Curiosity killed the cat

 

 

HOSPITALS ARE made of corridors—walkways that hold everything together. I get lost. I want to get lost. It’s easier than you imagine.

I end up back near A&E. Then I remember Demi and head quickly away in another direction. It’s doubtful she’d remember me, unless she got in trouble for losing me—then she probably wouldn’t forget so easily.

I should go back to my nest and sleep. I’m not sure what wandering around like this is achieving. My shoulder is aching so badly that I’m grinding my teeth.

Tiredly I slump against a cold white wall at the bottom of a narrow echoey stairwell. Outside it’s snowing again—fairy-tale London, all cold and bright and glittering. Except I’m not sure how we find our happy endings out there. No knight is going to ride up on a white horse to save us. No prince or princess is strong or brave enough to stand up against evil. The sharks keep swimming. No one wants to get in the water with them. Not even the police.

Quick, quiet footsteps startle me and instinctively I step away from the wall and into the shadows beneath the stairs. I have no real idea why I’m hiding. All I do know is the hairs on the back of my neck are standing on end and my heart is hammering.

The footsteps are close and fast—someone rushing down the stairs. As they round the corner, I can see they’re tall. I can see a white lab coat, grey trousers, and soft leather shoes.

That’s what startled me—whoever it is barely makes a sound. I can’t even see their head until they start walking down the corridor. But my breath catches all the same. It’s the way he walks, more than anything.

When you’ve followed someone for hours, you know every detail about the way they walk. Everything else, from his barely there hair—no hat in the hospital—to the way his left arm swings out, is secondary. I close my eyes, picturing him in his long black coat walking down the embankment, and I step out of the shadows to follow him.

Dollman walks with purpose, always, and he walks fast, navigating the packed corridors of A&E and out across the snowy car park to a smaller hospital building—a lab.

That is where I lose him.

By the time I’m through the entrance, the corridor in front of me is empty and I’ve no idea where he’s gone.

There must be about twenty doors, all closed. He could have gone through any of them. I head down the corridor anyway, hoping to feel something, some clue, maybe an echo of him or something, like I’m a psychic detective in a TV drama. Where are my superpowers now, Micky?

If I could just find out Dollman’s name, I would have something. Something I could give to the police. It would be better than breaking into the possibly alarmed warehouse flats up in Chelsea, where he might not even live.

Every door here is marked with a name like Pathology or a few letters and numbers that mean nothing to me. They all have swipe card entries. The harsh overhead lights hurt my eyes and I blink tiredly in the brightness.

I’m almost at the end of the corridor when a door opens behind me. The sound is just a hushy whisper of air as if someone is trying very hard to be quiet. Curious, I start to turn my head, but an arm comes around my shoulders cutting off my airway, and a large hand covers my mouth so I can’t shout.

Panic surges through me and I go berserk, kicking and struggling as a body much stronger than mine drags me backwards into a small room full of books.

“If you shout, it’ll be the last thing you do,” a voice says coldly in my ear.

I’m dumped unceremoniously on the floor, and the door slams shut behind me. Dollman glares down at me, straightening the shirt and tie he’s wearing beneath his white lab coat. He quickly tucks his name tag into his shirt pocket.

For a second I’m too shocked to do anything but stare up at his skull-white face and gasp some much-needed air into my lungs.

The immediate danger seems to have passed, though my heart is still tripping over itself as if I’m running across the common as fast as I can. My shoulder demands my attention—pain lancing through it like hot wires being forced into my skin. The agony makes me grit my teeth as I struggle to my feet. The door is right behind me—however much it hurts, I’m ready to run.

“Sit down,” Dollman orders, pulling out a metal chair from behind a desk I didn’t see at the back of the room.

I edge backwards. He’s stronger than me, taller, and I’m in pain, but I can put up a pretty good fight. And I will shout and scream and yell if he comes one step closer.

“For fuck’s sake,” he hisses. “I know you’ve been following me. Have a fucking seat and let’s introduce ourselves, shall we?”

I don’t know how he knows I’ve been following him. Perhaps he means right now through the hospital.

Holding his gaze, I shake my head. I take another small step backwards, and reach out until I can feel the door behind me. I’m not going to turn away from him, so I blindly search for the door handle I know is there somewhere—has to be there somewhere!

“Do you understand what I’m saying to you?” Some strange combination of the slow, careful way he says it and the awful fear I’m feeling makes me laugh, just once—a loud, bright, terrified hiccup of sound.

My eyes are as wide and shocked as Dollman’s.

“You look cold,” he says.

He reaches for a switch on the wall and a heater somewhere blasts to life, warming the room with hot air.

I still can’t find the door handle. My panic is building again.

“This is my office,” he says. “I study things.” He cocks his head to the side as if he’s demonstrating how he does that.

“Like what?” I ask unsteadily, my finger reaching the doorframe and searching higher. Maybe this is my one-and-only chance to confront him.

Dollman smiles. It makes me feel cold, and I shiver despite the heat blasting into the room.

“Lots of things.”

He steps towards me and my hands scrabble across the wood of the door. Nothing. I turn, see the door handle, touch it, and—

“Go ahead,” he says. “You’re frightened. You think I’m going to hurt you or do something bad in the place where I work, in a hospital, with dozens of people in the rooms either side of us.”

“Yes,” I say. I open the door. The corridor is empty. Dollman makes no move to stop me rushing out.

“How about we take this opportunity to be civil and ask each other one question?” His voice is so close behind me it sends shivers down my spine.

I should run, get out of the water.

What am I doing?

You’re swimming with sharks, a little voice says. Well, if I am swimming with them, I might as well come at them head-on, spear out.

I spin around. “Did you kill Dashiel?”