‘There has.’ I cut him short, tersely. ‘But I don’t feel like any more talk. I’m tired. I’ve had enough.’
‘I’m sorry, but naturally, after that, I can only offer my apologies for any distress I may have caused you.’
‘I shouldn’t bother.’ I met his eyes. ‘It’s not important.’
‘I’m afraid I can’t agree with you there, Miss Hurst.’
I shrugged and looked at Bassy.
Bassy was the taller man by about five inches but, as he slouched badly and was so thin, even with his full beard he gave the general impression of a gangling schoolboy who’d outgrown his strength. He actually possessed the muscular strength of a professional wrestler, and as he was a passionate advocate of non-violence, he kept in good condition. At his most heated he had never gone beyond threatening to thump an opponent with his ‘Make love, not war’ placard. So on his many demonstrations he was always posted close to the hooligan fringe. When he went into action his peace-keeping technique very much resembled Meggy’s.
He seemed to uncoil inside his crumpled red tracksuit. ‘Apparently my sister no longer wishes this conversation to continue ‒ sir! I’d be obliged, sir’ ‒ his pompous manner matched Charles’s ‒ ‘if you’d take that as final, sir, because if you don’t I’ll probably bloody thump you down these stairs ‒ sir!’
‘Possibly, rather than probably, Mr Hurst. But I take your point. Goodnight to you both.’ Charles calmly walked back up the stairs. As we heard his door close Bassy jerked an urgent thumb downwards. ‘Cold as charity at the sit-in,’ he remarked, as we went down. ‘The bastards have turned off the heating.’
Sandra, her boyfriend, and another couple were on the third landing. Sandra was pink. ‘What’s going on above, Alix?’
Bassy answered. ‘A right rave! Too bad you missed it, Sandra. Sorry we can’t wait, but my bird’s just taken off with two other guys.’ He hurried me on to the front hall and removed his track jacket. He was wearing four sweaters. ‘You can have this.’
‘Thanks. My mac’s in his flat.’
‘He knows what he can do with it! Let’s get out of the joint. Don’t like the smell.’
The mist clung round the street-lamps in orange circles, and the slow traffic made the sound of tearing silk. The high buildings were ominous, jostling ghosts; the pavements could have been oiled. We would have walked as slowly on a clear, dry evening.
I peered round. ‘Where’s Melly?’
‘Making for my place with Bert and Hamish, if she’s not there already.’
‘How do you know? You didn’t tell her.’
‘Plan B. You were A. She’s got Pete’s key. With her IQ one doesn’t have to spell it out.’ He moved nearer. ‘And meanwhile, back at the ranch? …’
He listened in silence, and remained silent when I finished. ‘I know,’ I said, ‘I need my head examined. Come to that, so does he. I’m not sure yet which he is ‒ psycho or schizoid.’
‘Bit more complicated than that. And though you’re a bloody moron with men,’ said Bassy very slowly, ‘and haven’t Melly’s IQ, it’s not all your fault you didn’t get the whole picture that night I was skint. I thought I’d given you enough to catch on. That’s the snag of having a brain for a bird. One forgets other birds don’t have ’em. I couldn’t say the lot then as Pete asked me not to. He has this anti-father fixation. Root cause of his inhibitions and his acne.’
I stopped walking. ‘What’s Pete’s Oedipus got to do with Charlie?’
‘Dad’s a top accountant specializing in company taxation. So he has a mathematical genius for a son and top clients.’
‘Charlie’s one?’ I demanded incredulously. ‘On an academic salary? Tell that to the parents!’
‘Not on his salary, if he draws it, which he probably doesn’t as the lot’d go in tax.’
I propped myself against a dripping wall. ‘Why?’
‘Pete says he’s not in the big league yet, though his mum is. Family property, mostly in London ‒ and quite a bit of London. London property’s worth having and the value keeps rising. Pete reckons Charlie’s present share as chicken-feed, but as he’s the only son ‒ Mum’s second husband is in her own league and able to take care of the two girls ‒ Charlie has a rosy future. And safe. Pete says there’s the hell of a tight entail on most of Mum’s nest-egg.’
‘What does Pete reckon chicken-feed?’
‘Over a half and under a million.’
