‘My answer to your offer, Gabriel, is, yes, please,’ he said, ‘and to yours, Laura, no, but thank you just the same. I have taken a rented apartment in London and will stay there during my treatment. I shall go back to Spain whenever possible as it’s only a couple of hours’ flight and will commute between the two countries.’
‘Leave me the details of your medical people over there,’ Gabriel told him, ‘and I will get on to them to let me have your records and the results of any tests that you’ve already had sent to me immediately.’
* * *
The shock of what her uncle had told them left little room for thought regarding anything else and with Gabriel’s sleeping arrangement as he had suggested and Laura lying wide-eyed and anxious in the bed, the night passed without any disturbances.
But not without much concern on their part for the kindly old man who had given them his house as a farewell gift when he’d gone to spend his retirement in a warmer climate, and now was having to come back to where there was someone he could depend on to provide him with the best possible treatment and care that he was going to need.
Was her uncle’s illness going to be what Gabriel had needed to take him back into cancer care? It was a shame if it was. It should have been of his own free will, but at least he had promised to be there for Gordon, as she’d known he would the moment he’d been told about the other man’s problem, and it was a step in the right direction.
* * *
In the middle of Sunday morning they’d seen Gordon off on the local train that would take him to a major station where he could get a connection to London, and for once Laura and Gabriel were alone. Josh was at Toby’s for the day, and Sophie had been invited to lunch at the home of Lily, the school friend that she’d brought along to the party on The Lady of the Lake.
‘Why don’t we go for a walk along the lakeside and have our lunch out, just the two of us?’ Gabriel suggested as the train disappeared from sight. ‘We’ve had no chance to discuss the bombshell that Gordon dropped on us last night, although we won’t know anything constructive until I get the details from the Spanish side.’
‘He seemed very calm about it, didn’t he?’ she commented. ‘We were more alarmed than he was.’ She was about to say more when an incredible thought struck her.
When Gabriel had gone down the village to get the Sunday papers while she’d been making breakfast, her uncle had gone to sit in the garden and while he had been there had made a call on his mobile.
She’d thought nothing of it at the time, but on looking back she remembered that he had been speaking to someone about renting accommodation in London. Could it be that their conversation the day before had made him decide to transfer his medical arrangements from Spain to London to get Gabriel back into cancer care, knowing that he would not refuse to treat him? And now, having blithely told them he’d got an apartment in the city, was about to back it up by finding one with all speed?
Gabriel hadn’t noticed her hesitation. He was wondering what the count of Gordon’s prostate would be when he received it from the other hospital. It would be a good guide to the seriousness of the cancer and the urgency of the treatment required, but he could do nothing until then, and as he and Laura had some time to themselves the next few hours were going to be their time and no one else’s.
As they strolled along by the lake he took her hand in his and when they came to age-old rocks by the water’s edge that would have been there ever since nature had created a lake of such a size beneath the towering fells, they climbed up onto them and sitting side by side took in the scene before them.
‘I want us to live here for ever,’ Laura said dreamily. ‘And our children, and our grandchildren.’
He was smiling. ‘I would say that is pushing it a bit. In this day and age offspring want to spread their wings, and the more they see in other places the less they want to live where they were brought up. I could see Josh maybe staying put, but not Sophie. She has too much get up and go for that.’
‘She was a little lost soul when you weren’t around,’ she told him. ‘I had to keep telling her that you were looking after sick people and she would accept that for a while and then begin asking where you were all over again.’
They were actually talking like normal people, naturally, freely, without constraint, and venturing further she asked, ‘How do you feel about my uncle persuading you to go back to medicine for his sake?’
He wanted to tell her that he felt fine, that what Gordon had asked of him had made his blood run warm, his brain engage, that he would do all he could to cure him, or at the least lengthen his life, but that he had wanted his return to his profession to be more in keeping with what he’d been planning for weeks and still hadn’t got the go-ahead for.
‘I’m easy about it,’ he said, ‘and if we’re going to have time for lunch before we collect the children, I think we’d better make a move.’
She’d spoilt it by mentioning his work, Laura thought as they scrambled down off the rocks. Why couldn’t she have kept it light?
Yet why should she have to? She wasn’t the one who had made it into something not to be discussed.
But Gabriel was right about their free time together being something not to be wasted and for the next couple of hours she was how she knew he wanted her to be, smiling and relaxed, and when Gordon’s name came up again in conversation as they walked back into the village to collect Josh and Sophie after they’d had a leisurely lunch, the mention of him came from Gabriel.
‘I will use the London house as my base while treating Gordon,’ he said, ‘and liaise with the hospital from there.’
‘Yes, whatever is best,’ she agreed without further comment.
He was observing her questioningly but didn’t say anything further. There was no point until he knew where he was up to with the rest of his working life.
