‘What’s wrong?’ Steve asked, leaping up the last few steps. ‘Is it Liam?’
She shook her head. ‘No. He’s fast asleep. The vicar’s wife has just been on the phone to say that the Scout group from the church were taken on a march across the moors this morning. They should have been back late afternoon but haven’t turned up. The vicar has phoned the police and they are going to organise a search party, but the villagers aren’t prepared to wait and some of them are ready to go and look for them themselves. They feel that a doctor in the search party would come in handy if any of them have been injured or are suffering from the cold and wet conditions up there.’
Steve went into the bedroom and got out of his wedding clothes. When he reappeared dressed in a thick anorak, jeans and walking boots, he found Sallie dressed in similar clothes.
She saw that he was frowning and told him, ‘I’m coming, too. Hannah says she will stay the night with Liam if need be. Are you ready?’
‘Yes,’ he said abruptly. ‘And I don’t see the need for you to go. It could be treacherous up there.’
She shook her head. ‘You know what they say. Two doctors are better than one, and I know the moors as well as anybody. So let’s get moving or they’ll be setting off without us. And we need torches, Steve. There are a couple in one of the kitchen cupboards.’
CHAPTER SIX
WHEN they arrived at the church Alison greeted them. It was clear she was trying to keep calm, which wasn’t easy under the circumstances as two of her children were among those missing.
The vicar was there and the fathers of some of the Scouts. When they saw the two doctors there were nods of approval. One of the men said, ‘Let’s hope that we don’t need you, but something is wrong up there.’ And as they piled into three cars that would take them along the route where the trek was to have taken place, nobody seemed inclined to disagree with him.
Steve had been right about it being treacherous. As they drove higher up the hillside, the mist became thicker and in the end they parked the cars and set off on foot.
Some of them had lamps, others torches, and almost everyone had brought their mobile phones, but they were of little use in the terrain on which they found themselves
Steve was gripping Sallie’s hand tightly and he told her, ‘Don’t budge from my side. We mustn’t get separated from each other. I was insane to have agreed to you coming.’
‘You couldn’t have stopped me.’
She could just about see his face in the swirling mist and there was a half-smile on it. ‘No, I don’t suppose I could. It’s like the old days when we did everything together. But if I had a choice I would prefer an evening at the Kestrel.’
The search party was walking in single file so that each of them had the benefit of the light carried by the person behind, as well as their own. Most of them were well acquainted with the moors and the gullies among them, but progress was being hindered by the extreme weather conditions.
As they trudged along the tops there was a grim silence as words like ‘hypothermia’ and ‘extreme-exhaustion’ kept coming to mind. They’d brought flasks of hot drinks with them and everyone had a blanket in their backpack, but they weren’t going to be of any use until they found the missing group.
Every time they came to a steep drop they all flashed their torches down to check that there was no one sheltering or lying at the bottom. Remote barns and out-buildings were searched but there was no sign of a group of bedraggled boys and their leader.
‘The risks wouldn’t be as great on a warm summer night,’ Steve said in a low voice that was for Sallie’s ears only, ‘but it’s November. Without protection you could die of exposure up here. I don’t suppose they would have had a tent with them.’
They found them at last at the bottom of a deep gully between the peaks. When they saw the faint light of lamps and torches up above the Scouts sent up a cheer, and it was the sweetest sound those searching for them had ever heard.
When they’d made their way carefully to the bottom of the drop and been greeted thankfully by the Scoutmaster, he said, ‘We’ve got a lad here with what is almost certainly a broken leg.’ He turned to the worried clergyman. ‘It’s your son, Jeremy, Vicar. He missed his footing and came hurtling over the edge as the light was fading and we were on our way back to the village.
‘We’ve given what first aid we could,’ he went on as they gathered around the injured youth, ‘but we need an ambulance and my phone isn’t working.’
‘I’ve managed to get through on mine,’ Sallie said. ‘As soon as I knew we’d found you, I rang the ambulance services to tell them where we were.’
