Lilith
A set of temporary traffic lights gave me the first opportunity to stop. Something was badly wrong. I leaned over and pulled the duvet aside, and saw the cherry-red stain that had spread across Finn’s t-shirt since we had started the journey. I recalled Coyle’s stunt as he moved Finn into the Land Rover, and realised that it had done far more damage than I had first thought.
‘You know, sometimes stoicism is a very overrated virtue.’
Finn gave me a drunken look of puzzlement. ‘Huh?’
‘Nothing.’ I rested my forehead on the grimy steering wheel and for the first time since I’d started my rescue mission, began to fear for its success. I had naively thought that getting Finn off the island was the end of the problems, but in reality it was only the start. I guessed I still had some twenty miles to go before I reached the hospital, and the way things were going, it was going to take us until curfew to cover the next few yards.
Just before the lights changed, I saw the only break I was likely to get that day. Two hundred yards ahead, sunlight flared off the reflective stripe of a police patrol car, hiding in a nest of hawthorn and cow parsley. Before I had time to analyse the risk, I placed a hand on Finn’s shoulder. ‘Hold on,’ I warned him. The lights turned to green and I ground the stubborn gear lever into first and floored the accelerator.
We were already doing sixty by the time we streaked past the incredulous officer at the wheel of the BMW. Within seconds, the cab of the Land Rover was flooded with dancing blue light and I pulled into the verge. I jammed a frayed and filthy baseball cap on my head before I wound down the window. I could only hope I’d managed to bag myself a good one.
‘Eager to get pole position are we, miss?’ A ruddy-faced officer in his early fifties peered into the car, ready to deliver a stern telling off in a broad Yorkshire accent. Then he caught sight of Finn, slumped in a widening puddle of his own blood, and his complexion turned a whole shade lighter. ‘Oh, hell fire...’
‘I think we need your help, officer,’ I said, as calmly as I could manage.
The man’s stern facade evaporated, to be replaced with such a look of genuine concern that I could have kissed him. This was the Good One I had wished for.
‘Right, let’s just take it easy for a minute, shall we, Miss...?’
‘Masterson. Lili Masterson.’ I held my breath, waiting for the challenge, but none came. My transformation back from Lilith Bresson was complete.
‘Okay, Lili love. I’m Sergeant Eddie Newton. Call me Ed, why don’t you? Now, I’m just going to have a look at this fella of yours, see if there’s anything I can do. What happened to him?’
‘He was stabbed. Stomach and right leg. Behind his knee. About - God, I don’t know – four, five hours ago?’ I explained, rattling out the words. I saw the frown, and quickly added, ‘I only found him two hours ago. I’ve been trying to get him to Castlerigg ever since.’
‘What, the private place?’
‘Closest.’
‘Good idea. But it’s the bloomin’ bank holiday, isn’t it? Roads are full of numpties on their once-a-year run out. You’ll be having a right bugger of a job to get anywhere today.’ Sergeant Call-me-Ed walked around the car to open the passenger door. He had a lumbering stride that made him resemble a particularly friendly bear. ‘Now then, son. Let’s just see how you’re doing, shall we?’ He gave Finn’s shoulder a soft, encouraging pat.
Even in his twilight world, Finn flinched away at the contact.
‘It’s all right, sweetheart. He’s going to help us,’ I assured him. To my relief he settled again as the officer checked his pulse and looked into his unfocused eyes.
Ed finished his inspection and carefully folded the duvet back over Finn. ‘Well, someone’s done a nice job on you, haven’t they?’ He straightened up and winced as he was bitten by arthritis in his knees. ‘And us standing here nattering about it like a couple of old biddies is doing you no good at all.’
He carefully shut the car door and came to stand with me. ‘Right, Lili pet, here’s what we’re going to do. I don’t think it’s a good idea to go manhandling the lad any more than he needs, so I’m just going to nip to my car and fetch a foil blanket so we can wrap him up like a Christmas turkey, then I’ll drive ahead with the blues and twos going and make sure you get a clear run to the hospital. How does that sound?’
‘Good.’
‘I’ll just radio through and let the chaps at Castlerigg nick know what I’m up to while I’m at it...’ He began to amble back to his patrol car.
