Читать книгу Darkmans - Nicola Barker - Страница 12

She was lying on a trolley in the hospital corridor, propped up on her elbow and reading an old copy of Marie Claire. She’d already made firm friends with two of the porters, one of whom was still buzzing around in the background; perhaps imagining – even though she was obviously suffering from a serious fracture – that he might be on to a Good Thing here.

And what more could she expect (the porter’s lascivious expression seemed to proclaim, as he slouched priapically against the Nurses’ Station and hungrily appraised her)? She was a Broad, after all. They were a degenerate bunch. The now-legendary Jason Broad’d had his stomach pumped on the exact same Casualty Ward a mere eighteen months earlier, and had celebrated this momentous occasion with – wait for it – a can of Budweiser (downed it in one, the nutter)! Dr Morton almost had a coronary; was actually quoted as saying that ‘Jason Broad should take out a restraining order on himself’ (and if his current three-year prison sentence was anything to go by, then he’d pretty much followed the doctor’s orders to the letter).

The whole family were delinquent (it was totally genetic): the dad, a child-fancier, the mother a basket case, the brothers all hoodlums, the sisters, sluts. The uncle was a trickster and the cousins, simpletons (although – so far as anyone knew – there was nothing concrete on the aunt).

Perhaps sensing herself the focal-point of somebody’s attentions, Kelly suddenly glanced up –

Ah…

Patrick?

Is that his name?

She nodded and smiled politely. He smiled back –

Christ she wants me

– then turned and muttered something to the nurse on duty. The nurse sniggered, peering over. Kelly’s mouth tightened. She looked down, her cheeks flushing.

The second (and rather more hands-on) porter had delivered Beede a message just as soon as he’d arrived at work: less a polite invitation to pop up and see Kelly, than a haughty – if carefully phrased – injunction (in the idiom of The Whips, this was definitely a Three Liner).

Even so, he didn’t head up there immediately. He changed into his spotless white uniform, tinkered away at a faulty dryer, put on four wash-loads in quick succession, then took the service lift from his musty but well-ordered Basement Empire to the exotic, chaotic heights of Casualty (delivering a batch of clean towels to Paediatrics on the way).

As he strolled along the corridor, he observed (with some amusement) that Kelly had her nose buried in an article about a charitable Aids Trust in Southern Africa (whatever next? Principia Philosophia?).

‘Better sort yourself out, first,’ he volunteered dryly, ‘before you apply, eh?’

She started, guiltily, at the unexpected sound of his voice, then her chin jerked up defiantly. ‘Ha ha.’ She slapped the magazine down, scowling.

‘I believe you left your two dogs at the flat,’ he continued (completely undaunted by his frosty reception). ‘They’re currently standing guard in the hallway. One of them mauled Kane’s house guest.’

‘Screw the blasted dogs,’ she whispered crossly. ‘Why ain’t you returned my calls? Why’ve you been avoidin’ me?’

Beede’s brows rose slightly, but before he could open his mouth to answer she’d already charged on, ‘An’ that was your big mistake, see? I ain’t no fool. You’ve been avoidin’ me ‘cos’ you feel bad, an’ you feel bad…’ she poked a skinny index finger into his chest, ‘because you stole those drugs from Kane and then sold me up the bloody Mersey. I’ve been thinkin’ about it a lot – for days, in fact – and nothin’ else adds up.’

Beede’s expression did not change.

‘So you fractured your leg?’ he asked, at normal volume.

Kelly was briefly put off her stride by his refusal to engage with her. She admired Beede, after all. She didn’t understand him –

Of course not

– but she respected him. She saw him as a being of an entirely different order –

Celestial/monkish

– a fraction cold, perhaps, but noble, defiant, honourable. One-dimensional –

Certainly

– a little boring, maybe. But entirely trustworthy. Above reproach – or so she’d thought – like the Good King in a fairy story.

‘I fell off your stupid wall,’ she grumbled.

‘Why?’

‘I was waitin’ for ya. To have it out.’

‘But why did you fall?’ he persisted.

‘I had a row.’

He didn’t seem surprised by this. ‘With whom?’

