by Bill Douglas
She hadn’t expected this. She didn’t want it. And the insinuation about her home being ‘only a council house’ was derogatory. “No. What I’m saying is, can you please, if need be, see I get enough money so that Becky doesn’t suffer?”
Her parents were again looking at each other. They were hesitating. Their only child and grandchild needed their support – and they were hesitating! “Of course,” said Father, “we’ll do what we can to help.” He coughed. “You know, Heather, you probably have grounds for divorce if he’s pronounced insane.”
They wanted her and Becky away from John. She rose. “Time for bed – I’m tired.” On the way out of the room, she looked back. Her parents sat staring at her. They looked wretched. “Goodnight and thanks,” she added. “See you tomorrow.”
She tiptoed upstairs and pulled the door to. Becky was asleep.
She stretched out on the bed. Shocking, how they talked about John! And their hesitation about helping – and the way they’d looked at each other – was odd. ‘We’ll try, do what we can’ was scarcely reassuring. Had the well run dry? Was there a worrying secret?
Lurking deep within her was a vision of the workhouse Granny had feared. A grim safety net for the poor, but this was the Britain of the welfare state.
Through the night, haunting spectres of her Springwell visit wouldn’t let her rest. Something was gnawing at her. When she’d asked how John got so ill, the nurse mentioned hypothermia. And she’d been outraged at the idea John might have had it before he went in. But of course, John had been soaking – said he jumped in the river.
Did he mean to kill himself? And if so, what brought him to that? Had she been too engrossed with Becky over the weeks before Easter to listen to him when he was troubled? And he was monosyllabic when she asked about work that last evening together. Had he been sacked?
Did she overreact when he picked up the knife? He scowled and shouted – but would he have done anything? She’d panicked. His removal to the loony bin was her fault. If he hadn’t gone there, he’d have been treated for pneumonia at the local infirmary. She must ring Springwell.
*
Next day, with Mother at work, and Becky asleep, Heather got the okay to ring Springwell. She went into the front hall and dialled. Mr Macnamara was off duty, she was told, and nobody was available to speak to her. The brush-off!
She stomped back to the living room and told Father about the call. He shrugged and sighed.
She paced round the room. “The trouble is, they don’t let you just drop in. Visiting’s only allowed once a month. I’m worried about John. They thought he was dying. That’s why they summoned me. I must see him, or at least find out how he is.”
“How can you see him, if they won’t let you in?” her father queried.
Not Father of old. He might have offered to blast fortress walls for her. She walked over to gaze out the window. An unmown lawn, weeds galore. Something was wrong. Tonight, she’d press them about this – Mother’s headaches, and a ‘terrible thing’ Granny referred to mysteriously long ago.
She should get home. John was now her main worry. She could use Elsie’s phone and, if need be, enlist the mental man’s help. Tomorrow, maybe. Tonight – her parents!
“Father, can you drive me back tomorrow, please? I meant to stay longer, but I really should get home, in case Springwell ring for me. And someone I know could probably get news of him.”
Father scratched his head. “Mother will be disappointed. But yes. I’ve got something on here that’ll swallow up most of the day. I’ll take you after I’ve brought Mother home.”
*
In the evening, Heather was the disappointed one. Mother arrived ashen-faced, pecked her on the cheek, said “Raging headache, need my bed, darling,” and went upstairs.
*
Later, with Becky settled upstairs, Heather returned to the living room. “Look Father, I know there’s something not okay with you. Before I went to university –”
Father cut in. “Right, Heather. My health is fine.” He cleared his throat. “But I had to leave the bank earlier than planned…” He was gazing at the carpet. “Mergers, a managerial cull, and I lost out.” This would be painful, for a proud man that she couldn’t remember ever moaning to her. “Mother went back part-time to boost finances, but finds it hard.” He rose, yawning. “Must go up.” He looked her in the eye. “Heather, we’ll see that you and Becky have the support you need.”
