Sins Out of School

by Jeanne M. Dams

  “She’s alive, Dorothy. Only just. Injuries to the head, the spinal cord, multiple internal injuries. They can’t even assess all the damage until she’s stabilized. If she survives, she may be brain damaged, or paralyzed. Sit down, love. Here.”

  He handed me a cup of tea. “I don’t want it.”

  “Drink it.”

  I took an unwilling sip. It was very strong and very sweet and laced with brandy or whiskey or something. “But how did it happen? And where were they?”

  “Brentford, near Kew. Drink your tea.”

  “So they’d gone to stay with Gillian after all.”

  “Perhaps. More likely with a friend who could be counted on not to talk. Derek will ask Gillian, of course, as soon as the doctors will let her be talked to. As to what happened—” Alan held up both hands. “Anybody’s guess. Gillian lost control of the car, somehow, on a busy double roundabout at the edge of Brentford. It happened just an hour or so ago, so the traffic was heavy. By some miracle no one else was hurt. She ran the car, at high speed, into the wall of an abandoned brewery by the side of the road. Accident, suicide attempt—”

  “No. Not suicide. She isn’t the type, and anyway, she’d never, never endanger Amanda and Miriam.”

  “I meant,” he said gently, “suicide on Amanda’s part. It’s easy for a passenger to snatch a steering wheel, and at the speed Gillian drives …”

  I shook my head. “Not with Miriam in the car.”

  “What sort of life do you think Miriam would have with her mother in prison for murdering her father? And don’t you suppose Amanda might have thought of that?”

  I put down the tea. “She didn’t do it, Alan. She didn’t murder John, and she didn’t cause this accident. It was probably just that, an accident. Weren’t there witnesses?”

  “Well … there were lots of other people there, but you know what roundabouts are, especially at rush hour. No one’s paying attention to anything but getting through the thing as fast as possible. Once they heard the crash, it was too late to see what caused it. And face it, Dorothy. Human nature being what it is, most of them would simply drive on anyway.”

  “Except,” I said, feeling ill, “for the ones who would stop and stare at the carnage.”

  “As you say.” He sighed heavily. “Derek’s people are busy interviewing the drivers who did stop, and a few passers-by. They’ll get about as much out of it as they usually do. A mass of vague, contradictory reports that will have to be sifted through as carefully as though every one of them contained nuggets of gold. And at the end of the day, who knows? Maybe something, maybe nothing at all.”

  “But Gillian isn’t badly hurt. She’ll be able to say what happened.”

  “You know better than that, Dorothy. She may remember a bit, but even then, her evidence isn’t to be relied upon. Were you ever involved in an accident?”

  “Once, when I was very young, twenty-one or so. It was a one-car accident, like this one, only fortunately not serious. I was visiting my California sister and lost control of the car on a freeway.”

  “Did you remember afterward exactly what had happened?”

  “Not very clearly,” I admitted. “I remember thinking someone was going to sideswipe me, and the next thing I knew I was stopped up against the median railing, headed in the wrong direction.”

  “So you see.”

  We were silent for a moment; then I began to cry. “Alan, she has to be all right. She has to be!”

  He didn’t ask who I meant. He just stood next to my chair and held my hand.

  29

  WE waited all that evening for word. We watched the news on television, both early and late. The reports gave fewer details than we already knew, along with pictures we turned away from as soon as they appeared on the screen.

  On both broadcasts, the accident gave way to yet another sound bite by Anthony Blake against the familiar Big Ben background. I lost my temper.

  “Alan, how can he! Here are both his daughters in the hospital, and his only grandchild fighting for her life, and he stands there and makes an inane political speech! He’s the most egotistical, cold-hearted, self-righteous …” I ran out of adjectives.

  “Bloody bastard,” Alan finished for me. Neither of us uses that kind of language much. It seemed appropriate to me.

