Aunt Dimity and the Next of Kin (2 page)

I was, for the most part, a passive visitor, sitting back and listening while my charges did the talking. And they were, for the most part, content to tell their stories, complain about the food, and wish me well when they left. It wasn’t until the middle of March, a week after the twins’ fifth birthday and three weeks before the first meeting of Finch’s Summer Fete committee, that I met the patient who captured my imagination by saying almost nothing.

Elizabeth Beacham was unmarried and undergoing treatment for a rare form of liver cancer. She’d been hospitalized for a week before Lucinda Willoughby telephoned to alert me to her situation.

“She’s terminally ill, but no one seems to care,” the young nurse informed me. “I know she has a brother—he’s listed as her next of kin—but he hasn’t bothered to come and see her. She hasn’t gotten a potted plant or a bouquet of flowers or a single telephone call. I wish she wasn’t in a private room. If she was on the ward, she’d be with other people, but as it is, she has nothing to look at but the television, and no one to talk to but staff members who don’t have time to talk. It’s
horrid.
”

I agreed, and trundled my book trolley into Miss Beacham’s private room promptly at nine o’clock the following morning.

The first thing I noticed about Miss Beacham was her frailty.

Her face was as gaunt as a prisoner of war’s, the skin on her hands was like blue-veined parchment, and her gray hair had dwindled to a few stray strands, which she tried to hide beneath a red-checked hospital-issue bandana. She seemed as small as a child in the huge hospital bed, with IV poles and a bank of monitors looming over her, but the measuring look she gave me as I entered her room was far from childish. Her gaze was so penetrating, her eyes so bright and full of life, that her frailty seemed to fade into the background.

“Good morning,” I said. “My name’s Lori Shepherd.”

“The listener. The bringer of books.” Miss Beacham’s voice was breathy and weak, and she spoke with frequent pauses, as if full sentences taxed her strength. “I’ve heard of you, Ms. Shepherd. I wondered if you would stop by.”

“Please, call me Lori,” I said, and rolled the trolley closer to the bed. I was slightly disconcerted to learn that my fame, such as it was, had preceded me. “How did you hear about me?”

“Mr. Walker mentioned you,” Miss Beacham answered.

“The retired stonemason,” I said, recalling the old man’s scarred and powerful hands.

“That’s right.” Miss Beacham nodded. “Mr. Walker and I were parked beside each other—in our wheelchairs, you understand—waiting for tests. He told me he preferred your visits to watching the morning chat shows. High praise, indeed.”

“Is it?” I glanced at the blank screen of the wall-mounted television facing Miss Beacham’s bed. “I can’t help noticing that you’re not watching the morning chat shows.”

“I’d rather have my teeth drilled,” she said evenly.

I chuckled appreciatively. “Television isn’t my cup of tea, either. I’ll take a good book over a chat show anytime.”

“I see you like detective novels,” she commented, eyeing the books on my trolley.

“People confined to hospital seem to like them. That’s why I bring so many.” I selected a book with a particularly gruesome cover illustration and held it out for Miss Beacham’s inspection. “One of Mr. Walker’s favorites,” I explained. “He can’t get enough gore. Decapitation, strangulation, any horrible thing done with an axe—it’s his idea of light entertainment. The more heinous the murder, the better, as far as Mr. Walker’s concerned.”

“But detective novels don’t appeal to you, personally?” Miss Beacham observed.

“I don’t mind nibbling on one from time to time,” I admitted, “but I prefer a steady diet of history, memoirs, biographies.”

“Such books are spattered with their share of gore,” Miss Beacham pointed out. “Mary, Queen of Scots, for example, met a very sticky end.”

“True.” I returned Mr. Walker’s favorite to the trolley. “But Mary wasn’t hacked to pieces in a back alley by a psychotic little weasel. She was given the opportunity to straighten her wig and say her prayers and walk in a procession before her head was lopped off. And the executioner had excellent manners.”

Miss Beacham’s eyes began to twinkle. “In other words, you don’t mind murder, so long as it’s accompanied by pomp and circumstance.”

“Style is
so
important, don’t you think?” I said airily.

Smiling, Miss Beacham motioned for me to draw up the chair reserved for visitors. I pushed the trolley aside, took a seat, and asked what kind of books she liked.