Kelly pushed her shoulders back, dramatically. ‘That coloured bitch who killed Paul.’

‘Ah,’ Beede quickly put two and two together. ‘That would be Winifred.’

She nodded (not a little deflated by his emotionless response).

‘Anyway,’ Beede spoke very gently (as if dealing with an Alzheimer’s patient who’d been discovered trying to buy a cup of tea in the staff canteen with a tampon), ‘he isn’t dead, is he?’

‘Stop tryin’ to wriggle off the damn hook,’ she growled.

‘I wasn’t ever on it, Kelly,’ Beede said gravely (but there was an edge of steel in his voice). ‘And Paul isn’t dead. He’s very much alive.’ ‘He’s a fuckin’ vegetable,’ Kelly bleated. ‘An’ she did that. Said as much herself. It was her who got him started: took him under her wing when he was feelin’ low, got him into dope an’ sniff an’ all that other shit. Then, once he was hooked, once he was well and truly screwed, kicked up her posh, little heels an’ cheerfully buggered off.’

‘If it makes you feel better to apportion blame…’ Beede murmured, imperturbably.

‘Private bloody school, a new bloody life. Fine for her…’ Kelly continued, then she paused, as if only just registering his interjection. ‘Yes.’ She nodded. ‘It bloody does…’ (Beede smiled. He was familiar with Kelly’s conversational stock-car racing – the dramatic zoom past, the sudden handbrake turn, the skid, the spin.)

‘…though I ain’t sure what you mean by that, exactly,’ she finished off, scowling.

‘If it makes you feel better to focus all your understandable rancour on somebody else – somebody who is, to all intents and purposes, quite extraneous to the situation – then that’s perfectly understandable…’ Beede said benignly. ‘In fact it’s utterly human.’

Kelly was quiet for a while, then, ‘You’re head-fucking me,’ she announced.

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘You are.’

‘I merely stated a simple truth about your brother.’

‘No,’ she paused. ‘No. I’m wise to your tricks, see? On the surface you’re pretendin’ to be all sweet and kind and charmin’ about it – like butter wouldn’t melt – but underneath, what you’re really sayin’ – what you’re really thinkin’ – is that I’m somehow to blame for what’s happened to him…’

‘Not that you are,’ Beede mildly demurred, ‘but that perhaps – at some level – you believe you might be.’

Kelly gasped (her hand flew to her chest). ‘You think I scragged my own brother?!’

‘Now you’re just being hysterical,’ Beede snapped, barely managing to compose his features in time to nod, politely, at a passing Staff Matron.

‘Fuck off I am!’

‘Good. Fine. Whatever you say, Kelly.’

She stared up at him, in wonderment, the scales apparently fallen. ‘Oh. My. God. You are evil.’

‘I’d better get back,’ Beede smiled, crisply (no point in a denial). ‘It may’ve escaped your attention, but I’m actually meant to be employed by this hospital.’

‘Yeah. That’d be right. Off you go, Grandad…’ Kelly waved him away, airily. ‘Back to work. Back to the grindstone, eh? Back to cleanin’ your dirty, bloody laundry…’

Her voice oozed ill-will.

Beede didn’t respond, initially, he just cocked his head and gazed at her, blankly, as if inexplicably baffled by the words she’d just uttered. Kelly shifted, uneasily, under his vigorous scrutiny.

Then – quite out of the blue – he smiled. He beamed. ‘Have I got this all wrong…?’ he asked (suddenly the very essence of genial avuncularity). ‘Or were you actually experimenting with a clever piece of word-play there?’

Before she could muster up an answer (she’d half-opened her mouth, in preparation, but had yet to rally her considerable intellectual forces – she was still in shock from the fall, after all), he’d patted her, encouragingly, on her bony shoulder.

‘Because if you were, I’m very impressed, dear. Well done. Bravo!’

Kelly’s eyes bulged at this near-perfect kiss-off.

‘And by the way…’ Beede continued, benevolently, ‘if you were hoping for a visit from your mother any time soon…’ (Her mouth quickly snapped shut again. Oh God. The very thought almost calcified her entire bone-structure) –’…then you’ll be delighted to know,’ he purred soothingly, ‘that she’s here.’