  We stayed up late, both hoping and fearing that the phone would ring. When it did, around midnight, Derek could report only negatives. No useful information from Gillian, no change in the condition of Amanda or Miriam. “That’s good news in a way,” he said. He sounded exhausted. “The doctors half expected a rapid deterioration, especially in the case of the little girl. The fact that she’s holding her own raises some hope.”

  But not much. He didn’t say it, but it was there in his voice. We thanked him and dragged ourselves up to bed.

  “Alan, I’ve got to go see them,” I said, sitting on the bed and kicking off my shoes.

  “First thing in the morning, I’ll find out which hospital. I’ll go with you; you won’t want to face it alone. You do realize they probably won’t let you actually see anyone but Gillian, not unless the other two are greatly improved.”

  “I know.” Neither of us felt like speculating on the possibility of that near miracle.

  I fell asleep, finally, curled up close to Alan’s warm bulk. It wasn’t quite as comforting as usual, but it helped.

  I would gladly have caught the first train in the morning, but there was no sense in it. Visiting hours in English hospitals are, as a rule, strictly limited, and what would we do, hanging around London, waiting to be allowed in? So we slept, albeit fitfully, as long as we could, and then took our time over a breakfast neither of us felt much like eating.

  “Derek will call if there’s any change?” I asked.

  “He promised he would.”

  But there was no change by the time we had to leave for the station.

  The train was late, of course, but no later than we had come to expect. “I wish I’d thought to stop by Amanda’s house and pick up one of Miriam’s toys,” I said when we were finally under way. I always think of these things when it’s too late.

  “My dear, you wouldn’t have been able to get in. And I was rather under the impression that toys were frowned upon in that household. In any case, Miriam …”

  He trailed off. There seemed to be a lot we didn’t especially want to say. Why, I wondered bitterly, did we feel that not talking about Miriam’s condition would make it any better?

  We took a taxi to the hospital. It was a long ride from central London, nearly to Kew Gardens. I had expected a dark, dreary Victorian edifice, but the hospital was relatively modern. Sixties vintage concrete, now looking streaked and dirty and infinitely depressing, especially on a gray December day.

  At least it was brighter inside than out. We sought a source of information. When we found it, what we learned wasn’t good. No one’s condition had changed materially. We would not be allowed to visit either Amanda or Miriam. “But how is she? Miriam? That poor little girl. Can’t we even see her, if we promise not to talk or anything?”

  But my passionate pleading had no effect on the adamant heart of the nursing sister. “Family only, I’m afraid, and that only for a few minutes. Of course we allowed her grandfather in this morning.”

  “Her grandfather?” My mind wasn’t working very well.

  “Yes, he’s Anthony Blake, you know. Ever such a nice man, for all he’s so important. Not a bit condescending.”

  “Anthony Blake came to visit Miriam?” I still couldn’t twist my brain around the fact.

  “And his daughters, of course. He was in a state, poor man, all of them being so badly hurt that way.”

  “But I thought he was in Edinburgh, and going on to America after that.”

  “Well, he’d come back when his family was so badly hurt, wouldn’t he? Do you know, I never knew he had a family before this happened.”

  “But—”

  Alan took my ha
nd and pressed it firmly. “We may see Gillian for a moment, though?”

  “Oh, yes, Ms. Blake is doing quite well, really. In a good deal of pain, of course, so she may be a bit muzzy from the medication.”

  We were shown to her bedside, in a six-bed bay. The feeling was far more institutional than an American hospital, and more crowded, but the staff seemed both competent and sympathetic.

  Gillian in a hospital gown and several casts, bereft of makeup and her usual dramatic clothing, her hair lying limp, looked utterly unlike herself, but quite a lot like Amanda. She had also shed most of her abrasiveness, though that might have been the pain pills.

  Her eyes were closed, but they opened when I sat down in the hard white chair. “Hello,” she said without interest.

  “Hello, Gillian. I’m so sorry about all this.”

  She moved her head restlessly. “How are Miriam and Amanda? Nobody will tell me anything.”

  “They’re still unconscious, so it’s hard to tell. They’re getting excellent care.” I had no idea whether they were or not, but the hospital had a good reputation, and Gillian didn’t need to worry about them right now.

