A Dark Dividing (38 page)

I’ll be watching you, Melissa…
Mel repressed a shudder, but Martin said, ‘I’ve talked to the Swiss clinic twice now—it’s an excellent place, in fact I know one of the surgeons from university. He’s phoning me at home this weekend, but I’m fairly sure they’ll be able to take the twins. It’s a question of logistics—of how soon they can assemble the right surgical team.’

‘Might they manage it before Christmas?’

‘I’ll do what I can to push them, but I can’t promise.’ He looked at Mel. ‘I’d rather they had the operation in this country,’ he said, ‘but there are only two or three hospitals here that could cope with it, and we’d never keep it secret.’ He paused, and then said, ‘If I do get you into the Swiss place how would you get there?’

‘I’ve talked to Isobel about that. We thought flying would be a bit public, and probably not very comfortable for the twins either. So we’ll go in Isobel’s car. She can get a longish leave from her company—she’s on one of those short-term contract arrangements with them, so she can organise things to get a month or so between two jobs. We’ll take the ferry at Dover, and drive across to Switzerland.’

Martin considered this, and then said, ‘That’s quite a good idea. Even if anyone did recognize you all you’re doing is dodging the journalists, which is understandable in anyone’s book. It’ll be a much longer journey than if you went by plane, but you could take it in easy stages.’

‘We thought we’d make two overnight stops,’ said Mel. ‘One in Reims and then one in Dijon. They’re both big enough places for us to be anonymous, and there are several large hotels—Travel Lodge types.’

‘You and Isobel would share the driving?’

‘Yes.’

Martin said thoughtfully, ‘I’ve driven in France and Spain quite a bit, so I’m used to the right-hand side of the road. Would you like a third driver?’

‘Yes,’ said Mel staring at him. ‘Yes, I think we’d like that very much.’

‘I’d have to let the GMC know,’ said Martin. ‘Because you and the twins are still officially my patients. But I don’t think they would object. We could let it be thought that Isobel’s a girlfriend of mine—that’s she’s helping you with the twins and I’m coming along partly in case they develop any problems en route. A working holiday. I’m due some leave anyway, and I think I can re-arrange my clinics. Isobel and I could drive to Dover with the twins, and you can travel down there by train. We’ll hand the twins back to you for the actual boarding so they can go through on your passport. They’re still below the age for needing their own, aren’t they?’

‘Yes. I could apply for passports for them,’ said Mel. ‘But I don’t think there’s time.’

‘Roz doesn’t drive, does she?’

‘No. So even if she finds out where we’re going she won’t be able to follow us, not at such short notice, and certainly not on the same ferry. And she couldn’t possibly track us across France and into Switzerland. I think it’ll work,’ said Mel.

‘So do I.’

It would have to work. Mel could not begin to think what she would do if Roz eventually found her.

T
HE SMALL NEWS item in the weekend paper was not very informative. It simply said that the conjoined Anderson twins had been taken abroad for the operation that would separate them: the family did not want the venue disclosed, but it was known that a team of specialists had been assembled, so presumably the operation would take place soon. Roz, reading this, knew at once that despite all her care, Melissa had slipped out of her grasp, taking the twins with her. Or had she…?

That night she began to weave her plans. She thought her aunt would have approved of what she was doing: God punishes where it is required, and rewards where it is deserved, she had said.
Reward
. The replacing of the child—the little lost thing—that had trickled sadly and despairingly out of Roz’s womb in that grey dawn.

The first priority was to find out where Mel had gone. It took a while for Roz to decide how to go about this, but after a night’s consideration she focused on Martin Brannan. Where was he in all this? In fact, where was he literally, because he was not at St Luke’s at the moment, that was for sure. He was where? On holiday? Until after the New Year? Well, how interesting.

Roz had kept up the lukewarm friendship with Martin’s secretary at St Luke’s, not because she particularly liked the woman, but because you never knew who might come in useful. The friendship came in useful now.

Mr Brannan was in France, said Martin’s secretary, and added, in the smug, I-am-in-the-know tone that always jarred on Roz, that he was not alone. A lady friend, said the secretary coyly. Well, they all knew what Mr Brannan was, of course. Quite a lot of girlfriends he had had over the years. But this latest trip had all been arranged in secrecy—a surprise for the lady apparently, wasn’t that romantic? A ferry crossing, and then a drive down into Southern France.

Roz did not care if Martin Brannan shipped an entire harem across the English Channel, or held orgies all the way from Dover to Provence and back again. What she did want to know was the identity of the ‘lady friend’. Could it possibly be Melissa?

But it was not. Roz was aware of a stab of disappointment because it would have fitted so well. Melissa and Martin would have driven quietly down to Dover to get on the ferry, the twins travelling on their mother’s passport. Two babies, well wrapped up in a carry-cot, would not have been especially remarkable.

She said, casually, to Martin Brannan’s secretary, that hadn’t Mr Brannan been seen with the French actress, Anne-Marie St Clair?