‘Oh shit,’ I whispered. For all that folksy, easy-going approach, Eddie Newton wasn’t a fool. The warmth was undoubtedly genuine, but his manner would have been honed by years of calming irate, violent customers. Some speeding, wild-eyed young woman with a stabbing victim wasn’t going to be a secret he could keep to himself, and Blaine’s ‘special’ friendship with his Chief Inspector loomed wraith-like in my mind.
As if he’d heard my thoughts, Ed stopped halfway to the BMW and smiled at me. ‘It’s all right. I’ll give ‘em just enough info to keep ‘em happy as to why their champion butty-eating desk-sergeant’s suddenly turned into Special Branch, but I’m sure everything else can be sorted between us once we’ve got the young ‘un where he needs to be, eh?’
Three months of Blaine Albermarle’s random cruelty had made me wary, and I paused, unsure of how he wanted me to react.
‘Trust me, love. It’s pretty ruddy obvious you didn’t do it, and the look on your face, I reckon something’s scaring the... well, let’s just say it’s shaken you up pretty badly, eh? Got a boy about his age, myself – our Damon. I’d kick the arse of anyone who laid a finger on him.’
As soon as he said that, I would have followed the man blindfolded.
Ed returned to the Land Rover and wrapped the foil insulating sheet around Finn as gently as if he were tucking a baby into its cot. ‘There we are, lad. Not long now.’ He looked at me across the bonnet. ‘Right, Lili – keep close. Don’t be worrying about red lights and the like, and just follow me. You reckon you can keep up in that crate?’
I mustered a smile. ‘I’ll do my best.’
*****
I slewed the Land Rover to a screeching handbrake stop in a cloud of white smoke, jamming it across two spaces in the hospital’s pick-up point and ignoring the frantic horn-blaring and gesturing of a man in a Mondeo, coming to collect his hobbling wife.
‘They have those bloody lines painted for a reason, you know!’ the driver yelled out of his window.
‘Piss off!’ I hollered back, before I could stop myself. The irate husband parked on a double yellow line and opened the door for his wife, the pair of them glaring at me all the while.
I lowered myself onto the pavement and felt my knees buckle. I had just straightened up as Ed caught up with me. ‘Nice driving, pet. Bet you would’ve enjoyed that in different circumstances, eh?’
I had just run seven red lights and even briefly managed to push the dilapidated heap up to a hundred on the straight. ‘Any other time.’
Ed placed huge hands on my shoulders, suddenly serious. ‘Look, I hate to have to do this, but I’m going to have to nip off for a while. Call just came through about some nonsense on one of the estates. Too much loopy juice and hot weather, no doubt. Bloody typical – I crawl out from behind my nice, cosy night-desk to cover for a mate with a case of Delhi belly and it all goes off. Anyhow, I can’t see your young man going anywhere for a while, so what say you if I pop back later for that chat? Just you and me, like I said.’
‘Is that a promise?’ I asked.
‘What, that I’ll be back, or it’ll be me that talks to you?’
‘Both.’
Ed surveyed my face. ‘I do my very best to be a man of my word. And most times, I manage.’ Before I could respond, he gave me a spontaneous hug that made me think even more of bears. ‘You take care of yourself, Lili. You and your fella there.’ With that he gave me a rueful smile and went off to confront his rioters, and we were alone against the world once more.
*****
Finn had not spoken since Ed had stopped us. I left him in the car and tried to appear as calm as possible as I walked into the deserted reception of Castlerigg Hospital. It was a small, genteel Victorian building, a throwback to when monied gentlefolk would pay a small fortune to attend the sanatorium, and the poor just had to suffer and find a quiet corner to drop dead. I had forgotten just how much I hated hospitals, and I did my best to breathe through my mouth; anything to avoid the universal smell of disinfectant and disease.
The minute I saw the receptionist, I knew she must have come with the fixtures and fittings. Where Ed had been the answer to my non-believer’s prayers, this woman looked like a twin-set-wearing guard dog at the gates of hell. I stepped up to the counter.
