Presence of Mind (23 page)

Gordon broke violently into my confused thoughts. ‘Is this some kind of game?'

‘No game,' she answered calmly. ‘Hasn't Mrs Tenby explained?'

‘
Mrs Tenby?
You call your mother Mrs Tenby?'

She looked at him in mild surprise. ‘Mrs Tenby is Briony's mother.'

I said with an effort, ‘Does Briony know about you?'

‘Oh no. She thinks she just has blackouts. That's what she fights against.'

‘But can you come and go as you like?'

‘It's getting easier all the time.'

‘Ailsa –' I glanced at Gordon's rigid, horrified face. ‘Would you like to see your own mother?'

‘Oh, I would!' She clasped her hands together. ‘I called at the house when I was up here last week but they weren't at home. I asked a milkman in the road and he said they were away on holiday so I went to the flat but there was no one there either.'

‘That was why you came to Scotland? To see your parents?'

‘Yes, I wanted to let them know I'm all right.'

‘If I try to take you to them, will you let Briony come back now?'

She hesitated. ‘You mean that? You, Briony's mother, would let me go home?'

‘For a while, yes, if your parents agree, but please go now and send Briony back.'

‘All right.'

Painfully I held my breath and as Gordon and I watched unmoving, her face suddenly went blank. She stared fixedly ahead of her for a moment, then the little tremor rippled over her face and she blinked. She was Briony again. She glanced from me to Gordon, said uncertainly, ‘Mr MacIntyre!' And then, fearfully, ‘It happened again, didn't it?'

Gordon said in a strangled voice, ‘I'll have that drink after all.'

‘Would you ring down while I take Briony back to bed?'

As I led my daughter back to the bedroom, soothed her troubled questioning and wrapped the bedclothes securely about her, I tried to assimilate all the new factors which had arisen. There was at least a small crumb of comfort in finding that in her secondary state she responded rationally to questioning as Max had intimated. But so, I reminded myself, would the spirit of Ailsa if it were a case of possession. Our fantastic conversation had done nothing to confirm a diagnosis either way.

Back in the sitting-room, Gordon said, ‘Did I imagine all that, or was it true?'

‘It was true,' I said flatly. A waiter knocked on the door and brought in a tray with two glasses. When he had gone I added, ‘Well, what do you say? Will you go and see them?'

‘I suppose so, though God knows what I'll tell them.' He looked at me accusingly. “You seem pretty calm about it, I must say.'

‘Not calm, Gordon, just desperate.'

‘Does Lance know about this?'

‘Not where we are. I just said we were going away for a few days.'

‘I presume you've taken her to a specialist of some kind?'

‘Yes. He regards it as a case of dual personality, which apparently is a well-documented form of mental illness.' I didn't repeat my own doubts, nor mention the fact that most cases of alternating consciousness were splits of one self, not entirely separate entities. Only the strange case of Mary Roff and Lurancy was on a par with ours, and even there there were differences. All I could do was play on the similarities and hope the eventual outcome would be the same.

Gordon finished his drink and stood up. ‘All right, Ann. I'll do what you ask provided you promise to rescue me from my padded cell if they have me put away. And of course I can't vouch for their reactions.'

‘You might be able to convince them, now you've seen her for yourself.'

‘The trouble is I don't know what the hell it was I did see.'

‘You can only try. If they refuse to see her, I'll just have to take her home and – let them put her in hospital.'

He stood looking down at me. ‘You're a brave woman, Ann Tenby.'

‘Or a foolish one. It's a calculated risk, but I have to try.'

‘I think I can see that. Now, to business: if the milkman said last week the Camerons were away they might not be home yet. I'll ring them tomorrow and let you know how I get on. Will you be all right in the meantime?'

I nodded, fighting the enervating exhaustion which always overwhelmed me after a tussle with my daughter's double.

‘Then away to your bed and sleep easy.' He smiled crookedly. ‘You're over one hurdle, anyway; you've managed somehow to enlist my services!'

‘Thank you, Gordon.'

