Sleepless Nights (28 page)

“But—how can you do that? I don’t even understand what they want me to do!” She was wringing her hands now, twisting them up to her face; I was delighted to see them engaged in more normal activities.

“This? All it means is, they want us to learn to work together,” I said, grinning, “which we don’t need to learn, because we do it already. Look, we’ll have a few tea parties and a couple of games of pass-the-parcel, I’ll describe them as ‘entertainment events designed to facilitate greater collaborative understanding of mutual shared goals,’ Andrew will be delighted, and you’ll keep your job.”

Mrs. Forrest flung her arms right around me. “Jeanie, I think the Lord sent you to me,” she said seriously, snuffling like a bunny into my T-shirt.

When I walked into the day room, quarter of an hour later, I was almost immediately barraged by questions about “how that in’eresting young man of yours is doing.” He’s very well, I said; he’s gone back to London. I don’t know when I’ll see him again. Ken kept trying to push me, but Sue-Ellen weighed majestically in: “We will leave you in peace,” she commanded, and Ken raised his eyebrows, took his magazine, and submitted with a very good grace. But several of the other old people seemed keen to take up the challenge, so, without looking at me, Sue-Ellen began to tell a very long story about her first husband, who apparently made his money diving for lost ships and recovering their treasure. She showed us a locket she was wearing that went down in 1587 off the coast of Sicily, and described the tea set she had given her daughter that still had salt deposits deep in its glaze. By the time she’d finished, everyone had stopped thinking about Dave, and even I was so enthralled by her narrative of danger and gold and lost ruby necklaces I lost track of time, then suddenly realized I’d stayed more than the requisite two hours. “See, Jeanie? I’m telling you; time just
flies
at Quiet Lanes,” said Mrs. Forrest, who now seemed almost restored to her twinkly self; her fingers fluttered as she spread her hands gleefully wide.

I was just about to walk out the door when I felt a soft touch on my shoulder; I wasn’t surprised to see Sue-Ellen. “Honey, we need to talk,” she murmured in my ear, and a little reluctantly I followed her through the French doors onto the patio. Carefully tended pots of ivy and bright red, richly fragrant flowers lined the weed-free concrete; Sue-Ellen settled herself on a bench, and crossed her ankles.

Her English counterpart would probably sport tweed two-pieces from Jaeger and burgundy leather court shoes. Sue-Ellen, being American, wore pressed trousers and T-shirts with bright white trainers instead.

“I’m worried about you, Jeanie,” she began abruptly. “You’re going around with a face like a camel from Cairo; you’re obviously in some kind of trouble. Is it about that young man you brought here?” I nodded slowly.

“I’m not surprised. He’s here, there, everywhere, zig-zaggin’ all over, reminded me of a rabbit. There’s someone else, I think?”

Again I nodded, more bewildered this time. How did she—? “And on top of that, you don’t know what to do with yourself, you’re nervous of putting yourself out on the market in difficult times like these. Life passes you by so fast, Jeanie! Figure out what you want, and get on with it. Make the times work for you, my dear; there are opportunities out there if you can just grab them. Now, one other important piece of advice,” she continued—I leaned forward, head spinning, wondering what on earth would come next—good sex is worth fighting for! You make sure you get plenty of it. That’s my strategy. Worst thing about Quiet Lanes, I’ll tell you, is having Mrs. Forrest walking the corridors when you’re trying to get it on…” I tried neither to laugh nor to think about exactly who Sue-Ellen was trying to get it on with (although since the options were limited, it was hard).

“Where did you learn to tell fortunes?” I asked her suddenly; and she laughed.

“Ah, my dear, that was from husband number two,” she explained, rocking gently backward and forward in her seat. “
His
aunt
was a Romany, you see, a genuine Romany. We visited her in Bucharest in the second year of our marriage. Philip, my husband, obviously inherited the gift, but I—well, Aunt Sofia said I had potential,” she remarked modestly. “She lived in a small house with another old lady, the two of them were known for miles around. I remember sitting with them in their front room, a tiny dark box, the air filled with heady perfume and walls hung with bright woven scarves. We learned the craft by lamplight. There’s no skeptic alive could’ve come out of such a place untouched,” she added. “You could
feel
the force of the future in their presence.”