I took a long, long breath. ‘No wonder he runs an inexpensive car. This explains his flat.’ I explained that. ‘But not why no-one else has told me ‒ Robbie, Catriona. Such chicken-feed is news.’
‘But old news. Maybe it hit the headlines when Mum married Charlie’s old man. According to Pete’s dad, he was an up-and-coming but ordinary medic, son of the manse, loaded with principles and education, with no more than he earned. Seems he insisted they either lived on that, or he wouldn’t marry the girl. He sounds a decent guy with a right touch of the old John Knoxes. The marriage didn’t last long as he was killed at Dunkirk, but Pete’s dad says it seemed surprisingly happy. Pete’s dad then reckons Mum came to her senses by remarrying into her own league. Pete says the one thing that really hurts his dad is idle money. Pete’s bloody peeved he’s not on speaking terms with Dad right now, as he’s sure Dad’s blowing a gasket over Charlie’s being ditched by his loaded bird. Pete thinks it might cure his acne to see his old man sweat.’
‘Pete has problems,’ I muttered vaguely. ‘And Catriona. She doesn’t fancy girlish gossip. Think that’s why she didn’t tell me?’
‘Either that or she thinks money too sordid a subject for a nice girl to mention. She went to a good girls’ boarding-school. And it shows!’ He added feelingly. ‘Christ, but it shows! Poor kid!’
‘Robbie didn’t go to a boarding-school.’
‘No, but he wasn’t around the Edinburgh social scene thirty-odd years back, doesn’t mix in it now, and very likely hasn’t heard it around his hospital. Pete said he’d been keeping a big ear out amongst our medics, and since he told me, so’ve I. They don’t seem to know Charlie as anything but an ordinary, quiet sort of guy ‒ if they know him at all, and not many do.’
I was feeling rather ill. ‘What’s Charlie’s mum’s name?’
‘Don’t know. All Pete said was that he’d never met her. He’d only met Charlie once, and that was two years ago when his dad was standing him lunch in London for getting three Grade As for his ‘A’s Charlie stopped at their table or something ‒ only for a few minutes ‒ but Pete’s computer mind never forgets faces, and as the city pages are his favourite light reading he filled in most of the financial side for himself. He recognized Charlie when he brought back your purse, but only tipped me off after seeing you in his car. Pete may hate his old man’s guts, but he wouldn’t want to do him dirt. So he asked me to keep this to myself. Also, like he said, why force Charlie to buy up barbed-wire by the ton to keep out the rush of eager birdies switching subjects? Charlie hadn’t done him any harm. And Charlie then seemed hooked. Now he’s off the line, spread the word, and if you don’t think every other student-birdie is suddenly going to develop a passionate interest in pathological research, then you really are out of your tiny mind, Alix! One doesn’t have to love the bastard to see he’s a sitting duck.’
‘No. Charlie has problems.’ I was quiet for a few seconds, thinking of all my meetings with Charles, and particularly of those since the day that wedding announcement appeared. ‘Makes me want to throw up, but I can see I could’ve seemed eager to get in on the act now he’s free. What I don’t see is why he earlier stuck his neck out. Why bring back my purse?’
Bassy said that had foxed him until Pete provided the answer. ‘Had Charlie left it on the floor and it had been stolen, and you’d later asked the cops if it had been handed in, they’d ask you for details. That’d involve Charlie. But if he’d taken it to the cops, what if you later claimed some cash was missing? And that’s been done before, and thou
gh you couldn’t make it stick ‒ your word against his ‒ who’d be most hurt by any kind of scandal? Who’d everyone most love to hate? Hard-working, under-paid nursie, or poor old MacRockefeller?’
‘No, he wouldn’t like mud in those turn-ups. Yet, didn’t he risk worse taking me up that hill at night?’
‘Pete thinks so, but you’re the only nurse Pete knows. Didn’t you say you were all apart, and being a medic Charlie read you right? Haven’t you said at such times nurses and medics get an instant togetherness?’
‘Well, yes.’ I thought back. ‘He was still engaged and I was in uniform. Both’ll have worked on us.’
‘Chastity belts for two?’
‘Roughly.’ The mist was very wet, very cold, and I shivered. ‘Must’ve been that, though after tonight I don’t really figure it. Yeugh! How could I’ve thought that pompous, priggish, conceited sod sweet! And how do you suppose he thought I knew his bank balance? Pete?’