The cat had found sanctuary in its basket. Only a piercing pair of china-blue eyes were now visible, peeking out at him, anxiously, from the creaking confines of its smart, wicker corral. Kane blew an idle raspberry at it, and the cat hunched down even lower, emitting a strangely haunting, dog-like yowl.

He glanced around him. It’d been a long while since he’d ventured inside Beede’s bedroom, but during this considerable interim, a dramatic transformation – a revolution – had taken place.

Where previously Beede had been the master of decorative understatement (books, reading lamp, bed, eiderdown, matching Victorian dark-wood cupboard and chest of drawers) now the place was like some kind of Aladdin’s cave: a veritable bring-and-buy sale of disparate objects, for the most part stacked up in crates (which now covered – floor to ceiling – three of the four walls).

The crates had been turned on to their sides, so that the items within were individually showcased; almost as if inhabiting their own miniature plywood theatres. Kane remembered staging theatrical endeavours of this kind himself, as a boy, in cardboard boxes; with badly painted back-drops, a batch of plastic animals and his Action Man – but –

Hey…

– surely Beede was taking things a little far here…?

Even the cat’s basket had been placed inside a crate. And each crate – Kane scowled as he bent down to inspect one – was tagged with a crisp, white label containing a date, a description of the item – eg:

13.08.2002

Three coffee mugs c. 1997

One bears the inscription: The world’s best fisherman

Cup three has slight chip on lip

– as well as a digital image of the item/s in question neatly affixed underneath.

Kane found himself staring at the photograph of the mugs for some minutes –

Has Beede completely lost his marbles?

Or is it me?

Is it the weed?

Has my fantasy/fact facility become utterly jumbled?

He was finally stirred from his reverie by a hoarse cough from the cat –

Hairball?

He moved over to inspect its crate (squatted down to read the label):

22.12.2002

Blue-point Siamese

‘Chairman Miaow’, aka ‘Manny’

Three years old

Neutered male

He stared at its photograph, then directly at the animal –

Hmmn.

A good likeness.

The cat returned his stare, unblinking.

Kane’s mind suddenly turned to the chiropodist –

Ella?

No

Ellen?

He thought about her hands and her long, plain, brown hair –

Uh…

Then he focussed in on his foot. A small verruca, hidden underneath the arch (which he’d possessed – almost without noticing – for seven years? Eight?) had actually been niggling him for several weeks now (new trainers – he reasoned – with slightly higher insoles. A different distribution of pressure, of body weight…That’d set it off. Those tiny, jabbing sensations. Those sharp bouts of ferocious itching –

Urgh).

He flexed his toes and stood up. His phone vibrated inside his pocket. He took it out and inspected it, stepping back. As he stepped, he kicked into a tray of damp cat litter. The grey granules peppered the surrounding carpet.

‘Shit,’ he looked down, scowling, lifting his feet, gingerly.

Now what?

He shoved his phone away, squatted down and scooped a few of the granules on to his hand, wincing, fastidiously, as he dropped them back into the tray again. As they fell he noticed that the base of the tray had been lined with –

Not newspaper, but…

– a letter…Handwritten. He tipped the tray up slightly to enable him to read it more easily. At the top of the page was the heading: Ryan Monkeith Road Crossing Initiative.

Ryan Monkeith? The name rang a bell, for some reason. He frowned for a moment, struggling to remember…

Ah…Yes!

But of course!

Ryan Monkeith – son of Laura – Laura with the dodgy tranquilliser habit – Blonde Laura – Scatty Laura…

It’d been all over the local news the previous year –

But Laura never…

– after he’d been killed crossing a road close to one of the new developments – a pedestrian blackspot…

The A292?

The Hythe Road?

The A251?

They were trying to build a bridge or install a crossing or something –

Weren’t they?

In his honour?

– to be funded by his grandad or uncle or godfather. Some powerful local contractor…

Kane inspected the letter. It was the second page.

