“So go look at your appointment card, there’s a good kid, and we’ll fix it right now. The only time I absolutely can’t do is Thursday afternoon, between two and four…”
CHAPTER XI
AND THUS IT came about that it was on Thursday afternoons, between two and four, that a certain non-existent Dr Fergusson held his mythical ante-natal clinic at a St Benedict’s Hospital of infinitely indeterminate location. Though Miranda’s first visit to this establishment was exhausting in many ways, and involved sheltering for two hours in a station waiting room as well as mooching round and round unfamiliar streets until the requisite number of hours had been filled, she nevertheless managed to arrive back at the flat in good spirits, and full of the news that this Dr Fergusson had pronounced her to be perfectly O.K.
Rejoicings all round. Anxiety levels down to zero. Life resumed its happy-go-lucky routine until, almost before she knew it, next Thursday was upon her, and off Miranda had to go again, reluctantly this time, and with glum anticipation of the long, tedious hours ahead. Five of them at least would have to be whiled away, for so remote had she made St Benedict’s sound—to explain why nobody had ever heard of it—that she could not also claim that it could be reached by public transport in anything less than one and a half hours, at the very least. So three hours’ travelling had to be presumed, on top of the two hours spent hanging about among all those non-existent maternity cases with their non-existent symptoms, ranging from disembodied blood-pressure to spectral haemorrhoids. Last time, Miranda had fallen down a bit on these sort of details, and Iris had expressed mild surprise that she knew so little about her fellow patients, even after all these months of attending ante-natal clinic together. And so this time, Miranda was determined to make good the deficiency, and spent most of her five hours in the public library looking up Obstetrics and Home Midwifery, to such good effect that even Iris could not fault her. As she talked, she even began to feel herself that all these detailed anecdotes of her afternoon at the clinic must, in some sense, be true; including Dr Fergusson’s reiterated assurances that she was getting on fine, nothing to worry about at all; and the baby likewise. And it did seem perfectly plausible: in this non-existent world of non-existent mothers and visionary symptoms, the non-existent Baby Caroline fitted in like a dream.
All the same, her report on this occasion, detailed and reassuring though it was, did not quite allay her friends’ anxiety as her last week’s account had done. She was now (by her own calculation) more than a week overdue, and though they were very kind, and very, very reassuring, she could feel, this time, a build-up of anxiety, and indeed of puzzlement, which nothing could stem. When Thursday came round for the third time, and she set off yet again on her futile and increasingly implausible errand, she knew, with secret inner panic, that it was for the last time. She could not keep it up much longer. Before next Thursday came, something would have had to happen. What, exactly, it would be, she did not even dare to wonder.
Meantime, there was today to be got through. Five hours, to be filled up somehow, somewhere.
In the park, it was too hot. In the library, it was too boring. She’d gone in there with the intention of relaxing in the quiet and the coolness, whiling away the long afternoon by reading the papers, or maybe browsing along the shelves until she came across something amusing enough, or gripping enough, to distract her mind from its preoccupations, ever more insistent as day followed day.
But it was no use. She could concentrate on nothing. Sitting at one of the empty, polished tables in the quiet room, her book unread in front of her, all she could do was think, think, think. The same old thoughts, over and over again, without respite, and leading nowhere. By now, her brain was like a gramophone record, going round and round, senselessly, in the same old grooves, until suddenly it screeched to a halt, in the exact same place, time after time: the place from which there was no further to go. Then, back to the beginning again—on … and on … and on…
Already, the baby was more than two weeks overdue; her friends at the Squat were growing more and more bothered about her day by day, more and more concerned and puzzled. Tim, in particular, armed with professional knowledge which was proving impossible to laugh off, was becoming more and more insistent; only last night, he’d been on at her in a big way. What were they doing about her at that damn hospital, he’d demanded, quite angrily. Hadn’t they said anything about an induction? Or having her in for observation? What the hell did they think they were playing at? And don’t give him that one about having “got her dates wrong”—hadn’t they told her almost three weeks ago that the baby was even then eight pounds or over? How could they let it drag on like this, without so much as taking her in for a proper investigation?—and who was this damn doctor, anyway? Was he a qualified obstetrician? For two pins, Tim would ring him up himself, medical etiquette or no medical etiquette…
Two pins. That’s not much of a bulwark to stand between yourself and total, irretrievable disaster. If Tim did ring up this non-existent Dr Fergusson (and who knew that there might not be such a person?) in this non-existent hospital, and started cross-questioning him about his non-existent patient… At this point, Miranda’s imagination stopped dead, refusing, like a recalcitrant horse, to take so impossible a fence. It baulked, veered sideways, reared, and refused again. Any direction—any direction at all—except this one.
So suppose she simply disappeared, as she’d originally planned? Disappeared; vanished from their lives for ever, without a word of explanation? Apart from the monstrous ingratitude of such a course, there was no chance, any longer, that it would work.
“I’d ring them up myself,” Tim had threatened, worried and frowning; and if this was the way he felt about the mere non-arrival of the baby, then how was he going to react if Miranda herself (still, as he would suppose, in this precariously overdue condition) were simply to vanish?