‘There is a system.’ The woman, identified as Marjorie Blandford on her neat little name badge, stapled a sheaf of papers together and didn’t look up.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘I said, there’s a system. It’s called a queue and you’ll find that that is the start of it.’ She used her stapler to indicate a roped-off area that bore the sign, Please Queue Here.
‘You’re kidding. It’s six o’clock in the effing morning. There’s no-one else here. Does it even class as a queue if there’s only one of you?’ In fact, there was a bored-looking young security guard standing by a flickering drinks machine, listening to something loud and unpleasant on his MP3 whilst he picked at the acne on his chin, but he definitely didn’t count.
‘And I am busy, and once I’ve finished, I’ll be available to help you.’ She finally glanced up and I found myself appraised by marble-hard, disapproving eyes. ‘And I’d be grateful if you didn’t swear.’
‘What? I said ‘effing,’ for f... for heaven’s sake! And it’s not for me – it’s for my friend. He’s waiting outside.’
Marjorie glared at me. ‘Well it’s obviously not serious enough to warrant a trip to a proper casualty department. If your ‘friend’ requires private treatment he’ll have to come in here and give me his details himself. And I must inform you, if he’s been drinking, we have the right to refuse -’
‘James Maxwell. I was told to bring him to see Doctor James Maxwell,’ I interrupted, finally remembering the man’s bloody name.
‘Young lady, you can’t walk in here and simply demand to see the Senior Consultant. Certainly not on a bank holiday.’ Marjorie, with her neat, salt-and-pepper bun and Stalinist’s blouse, had taken in my unkempt appearance and acted as judge and jury: I was trash, to be dealt with at arm’s length. She delivered her coup de grace. ‘And anyway, Mr Maxwell isn’t in attendance. He’s golfing all day.’
‘Oh, you have got to be bloody kidding,’ I whispered.
Marjorie had hearing like a bat. ‘I will not tell you again about your language.’
As everything began to fall apart around me, something snapped in my head. ‘For fuck’s sake, you ignorant, boot-faced old cow! There’s a man bleeding to death in my fucking car and all I want is one sodding doctor from this poxy fucking shitpile of a hospital to see to him. Is that too much to fucking well ask?’
Marjorie’s hand hovered gleefully over her panic button, but before she could press it, the security guard strode across and placed a restraining hand on my shoulder.
‘Get your fucking hands off me!’ I howled, as my right fist connected with the youth’s jaw. He staggered backwards onto a row of fixed plastic seats.
I knew for sure I was about to get arrested whilst Finn bled out over the car seat. I shut my eyes, attempted to take a centring breath, and raised my hands in a belated conciliatory gesture. ‘I’m sorry,’ I began.
‘You will be.’ The security guard rubbed at his reddening jaw and hauled himself back to his feet, ready to restore his honour.
‘Can I help you?’ More hands on me, this time clad in white sleeves, with skin another shade darker than mine. There was something calm about the soft, feminine voice that stopped me lashing out for a second time, and I let my arms relax.
Marjorie was apoplectic. ‘Doctor Chawla, that... that trollop has just verbally abused me and physically assaulted a member of staff! She has forfeited any right to treatment, and I need to call the police as laid down in departmental procedure number -’
‘It’s all right, Marjorie. I’ll deal with it.’
I turned to face my rescuer. She was no older than thirty, with warm brown eyes that were heavy with the fatigue of a long night shift. A thick, ebony plait of hair hung down her back, and she could have stepped out of a Moghul Emperor’s portrait of his true love. To my relief, she was also firmly on the side of Call-me-Ed: another good guy.
Doctor Chawla smiled at the security guard. ‘Colin? Really, I can’t imagine a strapping man like you being floored by a girl. Not with all that martial arts training you’re always telling me about.’
Colin straightened his cap and blushed. ‘Nah, I tripped, that’s all. I mean, I could’ve had her, but I reckon Marjorie’s over-reacting a bit, like. Don’t tell anyone about this, will you Doctor?’
Leaving Marjorie mouthing like a stranded goldfish, the doctor walked me away from the carnage. ‘Okay, now we’ve dealt with that little drama, I’m Sangita Chawla, and I’ll be your doctor today. So, do you want to tell me what the hell’s going on?’