  “I wish to God I knew what happened, but all I know is what they’ve told me. There was an accident, I ran into a wall. I can’t remember anything. Was it my fault?”

  “I’m sure it wasn’t, Gillian. Accidents happen. Don’t worry about it.”

  “Right,” she said, and for a moment there was a trace of bitter sarcasm. Well, she was justified. It had been a stupid thing to say.

  “How are you feeling?”

  This time she just looked at me. Okay, another dumb question. I began to wonder what I was doing there.

  “They won’t let us stay very long, but is there anything we can do for you? Anything you want?”

  “How bad is my car?” She addressed Alan. Well, Derek might have told him. I assumed it was totaled.

  Alan shook his head. “I have no details, but not good, I’m afraid. They towed the wreckage away, of course.”

  “Can you find it, and see if any of our things are still in it? We were going to stay with some friends of mine, and all our bags were in the boot. I’d stopped at my flat to pack. Most of the clothes I own are in that car, and I can’t afford to replace them, especially now I can’t work for a while.”

  She sounded angry and depressed and near the end of her rope. Well, that wasn’t good for her. I looked appealingly at Alan.

  “Of course I can do that,” he said in that calm, reassuring voice that I so love. “What shall we do with any luggage we find?”

  “Keep it, I suppose, until we get out of here. Or, you might bring my toothbrush and bathrobe, if you can find them. They’ve threatened to have me up and walking soon, and I don’t fancy giving the whole ward a view of my backside.”

  “We’ll bring all of them,” I told her. “I’m sure Amanda and Miriam will need theirs soon, too.”

  And may that lie turn to the truth, I prayed fervently.

  We checked again on Amanda and Miriam before we left. There was no news.

  “Are you really going to be able to find Gillian’s car?” I asked as we left the building.

  “Given the high profile of this whole matter, it won’t have been taken to a junkyard. The police will still have it so they can check for tampering. I’ll find out where from Derek, and we’ll go and have a look. I’ll have to throw my weight about to get them to release the luggage, but I still have some influence.”

  “It would all be easier if we had a car.”

  “Not really. Taxis are the only answer in London.”

  “And the Underground. I love the Underground.”

  “Except at rush hour.”

  Alan called Derek on the cell phone and learned where the car was. “Can you give them a ring, old boy, and tell them I’ll be coming ’round to fetch some necessities from the bags in the boot? If they’re intact, that is.”

  “A bit scratched and so on, but essentially intact. It was the front and the passenger side of the car that took the worst of it. I’ll tell them to expect you.”

  We had to go all the way to Balham, beyond Wimbledon. I pulled out my pocket guide to the tube and discovered that Wimbledon was on the District line, the same as Kew, but Alan nixed the idea. “Look, darling. We’d have to go all the way in to Earl’s Court and get another train. Wimbledon’s on a different branch. It would take forever, and there’d still be a very long walk. And Balham itself is on an entirely different line, with complicated changes. We’ll have to take a cab, but if you want to play tourist, I’ll ask the driver to take us across Richmond Park. It’s rather pretty in summer, though there won’t be much to see this time of year, I’m afraid.”

  “No, it’s all right. It’s the rush and bustle of the tube that appeals to me. It takes my mind off …”

  He gave me a quick hug and stepped into the road to hail a taxi.

  30

  SOME London suburbs are quite attractive. The place where the car was being held was not in one of those. Or perhaps it was only my mood that made the surroundings seem sterile and chilling. I knew for certain, though, that Prince Charles would be appalled by the modern architecture that was everywhere. Both houses and commercial buildings were square, skimpy, and utterly un-English, at least to my eyes.

  Looking at the buildings, however, was preferable to looking at the mass of crushed metal that had once been Gillian’s car. It didn’t seem possible that any human could have survived the forces that could do that to steel. I glanced at it once and then concentrated very hard on hating the bank across the street, while Alan dealt with the bags.