“My tastes run along the same lines as yours,” she replied. “I’m partial to history, British history in particular. Give me a biography of Disraeli, and I’ll be happy for hours.” She closed her eyes for a moment, as if she needed to rest before going on. “I find real life sufficiently mysterious. So many questions begging for answers. So many lost things waiting to be found.”

I nodded. “I know what you mean. I’ve stumbled into more than my share of real-life mysteries. I suppose that’s why I don’t feel the need to go looking for them between the covers of a book.”

Miss Beacham’s eyebrows rose. “How intriguing. I hope your real-life mysteries haven’t involved heinous murders or psychotic weasels.”

I laughed. “Thank heavens, no. Though a woman in my village
was
killed with a blunt instrument a couple of years ago. . . .”

“Do tell,” Miss Beacham coaxed.

It was all the encouragement I needed to embark upon a series of anecdotes that would have continued well into the afternoon if Nurse Willoughby hadn’t arrived to take Miss Beacham away for treatment.

The intrusion startled me. Miss Beacham had been such an engaging companion that I’d forgotten I was in a hospital, conversing with a desperately ill woman. I felt as if I’d discovered a kindred spirit and I was eager to see her again. The moment I left the Radcliffe I made a beeline for my bookseller friend’s shop, where I bought a fat biography of Disraeli, which I presented to Miss Beacham the next morning.

“You needn’t bring any more books to me,” Miss Beacham said, cradling the biography in her frail hands. “I shall be quite content to spend the remainder of my days here reading this.”

By our third visit, my reputation as a good listener was kaput. Miss Beacham seemed so interested in everything I said that I just kept talking. I told her about the twins’ passion for horses—and presented her with equine portraits the boys had drawn for her the night before. I recounted recent happenings in Finch, including the spectacular fire that had destroyed Mr. Barlow’s chimney in February, and described the ragtag army of friends I’d made at St. Benedict’s. I gave my new friend plenty of opportunities to talk about herself, but I didn’t press. My job was to entertain, not to interrogate.

It wasn’t until the fourth visit that Miss Beacham let slip a few details about her private life. When I mentioned that Bill was a lawyer, she told me that she’d been a legal secretary in London for twenty-nine years before moving to Oxford six years earlier, to be near her brother Kenneth. My ears pricked up at Kenneth’s name—mainly because I wanted to track him down and nail him to a wall for being such a rotten, absentee brother—but she veered away from the subject and turned instead to her love of baking. At one point she closed her eyes to recite from memory a recipe for raisin bread, which I jotted down covertly on the back of a bookmark.

“I do miss my kitchen,” she confessed. “The measuring and the mixing, the scent of fresh-baked loaves drifting through the flat, the sight of butter melting on a thick slice of warm bread . . .” She sighed.

“What else do you miss?” I asked. “Is there anything you want from your flat? I’ll be happy to get it for you.”

“No, no, there’s nothing I want.” She hesitated, and her gaze turned inward for a moment. “Well, perhaps one thing . . .”

“Name it,” I said.

Her pale lips curled into an odd smile as she whispered, “Hamish. I miss Hamish.”

“Your cat?” I ventured, vowing silently that if Miss Beacham wanted to see her cat, I’d break every rule in the hospital to bring it to her. But Hamish, as it turned out, wasn’t a cat.

“I don’t own a cat,” Miss Beacham replied. “My flat has no back garden, you see, and I don’t believe a cat can be
truly
happy without a back garden. No, I’ve never owned any pets.”

“Then who’s—?”

The door swung open and Nurse Willoughby put her head into the room.

“Quick, Lori,” she said, beckoning urgently. “You’ve overstayed visiting hours. Matron’s on the way and if she catches you here, she’ll have my head—and yours.”

“My weekend’s filled up,” I said quickly to Miss Beacham. “But I’ll be back on Monday.”

I bent to buss her gently on the cheek, then sprinted from the room at top speed. I was grinning as I left, already filled with plans to surprise my new friend pleasantly on Monday morning. I thought it would be the first of many pleasant surprises I would spring on her. I thought I had all the time in the world to get to know Miss Beacham better, and to find out who Hamish was.

I was wrong.

Two

I returned to the hospital on Monday morning in high spirits. I’d spent much of the weekend in my kitchen, where I’d baked seven loaves of Miss Beacham’s raisin bread before producing one fine enough to present to her. After wrapping the flawless golden loaf securely in tin foil, I’d swaddled it in a length of calico tied up with pale pink ribbon. I doubted that Miss Beacham would be able to eat the bread—her diet was strictly regulated—but I hoped its fragrance would bring a touch of home to her hospital room.