“Thanks.” It was enough for now. Some light on Granny’s worrying comment from long ago (though vivid as yesterday) – and on Mother’s headaches – would have to wait.
*
That night, she lay awake thinking. For as long as she could remember, Mother had often gone to bed early with a headache. She could still see Granny, brow furrowing, standing over her and saying, “Heather, there are bad days when dark clouds come over your mother – and me.”
Even more powerful was the day (she was nine) she saw Granny staring at the ceiling and shaking a clenched fist. As though kind caring Granny, always there for her granddaughter, had gone into another world.
It’d been scary. “What is it, Granny?”
Granny, looking down at her, said, “Once a terrible thing came to try us, Heather dear – you’ll understand when you grow up,” then smiled and changed the subject.
But she never did learn what that ‘terrible thing’ was, and she hadn’t asked her parents about it. She knew what she’d heard. It was time they told her.
*
After tea next day – still pondering a surprisingly tearful goodbye to Mother – Heather was homeward bound. Seated in the front beside Father – with Becky asleep in the crib at the back. They were on a clear stretch of dual carriageway. Her opportunity.
“Father, I’m worried about Mother’s headaches and what’s causing them.”
“They started long ago, but they’re worse now she’s working again.”
“When I was a girl, Granny said something terrible happened, and I was too young to be told.”
He was frowning, “Ancient history. Can’t talk without Mother, anyway.”
So the ‘terrible thing’ remained a mystery.
*
At the other end, Heather got her father to drop her outside the shop. She’d welcome having tea with the older couple, but she would not stay overnight. It was time to face the demons lurking at home.
14
Wednesday 25thApril – Sunday 6th May 1956 – in Springwell.
John lay half-awake, musing on the grim times after Da’s accident.
“Da’s in hospital,” Ma says, “hurt bad.” Da’s away ages. He’s afraid Da’s gone forever. Ma goes to visit twice a week, but the miners’ hospital is two bus rides away, so on those days he and Dave do for themselves after school. Dave looks after him – takes him to football, includes him with the big boys. Ma says Da’s getting better. Nights he hears her crying. He asks Dave about this, and is told “Go to sleep.”
Da comes home with no legs. The big wheelchair makes the living room look small. Prosthetic legs come. Da says, “Magic legs, my boys. I’ll be a great big giant.”
Then Dave vanishes. For ages, he half thinks Dave’ll burst through the door. He takes on Dave’s paper round as well. Through all weathers on a big bike, he rages, feels the tears.
And there’s no magic in the new legs. They’re too short and Da keeps tumbling over. Ma wants to try and get another pair, but Da says not to fuss and learns to use the legs to get around the house.
After school he stays in for the household chores and doing homework, and often falls asleep downstairs before Ma’s home. They’re real hard up, even with help from Miners’ Relief and neighbours. Ma takes three jobs charring for families in the snobby part of town. He’s proud of his Ma; wearing herself out to keep them going.
He blinked himself fully awake. A hand was gripping his shoulder. He glanced up. Black bulging eyes glared at him. Niven.
“Make sure Chisholm’
s awake, Tommy.” Macnamara’s Irish brogue. “Doctor’ll be coming soon.”
He didn’t want to see anybody. He shut his eyes and lay still.
“Get the hell up!” A low voice, menacing. Niven threw the bedclothes off, jerked him up to a sitting position.
“The patient stinks, boss,” Niven shouted.
“Change the drawer sheet and the mac. Eddie, you take the man walkies.”
Maclean appeared beside Niven. “I’ll take you to the bog. No funny tricks!”
Some chance. He closed his eyes and saw stars as a tug under each arm hauled him out of bed to standing.
“I’ll manage, Tommy,” said Maclean.
He began to totter down the ward, glad of Maclean’s support. He saw from the corner of his eye an old man with a shock of white hair, sitting up in bed and pointing at him – and it dawned. He looked down, to see that he was naked apart from the coarse pyjama jacket.
“My trousers,” he said. He felt the white-coat’s grip tighten.
“You haven’t got any yet. You’ve been too incontinent.”
