The Girl Who Couldn't Smile (4 page)

It was six thirty by the time I got home. I was renting a little cottage, a one-bedroom affair with a bit of garden. The owner, a semi-retired farmer who lived on a neighbouring hill, had helped me to put up an enclosure for Millie, a development my new canine friend viewed with distaste.

As I pulled up in the Austin I could see her standing upright, staring directly at me, and as I got out of the car she began whining and growling at me in tones of complaint.

I let her out and she tore around the garden three times, finally stopping on the front lawn to mark her territory. I noted with resignation that my previously verdant grass was becoming pock-marked with burned patches where similar displays had occurred, and went inside to make supper.

In all the fluster of starting in Little Scamps I had neglected to do any grocery shopping, but a quick perusal of the freezer unearthed some diced beef, and the vegetable tray had a couple of dried-up onions and two shrivelled chillies. I stuck the beef into the microwave to defrost and then, with Millie following me in case I happened to drop anything edible, I went out to the garden to see if there was anything to offer to the pot.

My efforts were rewarded with two bay leaves, some
thyme and sage, a handful of spinach, a couple of oversized radishes and a smallish beet. Back inside I put a Niall Toner CD on the kitchen stereo and began to chop the herbs. Then I diced the vegetables. Millie kept a very close eye on all this activity, standing at my side, acutely aware that the slightest slip of my hand might send something tasty her way.

Ten minutes later the cottage was filling with the scent of dinner cooking, and Millie and I were sitting out back, me with a bottle of beer, she with her favourite cuddly toy, a rather evil-looking stuffed rabbit. I’d like to say she treated it with affection, but all of Millie’s toys ended up shredded – the similarities between my dog and the children at Little Scamps were becoming disturbing.

The secret to a good chilli is to cook it long enough for the beef to get really tender, but not so long that it all turns to mush. I have found that, if you cut the beef up quite small, an hour just about does it. If you put some bread in to bake about fifteen minutes after the chilli starts to simmer and keep a watchful eye on the clock, everything should be ready at about the same time. So I sipped my beer, listened to Niall singing about walking on water, and closed my eyes.

I probably would have dozed – Millie’s breathing told me she was already asleep – if a voice hadn’t said, ‘I hope that’s our dinner I smell and not the dog’s.’

Lonnie was perched on my garden wall. ‘Can’t you just come in the gate like a normal person?’ I asked, pleased to see him.

‘I’d be hugely insulted if anyone ever accused me of being a normal person,’ my friend retorted, jumping down to the grass and marching across it.

Lonnie is just under four feet tall. He has a strong, handsome face with a pronounced brow and a shock of black hair that he wears quite long. He also has a pronounced
hump on his right shoulder and dresses flamboyantly. When I first met him he favoured enormous hats, flowing
trench-coats
that would trail along the ground behind him and loud flared trousers. I have always assumed that this was primarily because he had spent most of his life locked away from prying eyes, ‘protected’ from mockery by a mother and maiden aunt who were embarrassed by his condition. Lonnie had passed the time reading fantasy novels, stories in which dwarfs were heroic and accepted, and his attire reflected this.

Since becoming a member of staff at Drumlin (and seeing how other people dressed) Lonnie had tempered his fashion sense slightly, but still leaned towards bright colours and an almost punkish desire to clash whenever possible. Today he was wearing a loose shirt that was bright orange down one side and electric blue down the other. This was matched with pink and white checked trousers and canary yellow Doc Marten boots. If the fashion police ever came upon him, he’d soon be serving a very lengthy institutional sentence.  

‘I’ve got a pot of chilli on,’ I said. ‘You want a beer?’  

‘What’ve you got?’

‘Umm … Bavaria. It’s Dutch, I think.’

Out of a bag he had slung across his shoulder he produced an amber bottle, some kind of Scotch – Lonnie favoured single malts. ‘I’m sure you’ll take a drop of this afterwards.’

‘I might force some down.’ I grinned. ‘Get a beer and a chair. Dinner’ll be half an hour or so yet.’

When he was settled beside me he leaned down and scratched Millie behind the ears. ‘She seems to be settling in nicely. Has she house-trained you yet?’

‘I’m a slow learner. How are things at Drumlin?’