Steve was crouching beside the vicar’s son and he said, ‘Jeremy is only semi-conscious. There could be a head injury of some sort but in this light it’s impossible to tell.’ When he’d examined the leg he reported, ‘There is a fracture all right, that much I can see. There’s a first-aid kit in my rucksack, Sallie, with some thick crêpe bandages in it. If you’ll strap his legs together, I’ll check the rest of him as best I can.’
Sallie turned to the vicar. ‘I’m going to strap his legs together, Robert, to avoid further damage when they move him. Then all we can do is sit tight until the emergency services arrive.’ She then addressed the Scoutmaster, ‘How long has he been slipping in and out of unconsciousness?’
‘Ever since the fall. He came round just before you found us and then drifted off again.’
Steve turned to Sallie. ‘What do you think?’
‘Either a head injury of some kind or shock,’ she said.
One of the fathers was hovering and he said, ‘We’d like to get our boys back home. They are wet, tired and hungry.’
Sallie looked around at the rest of the bedraggled troop and their anxious fathers and she said, ‘Yes, of course. Take your boys home. They need hot baths and food. We’ll be here with the vicar until the ambulance comes and if you think any of them should be checked over by Steve or myself when we get home, we’ll open the surgery.’
As the fathers and sons climbed up the steep side of the gully onto the level ground above, the Scoutmaster said, ‘I’m staying. I was responsible for their safety. Jeremy was in my care, and if it’s all right with you, Vicar, I’m going with you in the ambulance.’
As Sallie was finishing strapping the boy’s legs together, Steve said, ‘We need someone up on the top to watch out for the ambulance, otherwise they could be searching for us all night in this sort of weather.’
He checked Jeremy’s breathing again, making sure that his tongue hadn’t gone back and was blocking his airway, and she said, ‘I’ll go.’ Picking up a lamp and a torch, she set off.
‘You aren’t going up there on your own. Don’t even think of it!’ Steve exclaimed, without looking up from what he was doing. ‘It’s too dangerous. I don’t want to have to come searching for you, Sallie.’
When he looked up she wasn’t there and he groaned. The mist seemed thicker than ever and all he could hear was her clambering over wet rock and slithering on clay.
‘I should have gone,’ the vicar choked, ‘but I don’t want to leave Jeremy. This is my worst nightmare.’
‘Mine, too,’ the Scoutmaster said wearily and collapsed onto a nearby ledge.
At that moment Jeremy opened his eyes and gave a soft moan. ‘Where am I?’ he asked. ‘What happened?’ Then, with a grimace, he said, ‘My leg hurts.’
‘Thank goodness he’s back with us,’ his father said, and Steve nodded his agreement.
‘It’s a good sign,’ he said. ‘He seems rational enough at the moment and is as warm as we can manage to make him.’
He switched his glance to the mist-covered slope that led to the top of the gully and said, ‘I have to check on my wife.’
Unaware that he’d followed her, Sallie was swinging the lights from side to side frantically when he reached the top. He grabbed her from behind and spun her round angrily.
‘Are you insane?’ he said thro
ugh gritted teeth. ‘My heart almost stopped when I saw that you’d gone after I’d told you not to. Have you got a death wish or something?’
She smiled. ‘No. But I did almost die of fright when a big sheep came out of the mist right past me. I’m sorry I caused you worry but I was the obvious one to come back up top to keep a lookout for the ambulance. The vicar wouldn’t want to leave his son’s side You were needed to keep an eye on his condition, and the Scoutmaster looked completely exhausted…’ She trailed off. ‘Do I see headlights in the distance?’
‘Yes, you do, but they won’t be here yet. It’s too soon.’
‘Not necessarily,’ she told him. ‘When I made the call I was told that they weren’t too far away and I can hear a siren.’