‘…people like yourself,’ it said, in a feminine hand, ‘with your background in local politics, fundraising skills and the confidence of the local community…’

Kane snorted, dryly. The next section was smudged. But further down…

‘…different sides of the fence, but after a tragedy of this magnitude we hope a certain amount of…’ more smudging ‘…and that’s why we feel your involvement would be especially…’

Blah blah

His eye was caught, briefly, by something at the bottom of the page –

‘Isidore has been amazing – you’ll be more than familiar with his energy and enthusiasm. He recommended you very highly…’

Gaffar popped his head around the door.

‘Is fix,’ he announced, smiling broadly.

‘What? You fixed it already?’ Kane slammed down the tray. ‘You fixed the rug? Seriously?’

Gaffar threw out his arms in a shrug of pseudo-modest self-aggrandisement.

Kane followed him back through to the living-room. He located the precise spot where the burn had been (just next to the sidetable), squatted down and tried to find any sign of it. Nothing. Not a damn thing.

‘Jesus,’ he muttered, ‘you’ve even…the burn went right through to the rough fibre underneath. How’d you get rid of that?’

‘I just turned it around, you imbecile,’ Gaffar explained, smiling, ‘and hid the burn under the sofa.’

Kane glanced up. ‘So you’re from Turkey? You really know about this stuff, huh?’

Gaffar nodded. ‘Turk.’

Then he paused. ‘Kurd,’ he modified.

‘Did you train in this kind of shit?’

‘Are you kidding me?’ Gaffar snorted, haughtily. ‘Do I look like one of those rough-thumbed, short-sighted, carpet-weaving cunts?’

Kane peered down again, feeling the spot with his hands. He was in love with the job Gaffar had done.

‘You’re a genius, man,’ he murmured, gazing up through his lank fringe again. ‘What’s your name? Gaffar? I owe you big-time, Gaffar. You are an unbelievable fucking God-send. You’ve saved my fucking life here.’

Gaffar tipped his head, bashfully (although he found himself a perfectly fitting receptacle for Kane’s panegyric). ‘Uh…an’ look…’ he clumsily stuttered, in his make-shift English, pushing his hand into his suit pocket and deftly withdrawing a small, neat disc of semi-transparent plastic ‘…Under sofa, lid, eh?’

Mrs Dina Broad had a wonderful facility for getting total strangers to do exactly as she wanted. It was something to do with her size, the tone of her voice (at once wheedling yet strident), her filthy tongue, and the considerable force of what a quality horse-breeder might call ‘her character’.

Dina’s manipulative genius was a happy coincidence, because she simply adored to be waited upon (to be bolstered and escorted, indulged and cosseted). In fact she absolutely demanded it. The cornerstone of her ideology was: if you don’t fuckin’ ask, you don’t fuckin’ get – a maxim which she used so often when her kids were young that – during a fit of high-spiritedness while working Saturdays in a print shop – her eldest son had designed her a t-shirt with this, her favourite slogan, emblazoned across the chest.

If Dina’s life was a carousel (which it was anything but), then there was only enough room on the rotating podium (midst the high-painted roses, the mirror-tiles, the lovely organ) for a single pony; and Dina’s was it (there was her name, in exquisite calligraphy, on a beautifully embossed tag around the neck…And just look at the mane: real silk. And see how straight the brow! How flared the nostril! How long the tail!).

Dina flew up and down (as her moods – and her blood-sugar levels – dictated), and the carousel just kept on spinning, with the music (Ah, the lilting music) never seeming to stop. It was Dina’s show, entirely – paying customers could cheerfully go hang (Dina would supply the rope; would even – although it was a great deal of effort, and she hated effort – tie the noose herself. She was good like that).

The Dina Broad Show (like Celine Dion in Las Vegas) was a show that never ended (it just went on and on and on); but this low-budget extravaganza (in perfect Technicolor) by no means ran itself.

Nuh-uh.

There was the buffing and the oiling (to be regularly undertaken); the electrics (the wiring, the lighting, the amplification), not to mention the construction, the deconstruction, the reconstruction (this was a mobile – well, semi-mobile – proposition, after all), the ground-rent, the barkers, the cashiers, the crowd control…A whole battery – in other words – of tedious, time-consuming rigmarole.