‘We’re just about managing without you. We say a prayer every morning for your safe return and for the welfare of the poor children left to your tender mercies.’ He took a slug of
beer and nodded in satisfaction. ‘How are you managing in your new position?’

‘All right, so far,’ I said. ‘But I have a feeling that the children are sort of sizing me up. I don’t think the axe has really fallen yet.’

‘Do tell,’ Lonnie said, leaning back in his chair, so the front two legs were in the air. He had remarkable balance.

I told him about my first couple of days at Little Scamps, about the staff’s exhaustion and the general chaos.

‘So your plan is to redecorate, and get the kids to help?’ he said, peeling the label off his beer bottle.

‘I can’t change the kids in one go,’ I said, ‘but I can change the environment.’

‘Mmm. And our little water baby is one of your charges?’

‘Tammy, yeah.’

‘How has she been with you?’

‘You’d think she’d never ever set eyes on me before.’

‘What’s wrong with her, anyway?’ Lonnie asked.

‘No one seems to know,’ I replied, and told him what I had seen at Tammy’s house earlier that day.

‘I’d guess neglect might have something to do with it, then,’ my friend said.

‘To begin with,’ I agreed.

‘So what are you going to do?’

‘About Tammy?’

‘About all of it,’ Lonnie said.

‘Finish decorating and then play it by ear.’

‘What I like about that plan is its simplicity,’ Lonnie said sagely.

‘Kind of foolproof, isn’t it?’ I agreed. ‘I also need to hire some extra staff, and that may be a problem.’

‘Why?’

‘Well, Susan and Tush have tried and failed to get any new
people to stay,’ I explained, ‘and I am, in fairness, supposed to be getting these children to settle down and feel safe and comfortable in the place. If I cause even more changes – particularly ones that don’t last – I might end up making things worse.’

‘Bit of a mess,’ Lonnie said, deadpan. ‘One might even go so far as to say that you’ve been a total disaster.’

‘Thanks for the support.’

‘You’re welcome. Now, seeing as how I hauled my arse all the way over here on a very warm evening, is there any chance of you feeding me before I die of starvation?’

‘Well, since you put it like that …’ I said.

We went inside.

Dinner passed pleasantly, with no mention of work. Lonnie had seen very little of the world, but he was widely read and could talk on virtually any subject. This made him an enormously entertaining dinner companion. That evening I was treated to his theories about the latent homosexuality in Tolkien’s
Lord of the Rings
(riddled with it, apparently), the real reason the French irritate so many people (how can a nation consider itself the pinnacle of art and culture when its greatest work of architecture is basically a bit of leftover scaffolding?), and whether or not Elvis was really dead (who cared?). When the plates were cleared away we took Millie for a short stroll through a pretty little wood near the cottage, where she spent her time chasing rabbits.

‘What do you think she’d do if she ever caught one?’ I asked Lonnie, as we watched the greyhound pounding
helter-skelter
after a bundle of grey with a white bobtail. As soon as it disappeared underground another (or maybe the same one) popped out of a hole ten yards to the left and Millie was off again.

‘I expect she’d break its neck, disembowel it and eat the viscera,’ Lonnie said, without a blink.

‘Not the baby?’ I said, aghast.

‘Nature red in tooth and claw,’ Lonnie said. ‘It’s instinct.’

By the time we got back to the cottage it was starting to get dark. I lit a small fire (it wasn’t even slightly cold, but I always find a fire soothing and cheering), put some Miles Davis on the stereo and we sat nursing large whiskies.

‘I’ve been thinking,’ Lonnie said.

‘I always find those words deeply disturbing,’ I said.

‘You should.’

‘All right, I’ll take the bait. What were you thinking about?’

‘You need staff at this playschool, right?’

‘We do.’

‘How many do you need?’

‘One will suffice. For now, anyway.’

‘I’ll do it.’

I took a swig of whisky. It was Teacher’s – not a single malt but very mellow. ‘That idea had never occurred to me,’ I said, mulling the ins and outs of the proposal. ‘You’re qualified, aren’t you?’

‘I did a course last year. Tristan insisted on it.’

‘And you have no criminal record.’

‘Correct. And a piece of paper to prove it. As you well know, I haven’t had much opportunity to get arrested in my uneventful life.’