* * *
That evening there was a phone call from her uncle with the address and telephone number of an apartment not far from the hospital, and Laura was even more convinced that it had been arranged after rather than before she had confided her anxieties to him about Gabriel’s reluctance to return to his profession.
If she was right in her surmise, it would seem that Gordon had been extremely quick thinking after she’d confided in him, and had seen a way of not only getting a man he greatly admired back to where he belonged but would also be benefiting himself by being treated by one of the top cancer specialists in the UK.
He was a crafty old love, she thought when he’d gone off the line. It would be the third time he had done something very special for them over recent months. He’d given them the house, recommended her for the job, and was doing his best to bring Gabriel back to where he belonged.
* * *
Nathan had arranged to have two weeks’ leave when the baby arrived and in her role of practice manager Laura was concerned about staffing problems amongst the doctors. Ruby and Hugo were fine, no holidays due there. John Gallagher had said that in a real emergency he would be prepared to lend a hand but he might be a bit rusty, and then there was Aaron Somerton, Nathan’s acquaintance from way back, due to get in touch any time to give her an arrival date.
But it was all going to be rather hit and miss until the little one had actually arrived, and then it would be all systems go, with September now well under way, October ready to step into its place, and the flu-jab season would be upon them.
On the home front Gabriel had received all the necessary information he required to be able to start treating Gordon’s cancer and was now in control of the situation, with the sick man visiting him each week at the town house and then proceeding to the hospital not far away if any tests were required.
He had phoned James to tell him what he was involved in with Gordon, explaining that he was treating him as a private patient and was not expe
cting to create any waves at the hospital himself as all test results would be sent to him by computer.
There was only one situation where he might have to go there and it was if his patient should need surgery that he, Gabriel, would want to perform. If that should occur he wouldn’t hesitate, would be over the threshold in a flash with the adrenaline pumping, but he wanted it to be an orderly, organised thing if he ever went back, not a sudden appearance in Theatre like a ghost from the past.
But Gordon’s count was high. If the
radiotherapy he had arranged for him to have at the hospital didn’t have the desired effect, Gabriel would be back where he belonged, performing a prostatectomy with all his bad memories and heartaches put to one side as he did what came to him as naturally as breathing.
None of that had been part of his conversation with James. It had been just a courtesy call, and his friend had listened to what he had to say and wondered how Gabriel could endure being so near yet so far away from how it used to be.
But like Laura he’d thought it was a step in the right direction and knew there was no point in them discussing him returning to any other aspects of his work until the hearing had taken place.
* * *
Gabriel had just arrived home in the early evening from his second weekly appointment at the town house with Gordon when Nathan phoned to say that Libby was in labour and he was about to take her to the maternity unit at the hospital.
Laura had answered the call and she asked, ‘What about Toby? Do you want us to have him, Nathan? Josh would be delighted.’
‘No,’ was the reply. ‘But thanks for the offer. He’s staying with my father until the baby is born, but I’m sure that he’ll bring Toby round to play if you ask him. You know I’ll be missing for the next two weeks, Laura?’
As she was replacing the receiver Gabriel appeared and on seeing her expression asked, ‘What’s wrong? You look serious. That wasn’t James, was it, or your uncle? I only left him a few hours ago’
She shook her head. ‘No, it was Nathan. It would seem that the baby is on the way. He’s taking Laura into the maternity unit and Toby is with John Gallagher. Libby says that Grandfather Gallagher and Toby are big mates so that should work out well.’
‘And so do I take it that your concerned expression is connected with staffing at the surgery?’
‘Yes. It is,’ she told him. ‘Once we’ve had our meal I must get in touch with the new doctor, but first how did you find your patient?’
‘Not bad. The waterworks aren’t comfortable, of course. They never are in those kinds of cases, but if radiotherapy begins to have an effect soon, it might give Gordon some relief.’
* * *
The morning brought news that the Gallaghers had a daughter and a sister for Toby. The baby was to be called Elsie after
Libby’s mother and her arrival was the main topic of conversation at the practice, with Ruby joining in just as naturally as anyone else, with Hugo close by.
She would have had to face this sort of situation countless times, Laura thought, and would come across it many more. When they were ready to go ahead, adoption or fostering would hopefully fill the gap in their lives.
In the middle of the morning she had a reply from Aaron Somerton regarding her enquiry of the previous night as to when he could be expected to join the practice, and the answer was that it might be three weeks due to last-minute problems at the African hospital where he was based.
Not good news with regard to staffing arrangements at this end, she thought, as now the very thing he had been coming to do was upon them, with not only Libby no longer employed there but with Nathan also away now that the baby had arrived.
It occurred to her that maybe Gabriel would be willing to fill in for a couple of hours each morning and in the afternoon before he went to pick up the children from school.
It would be far from the kind of medicine he’d been involved in, but he would have seen hundreds of patients with hundreds of problems over the years, so wasn’t likely to be fazed by what he came across at the Swallowbrook Medical Practice.
