
‘You want to know an awful lot,’ she protested.
He shrugged. ‘If we’re to work closely together I think it’s important we know where we’re coming from, and that includes understanding past history.’
‘OK.’ She took a deep breath, bracing herself. ‘He was a live-in lover. We didn’t get as far as marriage or even an engagement, although I believed it was heading in that direction.’
‘What went wrong?’ There was a softer note in his voice now.
Adele hesitated, unsure how much she should be revealing, then it was her turn to shrug. What the hell did it matter? Casey didn’t know Nigel and they were never likely to meet. It was all history now, painful history, but history none the less. ‘He went home to visit his family one weekend,’ she said at last. ‘I had to work, but after he’d gone I found I could get away after all so I decided to surprise him by joining him and his family.’
‘What happened? Did you get more than you’d bargained for?’
‘You could say that.’ She pulled a face. ‘I knew they were well off, what I hadn’t realised was just how well off. We’re talking serious money here—a country estate, a London town-house, that sort of thing. The whole thing was a nightmare. It soon became obvious that his family had never even heard of me. His mother was a frightful snob who looked down her nose at me and made it perfectly plain that her son’s affections lay elsewhere.’
‘And did they?’ asked Casey curiously.
‘Yes, I think they did. There was a young woman there from another terribly rich family who seemed to think that she and Nigel—that was his name—had some longstanding arrangement.’
‘I take it you tackled him about this?’ Casey half turned towards her, raising one eyebrow, the gesture while questioning also indicating disgust at what he was hearing.
‘Of course,’ she retorted.
‘And did they—have some long-standing arrangement?’
‘Yes, it appears they did. The idea was that they would marry eventually, so merging the two families’ wealth.’
‘So what was your part in all this?’
‘To start with I suppose I was just a diversion—a bit on the side if you like,’ she added bitterly. ‘Later it got rather more serious and Nigel confessed he hadn’t known how to tell me about Lucinda Ratsey-Pemberton.’
‘Good grief, was that her name?’ Casey looked startled. ‘What happened? What did you do?’
‘Ended it immediately.’ Adele tilted her chin. ‘Chucked him out of my flat and got on with my life.’
‘Good for you.’ Casey brought the Land Rover to a halt and switched off the engine. They sat for a while in silence while Adele stared out of the windscreen with unseeing eyes as she tried desperately to quell the tide of feelings surging inside her as she relived those final days with Nigel.
‘Trouble is,’ said Casey at last, breaking the silence between them, ‘it’s never that easy, is it?’
‘What?’ Wildly she turned her head to look at him. He was staring thoughtfully at her through narrowed eyes.
‘The end of a long-term relationship. It hurts, whatever the circumstances, and in your case it must have been doubly so because you had been deceived as well.’
‘Yes,’ she gulped. ‘It did hurt—still does, if I’m honest. But I’m getting there.’
‘Good for you.’ Casey said, then he glanced out of the window. ‘After all that do you feel ready to face the Procter brood?’
‘After that I think I could face anything,’ she said shakily. Surprisingly she found she meant it. She’d hardly talked to anyone about Nigel and why they had parted, but by telling Casey, who hadn’t been in any way involved, she seemed to have released something, whether anger or pain she wasn’t quite sure. Whatever it was, it had a cathartic effect and made her feel marginally better.
As Casey began to climb out of the vehicle she found herself looking at their surroundings. While they’d been driving she’d become so caught up in her emotions that she hadn’t taken any notice of the area but now she realised that they seemed to be in the centre of a vast housing estate. Rows and rows of identical houses stretched for as far as the eye could see while the skyline was only relieved by a few blocks of bleak, high-rise flats. They had parked in front of what had obviously once been a little shopping mall but which now housed only a take-away and a betting shop, the rest of the units being boarded up.
A group of youths lolled against the railings of the mall, eyeing the Land Rover as Casey and Adele climbed out. Casey turned and looked at them. ‘Don’t even think about it,’ he said warningly.
‘All right, then, Casey?’ called one of the youths.
Adele looked quickly at Casey to see his reaction to such familiarity but he merely nodded.
‘Who’s your bird?’ said another.
‘She isn’t my bird. This is Dr Brooks.’ Casey placed great emphasis on the word ‘doctor’. ‘You’ll be seeing her around for the next year or so.’
‘Phwoar!’ The response was collective.
‘She can feel my bits any time she likes…’
‘I think I’m dying, Dr Brooks…’
‘Doctor, come and have a look at this…’
Adele was aware of only two things—the fact that her cheeks had flushed and the smile on Casey’s face as they crossed the road and approached one of the houses.
‘You’ll get used to it,’ he said. ‘They’re a rough bunch but the answer is to give as good as you get.’
‘What happens if the Land Rover is minus its wheels when we come out?’ she remarked dryly.
‘I’d have them—and they know it,’ he replied grimly. ‘Now, let’s see what delights the Procters have for us today. As you will have noticed, the houses are all the same—three-bedroomed semi-detached. The Procters only differ in that they have two houses knocked into one to accommodate them all.’
