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"Not necessarily. Anyone with half an eye could see you were thunderstruck when that report turned up this morning. When Sir Charles has had time to cool down and consider it, he's bound to realise that if you had sent the blood to the lab, and entered up their results as if they were your own, the last thing on earth you'd be likely to do is leave the evidence lying around to be discovered."

"Still, it's sown the element of doubt in his mind. I'm the person who can't be trusted from now on."

"Let's be sensible about this." Angela sat down primly and rearranged her gown and pinafore. "If it's unwise to challenge Harry directly - and I'm sure it is - what are the alternative courses of action? Well, you could always tell Sir Charles that it was a deliberate plant. Then it would be your word against his registrar's. Now I grant you he might be uncertain which to take. But there's one thing of which you can be sure - Harry didn't start this without meaning to see it through. If you'd said this morning that it was a fake report he would undoubtedly have called in the haematologist. Kate Ritchie will have been briefed about what to say. From all accounts," she glanced sideways at Lesley, "she seems to think she has grounds for a personal grudge against you."

Lesley flushed again. "You mean the old wrangle about the bathroom? You know, Sister," she looked Angela Bishop in the eye, "I wasn't responsible for that at all, though nothing will convince the medical auxiliaries. It was one of their own number who pinned the notice to the door."

Sister nodded. "Nan Baillie, I suppose. It figures." She put her elbows on the desk and pursed her lips for a moment. "Still, Sir Charles would have no option but to accept Kate Ritchie's word. Besides, it would put you in a bad light, if you know what I mean. Forcing a showdown would blow the whole thing out of proportion."

"You're not suggesting I should just let things slide, are you, Sister?"

"No, not exactly. You shouldn't do that - though sometimes it's difficult to avoid it." She seemed to be caught up in her own thoughts for a moment, then just as suddenly snapped out of them. "Tell me one thing, Doctor. Before all this happened, what was the hold Harry had over you?"

"Hold, Sister?"

"Yes. If I'm to help I must know what it was."

"Oh, that." Lesley drew a circle with her foot on the floor. "Jim did some bloods for me one night while I was out - at least I thought he had done them. Dr. Dayborough said they'd been sent to the lab."

"And had they?"

"Oh, yes. I wondered about that myself. But they had. Apparently Jim does it all the time."

"And Harry threatened to let Sir Charles find out - in the most refined way, of course; one that couldn't be challenged?"

"That's about it."

"Since then you've been doing half his work?"

"All the stooging bits anyway," Lesley admitted.

"It's worse than blackmail - you realise that?"

"That doesn't make it any easier to cope with."

"What does young Graham have to say about this?" Sister was obviously going to spare her nothing.

"He doesn't know anything about it." She kept her eyes on the floor.

"As if I hadn't guessed." Sister leaned back in her chair and shook her head. "For a very bright girl you've handled this rather foolishly. Isn't it about time you let him know what's going on?"

"The trouble is, Dr. Dayborough's promised to back him for promotion."

"And you're afraid that if you told him, Graham might cause a stir. I thought that was what you wanted - the thing out in the open?"

"Not that way, Sister."

"I see. You think he might put paid to his own chances? Is that it?"

Lesley was silent.

"So. We have to go carefully." Angela whistled under her breath.

"I don't want you getting involved." Lesley looked anxious. "Enough people seem to have been roped in as it is."

"Bless your heart," Angela said breezily, "I was born getting involved. Sometimes I think I've never been anything else - especially where Harry Dayborough is concerned. Tell you what, Doctor," she seemed to come to a sudden decision, "how would it be if we were both to sign lab requisitions in future?"

"Two signatures?"

"Yes. That way Kate Ritchie and Harry would both get the message. If I know anything about it, they'll hesitate to say a red cell count was requested if I've signed a chit for a legitimate prothrombin time." There was a familiar and formidable gleam in her eyes.

Lesley smiled in spite of herself. "A touch of the red-haired temperament, there, Sister?"