I wanted to cover the woman’s face with kisses of undying gratitude, but instead I grabbed her hand and hauled her outside.
*****
Exiled from the treatment room where the sainted Doctor Chawla had taken Finn, I sat with my vest top pulled over my knees on a plastic seat that had been designed to cause as much discomfort as humanly possible. The last time I had been anywhere like this it was to identify my mother’s dead body, lying cold and pale in a side room, like a desiccated goblin. At least then I was numbed with cold relief that it was all over: now all I had to comfort me was a dog-eared 1997 Reader’s Digest.
After ten minutes I realised I had read the same story about a kitten’s miraculous escape from a house fire for the fifth time and I hadn’t understood a single word. I was exhausted and, once Sangita had extracted the information she needed from me, utterly useless.
‘Shit. Can’t even afford a coffee.’ I was patting down my pockets in the forlorn hope that I would hear the welcome clink of loose change when a noise like a thousand metal trays being dropped from a great height reverberated through the reception, and I hurtled to the door.
Doctor Chawla met me at the threshold. ‘Did you know he was scared of needles?’
*****
I was allowed inside that hallowed space pretty damn quickly then. Finn had chosen to come round just as a young nurse attempted to insert an IV line into the back of his hand and despite his prone state, had managed an effective trashing of the room simply by kicking out as hard as he could. Now he wasn’t letting anyone near him.
Sangita ushered me closer. ‘Your friend -’
‘Finn. He’s called Finn.’
‘We need to get Finn into surgery to explore that abdominal injury, and he’s probably going to need a transfusion, not to mention some decent pain relief. We can’t begin to do any of that unless he calms down. Do you think you could talk to him?’
I’ll try.’ I went to his side.
‘Lili? You’re still here?’ he asked incredulously.
‘Where else was I going to go, dumbfuck? I’m skint, covered in your blood, and very nearly under house arrest. I think a trip around the local stately home to pass the time’s out of the question.’
‘M’ glad.’ Finn’s eyes rolled in his head as he struggled to stay awake. ‘I’m shittin’ myself, Lili. Needles – I can’t do ‘em.’
‘They need to fix you, darling.’ I reached out and brushed Finn’s sweat-sodden hair away from his face.
‘I know. I know. Just... fuck, don’t go.’ He grasped my hand, gripping it so tightly that what remained of his bitten fingernails made livid crescents in my brown skin.
‘I won’t. I promise.’ I used my free hand to stroke his arm as though I were calming a scared dog. ‘Ignore everything else and just look at me, huh? It’ll be over before you know it.’ Through my fingertips I felt him begin to relax and give me the trust I had asked for. I glanced up at Sangita.
‘Thank you,’ she mouthed, and slid the cannula into the back of Finn’s rigid hand as he clung on to me like a drowning man.
After that, I was allowed to stay without argument, from when they pumped his stomach to flush out the remains of the temazepam until he was taken to the theatre anteroom. The anaesthetist commented that he had never known anyone take so much anaesthetic before they would finally let go of a hand.
*****
I would never quite remember what I did for the hours that Finn was in surgery. I had a vague recollection of re-parking the Land Rover – diving behind the wheel just before it was clamped – and wandering the corridors and gardens of the dignified old building. I even spent time in the tiny chapel, alternately admiring a stained glass window that had seen out two centuries and swearing at a God in whom I did not believe. Finally, I stretched out on three chairs outside the operating theatre and fell into a fitful sleep, blanketed only by the cloying, storm-filled air.
I was awoken by Sangita gently shaking my shoulder. ‘Lili? That’s your name, isn’t it?’ I tensed when she called me by Finn’s diminutive, but if she recognised me she hid it well.
‘Finn’s out of surgery. I’ve had a chat with the surgeon, and everything went just fine – apparently they’ve even managed to replace some of that blood that’s redecorated your car. Just watch what he drinks for the next day or so – you don’t want him leaking now, do you?’ She gave me an impish little wink and I liked her more than ever.
‘I’ll keep that in mind.’ I rubbed the sleep from my eyes.
