this salad with tinned tuna followed by a tinned pear with tinned cream.
‘I saw that man, here in the hospital,’ she broke out in a shaky whisper, afraid somebody might overhear. The other patients always eavesdropped on phone conversations. ‘You know, the man who I told you about, who is a customer of Finnigan’s, the boat builder, the one who I saw just before my accident and afterwards, among the crowd around me. He was sitting in a waiting room. I was being wheeled back to the ward. I don’t think he saw me, but I don’t want him visiting me – can you talk to the ward sister, leave instructions to make sure they don’t let him in?’
The policeman was reassuring. ‘Of course, don’t worry, I’ll make sure they keep him out, but . . . tell me, why do you find him so frightening?’
She couldn’t tell him; it would sound so stupid. ‘I don’t know.’
It was true, in a way. Whenever she tried to think about him her mind became confused, muddled, with different emotions churning inside her. ‘I just don’t want him near me,’ she insisted.
‘I’ll take care of it. Is that all?’
‘Yes.’ She couldn’t tell him that she had felt safe here, in the hospital, but now she didn’t. Would she feel safe anywhere in future?
‘How did you find your mother?’
‘She seems OK. Well enough to go back to Dorset tomorrow, she says.’
‘What are you going to do when you get out of hospital? Have you decided yet?’
‘Well, I can’t go back to my flat, obviously, and I don’t want to put my mother into danger by going to her house, in case they follow me down to Dorset and have another try at . . .’ She didn’t want to finish that sentence or contemplate what ‘they’ might do next. She plunged on huskily. ‘I may go abroad, I’m trying to decide where. My mother suggested Australia.’
‘Rather a long flight, especially for someone who has recently been ill. These long-haul flights are tiring. Also, we may need you to come back at any time. I would rather you stayed in Europe, where you can get back here quickly.’
She didn’t really care where she went. ‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ she promised.
He rang off a moment later and she finished her salad, then ate some of the pear, which tasted tinny.
‘Why can’t they use fresh ones?’ she complained when the nurse came round to remove the trays.
‘Tinned ones are cheaper and quicker. I had them – I thought they were quite nice. Nobody else said anything,’
I bet my mother did, thought Miranda. She would have said a great deal. Her mother had a pear tree in the garden, dropping snowy white petals in spring before the fruit began to develop. Dorothy bottled most of the pears and ate them through the rest of the year, just as she preserved raspberries, blackcurrants, apples, and other fruit. She led a very busy life in many ways.
Last year she had won prizes for her preserves, for the tomato chutney she made and for strawberry jam, thick with whole fruit, meltingly delicious on bread and butter, or on thick brown toast. Her mother made her own bread too, which always tasted far better than shop bought. When they lived in London, Dorothy hadn’t made bread or bottled fruit; all that had entered her life only when she left the city, as though that part of her had been liberated by her new life.
Once her mother had told her, ‘I used to dream about living in the country, lots of times, it was a fantasy, you know, like daydreaming about winning the lottery. It wasn’t really possible because I had to have a job and there was you, I wanted you to go to a good school and then maybe university, so I stayed on in London. We didn’t have room, either, for growing things. Once I was sure you were settled, I could afford to move out into the country. I would only have cramped your style by then, so I didn’t feel guilty. I knew you would need to be independent, free to live however you liked. I’ve been very lucky, I’ve achieved my dream, I’ve got the garden, and the life, I always wanted.’
Mum was so lucky. Miranda wished she knew what she wanted, but she had no dreams, no ambitions. In fact, at the moment she had only fears, they darkened her horizon, were between her and the sun. She could think of nothing else, most of the time.
That night she woke up in the shadowy ward to hear footsteps. Sleepily she raised her head and there he was – the Angel of Death – walking towards her. In a state of panic she climbed out of bed, running towards the ward sister’s office, where the two night nurses sat drinking tea not looking in her direction.
One minute he was behind her, and the next he was between her and the nurses. She saw him too late to stop or evade him. She ran right into his arms which closed around her. Miranda looked up at him, eyes wide, barely able to breathe.
He gave her a strange slow smile, then his head began to descend towards her.
In terrified shock she realised he was going to kiss her.
His mouth was beautifully moulded, she thought, staring at it. A full lower lip, parting from the firm-cut upper one, a warm pinkish colour, his white teeth just visible.
She wanted him to kiss her. Yet she was appalled by the thought.
Miranda closed her eyes, afraid to watch.
At once she was back in bed, in the dark, with the dizzying abruptness of nightmare.
Was that what this was?
She leaned up on her elbow, out of breath, trembling – and there he was again, walking towards her down the ward.