Steve listened. ‘Yes, so can I. Thank goodness for that! Once they arrive, please come back to where I can see you. This could have turned into a real tragedy if we hadn’t found those boys. I’m going back down now. Jeremy regained consciousness for a few moments and I’m hoping he stays that way. I just wish I had more light to assess his injuries properly. Tell them to position their headlights when they get here so that they shine down as much as possible into the gully.’
Midnight was long gone by the time the two doctors arrived back home, and Hannah was dozing in a chair by the window where she’d been watching out for them.
They’d stopped off at the vicarage to let Robert’s agitated wife, Alison, know that Jeremy was on his way to hospital with a possible head injury. Their other son had arrived home with the rest of the Scouts and their fathers, so she was aware of what had happened but desperate for news. When it had come, she’d set off immediately for the hospital.
Steve had explained to the paramedics that Jeremy was either suffering from severe shock or had suffered a head injury of some sort, which had caused him to lose consciousness.
It hadn’t been the easiest of tasks, stretchering him up from the bottom of the gully in those conditions, but it had been achieved at last, and the fact that the injured leg had been strapped to the other had saved any jarring as they’d carried him upwards. But there was still anxiety because of the way he was drifting in and out of consciousness.
When Steve came back from taking Hannah home, Sallie said, ‘Are you still annoyed with me for going back up top to watch out for the ambulance?’
He was peeling off his wet clothes and easing his feet out of the heavy boots and paused to tell her unsmilingly, ‘I was more concerned than annoyed. It was a nightmare out there, trying to treat the lad under those conditions, and then you disappear.’
It was putting it mildly. The thought of anything happening to her had made him feel sick inside. He supposed that he might have overreacted and was about to discover that, as far as Sallie was concerned, he had.
‘Do you honestly think I would have done anything to make matters worse? The directions I’d given in my phone call had been hazy to say the least, and without some guidance the ambulance might not have found us. It was kind of you to be concerned, but who do you think has been watching over me for the past three years, Steve? Nobody!’
His face had whitened. ‘I do know that. It was my mistake. I was presuming too much. I thought that we were at least friends, and I wouldn’t want to see a friend in danger. But it seems a shame to be bickering over something like this when the vicar and his family are coping with so much at this moment, don’t you think?’
Yes, she did, Sallie thought wretchedly as he went into his room and closed the door. Why couldn’t she have accepted Steve’s concern for her in the spirit it had been meant? Was there an urge inside her to punish him for what he’d done? She hoped not. It wasn’t in her nature, but she was still keeping him at a distance and couldn’t see that changing until her hurt went away.
They heard the next day that it had been severe shock affecting Jeremy the night before. Apart from cuts and bruises there had been no injuries other than the fracture, and he was now stable.
It was his mother who brought news of him. Alison called on her way home from the hospital to bring them up to date on what was happening, and at the same time thanked them for turning out for him.
‘We were only too happy to be of assistance,’ Sallie told her. ‘I felt so sorry for the three of them. For Jeremy having the nasty accident, for his father for finding him in that state and for the poor Scoutmaster, who was most upset that something like that should have happened when he was in his care.’
‘Yes. I know,’ Alison said with a shudder. ‘But I suppose it could have been worse. I’ve never seen the effects of severe shock before and it was frightening. However, he’s recovering so we have much to be thankful for.’
Steve appeared at that moment with Liam in his arms, and when he too had been brought up to date with the news on Jeremy, he said, ‘It was difficult to treat him under those conditions, and I was very much afraid he had a head wound.’
When she was ready to go Alison said, ‘What a pity that this little one will soon be leaving the village. It’s a great place for bringing up children.’
‘We’re delighted to say that Liam won’t be leaving,’ Steve said. ‘My niece and her partner are intending to settle down here.’
‘Really? That’s great news,’ she said, and touched Liam’s cheek. ‘Lucky little boy.’
When she’d gone Sallie went into the kitchen to start the preparations for Sunday lunch, and Steve followed her. ‘I’ll take Liam out for a while if you like,’ he offered. ‘It will give you some time to yourself.’