The garden resembled a scrap merchant’s yard, with the burnt-out shell of an old car and the parts of at least two motorbikes strewn around. There were skateboards, children’s scooters, a vast selection of plastic toys, a rusty barbeque, an old television set, a fridge minus its door and two wheelie-bins stuffed to overflowing with rubbish and kitchen waste. A thin, biscuit-coloured mongrel was tied to the broken stumps of what had once been a fence and on the doorstep two small children were playing with a bowl of soapy water and some empty jars. One of them looked up as Casey and Adele approached.
‘Hello,’ said Casey. ‘It’s R
obbie, isn’t it?’
‘No,’ said the child, ‘I’m Ronan.’
‘And I’m Madonna,’ said the little girl solemnly, looking up at them through a tangle of blonde hair.
‘Madonna…?’ murmured Adele.
‘I should have warned you,’ Casey began, then stopped as Ronan suddenly lifted his head and yelled at the top of his lungs.
‘Mam! Casey’s ’ere!’
A moment later Flo Procter’s awesome presence filled the doorway, a woman of vast proportions. Adele found herself wondering whether child number nine might be on the way then decided that it was too difficult to tell.
‘Casey.’ Flo, nodding curtly, addressed Casey but at the same time eyed Adele speculatively. ‘’Bout time, we’d almost given you up. Who’s this?’ she added. She made no attempt to move aside.
‘This is Dr Brooks,’ Casey explained. ‘She’s with us for a year while she completes her GP training.’
‘Student, then,’ said Flo.
‘No, not a student, Flo. Adele is a fully qualified doctor. She just needs to gain experience of what it takes to deal with the demands of being a GP.’
‘Dealing with the likes of us, you mean?’ Flo chuckled suddenly and unexpectedly.
‘Something like that, Flo,’ Casey agreed. ‘Now, are you going to let us in?’
Flo moved aside into the doorway of what was obviously a living room and Adele followed Casey into the hall, which was crammed with coats, bikes, empty bottles and wellington boots.
‘He’s in here,’ said Flo, then as first Adele, then Casey, squeezed past her into the living room she stared intently at Adele. ‘You got Irish blood in you, love?’
‘Yes, as it happens.’ Adele nodded and smiled. ‘My grandmother was Irish.’
‘I knew it.’ Flo grinned with satisfaction. ‘Well, there he is,’ she added darkly.
The living room was chaotic, with part of a fish and chip meal still in its paper wrapping on the wooden table, which was also littered with what looked like the remains of the previous evening’s meal. A huge television set blared out in one corner of the room and piles of old newspapers and magazines covered every surface.
A man was lying on the threadbare carpet, watching the television, his head supported by a couple of thick cushions. He looked up, startled, as Flo picked up the remote control and muted the sound. Catching sight of Casey and Adele, he immediately adopted an expression of intense suffering.
‘Hello, Mick,’ Casey crouched beside him. ‘What’s the problem?’
‘It’s me back again, Casey,’ whined Mick Procter. ‘It’s gone. All I did was bend over and I heard it go. Can’t move, I can’t.’
‘Right, Mick, let’s have a look at you.’ Adele watched as Casey proceeded to examine Mick. It was no easy matter as it soon became evident that the man was genuinely in a fair amount of pain and found it difficult to move.
‘Well,’ said Casey at last as he completed his examination by testing the man’s reflexes, ‘you know the drill. This isn’t the first time this disc has played up. You lie flat, so first of all let’s get rid of those cushions.’ As he spoke he eased the cushions from under Mick’s neck ‘I’ll prescribe some painkillers and a muscle relaxant. I think it’s probably also time we organised another X-ray then we’ll see about some physiotherapy.’
‘Oh, no,’ groaned Mick, ‘not that again.’
Ignoring him, Casey began scribbling out a prescription.
‘So where you living, love?’ Flo, seemingly oblivious to her husband’s predicament, turned to Adele.
‘In one of the flats at Woolverton House,’ Adele replied only after a hesitant glance at Casey. She wasn’t quite certain how much information she should divulge.
‘Oh, yes.’ Flo looked interested. ‘I knew someone who had one of those flats. Elvira Jackson—is she still there?’
It was Casey who answered, tearing off the prescription and handing it to Flo. ‘No,’ he said, ‘Elvira has moved on.’
‘Strange one, that, and no mistake.’ Flo folded the prescription and tucked it into her blouse. ‘You said you’d take a look at Mum while you’re here, Casey—she’s in the other room.’ Leaving the hapless Mick on the floor, minus his cushions and unable to reach the remote control, they all trooped through the house to a smaller room at the rear where an elderly woman sat in a corner, watching yet another television and wheezing noisily with every breath she took.
‘Hello, Maudie,’ said Casey cheerfully. ‘How are we today?’
‘Well, I don’t know how you are,’ rasped the old woman, ‘but I feel blooming awful.’