Taken in total, The Dina Broad Experience had a technical staff numbering well over a dozen (the doctor, the social worker, the neighbour, the policeman), and Kelly Broad (poor, skinny, weak-boned Kelly) enjoyed the unique distinction of being at the very heart (or – depending on your take on things – deep in the colon) of this hardworking, poorly rewarded, long-suffering division.

Dina would not perform without her: Fin.

By a series of complex, Machiavellian ruses (there were two people in Casualty – aside from her own daughter – who were currently sharing a single crutch between them) Dina had somehow managed to commandeer a ‘spare’ wheelchair in the foyer, and a rather bemused-looking member of the general public (a willowy and slightly effete man in his sixties called Larry who was meant to be visiting his ninety-year-old aunt in an adjacent ward) was making a brave attempt at pushing her around in it.

‘Aw shit, man!’ Kelly gasped, grabbing a tight hold of Beede’s arm. ‘What the fuck’s she doin’ here?’

‘She’s your mother,’ Beede explained patiently. ‘She’s visiting. It’s part of her function.’

Kelly gave him a quizzical look. ‘But she’s never troubled herself visitin’ me in hospital before…’

He stared down at her for a moment, almost with tenderness. It was difficult to decipher from the inflexible set of her gaunt features, but wasn’t there a sudden, tiny gleam of childish delight (mixed in with an overwhelming air of bemusement) at the prospect of this most basic of demonstrations of maternal care?

His heart promptly went out to her.

‘I should probably get on,’ he muttered (not wishing to involve his emotional self any further).

‘Don’t go!’

She tightened her grip on his arm.

‘I’m working, Kelly,’ Beede explained, trying to disengage her claw-like fingers.

‘But you don’t know what she’s like…’ Kelly started off (almost pleading with him now), ‘or how ticked-off she’s gonna be with me…’

‘It’s not real anger,’ Beede counselled, sagely, ‘it’s just worry…’

Kelly rapidly changed tack. ‘Either you stay,’ she threatened, ‘or I’ll tell Kane all about the drugs,’ she reached for her broken phone with her free hand, ‘I’ll ring him. I’ll text him. I swear…’

This was a foolish manoeuvre.

‘Do exactly as you wish.’ Beede coldly shook his arm free.

‘If you go…’ her eyes scanned the surrounding area, frantically, ‘then I’ll…I’ll leg it.’ She threw back her blanket and revealed her injury. He winced at the sight of it. She sat up and shifted her weight, as though fully preparing to hop off.

‘Okay, okay,’ he snapped, flipping the blanket back over again, ‘I suppose I do need to have a quick chat with her about the dogs…’

Kelly’s eyes flew wide. ‘Are you crazy?’

‘Pardon?’

‘She’ll flip. She’ll go spare.’

‘What?’

‘Just…’ Kelly put her hand over her mouth and spoke through a pretend-cough ‘…trust me.’

Dina (now perilously close), had already espied her daughter and was waving her walking stick at her (like a Dr Who Dalek, intending to exterminate).

‘D’YOU HAVE ANY FUCKIN’ IDEA,’ she bellowed, from a distance of 12 or more feet, ‘WHAT IT’S TAKEN TO GET ME HERE?!’ (Her prodigious rage came as a complete surprise to Larry, who’d been chatting with her, perfectly amiably, only moments before.) Several people turned and stared. The less-busy porter glanced up, grimaced, and then quietly sidled off.

‘You shouldn’t’ve bothered, Mum,’ Kelly murmured, all the stiffness disappearing from her backbone (rendering it floppy as a stick of soft liquorice). ‘All’s I did was break my stupid leg…’ (she cuffed the leg, weakly, as if it was the limb’s fault entirely), ‘and I smashed my stupid phone, so I couldn’t even…’

‘SCREW YOUR STUPID LEG!’ Dina yelled (indignant tears already brimming in her curiously mesmerising pipe-tobacco eyes). ‘I’VE BROKE MY FUCKIN’ ARSE GETTIN’ HERE TODAY, KELL. SO WHAT EXACTLY D’YOU PLAN TO DO ABOUT THAT, EH?!’

