by Sheila Burns
‘You’ll do nothing of the sort. What you will do is make me a pawn in your own game.’
She argued for a while, but now there were sounds outside of the house waking from siesta, for the heat of the day was past, and this meant that fairly soon her mother would be along. Then anything might happen! So she did ring up, but there was no answer.
It was quite possible with dangerous drugs like heroin, Max (if the thief was Max) was already selling it, and would get rid of the lot before it could be traced. There were always people waiting to buy it, ‘junkies’ who could not do without it; you could tell them by their haggard faces and strained eyes, and the way they could hardly talk clearly when matters grew worse.
‘There’s no reply,’ she said, and from the bed the sick man gasped wretchedly.
That was when she heard Mother approaching down the corridor, and knew that Cam was in a very desperate condition, not at all in the mood to see her. Whilst he was trying to think of some way out of this situation, he would not be himself again, and the sedative had not done much for him.
‘There were thousands of pounds in that packet,’ he whispered.
That was when the door opened and Mother was standing there. Mandy turned to her, and she felt that there are some things that one cannot forgive, and trespassing on illness is one of them. She moved quickly to her.
‘Mother, Cam’s feeling quite awful,’ she began, but her mother did not listen.
She came across the room, and now she was limping very little indeed; it was quite amazing with all her illnesses that, the moment she stopped thinking about them, she got better. She sat down in the chair beside him, genuinely distressed and worried for him. It struck Mandy that Mother was really in love with this man, even by the way that she looked so helplessly at him.
‘Cam, my darling? But you knew that I’d come to you the moment I could! You look quite awful. Cam dear, what have they been doing to you? You — you’ll die in this island,’ and she caught at his hand. ‘My own sweetie, what can I do to help you?’
He said nothing. For a moment he tried to say something yet no sound came, and his face had gone ashy again. The shock of the afternoon had been altogether too much for him, and to have his wife walking in was the end. Mandy knew it, but there was nothing that she could do. She went over to the side for one of the injections which steadied him, and she heard her mother protesting, ‘You aren’t going to hurt him. I won’t let you hurt him! I just won’t let you be cruel to him,’ but she ignored it.
‘You’ll be all right,’ she heard herself saying in what she always called her ‘trained nurse voice’, a voice which was there to help. ‘This will make you better, and quickly.’ She heard him sigh, and released the needle again, laying the syringe back in the enamel bowl, making that familiar hospital sound which was always a symbol of safety. She leant over him comfortingly.
‘You’ll be all right in a minute; just lie still and breathe easily. It’s not going to happen again, don’t think that. You’ll be all right, Cam.’
Her mother sat watching, a little awestruck and dismayed, for she must have realized how ill he was. He breathed better and lay there, his eyes shut, then after a moment he opened them and looked helplessly around him.
Mother was now seriously disturbed. The heat had flattened her hair so that she looked quite unlike herself, usually so very soignée, for she swore by a good appearance. ‘He’ll be all right, Mandy?’
‘Yes. Give him time! Just leave him alone.’
She pouted a little. ‘Nobody seems very pleased to see me. I come all this way, and I’ve been awfully ill myself, but that doesn’t seem to signify. Now this!’
‘Mother, he has been so dreadfully ill, and you have to be careful. It was a surprise seeing you, his second surprise this afternoon, and we are trying to avoid shocks for him.’ She still stood there, very much on duty, her finger on his pulse, and somehow it seemed to overawe her mother a little. She dabbed at her eyes with a small hankie, then fanned herself with it, murmuring something about ‘it all being so frightfully hot’. They had to wait. As she stood waiting, Mandy knew that her mind had gone back to the heroin. Of all the drugs in the world, why had he chosen that one? She rebelled from the thought that anyone could ever do it, and memory of those shocking cases which came into Casualties, of young people, often only in their teens, utterly shattered by what they had taken. She would never forget some of the sights that she had seen in that way. They had distressed her far more than the operating theatre, or those ghastly times in the post-mortem room (something she had dreaded, yet when it had come had been surprised that it was not as bad as she had thought it must be). But the ‘junkies’, poor things, generally in a fit of crazy adventure had lost their lives.
‘You must let him lie absolutely still, Mother,’ she heard herself saying.
‘But Mandy, dear, it is so awful! I have only just come and he does not even seem pleased to see me.’
‘He has been too ill; don’t worry him. He’ll be so happy when he feels better. Just give him time to get over this.’
In the end he did speak to her, but not very much. She knew the loss of the heroin was his anxiety, and nothing would take his mind off it. It was then that her mother, stifled by the heat, said she would take a breather, and go for a drive to get some fresh air, and they packed her off to do that. She should never have come, of course, and was out to be nothing less than a pest.
Then Mandy tried Max Jefferies again. Somehow she had the premonition that he would not be there and heard the bell ringing and ringing, and nothing happened. She was perfectly certain that he had never thought that Cam was in the Secret Service. All these people knew more about him than she had done, and in one way she resented this, for she had come out here in an attempt to help him, but somehow now this was not cutting much ice.