“You’ve never told my future,” I said, and I reached out my hand with a smile. “You told Dave’s, but you didn’t tell mine.” I held it steady before her. “Why don’t
you
tell me what’s going to happen in my life, Sue-Ellen? Really, it’ll make everything so much simpler!”

Sue-Ellen’s faded blue eyes were sympathetic beneath her towering sweep of golden hair. “Oh no, my dear,” she said gently. “No, no, no. That’s just what I’m talking about.
You
have to work your future out for yourself.”

I felt oddly embarrassed, but still I kept my hand outstretched. “Oh come on, Sue-Ellen,” I said, managing a confident chuckle. “If I cross your palm with silver, I’m sure you’ll spin me a good story. That’s all it is anyway, this fortune-telling business. It’s not as if I was going to—you know,
believe
you, or anything.”

Sue-Ellen stirred a little beside me, and brushed some soft yellow pollen off her trousers. “Really? Well, if you say so. Listen, my dear: some people need a little push in life. And you are one of them. There are no shortcuts,” she added seriously. “Whatever it is you believe in, you’ve got to work out your future, Jeanie, before it’s your past.”

I sat still on the bench for a moment, thinking of an e-mail I’d received from Una the other day, telling me I had to leave the flat: “Lolly says that now you’re not a student anymore, I’ll have to start paying council tax, so sorry about that. Just can’t afford to keep you,
haha! And anyway, Lolly wants to move in with me next month, so we’d probably have asked you to sod off anyway. Lolly’s amazing, you’d really like him. He’s using your room right now to stash his record collection. And Dukey’s sleeping there sometimes too, I said I was sure you wouldn’t mind.” I hadn’t had a clue who Dukey was. (Frankly I was a bit hazy on Lolly’s identity as well.)

“I know I have to—decide what I’m doing, but it’s hard!” I said into the warm breeze. “I’m fond of Dave, and I miss him, but we aren’t right for each other. Paul Dupont is—not the man I thought he was. I was totally wrong about him. I want to be a social worker—I think, but it’s hard; when I started my course there were still some jobs out there, now they’re all drying up—what am I supposed to do with my degree? I need a new flat, but I can’t afford the rent until I get a job, and if I don’t have a place I can’t get a job. And you wonder why I’m hanging out over here! I’m
trying
to decide what to do with myself, you know, but it’s not easy. It’s not easy being twenty-four in the middle of a recession.”

“Quite honestly, it’s not easy being seventy-four either,” replied Sue-Ellen.

48

Q

F
our days later, Tom was up to S.

And he was looking like a different man, although so was Kent; the old man developed a pained, long-suffering expression whenever he saw my husband. His shoulders sagged, his mouth rounded down, and I caught him sneaking surreptitious drags from a silver hip flask he thought we hadn’t noticed under his desk. Tom, meanwhile, had a new spring in his step, and whenever you asked him what he was thinking about, he mentioned the travails of some local mechanic or postmaster or veterinarian he’d never actually met. “I think we can get the shed removed,” he told me suddenly, over dinner one night, “I think I’ve figured it out!” I hadn’t a clue what he was talking about, but Tom was so pleased with himself he got up early and went into the office to talk through his discoveries with Kent.

Dr. Philip Reid’s practice had been serving the residents of a small town near Sussex called Branton for some thirty-five years. “Most people around here won’t hear a word against either of the partners, Reid or Craig Warwick,” Kent told us, as we drove there through a dull haze on Friday morning. “They’re well known for getting up in the middle of the night, traveling to the remotest corners of the state, doing whatever it takes to help their patients. This
is going to be an unpopular case, I’ll tell you. Shouldn’t be surprised if I lose clients over it. If
you
lose clients over it, that is…”

As we entered, a woman in her fifties looked up at us from behind a wooden desk. Her graying hair was twisted into a bun on top of her head, her ample form was clothed in a simple cotton dress, and a pair of steel spectacles were propped on her nose—spectacles which she immediately lifted from her face and dropped onto the desk as she caught sight of Kent. “Mr. Tyler!” she exclaimed, a hint of red in her cheeks. “What brings you here?”

Tom and I hung back discreetly near the circle of listless patients while Kent went over to the doctors’ secretary. He leaned over the table and cupped his face in his hands about six inches from her nose. “Elizabeth Summers, it sure is lovely to see you again,” he said; we could just hear his voice, low and caressing, as he smiled at her. “Tell me, how are those puppies you picked up a week or two back from the Mansons?”