Nausea hit him after a few steps. This exercise was tough, but worse was the pungent smell of urine, even stronger than the paraldehyde. Maclean halted him by the end of one of the beds. A pail stood half-full of stinking dark yellow liquid.
“Glaekit,” Maclean yelled. “Get this shit-pot emptied – and any others!” A young brown-coated man appeared, lifted the offending pail and walked off rapidly. “Damned orderly – it’s his job,” Maclean muttered.
John was thankful to continue the walk. They went slowly until Maclean said “Here,” and guided him towards an opening between the beds. “The bog. I’ll stay with you.”
Great cocktail. Piss and shit, plus disinfectant? A chain was pulled in one of the cubicles. He saw the brown-coated youth emerge with an empty pail and speed out onto the ward.
“I’m right here, laddie.” Maclean was talking to him. The shame of being watched like this!
Ablutions finished, he felt Maclean’s grip tighten again as they walked back into almost welcome paraldehyde territory. He inhaled. Mustn’t pass out!
At last, his bed. He flopped onto it, welcoming the bedclothes being pulled over him. He started to doze.
“Sit the patient up, Mr Macnamara!” A man’s voice, like Panjit’s. Ah, from the padded cell?
He was gripped under each arm and lofted to sit up. He sat, blinking at the white-coated man. A beard and a turban – like Panjit.
“This is Dr Singh, the psychiatrist,” said Macnamara, stepping back to let the doctor come nearer. Yes, the guy from the padded cell.
“Mr Chisholm, you have been very ill with pneumonia, and on a drip to give you nourishment,” said the doctor. “How are you?”
“Okay.” Slipped out automatically. He was anything but.
“We have also been worried about your mental state.”
So what? “Can I go home?”
“No, Mr Chisholm. You are a certified patient.”
A loony! He shut his eyes.
“Mr Chisholm, are you listening to me?” Like he was a naughty child.
“No.”
“You will be detained a long time while we treat your mental condition. After you have fully recovered from the pneumonia, you will be moved back to our Admissions Ward. Good day.”
Trapped. And they held all the cards. He saw the doctor and Macnamara move off down the ward, leaving Niven by the end of the bed. His minder?
He slid down the bed and curled into a ball. Befuddled. A word he’d seen in books, but never felt applied to him. His mind felt vacant – like his thoughts had been pulled out, into the ether somewhere. Maybe he was crazy, living out a nightmare.
The bedclothes were jerked back. “Wakey wakey.” Niven leaned over to whisper into his ear. “Sit up, you bastard, or I’ll tear off all your clothes.”
John sat up, leaning his head against the bed railings.
“Boss says you’ve to drink this. I hold the mug and you drink.”
Well, what if it was poison? He gulped the liquid down. It tasted like water.
*
Over his remaining days in the infirmary, John endured being shaved each morning – by Niven, who said “Bloody hayfield” the first day. Pointing out he could do this himself now led to being grabbed by his pyjama jacket and told that “Patients never get razors.” The shave that followed was painful and bloody, but at least he felt cleaner.
He also experienced the Niven bed bath. “You mad bastard,” Niven kept muttering as he sponged, too vigorously.
“I can wash myself,” he protested, then endured agony as his crotch was squeezed. Like Sarge, Niven was for that dark alley someday.
On trips to the bog, he had to be accompanied, they said. Utter humiliation. After that first trip, he could walk unsupported.
The meals came – breakfast, lunch, tea – with monotonous regularity. There was nothing appetising about them – and the soup had to be dishwater – but he forced everything down. He must get his strength back.
He began to welcome the nightly paraldehyde. Could it be addictive? And the penicillin injections were important to his getting well. Macnamara had explained about this life-saving medicine.
That wasn’t all Macnamara explained. One afternoon the Charge Nurse came across and sat beside the bed.
“How’re you doing?”
Sounded like the man cared. “I’m getting stronger. Why was I in that cell?”