‘
Has
he?’ said the secretary, saucer-eyed and wholly unsuspecting.

‘Perhaps I got it wrong—But when you said France—’

‘Mr Brannan isn’t in France with Anne-Marie St Clair, that I do know,’ said the secretary, and then, unable to resist sharing the rest of the gossip about her boss, and remembering that Nurse Raffan, so quiet and mouselike, never gossiped, she said, ‘It’s a lady called Isobel Ingram. I know because the travel agent sent the ferry tickets here by mistake.’

Isobel Ingram. The name smacked across Roz’s consciousness.
Isobel Ingram
. Melissa Anderson’s closest friend. Roz had met Isobel at St Luke’s when she had visited Mel, and several times during her babysitting stints for Mel and Joe at the house. Isobel Ingram. The one person in the world whom Melissa would trust after Martin Brannan! Roz saw at once that what Mel had done was to give the twins into the temporary care of Isobel and Martin Brannan for the journey to France. Probably Melissa had followed them a day later, or had even travelled on the same ferry, but separately. Once in France it was anybody’s guess where they had gone, although Roz was inclined to think it was Switzerland where there were so many private clinics. Money again, you see! It smoothed all paths!

There was absolutely no way that Roz could follow Melissa and the other two even if she had known their destination. She would have to wait until they got back, but that was fine; waiting would help her to sharpen up the finer points of her plan. It would let her imagine for a little longer the culmination of the plan—it was remarkable how much pleasure she was deriving from that.

But the plan was going to be carried out, that was for sure. The balance had got to be redressed. Melissa would be trying to evade Roz from now on, which meant she might not return to her own house. Roz thought Mel would probably put it up for sale, and go to live somewhere else.

But where?

The phone book listed three Ingrams with the initial
I
. Roz rang all three numbers that same evening. The first was a man, and although the second was a woman she was definitely not Isobel. To both people Roz said, crisply, that she was a British Telecom operator checking the line for faults. The third number rang out a few times, and then an answerphone clicked on and Roz heard Isobel’s voice asking the caller please to leave a message. In case the machine had detected someone calling and maybe even recorded the number, Roz again said she was ringing from BT engineers’ department, checking the lines in the area. If there were any problems, please telephone fault inquiries between nine and five.

So far so good. She had Isobel’s phone number and also her address from the phone book. She consulted a street map, and then caught a bus to Isobel’s house. She had been careful to put on her dark raincoat, and to take with her a collecting box for one of the hospital’s many charities. She was an indefatigable helper for all of the various Support Groups. Good, dependable Roz. And nobody ever looked twice at someone going from door to door with a collecting box.

Isobel lived in part of a converted Victorian house—No. 22b, the phone book had said. It was a tree-lined street, rather quiet and fairly prosperous-looking. No. 22 was halfway along; it stood a little way back from the road, in quite large gardens. The house itself looked quite large as well. It would be rather nice inside: probably it would have those large high-ceilinged rooms. Roz glanced up and down the street, and then advanced cautiously through the gate and down the gravel path. No. 22b was the top half, of course. There was a main doorway which was plainly shared by both flats. It was closed and locked, but it had two oblong panes of coloured glass let into the oak and Roz managed to peer through one of them. Yes, there was the door into the ground floor flat on the right-hand side, and straight ahead was a staircase winding upwards. It looked as if the main hall was shared; it looked very clean, and there was a well-polished hall table with a large asparagus fern on it.

There were curtains at the downstairs windows but there was a deserted feel to the place, and when she peered through one of the windows she saw that there was no furniture in any of the rooms. The ground floor flat was empty.

‘It’s been empty for about three weeks,’ said the woman at No. 24, in response to Roz’s deliberately timid inquiry. ‘But I should think it will have to be sold. A youngish woman’s got the first floor—I think she’s away at the moment or I’d suggest you knock on her door to ask if she knows what’s happening. But the old chap at 22a died recently, I do know that. He was in hospital for a longish time so the place has got a bit neglected. His family will probably redecorate before they sell. So as to get a better price, you see.’

Roz explained that she was looking for a flat in the area. Someone had told her about 22a so she was taking a look from the outside. She thought it looked a bit small for what she wanted, but she might ask the agents about viewing it.

Martin Brannan was not expected at St Luke’s until after Christmas and the New Year holiday. He would be back by the fifth of January for certain because he had a clinic on that day. The paragraph about the twins had appeared in early December, so if they came back with Mr Brannan, or perhaps shortly afterwards, they would have had about a month in the clinic, wherever the clinic might be. Roz was not very knowledgeable about time scales for this kind of surgery, but she thought four or five weeks did not sound an unreasonable recovery time.

Just before Christmas she asked a large firm of estate agents about renting out her own house; she might be taking a job in the north for a few years, she said. No, she did not want to actually sell the place; she would most likely be returning to it. Could they arrange a tenancy—a furnished let for two or three years? She would want someone responsible who would look after the place, but she would take advice as to the amount of rent to charge. She would not be greedy about that, although she would hope for a reasonable income from the property.