‘Pete doesn’t think he spotted him that first evening. Pete hadn’t the chin fringe, sideboards, or acne when they met in London. Word just gets round ‒ like now.’
I said, between my teeth, ‘Doesn’t matter how. Just what he thought! What I could do to the sod!’
‘Take five,’ said Bassy kindly. ‘You did it when you sent him up. No guy enjoys being laughed at by a bird.’
I thought of Charles’s expression as he leant against his drawing-room door. I began to feel better. ‘No, he didn’t like that at all, I’m delighted to say.’
Chapter Nine
Melanie sat cross-legged on the floor sipping milkless tea and blinking myopically without her glasses when Robbie rang me back next morning. ‘So that’s where you are, Alix! I’ve rung your flat three times.’
‘Sorry, what’s the crisis?’
‘My miserable opposite number’s slipped a disc. Today’s out, but I can make tomorrow. Any good?’
‘Not a chance. Working day. Sorry again.’
He said bitterly, ‘Other folk have free weekends and private lives. Do you ever get the impression we’re in the wrong business? Hang on.’ He was talking his end. ‘Alix? I’ve to go. I hate to do this to you, but what else can I do? I’ll be in touch. Right?’
‘Fine. Thanks for ringing.’
Melanie went on sipping and blinking as I bemoaned the lot of overworked, underpaid hospital residents. She had tied her hair back in a pony-tail, and without the white lipstick and heavy eye-do she was a very pretty girl.
She said, ‘Society always has taken advantage of workers in vocational occupations. It’s unfair, but life’s unfair. Robbie’s only answer, and yours, is to change jobs. Would you do that?’
‘No. Nor would he.’
‘Then society knows it’s got you where it wants you. How about when you marry?’
‘God knows. I know I’ll hate chucking nursing. Face it when I come to it, I guess. How about you?’
She had a husky voice and a particularly attractive Scottish accent. ‘The more I think on marriage, the more convinced I am it’s the biggest con-trick ever worked on women. Every unintelligent girl I know can’t wait to race up the altar. Every unintelligent boy says marriage is not catching him. But I’ve observed it’s the really bright lads who can’t get themselves wives fast enough ‒ and the last thing the bright girls of my acquaintance want to be is the wee wife.’ She reached for her glasses and perched them on her nose. ‘It’s a problem one’s hormones’ll undoubtedly solve in the wrong way. Did that Pete not even leave an ounce of marge?’
‘Nothing but that packet of tea.’
She got off the floor. ‘I’ll away to the shops. I can’t support human rights on an empty stomach.’
Whilst we cooked and ate brunch she delivered a long lecture on those rights that would have impressed me had I been listening properly. What did impress me was the way she never once, directly or indirectly, referred to last night.
‘I should do my duty by mankind now, Alix. What’ll you do?’
I looked around. ‘Spring-clean this slum. I think I should.’
‘Why should the fact that you’re female make you feel not merely responsible but guilty about the mess left by your brother and his male flatmates? Don’t you realize those responses are but conditioned reflexes imposed upon women as second-class citizens by a male-dominated society? St Paul,’ said Melanie darkly, ‘has a lot to answer for. And the Normans in England. Anglo-Saxon women had considerable rights until William of Normandy swept them away!’
I said, ‘I’m sure you’re right, Melly, but what you don’t realize is that I always clean anything handy when in a filthy temper. The dirtier the better the safety-valve.’
‘Oh? Now that’s logical.’ She smiled. ‘Me, I cook.’
I rang to check before going back that evening. Catriona had answered and was still clucking anxiously when she let me in. ‘Even your date off! How wretched for you! I know how you feel about Robbie!’
‘How the hell can you, as I don’t know myself!’ My raincoat was hanging in the hall. I held it at arm’s length. ‘How did this get here?’
‘I brought it in. It was in a paper bag on our doorstep. I thought you’d forgotten it. Hadn’t you?’
I did not intend coming out with it, but that damned raincoat had shaken me. Also I had done a great deal of thinking as I spring-cleaned. ‘Catriona, you did say Aunt Elspeth knew Charlie slightly?’
Her face closed. ‘Yes. Why?’
‘Too slightly for him to know you’re living here?’
‘She may’ve mentioned it to him. I don’t know.’