I sat forward on my chair and looked at Lonnie seriously. ‘Do you really want to leave Drumlin? I mean … it’s all you’ve really known since … well, since …’

‘Since you and Tristan found me,’ Lonnie said tersely. ‘Yes, I’m painfully aware of that. And it’s one of the main reasons I want to throw my hat in with you. I want to strike out a little.’

‘There are other ways,’ I said. ‘You could go to college, or take a holiday, or buy a cat. I appreciate what you’re offering but—’

‘Buy a cat?’ Lonnie spluttered. ‘Do you think I couldn’t help?’

I heard the sharpness in his voice. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, but I owed it to him to be honest.

‘I do. I think you’d be a huge benefit to me and the other staff, and the children would be lucky as hell to have you. But I need to know for certain that you aren’t just jumping ship out of some misplaced sense of duty to me.’

‘Why the fuck would I do that?’ Lonnie said. ‘I don’t even like you.’

‘I’m being serious,’ I said, getting angry now myself. ‘If you want me to go to Tristan and request that you be released, you have to be straight with me.’

‘Okay.’ Lonnie drained his glass and poured more. He held out the bottle to me, but I shook my head. ‘If anything,
you
would be doing
me
the favour.’

‘How so?’

Lonnie sat back and ran his hands through his hair. He was great at talking about anything other than his feelings – not unlike many of us, I suppose. ‘When I came to Drumlin I was what you folks call a “trainee”, a client, one of the people at the unit who needed help.’

‘When I arrived there I needed help too,’ I interjected. ‘Not a damn thing wrong with that.’

‘Yeah, but no one ever referred to you as disabled, or questioned your intellectual functioning, or tried to measure your social skills.’

I thought about a way to tell him he was wrong. But he wasn’t. Finally: ‘No. They didn’t try to establish what was wrong with me.’

‘Now don’t get me wrong,’ Lonnie said. ‘The investigation wasn’t done in a way that was intrusive or insulting. Anyway, I’m used to it. I’ve been the subject of comment and conjecture all my life. I’ve tolerated questions and probing about everything from my capacity to understand complex decimals to the size of my dick since I was a child. Tristan was, at least, sensitive about how he measured and classified me.’

‘I’m not sure that’s fair, Lonnie,’ I said. ‘No one tried to classify you.’

‘Oh, so there was never any discussion at staff meetings as to what kind of dwarfism I have?’

‘Well—’

‘I know there was, Shane. Don’t try and bullshit me!’

‘I’m not—’

‘You are! What classification of dwarfism do I have?’

‘I don’t fucking care what sort you have!’

‘Tell me! Say it!’

We were shouting now. Millie had woken up and was pacing nervily. Lonnie patted the couch beside him and she jumped up, resting her head on his lap.

‘You have achondroplasia,’ I said, hating the sound of the word.

‘What are the symptoms?’ Lonnie asked, absently stroking Millie’s head.

What killed me as I recited the scientific terminology was that, yet again, he was right. Tristan had a thick file detailing Lonnie’s personal and medical history, including the specifics of his particular form of genetic abnormality. And I had made a point of visiting the medical section of the library of a local college where I taught an occasional class to see if I could learn anything extra. I told myself it was so I could help the angry little man, but it was nothing more than intellectual curiosity. And arrogance.

‘What are the symptoms, Shane?’ Lonnie repeated. ‘I know you’re well aware of them.’

‘It’s the most recognizable and the commonest form of dwarfism,’ I said slowly, trying desperately to maintain eye contact. Looking away would just aggravate my embarrassment. ‘It accounts for seventy per cent of dwarfism cases internationally. The physical manifestations are short limbs, but in some cases, like yours, abnormally long ones too.’

‘Flattered you noticed,’ Lonnie said, smiling.

‘Also there can be increased spinal curvature – like in your … um … shoulder. And distortion of skull growth.’

‘So how does one end up with achondroplasic dwarfism, then?’ Lonnie asked. He was not going to let up.

‘Achondroplasia is an autosomal dominant disorder caused by the presence of a faulty allele in a person’s genome,’ I said. ‘If a pair of achondroplasia alleles are present, the result is fatal. One, though, causes the disorder in a live birth. Achondroplasia itself is a mutation in the fibroblast
growth-factor
receptor – gene three, I think, but don’t quote me.’

‘You’re right,’ Lonnie said. ‘Explain how this mutated gene works.’