She swivelled round to face him. Her hasty words of the night before hadn’t been commented on by either of them since they’d met up at breakfast and she couldn’t leave it like that.
‘I’m sorry about last night, Steve,’ she said in a low voice. ‘It was churlish of me to be so ungrateful over your concern. Can you forgive me?’
‘There is nothing to forgive,’ he said flatly. ‘What you said is true. I wasn’t there for you when you needed me, so why should you have to be grateful now?’
She didn’t reply to that. Instead, she said, ‘If you’ll hang on while I put the joint in the oven, I’ll come with you.’
It was a typical November morning, grey and overcast, but as Steve pushed Liam’s buggy with Sallie beside him they weren’t too aware of the weather. Both had more important things on their minds.
Another difficult moment had passed and they still wanted to be with each other, Sallie was thinking. In Steve’s thoughts was the fast-approaching return of Melanie and her boyfriend, and he was wondering what would be left for Sallie and himself once Liam had gone back to his mother. Would the frail bond between them fracture?
She had only once shown any real feeling towards him and that had been on the morning of Janine’s wedding, but it had been short-lived because of the past rearing its head. Her reaction when she saw the house would be a good guide to what the future held, and it wasn’t going to be long before that happened.
His conversation with Alison about Liam staying in the village must have brought Melanie to Sallie’s mind too as she said, ‘What about somewhere for Melanie to live? We still haven’t sorted it.’
Melanie was due to return during Christmas week and every time Sallie mentioned it Steve assured her that it would all be sorted by the time they arrived.
Christmas was just three and a half weeks away and the house was almost finished. It had been built exactly how Sallie had described her dream house and every time he saw it Steve felt pleasure wash over him. If she would come to live with him in it, there would be no need for her to hold his shirt in her arms, he thought. He would be where he belonged, beside her.
Old Henry had gone to stay with his daughter for Christmas and the weeks leading up to it, as there wasn’t adequate heating in his cottage, which meant that Steve was free to visit the site without being observed after the workmen had finished for the day. The electricity had been connected and each evening he went to check on progress, wandering f
rom room to room behind makeshift curtains.
He wasn’t intending to do anything about furnishings. He knew that, provided all went well, Sallie would want to choose them herself once she’d absorbed the fact that he and she were the mystery owners of the house in Bluebell Lane.
But in the midst of his euphoria he did have moments when panic set in. It made him feel weak at the knees when he thought of what he would do if she said she’d got used to the solitary life and wanted to stay where she was.
He was hoping she would see it as a new beginning. A reunion of minds as well as bodies. It had seemed claustrophobic in the apartment since he’d come back, helping to care for Liam while trying to live normally in a situation that was anything but.
Sallie’s curiosity finally got the better of her one evening when Steve said, as he had on previous occasions, ‘I’m just popping out. I won’t be long.’
‘Where do you go when you dash off the moment we’ve eaten?’ she asked. ‘If it’s to see Philip, why don’t you say so?’
‘I visit Philip during the day, so I have no need to go in the evening unless I’m sent for,’ he told her. ‘I’m involved in a project with some of the men in the village. You’ll find out what it is soon enough.’ And without giving her the chance to question him further, he departed.
Minutes later, as he put his key in the new front door that he hoped Sallie would soon be going in and out of, he hoped he hadn’t given the game away.
The next morning, before he was about to start his calls, one of the teachers from the school appeared. ‘I haven’t come as a patient, Dr Beaumont,’ she said, ‘but as someone who needs to ask a favour of you.’
As he listened to what she had to say, he started smiling. The smile was still there when Sallie saw him, and he said, ‘I’ve just seen one of the teachers from the school and they want me to be Santa on the day of the nativity play. Apparently Henry Crabtree usually does it, but as he’s gone off to his daughter’s and none of the other old folk are fit enough, they’ve asked me.’
The Village Doctor's Marriage Page 9