She hung up the telephone, and went back to his bedside. She brought him an iced drink, he was better, possibly over-joyed to have got rid of Mother for a moment, when the telephone rang again and she went to it.
Lucinda was at the other end.
‘I ‒ I’m afraid he is not at all well. He had another attack this afternoon, and we are keeping him very quiet.’
‘I must speak to him. It is imperative. Who is that on the other end?’
‘I am his stepdaughter, a trained nurse, who flew over to see after him,’ then, as she saw Cam’s frantic face, ‘One moment! Hold on just one moment, please.’
She put her hand over the mouthpiece. ‘It is that woman who came before, with the flowers and fruit. Contessa Lucinda is her name.’
He steadied himself. ‘I must speak to her.’
‘Cam, you can’t! You aren’t well enough, and at all costs you simply can’t do it.’
He turned his eyes to her, and they were angry. ‘You understand nothing. She is the one person who can help me. She is the woman who can give me a hand. She knows.’
‘You mean she’s in it, too?’
He flung that aside. ‘That’s absurd, but she knows everything that goes on in this island, and she will know who has the packet.’
She said to him, ‘I am very much against it. It is quite wrong, but …’ Then to the woman, who was nothing more than a voice on the far end, ‘One moment, please.’ She took the telephone to him. He signed to her to go out of the room, and she went. Not because she felt she ought to go, but suddenly she realized that this was something which was already too big for her, and she was afraid. Lucinda, who lived the other side of the island, and who you would have thought would have been above suspicion. Now this!
When she returned again he had finished speaking, and she thought that he looked easier. He refused to tell her anything, save that he was sure Max Jefferies was at the bottom of all this, and if only he were well he would be out and after him. It was horrible to be stricken as he had been at such a time, and when he needed the money so much.
‘Now don’t get worked up,’ she begged him.
&nbs
p; It would be disastrous if he did get seriously upset, especially as he had already had such a shock. She bathed his brow and begged him to take things more easily. Apparently what Lucinda had told him had helped him, for she did know something about it, and had made one or two suggestions to him. He seemed more at peace with himself. One thing was certain to Mandy, that if he was not careful, sooner or later he would be discovered and she did not want this to happen whilst she was in charge of him. At all costs she must make some arrangements for him to fly home, and take any risk which was attached to that.
She ’phoned Dr Mallea about it. The doctor was in a very good mood, and understood that Mother wanted to fly Cam back as soon as ever she could. Mandy wanted him to go. The doctor knew that Mrs Sykes would not wish to stay here too long, and he would raise no objection to this, provided the patient made no effort.
‘You travel with him, Nurse, yes?’
‘Of course.’
He hesitated. ‘If not, Marina is very anxious. She has the aunt in England and wish to come.’
‘Perhaps both of us can go,’ said Mandy, for nothing must stop this flight. She knew that her mother ought to be told what was happening. She had no idea of anything about the man she had married, nor how, if he continued this way, he would find himself facing up to a prison sentence. She hardly dared look ahead. First things first, she told herself.
She persuaded the doctor to help in any way that he could, for he had great influence in the island. She would need all that influence now.
She herself would have loved to have stayed for a few days in Malta. She felt limp, not only from the heat, for she had done too much. The previous strain of the exam was takings its toll, and she steadied herself.
She wanted a holiday terribly. If she could have stayed here for a week alone she would be a new girl. She thought of the bathing, of basking in the sunshine, or dancing half the night, or walking by moonlight in the Barracca Gardens, or driving out to St Paul’s Bay.
Her mother returned, having spent a fortune in Kingsway. She had bottles of perfume and embroidered handkerchiefs, a little bed jacket, beautifully embroidered with water lilies, lots for herself, but now she was tired, and she kicked off her shoes.
‘I must rest, darling Mandy.’
It was then that Luis rang her, and somehow when she heard the bell Mandy got the idea that this was very urgent. He said, ‘You know that you are supping with me tonight?’
She had forgotten it completely.
She began to stammer, trying to explain that everything had happened at once, and then her mother had walked in.
‘Bring her, too,’ he said.
‘No, no, I couldn’t do that,’ and she wondered how she could explain how tiresome Mother was at times. ‘Marina is coming within the half-hour. I could slip away then, but I dare not be very late.’
‘Very well. And the patient is better?’
‘He has had a trying afternoon.’
He said, ‘You ‒ you know the man who answers to the name of Max Jefferies? I hear that he was arrested this afternoon. It must have taken place in his flat; someone went to him, about an hour ago.’
‘He was arrested? Whatever for?’
‘He had dangerous drugs in his possession.’ Then he paused.
Mandy had a hideous feeling that he was waiting for her to explain something, that he knew she would understand how Max Jefferies had come by that packet of dangerous drugs, and fear seemed to cut right through her. She said, ‘Oh,’ her voice trembling, and she thought that never had the single word ‘Oh’ seemed to be more futile.
She felt terribly alone, almost as if she were confronted with an accusation from which there was no escape. She was dismayed that she knew so much and yet could not thrust that knowledge aside from her, and suffered for it.
He said, ‘We’ll talk about it tonight,’ and this was the last thing that she wanted to talk about.