The only problem was that he didn’t know she was thinking along those lines, and there was his commitment to Gordon, which meant him spending a day in London each week. But four days of his presence would be better than none, and if what the doctor who would be taking Libby’s place had said was correct, it would only be for three weeks that she would be asking Gabriel to help out at the practice.
There would have been no necessity to involve him if the original arrangements had been carried out, but the baby had arrived a little earlier than expected and Aaron Somerton wasn’t going to be there to fill the gap yet.
CHAPTER NINE
SHE was going to mention the idea to Gabriel before she said anything to Hugo and Ruby, who were holding the fort, and his reaction to the suggestion made her feel that she’d done a wise thing in consulting him first.
When she put the question to him that evening he said, ‘How do you know that the other doctors would want me to muscle in on them? I would imagine that Hugo and Ruby are very capable.’
‘Yes, they are,’ she agreed, ‘and, no, I don’t know what they will think of the idea. I wanted to suggest it to you first as staffing arrangements are my responsibility.’
‘Don’t you think the patients are going to be wary of being treated by someone with a reputation like mine?’ he said quizzically. ‘When I was down on the river bank the other day there were two guys fishing nearby and they kept checking that their catch was still where they’d laid it. They must have known I’d been inside and thought it was for thieving. I imagine they would have run a mile if they’d known the real reason.’
‘Do you have to be so flippant about it?’ she choked. ‘Anyone knowing the truth of what happened would never pass judgement on you.’
‘Possibly not, but the judiciary system did, if you recall.’
‘Of course I recall,’ she said indignantly. ‘I can’t believe you might think that I don’t.’
‘I’m sorry, Laura,’ he said contritely, and reaching out for her he held her close. ‘You are the last person I should be whingeing at. Yes, of course I’ll fill in at the practice if you want me to. Just tell me what you want me to do.’
She was still in his arms and wanting to stay there, but he put her away from him gently and said, ‘I’ve waited long enough and can wait a little longer.’
Her blood, which had been warming at the closeness of him, cooled, and as if his thoughts were already back to basics he said, ‘When do you want me to start?’
‘In the morning, if you will. The sooner, the better.’
‘Right, I’ll go straight to the surgery when I’ve dropped Sophie and Josh off at the school and will work through the lunch hour to make up for having to pick them up at half past three.’
‘We could have lunch together in my office if you like,’ she suggested.
He was smiling. ‘Let’s see how it goes first. If I receive a general boycott from the patients I might be back home filling the dishwasher and going around with the vac by lunchtime.’
‘You are doing it again,’ she protested.
‘What?’
‘Making it sound as if you care about the opinions of others when you don’t.’
‘It’s true, I don’t. The only person whose opinion matters is yours, and I know that it has hit a few lows over the last twelve months.’
‘I’ve accepted all of what is past,’ she told him. ‘What I can’t accept is that you know there are people out there who need all the help they can get and yet you are frittering your time away as if they don’t exist.’
‘You mean as the local layabout who is doing you out of the school walk? Are you sure those aren’t the kinds of reasons why you want to get me in harness at the surgery, and h
as it occurred to you that your uncle might have ditched his arrangements for treatment in Spain to get me back in touch with my London roots, even though I am only too happy to do what I can for him?’
‘Yes. I have to confess that it has,’ she told him, ‘though I wasn’t sure.’
‘And you didn’t think to pass on your thoughts about it?’
‘What would have been the point? I knew that you would want to treat him, whatever the ploy he had adopted, and with regard to me asking you to help out at the practice, it was for a few reasons. One was the shortage of staff, another was that you might enjoy the change from fishing, and I wanted us to be together during my working hours.’
‘But not during the night?’ he couldn’t resist commenting. Even though it was the opposite of what he’d said earlier when she’d been in his arms, and he got the answer he expected.
‘No, not then,’ she said in a low voice, and went to call the children in from play.
* * *
Ruby and Hugo were delighted to know that Gabriel was going to fill in one of the gaps at the practice when Laura phoned to tell them later that evening, and when he put in an appearance the following morning there was none of the aversion he’d expected from the patients.
There was plenty of curiosity and quite a bit of interest in knowing that a big-wig from London in a smart suit was there to listen to what some of them had to say about their health problems and prescribe whatever medication he thought was necessary.
Hugo told him laughingly, ‘They’ll be coming to consult you from miles around when the news gets out that you’re the new temp at the surgery. If they haven’t got anything wrong with them, they’ll invent something.’
Gabriel went down to Laura’s office in the lunch hour and when he was framed in the doorway with sandwiches and two mugs of tea she saw that he was smiling. When she asked what sort of a morning it had been he said, ‘It was better than fishing,’ and for the first time in weeks she felt light-hearted.
Marriage Miracle in Swallowbrook Page 12