Nurse Willoughby wasn’t at her station when I arrived, so I headed for Miss Beacham’s room without bothering to check in. When I reached her door, I paused briefly to examine the pretty gift I’d brought. I tweaked the silk ribbon nervously, like a schoolgirl anxious to make a good impression on a teacher, then entered the room, calling a cheerful greeting.

“Good morning, Miss Beacham. You’ll never guess what I’ve—” I faltered, then fell silent while my brain tried to process what my eyes were seeing.

It wasn’t just that the hospital bed was empty. The bed had been empty before, when tests and treatments had taken Miss Beacham to other parts of the hospital. But this time the bed wasn’t merely vacant—it had been stripped bare. The crisp white sheets, the pillows, and the lightweight green blanket were gone.

The IV poles had vanished as well, and the looming monitors had been switched off and pushed back against the wall. The horse portraits my sons had drawn were no longer on the bedside table, and the Disraeli biography was missing as well. The room reeked of disinfectant, as though it had recently been cleaned.

“Miss Beacham?” I said, in a very small voice.

The door opened behind me.

“There you are.” Nurse Willoughby closed the door and came to stand beside me. “I’d hoped to intercept you on your way in, but there was an emergency on the ward and I was called away.”

“Where is she?” I asked, swinging around to face the red-haired nurse.

“I’m sorry, Lori,” she said. “Miss Beacham’s gone.”

I understood what she meant, but refused to believe it.

“Gone home, you mean? Gone back to her flat? But that’s wonderful. You’ll have to give me her address so I can—”

“No, Lori, that’s not what I mean.” Nurse Willoughby squared her shoulders and said firmly, “Miss Beacham is dead. She died an hour ago. I tried to reach you at the cottage, but Annelise told me you’d just left. And your mobile—”

“—wasn’t on,” I said numbly. “Bill doesn’t like me answering my cell phone while I’m driving. Both hands on the wheel, eyes on the road . . .” I glanced at the stripped bed, then looked away.

“She took a sudden turn for the worse,” Nurse Willoughby said gently. “There was nothing we could do to save her.”

I nodded. “Was anyone with her when she . . . ?”

“Matron was with her.” Nurse Willoughby held up a hand. “And before you start to squawk, Lori, let me tell you that I hope and pray that I’ll have someone like Matron with me when my time comes. You’ve seen only her authoritarian side, but I’ve seen her with dying patients. There’s no one better.”

“Okay,” I said, chastened. I put a hand to my forehead. I felt dazed and disoriented, uncertain of what to do next. “Have you notified her brother?”

“Not yet,” Nurse Willoughby said. “We’ve been unable to locate him.”

“But he’s her next of kin,” I said. “His name should be on a form somewhere.”

“It should be, but it’s not.” Nurse Willoughby’s mouth tightened in disapproval. “Unfortunately, Roberta Lewis in clerical failed to notice that the form was incomplete. We didn’t realize that the address was missing until we looked for it this morning.”

I frowned in confusion. “If you can’t find her brother, who’s going to arrange the funeral?”

“There won’t be a funeral,” Nurse Willoughby informed me. “Miss Beacham elected to be cremated. She left instructions with her solicitor.”

“What about her ashes?” I asked. “Where will they go?”

“I don’t know, Lori. If I find out, I’ll ring you.” Nurse Willoughby held something out to me. It took a moment for me to realize that she was returning the crayon drawings and the biography I’d given to Miss Beacham. “I thought you might like to have these back.”

“Yes.” I took the book and the drawings, and handed the calico-wrapped loaf to the nurse. “It’s raisin bread,” I explained. “Miss Beacham’s recipe. It was supposed to be a surprise, but . . .” I cleared my throat and took a steadying breath. “Share it with the other nurses, will you?”

“Of course.” Nurse Willoughby’s freckled forehead creased sympathetically. “Would you like to speak with Father Bright? He’s on the ward, attending to one of his strays.”

Father Julian Bright was the Roman Catholic priest who ran St. Benedict’s Hostel for Transient Men. He came to the Radcliffe every day, to look for members of his disreputable flock who’d become ill or injured overnight. He was a good friend and an extremely good man.