‘He’s in recovery now. Perhaps you’d like to sit with him? It’s not strictly allowed, but he seems a lot happier if you’re within grabbing distance.’
I checked my watch: eleven thirty – still plenty of time. I stood and stretched, and followed Sangita. Finn was still out cold; a mask over his nose and mouth pushed oxygen into his lungs and a drip steadily replaced the precious fluids he needed. He looked like roadkill.
I summoned more restraint than I had ever needed in my life and allowed myself to stroke his cheek. ‘You’re a fucking liability, Strachan,’ I whispered.
Sangita stood by the doorway, giving us our space. Eventually, she asked, ‘Why don’t you sit down?’ and nodded at the chair by Finn’s bedside. I expected her to leave, but as I sat she pulled up a second chair and joined me. She took off her white coat and revealed her civvy outfit of khaki combats and a Nirvana t-shirt. For one treacherous second it felt as though I was sitting down to chat with an old friend. ‘Do you want to tell me how Finn got these injuries?’ she asked.
She had timed it beautifully. I dropped my head into my hands as the sudden urge to confess, to offload the nightmare, became enormous. It filled my mouth, my mind, even the room itself. I began to tremble with the sheer pressure of keeping the words inside.
Just five minutes was all it would take: to tell everything to this young doctor with her kind, inquisitive face; maybe five minutes more to ring the Police Station and leave a message for Call-Me-Ed, who would surely know how to deal with Blaine Albermarle and her sick, debauched kingdom. I fumbled for my inhaler and gave two blasts.
‘Lili? It’s okay, you can talk to me. There’s nothing to be scared of.’
The shaking grew worse. I glanced at Finn, whose anaesthetic-dulled eyes had now opened. He looked around the room in disorientated alarm. I managed to steady one hand enough to grasp his fingers. ‘I wouldn’t know where to start.’
‘The beginning?’ the doctor offered. ‘Lili, I can’t begin to guess what’s going on here, but whatever it is, it’s terrifying the pair of you.’
‘You’re not the first person to say that today,’ I said with a wan smile.
‘You mean someone else is as smart as me?’ Sangita leaned forward and covered my spare hand with both of hers. My breath sounded ragged and harsh in the airless room, as she continued. ‘I swear I’ll do all I can to help you - there’s so much support out there, you know? I can call people for you. There’s no shame in asking for help.’
I pulled my hand away. ‘Look, Doctor Chawla, If I screw up here, people might die. I mean really. Not some ridiculous metaphor, but really dead-and-gone. Do you understand?’
Sangita edged closer. ‘Yes. I understand perfectly.’
I felt the stinking, disinfectant-tainted air filling my lungs. Air that when exhaled would carry with it the first load of tawdry evil.
I opened my mouth to let the first word escape when the door swung open and a portly, avuncular man in a straining pinstripe suit and teddy-bear patterned bowtie strode in. ‘Doctor Chawla, according to the roster, you finished your shift over four hours ago. I suggest you go home before Castlerigg is sued for driving its housemen into the ground.’
Sangita stood in deference to our intruder. Mr Maxwell...’ she began, and I knew we were beaten.
‘If you value your position at this hospital, you will do as you are told and leave. I believe I have sufficient experience in post-operative care to ensure our patient is well tended, don’t you?’ James Maxwell, dearest friend of Blaine Albermarle, lifted Finn’s hand and took his pulse as he talked.
Sangita turned apologetically to me. ‘It looks like I’ve got to go, but I’m back here this evening. I’ll find Finn’s room and talk to you then, yeah?’
The second promise of a talk ‘later’: a million years away, for all the good it would now do. ‘Sure.’
Sangita Chawla backed out of the room with one last regretful glance at Finn and me.
Maxwell waited until the door had clicked shut then gave me a smile that chilled my soul. ‘Lilith Bresson. My, we are honoured. I believe you’re the first celebrity to grace our humble building since Queen Alexandra paid us a visit in 1908.’ He took the chair that Sangita had just vacated and crossed his legs to show off a pair of gleaming black patent leather brogues. ‘So, you’re a guest of Lady Albermarle, eh?’
I swallowed hard to get rid of the bile that flooded my mouth. ‘Guest. Interesting word.’
