The Storm Without (15 page)

She picked up a glass from the bar, started to polish it with a white teatowel. 'No, I suppose you wouldn't be.'

I felt a fire ignite in my belly and a burning trail passed through my chest and onto my neck. She seemed to be going for broke. I wondered if I had really been all that bad. I'd got drunk alone, in my room, and then Mason whisked me away to the Little Chef. I tried to piece together the jigsaw of my memories but the moments between him knocking at my door and my arrival at the restaurant were missing. I knew, potentially, this meant I could have provided Mrs Kerr with quite enough ammunition to fire in my direction.

'I suppose you'd like a coffee.' She put a stinging inflection in her last word.

I avoided her eyes. 'Yes, that would be lovely. Thank you.'

As she turned towards the coffee-pot I removed my gaze from the floor and took in the scene of Queens Terrace. It was a broad street and the bay window provided a view of the whole sweep, all the way to the County Buildings. I thought about taking a walk. I might get as far as the Golden Disk, or if I was lucky enough, I could follow the Low Green down to the Fairfield House and grab a heart-starter. I was still daydreaming about getting myself back on track when a coffee cup was clattered before me and Mrs Kerr spoke once more.

'You had a visitor here last night.'

I reached for the coffee; the cup was hot. 'Yes, Mason. We used to be on the force together.'

She gave an audible sigh. 'No, I don't mean him.'

The first hit of caffeine made my head throb. 'You mean another visitor … after I left?'

The white tea towel was picked up again; the same glass was picked up also. 'A woman.'

I lowered my coffee cup. 'That would have been Lyn.'

'That's not the name I was given.'

I was confused; the gnawing ache in my temples migrated to the base of my skull. The only other woman who knew I was here was my mother — I'd written the details down beside her telephone in case of emergencies; I doubted she would make a night visit to see me though. 'What name?'

Mrs Kerr stopped polishing the glass. 'Her name was Claire … she said she was your sister.'

'What? Claire … all the way from Inverness?'

'That's right. She waited for a bit but then she left.'

I was confused. I raised a hand to my head and scratched at my scalp. 'Well, did she leave a message?'

The audible sigh returned. Mrs Kerr's head tilted towards her shoulder in a gesture that could only be topped by snook cocking. 'She was a little irate after waiting for you to return, Mr Michie … in the end she said she would leave you a telephone message.'

I put my hand into my pocket and removed my mobile phone: the battery had died. The charger was upstairs in my room. I looked at my coffee cup on the bar, then back at Mrs Kerr. 'I'll have to check this.' I held up the phone. 'I'll come back for the coffee.'

She curled down her lips and looked away as I headed off. Why would my sister suddenly show up in Ayr? We'd exchanged some harsh words recently but I didn't expect her to show up and bawl me out for my insensitivity.

My hand was trembling a little as I reached out for my bedroom doorhandle. The hinges shrieked as I entered. The phone charger was where I'd left it, on the dresser, plugged into the wall. I connected my phone and waited for the green light to show that it was charging. In a moment the rest of the screen lit and my messages started to drop in. I scanned them briefly and clicked on the one with my sister's name beside the 'five missed calls' banner.

I dialled my voicemail.

'Doug … it's Claire, where are you?'

The line clicked off.

The next message queued up: 'Doug, Claire again, can you get back as soon as possible please? I need to talk to you.'

She sounded flustered, stressed.

The next call was empty. I heard her slam down a hard handset — a land-line.

The fourth call was the last one I listened to: 'Doug, I don't know where you are … Look, I came to your hotel … You need to get yourself to the hospital. It's mum. I'm afraid it's not good. Not good at all …'

I hated hospitals more than any other place on Earth. I could still remember when they started building the new Ayr Hospital out at the Dalmellington Road. It seemed such a huge task, it would never be finished. There had been those that bemoaned the loss of smaller, friendlier establishments but the debate had been wasted on me. Hospitals were a place to be avoided at all costs. I loathed the harshly over-lit corridors, the smell of industrial antiseptic and bleach. More than that, I despised the proximity to death. Just pulling up in the car park made me feel coldly mortal.

As I headed for the front steps an old man shuffled through the door. He was wearing a heavy, checked dressing gown; one arm was attached to a bizarre looking pole on what looked like shopping-trolley wheels. At the top of the pole was a small, box-shaped bag containing some kind of clear liquid that made its way into his arm through a length of tubing. He seemed perfectly at ease with the apparatus, as if he
'
d been lugging it around his whole life.

'
Excuse me, son.
'

He
'
d caught me off guard. I turned my gaze from him, then quickly back.
'
Yes
…'

He fumbled with something in the pocket of his dressing gown. When he gave up, I spotted his gnarled, arthritic fingers.
'
You couldn
'
t get a hold of the fags in there, could you?
'

I smiled.
'
Sure.
'

A packet of B&H, the long ones — 100s. I opened them up, removed one and offered it to him.

'
Could you light it for me, son?
'

I clamped the cig in my mouth and sparked it up. The taste drew my attention, had me gasping for one myself. I resisted: had a feeling this bloke was capable of talking the leg off an iron pot, and I had my mother to attend to.

I passed over the cigarette, watched him suck in his sallow cheeks and slowly roll his eyes back in time to the tilt of his neck. A weak, thin hand like a claw was raised in a grim salute of thanks. I nodded and headed for the door.