The whole party was quiet for a moment, as if jointly considering the most feasible solution to this perplexing dilemma (I mean what could Kelly do?). No suggestions were forthcoming, although Beede (for one) appeared to be deriving a measure of laconic amusement from Dina’s proximity. The woman was a legend, after all; she was Jabba the Hut with a womb, chronic asthma and a council flat. She was an old-fashioned bully – that much was clear – but her fury was swaddled by her considerable upholstery; her rage hijacked by blubber and then rapidly redirected into teary vulnerability.

Dina’s laser-guided eyes (she could detect independent thinking at 200 paces) quickly alighted upon Beede’s smirking visage. ‘Pay a good price for that front-row ticket, Mister?’ she enquired icily.

‘Not nearly enough, I fear,’ Beede answered smoothly.

Kelly stiffened. Dina sniffed the air, like a stag (he could almost hear her antlers rattling) and then turned to her daughter. ‘That old stiff botherin’ ya, darl?’ she asked, thumbing towards him, rudely.

‘This is Beede, Mum,’ Kelly explained, endeavouring to facilitate a polite introduction. ‘Kane’s dad. I’ve told you all about him, remember?’

‘Nope.’

Dina Broad shook her head, refusing, point-blank, to acknowledge this possibility.

‘Yes I have. He works here…’

Beede stepped forward and offered Dina his outstretched palm. ‘I’m Beede, Daniel Beede. Very pleased to meet you.’

Dina ignored his hand.

‘He on Day Release from the fuckin’ morgue or what?’ she asked, with a sideways smirk.

‘He don’t work in the morgue, Mum,’ Kelly spluttered.

‘You sure?’

Dina gave Beede the once over. ‘Been takin’ the odd nip of embalmin’ fluid, have we?’ she enquired.

Beede smiled, weakly.

She leaned forward and peered down at his feet.

‘What’s up, Mum?’

Kelly leaned forward too, concerned.

‘Eh?’ Dina gazed up at her daughter, her eyes watering slightly with repressed hilarity. ‘I’m just tryin’a read what that tag says on his toe, kid…’

‘But he don’t work in the morgue, Mum,’ Kelly repeated, shrugging hopelessly, ‘he works in the laundry…’

‘Your mother seems a little confused,’ Beede murmured (plainly eager to paddle awhile himself in Dina’s metaphorical slip-stream). ‘Is she operating two rinses short of her spin cycle, perhaps?’

Kelly’s eyes bulged.

Dina’s mirth evaporated.

‘Oh yes? Oh really?’ she exclaimed, straightening her back, her voice taking on a sharp, fluting quality. ‘So you think it’s a real laugh, do ya? A real, fuckin’ hoot, eh? To rip the piss out of a poor woman who’s stuck in a wheelchair?’

Beede mulled this over for a second, frowning. ‘I’m not quite sure. Do you mean literally stuck?’

‘It was the biggest one we could find,’ Larry interjected (keen not to be found wanting in his capacity as Dina’s temporary carer).

Everybody turned to stare at him, Dina with a look of especial ferocity.

He removed his hands from the chair and patted his damp palms on to the front of his jumper, ‘I was only…’ he muttered.

Dina spun back around to face Kelly again. ‘Who is this man?’ she enquired imperiously.

‘I dunno. Who are you?’ Kelly asked.

‘Larry.’ Larry said, ‘I’ve come to visit my aunt.’

‘Then FUCK RIGHT OFF AN’ VISIT HER!’ Dina yelled.

Larry took a quick step back, then paused. ‘But I promised Matron that I’d return the…’ he pointed, limply, to Dina’s chair ‘…just as soon as we…’

Dina flew around and tried to swipe him with her stick.

Larry took yet another step back. ‘There’s no need for that…’ he tried to caution her. She swiped again, this time making contact with his right knee.

‘Ow.’

‘Now GET LOST, DICK!’

The chair tipped, quite alarmingly, to one side.

‘I think you might’ve developed a puncture,’ Larry said (not intending to provoke, but succeeding, nonetheless).