‘Well, from what I can gather, your position is slightly different to that of young Finn here,’ he said dismissively. ‘I was just about to tee off when I took Blaine’s call: you can tell her that if I get a speeding ticket, I shall be invoicing her directly. To be honest, I was rather surprised that her boy had ventured so far afield.’
‘It’s hardly a fucking daytrip!’ I snapped.
‘Miss Bresson, your reputation as a foul-mouthed whore precedes you, so there’s no need for you to prove it in my presence. I’ve merely come to check that things hadn’t taken any unpleasant turns, and to inform you that I’m taking personal responsibility for Finn’s care, until he makes the foolish decision to discharge himself this evening. All against his doctor’s advice, of course, but well within his rights as a patient.’
‘Oh God, look at the state of him!’ I pleaded, fighting tears. ‘Please, just let him stay one night...’
‘I want him out of my hospital, Miss Bresson,’ Maxwell hissed, and I shrank back into my chair. ‘Tonight. Lady Albermarle is one of my oldest friends, and I am not about to place her reputation under threat by allowing you to use Castlerigg as your personal forum. Now, if you can manage to keep that disgusting mouth of yours shut, he can stay here undisturbed until the anaesthetic wears off. If, however, you decide upon a repeat performance of this morning’s amateur dramatics, or think that Lady Albermarle is in the business of issuing empty threats, you’ll get a demonstration of the kind of damage I can do.’
He stood at Finn’s side and stroked the prone man’s face. ‘Your friend is in a very vulnerable position at the moment, isn’t he?’
Finn made an inaudible sound of protest and tried to move away.
‘Finn, my dear boy!’ Maxwell’s demeanour changed again and he became the charming consultant, adored by women of a certain age for his soft hands and caring manner. To me, the sudden switch made the man even more terrifying: I could see him literally getting away with murder. ‘It was something of a surprise to hear you’d be paying me a visit at the workplace, I must say. How are you feeling now? A little better, yes?’
No reply. Maxwell stooped so that his face, with its snow-white goatee and expensive pince-nez glasses, was mere inches from Finn’s. ‘Well, when you do find your tongue, I suggest you explain to Lilith here the virtue of silence.’ He strutted to the door. ‘I’ll be seeing you at Christmas, Finn – I’m sure you’ll be back on your feet by then. And Miss Bresson? It’s been an absolute pleasure.’
The door clicked shut and those hand-crafted shoes echoed down the corridor. Finn pushed his oxygen mask to one side. ‘Cunt.’
I didn’t need to ask. ‘He’s a client.’
‘Uh-huh. Saves his pocket money. Fucks me f’ two days straight. ‘Christmas treat’. Filthy bastard.’ He frowned, as if hearing his words for the first time. ‘Jesus, Lili, this isn’t a fuckin’ life, is it?’ He squeezed his eyes shut against the world and turned his face to the wall.
I pulled the orange nylon blanket over his shoulders and ran my hand over his forehead as if by doing so I could wipe away the traces of Maxwell’s corrupted touch.
‘Can I sleep now?’ he asked, already tumbling back into a drugged slumber.
‘You do that,’ I whispered. ‘Sweet dreams.’
I didn’t move until I was certain Finn was sound asleep then, afraid that if I too began to doze I would never wake up in time, I stood and stretched and caught sight of myself in the mirror above the sink. The sleek, ebony bob of the previous day now hung in lank strands around my face, and the hard glare of the strip light gave me a ghost’s pallor and illuminated the sooty shadows under my eyes. ‘God, Clarissa, you look like Chi-Chi the fucking panda.’
I said the name without thinking, and in doing so summoned up a demon. The walls closed in and the hospital’s miasma clawed at my neck and I bolted from the room, blindly hurtling along the maze of corridors until I crashed through a fire door into an overgrown quadrangle with a stagnant, slime-filled pond. I threw up the meagre contents of my stomach into a straggling, diseased rosebush.
Before I knew it, my retching transformed into desperate sobs that became great, racking howls that hurt my chest and burned my neck and made fat tears that carried the final traces of last night’s mascara in stygian streams down my face.
‘Oh duck, why don’t you come in before you drown?’