I closed the door behind him and leant wearily against it, trying to summon up sufficient energy to undress and get myself to bed. I wondered how Lance had reacted to my brief message, whether he had phoned Max as I'd anticipated. Somewhere in the chaos of my mind there were two minute causes for relief. One was the horrified violence of his reaction to ‘Ailsa's' embraces and the other was the confirmation that he had not after all painted the picture which had always disturbed me so profoundly. The ethical consequences which were bound to follow this admission were for the moment beyond me.

I pushed myself away from the door, switched off the fight and went through to the bathroom. In the mirror over the basin my face was white and strained. The face of a woman who has seen a ghost, I thought wryly; not only seen one, but talked to it.

In the bedroom I undressed by the light which came from the uncurtained window to avoid disturbing Briony. Across the street the bland face of another hotel rose in row upon row of windows, many of them lit and uncurtained. I could make out people moving about in the rooms and there was a curious, god-like sensation about seeing in one glance those in the rooms above and below that on my own level, to the left of it and the right. They were all enclosed in their individual little cells like bees in a honeycomb, but I in my detachment could see around them, above and beneath, things that were hidden from them. Idly I wondered about those anonymous people over there, about their hopes and dreams, their doubts, worries and perplexities. Had love proved as destructive for them as it had for us? For love after all was at the root of all our troubles: Lance's for Ailsa, hers for him, his for Briony, mine for both Briony and himself. All of us were helplessly turning the treadmills of our own imprisonment, powerless to save ourselves from the cages we had ourselves made.

With a sigh for the futility of it all I turned away and started to prepare for bed.

By the next morning I was overwhelmed by the enormity of what I'd done and by what seemed the sheer lunacy of rushing Briony away from Max's expert care to fling her into the midst of people who didn't know her and whom she didn't herself know. I almost phoned Gordon to tell him to forget the whole thing and that I was going back home.

However, my panic abated slightly when I realised that, rested after her long sleep, Briony seemed better than she had for some time, and even suggested that we should go out and look at the shops. Accordingly we spent the morning like any other visitors to the city, walking along Sauchiehall Street, drinking coffee and watching the crowds go by. We returned to the hotel for lunch in case Gordon should phone but when no call materialised I again fell in with Briony's wishes and we went to a cinema.

As we changed for dinner my ears were constantly straining for the first ring of the phone and each time during the meal that the desk phone rang, I braced myself to hear my name called. The meal ended. We went back upstairs and watched television in our own sitting-room. Soon after nine-thirty Briony went to bed. By this time I was convinced that the Camerons had flatly refused to see either Gordon or me, and when the call actually came my hands were so fumbling that I almost dropped the receiver.

‘Ann? Gordon here. Everything all right?'

‘Yes thanks. We've had quite a reasonable day. How did you get on?'

‘I feel somewhat as though I've been through the ordeal of fire but I'm more or less unscathed.'

‘What happened?'

‘I phoned the Camerons this morning and asked if I might call round to see them this evening. They were delighted, poor souls. They little knew what lay in store.'

‘How did they react?'

‘Pretty well as you'd expect. Flat disbelief – even anger.'

‘I see.' My mouth was parched.

‘However, I finally talked them round to agreeing to see you both. You needn't go alone first – I've explained everything as fully as I can. But I think I should warn you they've only agreed to see you out of sheer curiosity. They've invited us all for tea tomorrow afternoon – Elspeth and myself as well, to ease the tension. It's Saturday of course, so there'd be no problem. Will that be all right?'

‘Fine. I'm glad you'll be there.'

“Elspeth suggests you come here for lunch and then we can all go along together. If that suits you, I'll come and collect you about noon.'

‘Thanks very much. I'll tell Briony we're going to see some friends of Lance's and then we'll just have to see what happens. I imagine you told Elspeth the whole story?'

‘Yes, indeed, as soon as I got back from you last night. I hoped it might clear things up a bit in my own mind, but I can't say it did. In fact, the more I think about it, the more fantastic it seems.' He hesitated. ‘Have you been in touch with Lance yet?'