Dina lobbed her stick at him. She missed her target. Larry scarpered.

‘Okay,’ Dina turned back around, snapped her fingers at Beede, and pointed. ‘Go fetch.’

‘Pardon?’

Beede’s thermostat instantly clicked on to freeze (Kelly could almost hear his engine buzzing).

Dina immediately felt his chill (it was three-star), and pulled her coat tighter.

‘Well what else does the old fart get paid for?’ she grumbled, glancing over her shoulder (the stick had just been kicked out of the way by a very flustered expectant father). ‘Oi! D’you MIND?!’

‘Beede’s in charge of the laundry, Mum,’ Kelly gently explained. ‘He ain’t a porter.’

‘Okay,’ Dina smiled, grimly. ‘Well if he won’t fetch my stick for me, who will?’

She gazed up at Kelly, moist-eyed (like an over-bred Pekinese begging pork rind at dinner). Kelly (who’d been virtually weaned on this particular look) started to get up.

‘Just stay where you are,’ Beede barked, immediately setting off to retrieve the stick himself. Dina whistled, appreciatively, as he bent over, then cackled, explosively, as he straightened up.

‘I can’t believe I smashed my damn phone…’ Kelly tried valiantly to defuse the situation with a little light conversation, ‘if I’ve lost all my numbers I’ll go feral, I swear…’

‘Huh?’ Dina squinted up at her, boredly.

‘They reckon it’s a clean break…’ Kelly yammered on, breathlessly.

‘What is?’ Dina interrupted.

‘My leg.’

‘Oh.’ Dina sighed, expansively.

‘And the doc who took the x-ray said I’d be done in a few hours. So if the shop’s still open…’

‘Which shop?’

‘The phone shop.’

‘Good idea,’ Dina conceded. ‘An’ those brown shoes’ll be ready at the cobbler’s. You can grab ‘em while you’re at it. I got the slip here…’ She took her purse from the handbag on her lap and removed the slip from inside it.

Beede was now standing beside her, proffering her the stick.

‘Keep ya wig on!’ she cautioned him, handing the slip over to her daughter.

‘I could grab us some take-away,’ Kelly continued helpfully, ‘for supper. What d’ya fancy, Mum? Thai? Pizza?’

Beede proffered Dina her stick again. She took it this time, with a sultry look.

‘So you work here, then?’ she asked (pointedly ignoring Kelly).

‘I do.’

‘Good. So you can push me over to Outpatients, pronto.’

Beede frowned, confused. ‘But Kelly isn’t even in surgery, yet…’

‘I have an appointment, stupid,’ Dina informed him imperiously, casually inspecting her watch. ‘Blood test. Two-thirty…’

Beede glanced over at Kelly, his lips tightening (her face fell for moment, but then she rapidly rallied. The speed of the rallying – he felt – was almost the saddest part).

‘But of course you do,’ she murmured, scratching her head, ‘Tuesday. Two-thirty. I’d totally forgot…’

‘One of these fine days,’ Mrs Broad informed her, majestically, ‘you might actually appreciate that not every little thing on this fuckin’ planet revolves around you, Kell.’

She prodded Beede with her stick. ‘Oi! You! Uncle Fester! Let’s split!’

Without further ado, Beede promptly stationed himself behind the chair and began to push. Five paces down the corridor – and still within ear-shot – he leaned gently forward and murmured, ‘I must have a quick word with you about your dogs…!

Kelly gasped, ducked her head, stopped breathing, her thin body stiffening (as if preparing for some kind of monumental impact), but Beede kept right on pushing, and before she knew it, they were inside the service lift and the doors were firmly shut. How long had it taken? Twenty seconds? Less?

She took one deep breath, then another. Her hands gradually unclenched. She blinked. She glanced up and peered warily around her. Close by, a woman with second-degree burns on her knuckles was sitting – her head tilted slightly – and gawping.

‘Show’s over, love,’ Kelly hissed.

Then she placed the slip for the cobbler’s into the lining of her bra, plumped up her hair, threw back her skinny shoulders and pouted.