He’d ring up every hospital in London, that’s what he’d do. And as soon as he’d satisfied himself that both Dr Fergusson and his ante-natal clinics were figments of the imagination, then, inevitably, he would ring the police.
There seemed no chance that Miranda was not, by now, somewhere in the police records as a Missing Person; no chance, either, that it would take them long to match up Tim’s description of her with that which her parents must have given many days earlier.
Within twenty-four hours, Tim would know everything. He would know about the abortion: about her craven and despicable surrender to parental pressure. He would remember her empty boasting that first night in the car, her phoney heroics; would remember, too, the way he’d been taken in by it all.
“Christ, but you’re a plucky kid!” he’d said—she could still recall the respect, the wonder in his voice—“I’ve never heard anything like it! Every other girl I’ve ever known would have chickened-out right from the word go!”
As she, Miranda, had in fact chickened-out; and soon, terribly soon, he was going to know it. Those eyes that in the darkness of the car had been shining with admiration for her courage—what was their expression going to be when he learned the truth about her cowardice and lies? When he learned that his sympathy, his kindness, his professional concern were become a mockery, a laughing stock?
It mustn’t happen! It mustn’t! Surely there was some way…?
*
Already it was five o’clock, and the library was beginning, gently but relentlessly, to close, with soft-footed assistants gliding purposefully this way and that, hell bent on the polite and soundless disturbance of everyone. Thrusting her book back on the shelf as randomly as she’d extracted it, Miranda gathered up her sparse belongings and stumbled out into the sunshine.
The glare was terrific after the muted coolness of the reading room; the heat struck at her as if she had stepped through into an oven. She would have liked to go straight home and run a cold bath, but of course this was out of the question. There was still an hour to fill in before she dared reappear at the flat, and face,
once again, the thickening miasma of concern and puzzlement, the barrage of kindly, anxious questions.
Could she face them? As she moved, unseeing, through the sweating, swaying crowds Miranda visualised, all over again, how it would be. The anxiety; the forced cheerfulness; the pretence that there was nothing to worry about. The cossetting, too, the cushions and the cups of tea, and the mounting bewilderment.
But didn’t the doctor say anything, Miranda, dear? Isn’t he worried about you by now?—I mean, of course, there’s nothing to worry about really, heaps of people go overdue, but all the same, Tim did say…
Slower grew Miranda’s steps, and slower; and the heat beat down relentlessly on her smooth, glowing young skin and her shining hair.
What could she do? What could she? Even suicide was no answer, for when they identified her dead body, as of course they would, they would identify her deception with it, as surely as in life. Tim, and all the rest of them, would still learn of her cowardice and her treachery, blazoned, as likely as not, over every newspaper in the land. Everyone would know.
No, death was no solution. What was it John Donne had said, in his Defence of Suicide?—“Methinks I have the keys to my prison in mine own hand”—which is well enough, no doubt, if all that is the matter with you is melancholia and debts.
But for Miranda there were no such keys, her prison was co-extensive with the entire reading public—not to mention television-viewers as well—and the duration of her sentence was the life span of all who had ever known her, and who would carry to their graves the memory of her lies, her treachery, and her craven, unforgiveable surrender.
What could she do? What could she?
Slower and slower still. Her feet dragged on the hot pavement, and with every step in the direction of the Squat, her whole body flinched, her stomach churned. The streets were growing familiar now as she approached the environs of her current domicile; and at last, right on the corner of the road, she found herself coming to a halt, stopped in her tracks by a thought so tremendous, a plan so bold, and yet so simple and so obvious, that it was amazing it hadn’t occurred to her before.
“I must have the baby tonight,” she said to herself; and quietly turned about and walked back the way she had come. Anyone watching would have assumed she’d suddenly remembered some extra item on her shopping list, so abrupt was the change of direction, and so coolly purposeful the expression on the smooth young face, tanned almost golden by the stored-up sun of all these long, dry summer days.
CHAPTER XII
“BABY SNATCHED FROM PRAM IN BUSY HIGH STREET!” screamed the headlines; and although Mrs Field, in common with almost every other woman in the country scanned the item with sharp attention, the idea never for one moment crossed her mind that her missing daughter might possibly have had a hand in the affair. Later, there were not a few of her acquaintances to upbraid her with not having been more perspicacious; but then it is easy, is it not, to be wise after the event. And, too, it must be remembered that at this time Norah Field hadn’t even realised that her daughter was missing—not in any definite, official sense. That the girl was away from home, and that the date of her return had been left vague—this, of course, she knew very well, having herself altruistically been party (or so she thought) to all the arrangements.