My heart rate ticked into a speedy incline that verged on panic as I got inside. When I was on the force I had always hated visits to the hospital. Invariably, appearing at the infirmary meant something had gone wrong. There was only one place I dreaded more: the morgue, but visits there came with warning; you had time to prepare yourself for what was coming. And death carried an air of unreality. It seemed as distant as dreams to the living. Hospitals were firmly rooted in the now and appeared altogether more personal. You couldn
'
t escape the incriminations of the patient you had come to see when they were lying before you. Even the beeps and whirs of medical machines spoke volumes in such situations.

I had come to see my own flesh and blood this time. As I approached the reception desk I felt my fists bunching in my coat pockets. Not from anger, but sheer anxiety. I knew my mother was in a bad way, had needed help, but I felt the most enormous guilt that I hadn
'
t done more.

'
Yes, can I help you?
'
The woman behind the counter had a kind face; she didn
'
t look like a nurse. I
'
d always found them to be tough customers.

'
Erm
…'
My mind went blank. I removed a hand, scratched the side of my head. My eyes scanned the woman in front of me again. She was smiling now. I dropped my gaze again. It fell on a name tag: Agnes McNeil.

'
Are you visiting?
' she said.

I took a breath, seemed to find focus.
'
Yes, my mother
…
Michie, the name
'
s Mich—
'

She rose from her seat and placed a cold hand over my own.
'
I think I know the lady.
'

Agnes walked me to the lift. There were directions uttered but I let them whiz past like cyclists in a velodrome. I stored the room number and relied on instinct to lead me there. Once outside the door I tried to gather my thoughts but they were eclipsed by a surge of adrenalin. My breathing faltered again; my heartrate ramped.

Suddenly the door eased open.

'
You
'
re here
…'
It was Claire.

'
Yes
…'
A ridiculous reply to a ridiculous question.

Claire pressed her thin frame through the door and placed a hand on my chest; she was motioning me away from the room.

'
I think we should make our way down the corridor
…'
Claire
'
s eyes flitted, first to the left and then the right. The gesture made me dizzy.

'
What?
'
I was confused. I
'
d come to see my mother.

'
There
'
s a room
…
one of those waiting rooms, I
'
ve just lost my bearings.
'
She took my arm, started to walk me down the cold, bright corridor. I heard her heels clack on the hard flooring. Her hair swished on her shoulders as she turned her head from left to right scanning the glass-fronted doors on the ward.
'
I
'
ve seen it, I know it
'
s here.
'

I wanted to grab my sister by the shoulders, spin her round and return to the room my mother was in.
'
Claire, I came here to see Mam.
'

She reached out, grabbed a handle and flung open the door it was attached to.
'
Let
'
s get a coffee.
'

'
Did you hear me?
'

'
Doug, please.
'
Her voice rose.
'
Can we just go inside
… ?'
She pointed into the open room; grey-blue carpet tiles on the floor looked primed with static. A tall vending machine with Twix and Mars and McCoy
'
s crisps sat against the wall.

'
I only want to see our mother, Claire. Why have you dragged me away?
'

Her thin lips started to tremble. She looked down towards the floor.
'
You can
'
t.
'

My chest inflated.
'
What do you mean,
I can
'
t
?
'

She folded her arms, gripped herself. She looked so small, a waif, like a schoolgirl. She tilted her head to the side and rubbed at the edges of her arms. The slow tremble of her lips seemed to disappear as she tried to speak again. But nothing came.

I didn
'
t need to hear the words.

I turned away and set off through the corridor towards my mother
'
s room. My steps were dull, flat thuds on the flooring, my legs almost too stiff to move as I struggled back the way we'd come just a few moments before, only now I carried a heavy weight of new knowledge in my mind.

Claire cried out.
'
Doug
…
no, please.
'

I waved her away. She ran behind me and grasped onto my coatsleeve.
'
Doug, Doug
…'

At the door she'd squeezed through earlier, Claire backed off. I turned to see her shivering against the wall. She looked away. I stepped inside and caught sight of my mother in the bed. Her head was pointed towards the ceiling, her mouth agape. Her skin, as thin as paper, was pale and yellowed. She was still. She looked like a stranger to me, She was certainly no longer my mother; her spirit had gone.

The drive back to my guest house in Queens Terrace passed in a blur. The greatest surprise to me was that I genuinely found it difficult to mourn for my mother. The woman who had raised me, who had cared for me and taught me as a child, had died a long time ago. I hardly recognised the person she had become. Drinking herself to a stupor, spouting bitter recriminations in every direction for the collapse of her once happy life was bad enough to see, but the lack of self-respect left us all bewildered.

I had tried to look at her as she lay on the hospital bed, tried to discern some hint of her emotion, but I couldn't register a glimmer of recognition. I couldn't help but believe the drinking, the dissipation, was the final chapter she had chosen for herself. It was a long slow suicide and we all took part. Me, my sister, the health authorities, social services. We were powerless to halt her fall. The decision was all hers.

In the force, I had watched people dive to the bottom of a whisky bottle every night of the week. Early on I'd seen the futility of intervention: how do you protect a man from himself? Their fate was theirs to control alone. Rabbie had put it more eloquently and his words gathered steam in my mind now:
nae man can tether time nor tide.
None indeed.