  “You know,” he said when we were back in a taxi, the bags piled around us, “we’ll either have to find a hotel, or take this lot home and come back. We can’t roam about London with this sort of luggage.”

  “You’re right. Or, no, there’s another alternative. I could find what we want right now, and then we could go to Victoria and put the bags in Left Luggage.”

  “If it’s open. If there hasn’t been some security alert that has them nervy if one drops a handkerchief.” He sounded grumpy, and I knew he had been as deeply upset as I by the wreckage.

  However, he redirected the driver to Victoria Station, and I opened each bag in turn and rummaged.

  Miriam’s was the hardest. Those few little skirts and blouses, the worn sweaters, the prim, plain underwear, all were so pathetic I nearly lost my composure. Her bathrobe was like the rest, plain and well-worn. It was also a size or two too small. Bought big, I guessed, so she’d grow into it. She’d done that and more. I promised myself I’d buy her a new one, a pretty one with flowers on it, just as soon as I could get to a store.

  And if she never needs it?

  Angrily, I pushed the thought away and concentrated on the other two cases. It was perfectly easy, of course, to tell which was which. Gillian hadn’t taken the time to pack carefully. Everything was tossed in at random, black miniskirts gathering wrinkles next to wads of panty hose and extra-brief briefs. Almost everything was black, with an occasional splash of bright poppy red. The bathrobe was red and skimpy and slinky. I pulled it out, wrapped it up with a toothbrush, comb, and washcloth. I didn’t know if English hospitals, unlike their hotels, provided face cloths, but there it was if Gillian needed it.

  Now Amanda. Her bag was neat, her clothing as drab as Miriam’s. She would probably hate the idea of someone going through her things, though they were certainly respectable enough, depressingly so.

  I wondered, not for the first time, what John Doyle had done with all the money in the household. He had a job, Amanda had a job, they had only one child and lived in an inexpensive house. Why did he allow his wife and child to live in such grinding poverty?

  The chapel, I supposed. He must have given it all away to those appalling Rookwoods, who had apparently done something nefarious with it. I wondered if there was any chance of retrieving any of it for Amanda and Miriam. Probably not, th
ough.

  They certainly needed money. I studied Amanda’s bathrobe. It might have had some color at one time, but it had been washed so often it was now an indeterminate greige sort of color, and nearly threadbare. I found the toothbrush, comb, and washcloth, and rolled them up into the same kind of bundle I’d made of Gillian’s and Miriam’s things.

  This one crackled, though. I unrolled it again and poked. There was something in a pocket of the bathrobe. I pulled it out.

  It was a small piece of paper with a fold in the center. In black ink and dashing, pretentious handwriting, it read: “Not tonight. Lydia’s home.”

  “What on earth?” I murmured to myself.

  “Hmm?” said Alan.

  “I found a note in Amanda’s pocket. I have no idea what it means, and I suppose it’s none of my business. I’ll keep it and give it back to her later. I don’t imagine it’s important, but there’s no telling what the hospital would do with it.”

  “Odd place to put a note,” he commented. “Unless she’s the sort of woman who goes about the house in a robe all day.”

  “I wouldn’t think so. She works very hard. And her husband had all sorts of rules; I don’t think he would have approved of anything that smacked of laziness.”

  “Ah, well. If she’s conscious you can ask her what to do with it.”

  We said no more about the note as we went about the tedious business of leaving the luggage at Victoria and then sped back to the hospital, but it was the first thing on my mind when we checked on Amanda.

  She was not conscious, however, or not completely. She had opened her eyes, the nurse said, and was talking a little, but not yet making any sense. “She’s coming along very well, though. She’ll be fully awake by tonight, I expect.”

  “May we see her?”

  She considered. “It might do her some good to see a friend. Might bring her a little closer to the surface. Only for a moment, though.”

  Alan went with me, staying in the background. I laid her belongings on the bedside table and put a hand on one of hers. They were lying neatly folded on her stomach, rising and falling ever so slightly with each breath.