‘No, there was no point until I knew if they'd see her.'

‘Surely he must be very anxious to hear from you.'

‘Yes. I'll phone him after we've seen the Camerons.'

‘Right, I'll pick you up tomorrow, then, about twelve.'

The MacIntyres lived in a fairly large house out in the Bearsden direction. Elspeth was blonde and petite, seeming minute beside her large husband. The three children were also there, but from their natural manner I guessed they had been told nothing of the circumstances. Elspeth kept watching Briony with a slight frown, but the girl, completely innocent about the turmoil she had created, chatted and laughed unconcernedly and after a while we all relaxed. I began to wonder what would happen if Briony remained herself all afternoon. Obviously the Camerons couldn't be expected to offer unlimited hospitality to a complete stranger.

I need not have worried. Ailsa's home was in a small village called Drumlochhead and as we said good-bye to the three young MacIntyres Briony began to show her first signs of agitation.

‘Couldn't I stay here with the others, while you go with Mr and Mrs MacIntyre?' she whispered. ‘It won't be much fun meeting Daddy's friends.'

‘You can't do that, you've been invited particularly. They want to meet you.'

She didn't argue any more. Perhaps subconsciously she knew it was no use, but I felt an uneasy sense of betrayal. In spasmodic silence Gordon drove between the large grey stone houses, through the narrower, less affluent streets and out into the countryside.

After some time Elspeth remarked, ‘Here's the loch now.' The road ran alongside it. At this end was a small hotel. Some brightly coloured boats were bobbing about on the water and a group of people swam and sunbathed on the narrow beach. At the far end of the loch lay the village, sheltered to the north by steeply rising hills, whose lower slopes were splashed with the white of sheep.

“We're almost there!' The voice was Ailsa's.

I had been so intent on the scenery that I hadn't been watching my daughter's face. Now it was too late: she had gone. I saw Gordon's shoulders stiffen and Elspeth's head spun round, her eyes widening as she registered the undeniable change. Part of me was aware of relief that at least the visit would not be pointless. The other half wondered with superstitious fear if Briony would ever come back again.

‘Are they expecting us?' she demanded excitedly.

I nodded in silence and she leant forward eagerly, looking out of the window. ‘I mind the time I went sailing with Jimmie McGregor and the boat sank! Fortunately the water wasn't deep. Between us we dragged the boat ashore and Jimmie abandoned it in disgust. It was taken over by a family of moorhens and left there for years. And yon's the tree I dared Jimmie to climb and he fell and broke his arm. I remember the spanking I got for that!'

I listened to her in a numb kind of misery. Only now was I realising that I was voluntarily preparing to hand my daughter over to someone else. Not that she
was
my daughter, but without her I had nothing.

Elspeth said suddenly, ‘Can you tell me the name of my brother?'

The girl turned from the window. ‘Hamish, of course. For shame, Elspeth! Are you trying to trick me?'

Elspeth did not reply and a moment later Gordon drew up outside a small neat cottage. Before I realised what she was doing, Briony had flung open the car door and run helter skelter up the path and straight into the cottage. The three of us sat in silence, waiting. Minutes passed. At last I said Shakily, ‘If we don't go and see what's happening I think I shall scream!'

The others moved at once and in a body, close together for protection, we went up the path. The front door was open and from inside we could hear a confusion of sounds – voices, exclamations and a soft sobbing. ‘Have you any idea what you're doing to these people?' Gordon had asked me.

He leant forward and lifted the knocker and a moment later Mr Cameron appeared, ashen-faced, his eyes bright with unshed tears.

‘Here's a fine welcome for you!' he exclaimed in self-reproach. ‘Come away in.'

In the big kitchen which also served as living-room and, during the winter, bedroom too, Briony stood wrapped in the arms of a sobbing, clinging woman. There was no need for me to speak. Elspeth went forward and kissed Mrs Cameron's cheek in silence and Gordon introduced me. The woman lifted her ravaged face from my daughter's shoulder and murmured brokenly, ‘How can I ever thank you?'