She tried to argue; she felt that in life there always comes the moment when you have to bring things to a head, and that moment had come to her now. ‘I’d rather we did not talk too much about it tonight. It has been an awful afternoon, quite dreadful, and Cam has been horribly ill. Let’s talk about you for a change.’
‘About me?’
She went on quickly, ‘The abbot told me lots about you, and I want to know more,’ then was amazed that she had said it.
He said, ‘All right.’
She rang off.
She did ring up Max, though she was quite sure that there would be no answer, and dumbly she listened to the telephone bell going on ringing and ringing. She had the idea that fate was against her, that quite suddenly she was a ship without a helm or an anchor, a ship which had been guided into a wide channel; now she was sailing down that channel with no idea of where she would end.
She got up, and went out of the room.
Chapter Ten
Her mother had recovered from the journey extraordinarily well. She was determined to plan for Cam’s flight home, and had discovered that she knew a retired admiral living in Sliema who had an interest in flights and would help her. One could never stop her when she began, and Mandy knew better than this. All her life Mother had been adept at knowing the right people in the right places, and never failed to use her influence with them.
She was one of those women who never draw back; she lived life entirely for herself, and worked the oracle whenever she could. Nothing in the world would ever change her, and long ago Mandy had given up trying it.
She herself was glad that she was going out with Luis tonight, seeing that maybe there would be only another couple of nights for her to spend in the island. Make the most of what you have got, one of the student nurses always told her, and there had been something in what she had said. She made the most of every moment that she got, and had gone through her training with fewer rows than most of them, and infinitely more fun.
Mandy had a talk to her mother as they waited for Marina to come on duty for the night. Mother was determined to take Cam home the second that she could, and this in spite of what the doctor said. Mandy told her that Dr Mallea was for it. He thought it would be a good thing to get him out of this heat, and back to his own country.
‘That’s right, and exactly what I am going to do,’ said Mother, with grim determination.
Possibly at this point Cam would offer no resistance, for he must be longing for the sight of home. He was broke in every way; a fortune had been locked up in the stolen parcel, and of course he would never see it again. He would lean on his wife to see him through, and because she had the money, and the influence too, she would manage it.
‘I had hoped to see something of the island,’ Mandy said to her mother, ‘so do forgive me if I go out to dine tonight. I shall have left it by the day after tomorrow.’
‘Well, I shall see nothing of the island,’ said Mother bitterly, and after a stern silence, ‘Who is the young man you’re going out with?’
Mandy told her as little as she could, because she always had the feeling that Mother was one of those wildly curious people who ask for the fun of it. Then she went off and changed her dress. There was something ideal about this place in the fact that automatically one had tepid baths, then got into evening dress every night. She chose white. That itself showed relaxation from the heat of the day. She fastened a spray of jasmine to her shoulder, sweet-smelling and strong, for there was always something about the perfume of jasmine which was intriguing. It grew everywhere in the island, with showers of fine dark leaves and the insignificant starry flowers.
It is time we went back home, she thought, as she fastened the flowers, and as she did so she heard her mother still babbling away to the old admiral in Sliema, and all about getting that emergency flight to England. Mandy came out of her own room just as Mother had done, and she turned to survey her daughter’s dress with some bitterness.
‘It is all very well for you, Mandy, but what shall I see of Malta?’
‘So
meone must stay with Cam. Marina is not enough.’
‘I know, of course. I know, and I’m not complaining, but all the same I’d have liked to have gadded out a bit.’
‘Yes I know.’
‘You only think of yourself,’ Mother remarked with that ice quality in her voice. ‘Still I like the Maltese nurse you have with Cam. She’s very sweet, and you’d have been worked to death if you hadn’t had the good fortune to get a nurse to help you. Marina is a charmer. She mended my stockings for me, but she is only half-trained.’
‘She wants to come to England, and loves the English.’
A bright idea shot through Mother. ‘Let’s take her with us; she could mend up my wardrobe for me and nurse my ankle, too,’ she said.
It certainly was an idea.
Cam had been on the telephone again, and looked worn out. Not for the world would she have admitted that Max had been arrested. She herself wanted the cool, and a little wind had risen; it often did at evening. It was heavenly.
The car arrived punctually on time with Luis driving it. It drew up before the door, waiting in the deep violet shadows which evening always brought. The car was soft cream picked out in scarlet, and with the cross of Malta on it. The morocco leather fittings were extravagant, Mandy was sure that they had cost a fortune, and were of a quality one did not see in England today, and she appreciated this.
The moment that Luis saw her, he realized that something had gone wrong. ‘Now what has happened?’ he asked her.
‘I suppose it’s Mother really. But Cam is not himself, and I’m worried about rushing him home.’
‘Yes, you’ll have to risk it.’
She trusted him of course, he was perhaps the most reliable personality that she had ever met, a man with an inflexible face, and dark eyes which could read right down into her heart. He was a man who knew how to guide her, and whom she could trust, she was sure. She felt that instinctively. He might be the man with a temple of pink marble in his garden, and the peace of that garden split by the sudden shriek of a child in distress, but she still trusted him.