“You were out cold when you came to Springwell. They took you to Reception to complete the certifying, then, as you’d cut up so rough, put you into seclusion on the Admissions Ward.”
“Seclusion?”
“That’s officially what being put in a cell is. It’s padded so that you can’t hurt yourself if you’re violent, and you’re put in there to help you cool off. We call it the cooler.” Macnamara smiled. “Sure, you can see why?”
John nodded. “‘Cooler’ is a euphemism. You should try it.”
“Sure I have done – and I’d heartily agree. Then after a few hours they came to take you to a bed on Admissions, and you cut up rough again.”
“Hell, you should’ve seen them square up. And one of them had a syringe.”
“That would be in case you resisted, for sure. They knocked you out and put you back in the cell. But this time the doc said you’d to be watched, and visited once an hour. He didn’t like you being there on your own too long.”
It was coming back. Doc would be Dr Singh.
“When they went in later, they saw you were breathing funny, gasping, and thought you were off with the angels. Lucky old Doc Burn was around – he’s a GP, lives out here as his wife’s a nurse on the female side. Doubles up on psychiatry, doing outpatient clinics. He diagnosed pneumonia, said it would be dangerous to move you into town as you could be dying.”
“Why didn’t you let me die?”
“Sure, we don’t want that. You were brought into Infirmary. We got you onto penicillin right away. After a bit longer for recovery, you’ll be for the Admissions Ward, where they’ll assess and begin treating you for the mental trouble.”
“When can I get out from Springwell?”
“I don’t know. You’re certified, and surely you’ll be in a long while.”
“But I’m sane. What do they say’s wrong with me?”
“You haven’t been diagnosed yet. They said your behaviour was disturbed.”
Disturbed? “Well, I put up a fight.”
Macnamara glanced at his watch and started to rise.
A reminder. “Where’s my watch?”
“In safe keeping. Could go missing if you kept it on your person. I’ve to go. One more thing – Doc Burn said to summon next of kin, and your wife was brought out to see you.” Macnamara stood up and started to walk away.
So he hadn’t dreamed it.
Macnamara paused and turned. “She was very upset.”
Well… Maybe Heather did still love him. But
it could have been an act. “I’ve been suspecting she doesn’t love me anymore.”
But Macnamara had gone.
“Trouble with the missus, son?”
Two beds away, the old man with the shock of white hair was sitting up, gesticulating towards him. Must have heard something. Great privacy in here. “Who wants to know?” he shouted back.
“Fred. I’ve been on this ward longer than any. Had trouble with my missus. That’s what brought me into these places.”
“Well, Fred. And –?” He twisted round to face the old man.
“I was in the Great War, joined up 1915. That damn Kitchener’s poster! I came home on leave after Mons and found the missus in bed with a lout. I beat him up and left him for dead. Trouble was, the weasel did peg it some time after and the police said it was from the hammering I gave him. I’d given the wife a thrashing too. She was whining, said she wouldn’t tell who’d beaten the lout up.”
“Did she?”
“Yes, she testified against me, said I’d gone right mad – and other things that wasn’t true. But I’d gone back to France, went over the top at the Somme – so by the time the trial came I’d lost a leg and a lot more down below. The court said I was insane. Meant I didn’t swing, but they put me in Broadmoor’s infirmary. Then they reckoned I couldn’t escape nor do no damage, and moved me in here.”
“Oh.” He wanted to say more, but his head was pounding and he sank down under the bedclothes.
Another patient appeared at the end of his bed. Looked familiar. It was the man who’d startled him the other day.
He sat up, and felt the bed being shaken, then the shaking stopped. The man stepped back and pointed at him, shouting “You,” before turning and going back down the ward – head bowed and muttering. The same routine as before.
“What’s all that about?” he shouted to Fred.
“Poor bugger, Larry. Came onto this ward in 1952. He’d been in the infantry and got decorated at Monte Casino. But he’d gone around shagging Italian women and got the clap. They brought him here in a straitjacket. Made a right shindig till they silenced him with their dope. He’s GPI.”