‘In that case we’d better see what we can do about it. Let’s have a listen to that chest.’ Casey took the stethoscope from his bag then passed it to Adele.
‘Me?’ she said, startled.
‘Why not? You’ve got to start somewhere,’ Casey replied, his gaze meeting hers.
Maudie looked up in sudden alarm. ‘Here, wait a minute,’ she snapped. ‘I’m not having no one practising on me.’
‘She’s not practising, Mum,’ said Flo. ‘She’s a doctor same as Casey—she’s come to help them out up at Woolverton House.’
‘But he said she had to start somewhere.’ Maudie was obviously still very suspicious and clutched at the front of her blouse with bony fingers. ‘She ain’t starting with me and that’s it and all about it.’
‘He meant she had to start getting to know people, didn’t you, Casey?’
‘That’s exactly what I meant,’ said Casey. ‘Now, come on, Maudie, be reasonable or I’ll start asking the kids how many cigarettes you’ve been smoking.’
The old lady began grumbling under her breath but at last, reluctantly, she opened her blouse and allowed Adele to listen first to her chest and then her back.
‘Took your time, didn’t you?’ she muttered as Adele finished her examination and removed the stethoscope from her ears. ‘Casey don’t take that long.’
‘Well?’ Casey looked at Adele.
‘There’s congestion and base crackles,’ Adele replied.
‘Another course of antibiotics, Maudie.’ Casey sat down on the arm of a chair took out his prescription pad for the second time since entering the Procter household. Balancing it on his knee, he began writing. ‘Are you using your inhalers, Maudie?’ he asked without looking up.
‘Course I am,’ she wheezed. ‘I wouldn’t get far without them.’
‘Right.’ Casey handed the prescription to Flo. ‘Another one for you, Flo.’
‘I’ll get Elton to pick them up,’ she said.
‘When you phoned you said something about Stevie,’ said Casey as he stood up. ‘Where is he?’
‘Don’t know.’ Flo shrugged. ‘He went out. I told him to wait. I said you wouldn’t like it.’
‘So was he better?’ Casey sounded annoyed and Adele threw him a wary glance. Casey in a good mood was one thing; Casey in a bad mood, she suspected, would be something else entirely.
‘Said he was,’ Flo replied. ‘You were probably right when you said it was too much lager last night. Mind you, he did have a terrible guts ache this morning. Rolling around he was. I tell you, what with him and Mick…’ She didn’t finish the sentence but it was pretty obvious that her sentiments towards her family were a little less than sympathetic.
A few moments later Adele found herself, together with Casey, on the pavement outside the Procters’ house.
‘Phew!’ she said.
‘What’s up?’ Casey raised one eyebrow but there was a glint of amusement in his eyes.
‘Well, I have to say that was quite an experience. But tell me,’ she said, as they made their way back to the Land Rover, ‘do all the children have pop-star names?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Casey replied in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘Flo lives in a world of pop stars—she always has done. I think they’re her consolation against the reality of her life. The eldest boy is Elvis, by the way, but he’s no longer at home.’
‘I
s he married?’ asked Adele, bracing herself to run the gauntlet of the leering youths at the shopping mall. Their numbers seemed to have swelled alarmingly, which led her to wonder if someone had been despatched to round up others in order to gawp at the new doctor.
‘No,’ said Casey. ‘He’s in prison for nicking cars.’
There were a few jibes of a suggestive but reasonably good-natured fashion from the youths but Adele was relieved to see that the Land Rover appeared to be in one piece and within minutes they were heading back to Woolverton House.
Casey was silent to start with and then suddenly and totally unexpectedly he resumed their conversation of earlier. ‘So, in view of recent events,’ he said, ‘can I assume that for the present you are off men in general?’
‘Sorry?’ Adele threw him a startled glance.
‘Well, it would be perfectly understandable if you were. Trust takes a terrific bashing in such circumstances and trust is one of those things that’s difficult to rebuild.’
‘That’s true,’ she agreed slowly.
‘So men are off your immediate agenda?’
‘Well, yes, I suppose you could say that,’ she admitted at last. She hadn’t really thought about it, but now that he put it like that, she guessed it was true. The last thing she wanted was to rush headlong into another relationship after Nigel and, yes, she supposed trust could well be the factor that would prevent her from doing so. She’d thought she’d been able to trust Nigel and it had been a shock when she’d realised he’d been lying to her from the very beginning. Turning her head, she looked at the man at her side and once again she found herself feeling annoyed with him. This time it was because of the number of questions he’d asked her, all the things he seemed to want to know about her private life, and because he seemed to have had the uncanny knack of summing things up pretty accurately.
Thoroughly irritated, she heard herself say, ‘So what about you?’
‘What about me?’ He was frowning now, a deep frown that was almost a scowl.
‘Well, it was you who said if we were to work together you thought we should know each other’s past history. I’ve told you mine…’ She trailed off, waiting for him to continue.
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