I said, ‘Figures. Auntie know his mother and family background?’
‘Er ‒ yes. Why?’
‘I wish you’d told me. I know you don’t fancy gossip, but I wish you had.’ I told her all but Pete’s side of the story. ‘Bassy heard somewhere and put me in the picture later last night. Turn clam on this one, please, as I don’t fancy having spread abroad the jolly news that our landlord thinks me the cutest little gold-digging chick in the call business.’
‘He can’t think you that!’
‘You weren’t there. I was.’
She was having another attempt at disjointing her fingers. ‘I feel so responsible. I’ve known for ‒ for quite a long time, but I thought you’d have heard before last night.’
‘How? This isn’t my scene, and though Bassy’s been here nearly two years, he only heard recently and by chance.’
‘I wasn’t thinking of Bassy ‒’ She broke off, looking very troubled. ‘But you know how people will talk! People always talk, and as I detest being talked about I try not to talk of others in that way. And if you’d not heard I never thought you’d be interested, but some girls might and ‒ well ‒ living in the same building, it might be difficult.’
‘Difficult for whom? Charlie?’
She coloured defensively. ‘Whatever the man is or is not, he is one of my fellow-countrymen!’
I smiled wearily. ‘Scots, wha hae! You and Charlie should get together, but at least your intentions were good.’ I tilted my head. ‘Sounds like our Gem on the stairs.’
Gemmie exploded in a minute later, flapping a new engagement ring in our faces. ‘You’ve both got yourselves a date as bridesmaids, first Saturday of our holiday between this lot and our year on district. I’m asking Miss Bruce for a Glasgow vacancy, and my Wilf’s asking his boss to shift him to their Glasgow branch. How’s that for planning, eh? Only seven more weeks, so we’re going to be right busy. Alix, you’re lovely with your needle ‒ you’ll help me with my wedding-dress, going-away coat and dress, and your two dresses?’
‘Sure! Any time! How about Wilf’s suit?’
She laughed. ‘You reckon we might, eh? Why not?’ She rounded on Catriona. ‘Stop standing around like a nervous rice-pudding, love! You’re my size, so you’ll be model ‒ and, hey, Alix! What’s all this, then, about your moving up with Charlie last night?’
Catriona said quickly, ‘The poor girl locked
herself out, and he offered her the use of his ’phone and a drink. Nice of him, wasn’t it?’
‘Then why’s Sandra saying he’d words with Bassy? She says, sounded like a bloody riot!’
‘Haven’t you heard Bassy’s organized a sit-in? Charlie does work for the opposition, and when students get protesting someone’s blood usually flows, doesn’t it, Alix?’
‘I couldn’t have put it better myself.’
Gemmie’s wedding was the big topic amongst the district students for several days for more than one reason. Ours was not the only set, and the nearness of her wedding day underlined how even nearer were our final exams. Over that weekend the demolition work was finished, and Charles’s car disappeared from its usual parking-place behind our house. The electricians working overtime on his private lift had gone by Tuesday evening.
The sit-in was called off. Bassy rang me to say Tam was back in business. Everyone on both sides was slapping everyone else on the back and packing up for the vac. Bassy was staying on alone in his flat to do some work. ‘Seen Charlie?’
‘Not a sign.’
‘Jolly good. See you when I’ve surfaced from under the books.’
Mrs Duncan was on holiday that week. There was a general post on district, and I was working half in her area, half in my old one. Mr Richards and Archie remained on my list.
Archie was at a standstill. Whenever I saw Dr MacDonald he said, ‘If he’s not worse he’s to be better. You’ve seen how his blood-count’s holding?’
‘Yes, Doctor. I’ve never seen one like it.’
‘You’re not in a minority of one, Nurse, or even two. Archie’s become such a medical curiosity they’d like to have him back in hospital for better observation. How do you think he’d take returning?’
‘I think ‒ though, of course, I could be wrong ‒ I think it’d kill him.’
‘In my humble but fixed opinion, Nurse ‒ inside of forty-eight hours. Good day to you!’
I was using a bike that day and nearing the Richards’ house when the fine drizzle became a downpour. When I propped the bike against the kerb and unstrapped my nursing-bag, the water from my hat-brim cascaded over my hands.
Edinburgh Excursion Page 11