"Why not?" Angela demanded. "Goodness knows, sometimes I think life makes nags of us all. You start out with the best of intentions. Then you find no one takes a blind bit of notice till you start shouting the odds and wielding the big stick."

"And Sir Charles?" Lesley asked. "Won't he think it strange?"

"It will alert him that this is in the category which you can't tell to chiefs."

"He might ask you."

"I should be ready for him."

"But that's no different from me spilling the beans now."

"I shouldn't tell him outright." She sounded astonished at the very suggestion. "It's amazing what you can do with the uplifted hands and a really expressive shrug of the shoulders." She demonstrated what she had in mind.

Lesley grinned. "Oh, Sister! Do you think it would work?"

"It's the best of the possible options. This way, Harry will have a good idea what I'm up to. He might even hesitate to apply any more pressure. Sir Charles will have his suspicions confirmed that this morning's incident was not what it seemed - and all without you having to appear unduly concerned about clearing yourself." She cocked her head on one side and twinkled at Lesley. "Yes, the more I think of it, the better I like it." She sat back and preened. "Though I say it myself, it's rather good."

"Meantime I go on doing his bidding?"

"Since that's how you've elected to cope with the other matter. We can only hope that if you give him enough rope, one of these days, our Harry will hang himself with it."

"We'll give it a try." Lesley held out her hand. The interview had filled her with new hope. "And thank you, Sister, for sparing so much time."

"Nonsense." Angela brushed aside the thanks. "Don't give it another thought. Off you go to your lunch." She was the brisk, efficient Ward Sister again. "And, Doctor -"

Lesley turned at the door.

"I leave Jim Graham to you. Personally, I think it's time someone told that young man a few home truths - about himself and Harry Dayborough, amongst other things." She looked cryptically at Lesley over the rim of her glasses.

But Lesley was much too relieved to give further thought to that now. Sister Bishop was right. This was how to foil Dayborough's latest scheme.

By the time she had crossed the courtyard, she'd convinced herself that, thanks to Sister's co-operation, it was only a matter of hours before she was vindicated in the Chief's eyes. Soon he would know that she had neither cheated nor told him a blatant he.

When she reached her room there was a note in Mrs. Frazer's handwriting propped up against her dressing table mirror.

Sir Charles Hope-Moncrieff's secretary had phoned. The arrangement with Dr. Leigh for Wednesday afternoon had been cancelled. Unfortunately, he'd found that a prior engagement intervened.

She turned over the paper. Apparently no alternative date had been suggested.

She sat down on the bed, her legs suddenly weak. There was to be no expedition to exchange the woolly toy.

On
Wednesday Lesley found herself caught up in the inevitable lunchtime chatter about cars. The men were never done discussing the merits and demerits of their respective models.

"I can't think why you don't get one of your own." It was a favourite hobby horse of Sandy's. "Old Miller down the road gives very favourable credit terms."

"I'll wait till I have the ready cash in my hand." She gave him her stock reply.

"But that's grossly old-fashioned. Nobody - but nobody - pays cash for anything nowadays."

"Old habits die hard. This one's built in with the bricks." She grinned as though she hadn't heard it all before. "I'm ready to admit it imposes grave limitations."

"I don't know so much," Pete Morrison put in slyly. "Who wants to buy a car when they can always be driven - or get some other mug to lay on the transport?"

She blushed. The use of Jim's car was becoming a sore spot. "You're at it again - Lesley-baiting," she quipped. "It's one of your favourite pastimes these days."

"No, but seriously, with the severe weather setting in, you should have a bone-shaker of your own. That two-mile hike to the clinic is no joke for anyone."

"It doesn't happen very often. "If I don't have the MG, sometimes I get a lift from the Chief. I've only had to walk it about twice so far." She refrained from saying that today would make it three times. In the circumstances that would have been too pointed a remark.

The bubbling conversation flowed on and around her. Without meaning to, she found herself isolated from it.

Shortly afterwards she excused herself. If she were to reach Snykes rural clinic in time she must catch the bus which passed the hospital gates at twenty minutes past one.