She smiled happily. “Oh, they’re
wonderful,
Mr. Tyler, I got two of them, you probably heard; they’re beautiful dogs, wonderful proportions…”

“And you’ll be winning gold rosettes with them all over the state before the year is up, I’ll bet,” Kent murmured. “Never knew anyone like it, you could take a cur from the street and have him looking like a champion in a few months, Elizabeth.”

“Oh goodness, I don’t know about that,” she said, her face flushing with pleasure, looking down at the desk, and idly playing with a small net purse that lay on top of the appointments’ ledger. “You can’t say a thing like that, it’s all to do with breeding you know…”

“Well now, listen here, Elizabeth, I need to ask a quick question of the doctor, Reid that is, about one of his patients. I wonder if you could get me five minutes?” he asked.

Her brow furrowed a bit, and she dropped her voice even lower. “I don’t know about that, we’re running behind today, Fridays are
always terrible, Dr. Reid had to go up to the hospital in the morning, we’ve been forty minutes slow ever since, people are waiting…” She nodded over to the group of patients, her eyes widening curiously as she caught sight of us.

Kent leaned over and said something quietly in her ear. Her face flushed bright scarlet. “Well, well—okay then,” I heard her say at last, reluctantly, “if you promise you’ll keep it to five minutes, I suppose it’s all right, just this once. And I’ll…” He twisted his ear toward her mouth to catch her words, and she whispered something inside we couldn’t quite hear, although I could swear it involved leaving a door unlocked at half past ten on Sunday night.

At that moment, a little red buzzer on the desk flashed and sounded. Elizabeth glanced over at the patients anxiously, then jerked her head in the direction of a door. “Go on then,” she said, in a hushed whisper, “but hurry up, or there’s going to be a riot in here.”

Kent stood up immediately. “Come on,” he called shortly to us, over his shoulder, and Elizabeth watched, bewildered, as we filed past her in Kent’s wake. “Who—why—who are they—” we heard her quacking, faintly, as we threaded our way along a corridor.

Kent rapped smartly on the doctor’s door, and we filed into his examining rooms.

A well-preserved man of about fifty, in shirtsleeves, was sitting at his desk, hunting and pecking on an elderly-looking computer. He turned to look at us over half-moon glasses, and his smooth, pink brow furrowed.

“Unless my medical skills have completely deserted me, you are not an eighty-year-old lady with a broken thumb,” he said calmly.

Kent grinned and sat down, while we crowded in through the door behind him. “True enough. How’re you doing, Phil? These are two—ah—new associates of mine. We want to talk to you about Emmie Cormier. Won’t take a minute.”

Dr. Reid sighed gently. “Elizabeth is losing her grip, I fear,” he
said. “And I’ve long known she has a—partiality—for you, you old reprobate. Well, well, since you’re here, what is it you want to know? Bearing in mind—” he went on, as Kent began to speak, his hand raised in warning, “I cannot break doctor-patient confidentiality. And I will not.”

Kent nodded. “I won’t ask you to. Got a letter here, authorizing you to talk to us. I just want to know, on behalf of my client, why you told Emmie her first baby died of crib death, not Reye’s syndrome.”

Dr. Reid, after examining the handwritten note for a moment, put his head on one side, and considered Kent’s face. “Excuse me?” he said coolly.

“Simple enough question,” Kent went on briskly. “She says you told her Angela’s death was diagnosed as SIDS, but the death certificate says Reye’s syndrome. Can you explain that?”

Dr. Reid stared first at Kent, then at us. “I wish I had more seating for you,” he said to us, ever so gently, “but I’m afraid I’m not used to entertaining
parties
in my office.” The edge in his voice was just palpable. He looked back at Kent. “My dear Mr. Tyler, I’m not entirely sure what you’re getting at. Of course I told Ms. Cormier—Vaughan in those days—that the child’s death was attributed to Reye’s syndrome in the autopsy. I explained the cause of death fully to her, what on earth are you suggesting? But it didn’t mean anything to her, she barely remembered her own name at the time, let alone complicated medical terminology. I suppose she has simply internalized ‘crib death,’ it’s quicker and easier, something most people have heard of. I am not in the business of deceiving my patients,” he finished, drawing himself up, his expression gently aggrieved.