I spun around, wiping snot, tears and make-up across my face with the back of my hand. A smiling woman with a neat perm and a matter-of-fact face stood in the doorway, proffering a mug of coffee and a clean handkerchief. The name badge on her bottle green tabard told me she was Agnes, a Friend of Castlerigg Hospital, Happy to Help.
‘Standing there in the pouring rain in just your vest. You’ll catch your death.’
‘ I’m not that lucky,’ I sniffed. I hadn’t even realised it was raining, but the storm had finally broken. Huge raindrops pounded the earth and sent up tiny explosions of dust and the distant rumble of thunder promised relief from my slow suffocation. I was already soaked through.
‘Come on, love. Get inside and drink this.’ Agnes enticed me back inside as though I were a feral cat.
‘I’m afraid I haven’t got any change on me,’ I began, but Agnes shushed me.
‘Apparently you told the Wicked Witch of the West what she could do with her bloomin’ stapler,’ the woman said with a wicked little grin. ‘And flattened that little security beggar in his Hitler suit. You’ve earned a coffee. In fact, I might even stretch to a chocolate digestive.’
I took the mug from her and the tears threatened to return. ‘Please don’t be too nice to me,’ I implored. ‘I don’t think I could cope with that right now.’
‘You see a lot of that, working in this place.’ Agnes handed me a tissue. ‘People holding it together, I mean. Especially the women. I take it that’s your young man in one of those rooms back there?’
I was going to say that it was far more complicated than that – in another time I might have told her to mind her own bloody business – but for now, I was damn certain I wasn’t going to let anyone else have him. ‘Yes, he’s mine.’ The words were nowhere near as difficult as I thought they might be.
‘I’m sure you’ll look after him beautifully,’ Agnes assured me, then checked her watch. ‘Oh heck, my Dave’ll be cursing me. He’ll have been sitting in that car park for the best part of half-an-hour, waiting to pick me up.’ She unclipped her tabard and pulled it off over her head. ‘Well love, I hate to leave you like this, but I’m afraid that’s me done for the day. Just pop the mug down there when you’ve finished.’
‘Thanks.’ I began to rally a little as I dried my eyes and gulped down scalding, sweet coffee. ‘Nice jumper, by the way.’
Agnes looked down at the design of two yellow Labradors against a burgundy background. ‘This old thing? Knitted it years ago.’
‘It’s very cool. I could never make anything like that.’
My companion smiled with delight. ‘Well that’s praise, coming from you.’
No disguise was ever perfect. ‘Ah. You know.’
‘Oh yes,’ Agnes nodded. ‘Art History ‘A’ level at night class – keeps the old grey matter from turning to jelly. A bit tricky mind, with you looking like you’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards, and with those lenses in. Wasn’t I meant to recognise you?’
‘It would make things an awful lot easier if you didn’t.’
‘Well in that case duck, this has all been a figment of my imagination, not to be shared with anyone, even my Dave. Is that better?’
I nodded. ‘Thank you. Again.’
Agnes was halfway down the corridor when she turned on her heels and came bustling back towards me. ‘Here, why don’t you take this? I reckon it’s warm enough for me to go home in just my blouse, and you’ll be nithered before too long.’ She took her sweater off and handed it to me. ‘I know it’s not exactly the height of fashion, but -’
‘Oh no, I can’t take that...’ I tried refusing.
‘Nonsense. I can have a new one knitted in a week, and it’s not going to help your young man if you catch pneumonia now, is it?’ She was taking no further argument from me, because she pulled the Labrador sweater over my head. ‘There now. That’s better. And here’s a couple of pounds – make sure get yourself a bar of chocolate from the machine, or something.’ She pressed the coins into my palm and gave me one last concerned appraisal. ‘Now, will you be okay?’
I found myself embraced in warmth and floral perfume and I had to gulp more coffee to stop the tears returning. I nodded, and she smiled.
‘Good girl. You take care now, won’t you?’
I watched Agnes disappear down the hallway, off to meet her Dave, and let the last inch of coffee and thick sugar syrup slide down my throat. Junkie’s coffee. I set the mug down before returning to Finn’s side.