For almost the first time Jim hadn't suggested that she use his car. She'd been wondering whether to offer to return his key, Somehow that seemed to place too much importance on their two recent tiffs. She'd decided} meantime, to let the matter drift.

The trouble was, she thought now, as she began sprinting for the bus, that the setbacks and tensions of the past few days had made it difficult any longer to see anything in its true - colours. From past experience she knew this was the moment to watch. It wasn't the time for endangering relationships or for taking irrevocable decisions.

She swung on to the bus which had slithered to a halt when the driver saw she was running. The Jamaican conductor mistook her for a nurse, which put them at cross purposes in the ensuing conversation. She was glad to jump off at Fenham crossroads. The two-mile stretch of moorland road would be a welcome diversion today.

She began to stride out, glad to feel the wind - and even the fine rain - on her face. A bit of her mind was engaged with the problem of what would happen if Sir Charles caught up with her, but when she eventually reached the old rural school, the coupe had still not put in an appearance. There was no sign of it in the school grounds when she finally emerged from her consulting room at the end of the afternoon.

Sister Meryl, the Health Visitor, said Sir Charles had phoned earlier to cancel his visit. Dr. Dayborough had been to attend to his more urgent patients.

There was nothing for it but to face the long walk back to the crossroads. It seemed a pitiful let-down after the promise of Sunday. It was only then that she realised how much she had been hoping - even against the evidence of his secretary's call - that he would, in spite of everything, turn up to take her to Glasgow.

It was silly, she knew, to feel disappointed like this. Of course, he had other appointments. He was just being kind on Sunday because of what the patients had said. Now that he had cause to doubt her, naturally he wasn't so convinced that she needed his protection. And anyway, there was no reason
in the world why the change of plan should have anything to do with her at all. She was only his resident: very small fry. Why should she be in his mind one minute after he had left the place?

She trudged on in the developing darkness and nothing that she told herself, consoled. Her mood matched the chilling dampness of this all-pervading Scottish mist. She could see only one face. It was one of the bonuses, or curses, of her particular type of memory that unwittingly it had hoarded every fleeting expression of his eyes and recorded each changing inflection of the voice. She had no hope at all of exorcising these tormentors. Yet already she knew that she had squandered too much time building impossible daydreams which had no earthly chance of ever coming true.

When she got back to hospital the residents' quarters were buzzing with the latest news. The week's medical journals had just been delivered in the internal mail. Next year's S.H.O. jobs were advertised. Contrary to expectation only one post was offered in Sir Charles Hope-Moncrieff's unit. The last date for applications was Hogmanay.

"Why only one when two vacancies were created?" Pete Morrison sounded thunderstruck.

"Perhaps one's already earmarked for someone else." Hugh Campbell was being cautious. "After all, I don't think they even need to advertise these grades."

"Surely not," said Sandy. "I'm sure you're wrong. I've always understood that they all had to go to the press."

"Even when they're going to be internally rigged?"

As usual when they were excited they were all talking at once. Everyone had a question or theory. The babble rose. Lesley stood at the window and took no part in it.

"There's this rider, too, about reserving the right not to fill them if no suitable candidates apply."

"Or to offer the post to someone else of their own choice."

"I don't much like the sound of that," said Pete.

"So much for our chances." Sandy tossed his copy on to the coffee table and sat down on it. "The only way I'll make anything out of this is by opening a book on the side."

"A book?" Lesley closed the journal in her hand and turned towards the group.

Sandy grinned. "I thought you would rise to that bait. I'm thinking of offering six to four on you."

Hugh took pity on her baffled expression. "I don't suppose it's struck you yet, Lesley, but this will mean open competition with Jim."

"Jim?" The same thing had just been dawning on her.

"Why don't you ever give anyone a straight answer?" Sandy feigned exasperation. "You've got a nasty little habit, baby, of always answering one question with another."

"It's a very convenient delaying device." Pete chuckled. "It buys her time in which to consider whether or not it's safe to reply to the first."