That Miranda should go on holiday with Sharon Whittaker and her parents to their Derbyshire cottage had seemed a godsend of an idea, after all the trauma and misery at home. In that lovely countryside, enjoying long healthy walks over the hills in the company of her best friend, and with the sensible Whittaker parents in the background, surely Miranda would recover fast from the shock and disappointment of the abortion. All that irrational rage and resentment would quickly fade away, and she would return from the holiday her own happy, loving self again, all forgotten and forgiven. And even before that, of course, there would be letters. Hardly had the Whittakers set off on their holiday, than Norah Field found herself watching for the post with beating heart. Just a postcard to start with, no doubt; to be followed by a slightly stilted, awkward letter—to which Norah’s reply would be so warm, so loving, so overflowing with forgiveness that all the barriers would be down, the air cleared; and thereafter would arrive, by almost every post, the amusing, newsy letters that Miranda had always been accustomed to send when on holiday away from home…
But there was nothing so far; and as a week became a fortnight, and still no news, Norah found herself trying to hide the intensity of her disappointment even from herself. Postal delays, perhaps? A strike of some sort, or a go-slow? This would explain, too, why Mrs Whittaker hadn’t written either. It was odd not to have had a single word from her, not even a telephone call to confirm the invitation issued so abruptly by Sharon, on the very eve of their departure. Maybe Mrs Whittaker was embarrassed, having learned from Sharon of her friend’s unfortunate situation, and just couldn’t think what to say?
Meantime, Norah didn’t even know the address of the Derbyshire cottage, or how long they were all staying there, or anything. There was nothing she could do but wait; and of course it was something, at least, to know that Miranda was safe and well.
*
Thus loyally, and with consummate cunning, had Sharon succeeded in keeping faith with her vanished friend; and all this without the faintest idea of what was going on, or what the secret could possibly be with which she’d been tacitly, but unmistakeably, entrusted.
It was a miracle, really, that she’d even spotted that there was a secret. Miranda had told her absolutely nothing, and had it not been for her, Sharon’s presence of mind, together with her swift and delicate antennae for parental fuss in any shape or form, the whole thing could have been absolute disaster. For when, at about eleven o’clock on that first night, Mrs Field had rung up the Whittakers’ house and asked to speak to her daughter, Sharon (who had luckily been the one to pick up the phone) had been on the very brink of saying, “I’m sorry, I’m afraid she’s not here,” when something—some indescribable nuance in Mrs Field’s voice—had warned her that here was Trouble. Trouble with a big “T”. What the trouble was she could not tell, for Miranda had told her nothing whatever—indeed, for these last two or three days seemed to have been inexplicably avoiding her old friend—but whatever it was, whatever Miranda might be up to, Sharon’s loyalty was unshakeable. If Miranda had told her mother that she was here at Sharon’s, then here she should unquestionably be.
“I’m sorry…” (she managed to change direction just in time) “I’m sorry, Mrs Field, she’s in the bath at the moment. Is it urgent?”
The suspense was almost unbearable. Suppose Miranda’s mother were to say, as she well might, “Well then, would you ask her to give me a ring when she comes out?” Then what was Sharon to do?
But it didn’t happen. With an almost audible release of breath in sheer thankfulness, Sharon heard the tension and anxiety drain out of Mrs Field’s voice.
‘Oh! Oh, well then, that’s all right! No, don’t bother her, dear, it doesn’t matter, I just wanted to make sure she’d turned up all right. Just give her my—my love—and tell her I’ll ring again in the morning…”
In the morning? So Miranda must have told her mother that she was staying here?
Well, so be it. No doubt all would be made clear before long, and meantime the important thing was that it should be Sharon, and not either of her parents, who reached the telephone should it ring before the two of them left for work in the morning.
It didn’t; but it rang almost immediately afterwards—the man about the gutters. He was coming—or maybe wasn’t coming, Sharon was too flustered to take in minor details—at ten o’clock on Saturday morning; and before Sharon had managed to devise a message for her father sufficiently wide-ranging to embrace both possibilities, the phone went again; and this time, it was Mrs Field.
Miranda couldn’t be having another bath. Sharon did some quick thinking.
“I’m afraid she’s still asleep, Mrs Field,” she declare
d cheerfully, though with a thudding heart. “You see—” here she forced an apologetic little laugh, “I’m afraid we were playing my tapes until all hours last night… she’s sleeping like the dead! But I’ll wake her, shall I?… If it’s important?”
Once again, a breath-stopping gamble; but necessary in the interests of an easy, natural atmosphere.
“Oh no! No … no … don’t do that. It’s not necessary. No, no, it’s nothing, dear … not important. Thank you so much. I’ll try again later…”
Ping! Breath released again. Heart resumes beating again. The gamble has paid off, and all is well. Until next time.
*
There would be a next time; that was for sure. Hell, what was Miranda up to? For the first time, Sharon allowed herself some stirrings of resentment. Why couldn’t the wretched girl telephone? Or somehow get some sort of message through to her, give her at least some idea of what was going on; of what was expected of her, and for how long? Being faithful unto death is all very fine and noble, but you do need to know what you are being faithful about.
The phone again; and Sharon, trembling, leaped into action.
It was the gutter man again, this time something about Monday afternoon: though whether this was as well as, or instead of, or nothing to do with, the Saturday morning appointment, she was too rattled to take in. Anyway, he either was or wasn’t coming, either morning or afternoon, on either Monday or Saturday, or maybe contrariwise, if that was convenient?
“Oh, yes, yes!” gasped Sharon thankfully; indeed, “convenient” was altogether too feeble a term for the sheer marvellousness of the call not being anything about Miranda. “Oh yes, that would be super! Oh, thank you!”
With No Crying Page 8
