“Do you want to wait a bit, so?” Hal asked. He looked a bit worried himself, though he wouldn't admit it.
“We'll give it another fifteen minutes, will we?” I said.
“OK,” he said. “And then what?”
I couldn't imagine what we'd do if Alec didn't reappear soon, so I pretended I hadn't heard the question.
F
ive minutes crawled by.
“My stomach thinks my throat is cut,” Hal remarked.
“Mine, too,” I muttered.
He has to come out soon, I thought. I mean, what can he be doing in there? He must have discovered by now that there is no paint, there is no Clem Callaghan, there is no painting job, there are no triple rates, and he should have gone with his wifeâor his not-wifeâto the golf tournament and saved himself a heap of trouble.
“Olivia,” Hal said after another little while, “I don't think he's coming out.”
“He has to come out sometime,” I said. “We said we'd give it fifteen minutes.”
“OK,” he said with a sigh, and kicked the wall some more.
I checked my watch again. Eight minutes past ten.
I began to hallucinate about food. I could see mounds of mash and great big troughs of porridge and a whole gingerbread house, just waiting to be gobbled and chomped and munched and swallowed.
Time moved agonizingly slowly.
“It's fifteen minutes, Hal,” I said at last, watching the second hand slipping around toward twelve. “When the second hand hits twelve, it's fifteen minutes from when we said we'd give it fifteen minutes. And that was after he'd already been gone about fifteen minutes. That's half an hour that he's been in there with those dead bodies, Hal.”
“Don't!” said Hal.
“Well, the mortuary part was your idea. In fact, this whole thing was your idea, Hal King. I am suffering from sleep deprivation and I am on the verge of starvation and you expect me to mince my words.”
“Don't say âmince,'” wailed Hal.
“Mince!” I said spitefully. “Hamburger. Bolognese. Mince pies.”
“I can't think if you keep talking about food.”
“And I can't think if I don't eat. If we don't eat soon,” I said, “there'll be two more candidates for the mortuary.”
“Olivia, that is not nice,” Hal said reproachfully.
“Tell you what,” I said. “Why don't we just ask the security man what the story is? And then we can decide what to do.”
You know, it was a bit weird. There was Hal, trying to get rid of Alec, and now that he had finally disappeared, we were putting all this energy into trying to find him again. Life is not very logical, is it?
Anyway, I went up to the little glass kiosk and knocked.
The security man looked up from his copy of the
Irish Independent.
“Yes?” he said, opening a little sliding glass door in the side of the kiosk.
“Did a man drive in here about half an hour ago?” I asked.
“Listen,
a-lanna,”
said the security man, pushing his peaked hat back off his forehead, “any number of men have driven in here in the last half hour. Which per-tick-ler man would you be thinking of?”
“The one in the white van with the ladder on top,” I said.
“The painter?” said the security man, and laughed. “Looking for the mortuary? Only he didn't seem to know it was the mortuary.”
“That's the one,” I said.
“Ah, yes,” said the security man. “Yes, indeed.”
“Well?” I said.
“Well, what?”
“Well, where is he now? I mean, would you have any idea?”
“I beg your parsnips?” said the security man.
Parsnips! What was he on about?
“The painter,” I said, enunciating carefully. “What happened to him?”
“How would I know?”
I looked at Hal. Hal shrugged.
“Is he your da or what?” asked the security man.
“He's his da,” I said, pointing at Hal.
Hal opened his mouth in a big O shape, like a goldfish. Please, Hal, I breathed silently. Please don't announce he is not your father, not even your stepfather, he is just this fly-by-night your mother has given houseroom to.
Just-âdon'tâsay-âit.
I don't know if thought transference works, but Hal closed his mouth again and said nothing.
“And Saturday is pocket-money day, I suppose,” the man went on, turning it into a joke. “But I'm afraid I can't help you. I definitely saw him coming in, and a right story he had, too, I can tell you. But what I can't tell you is what happened to him once he got inside. I haven't got a telescope in here, you know.” He gave a little chuckle at his own wit, and he slid the window closed.
We stood there for a moment. I was wondering what to do next, and Hal was blowing his nose. Next thing, the little sliding door opened again.
“You two planning on standing there all morning?” the security man asked.
“We were just wondering,” I said carefully, “suppose he couldn't find who he was looking for in there, what would happen to him?”
“Happen to him?” said the security man. “Nothing would happen to him. I suppose he'd just come out again, wouldn't he? We haven't got a policy on checking what happens to people who drive in here, you know. We have trouble enough making sure the
patients
get looked after.” He gave a short bark of laughter at that.
“So he's still inside then?” I ventured.
“Well, now,” said the security man, and he pushed his hat farther back off his forehead. It looked as if it might topple over the top of his head and down his back. “I can't really comment on that. He could be. And then again ⦔
Hal winced.
“And if we went in to look for him â¦?” I asked tentatively.
“It's a free country,” said the security man, “and this is a public hospital. As long as you don't go trampling on the flower beds or charging around the wards spreading germs and upsetting people, you're welcome to come in and take a look around. I wouldn't think you're a security threat. And if you've lost yer da ⦔
Hal gulped at that.
The little glass window slid shut again, and the security man went back to his paper.
“Let's go in,” I said to Hal.
“Let's not,” said Hal, hanging back.
“Hal, whatever has happened, it's our fault.”
“No, it isn't,” said Hal fiercely. “He's a grown-up. He gets called out to jobs all the time. He should be able to look after himself. If he can't, it's not our fault.”
Anyone could pick holes in that argument, but what was the point? I didn't even try. I really wanted my breakfast, and the best way to get it was to sort out this mystery.
“Look, Hal, let's just try to find out what's going on, and then we can go and get some food.”
“All right,” he muttered.
We went in the pedestrian gate, and we followed the sign around to the physiotherapy department. Then we came to a little wooden sign shaped like a finger.
Mortuary
, it said, in spooky writing.
“This way,” I said, and we went in the direction the sign pointed.
Sure enough, there was the long, low building with a green door.
“You've been here before, Hal,” I said, suddenly realizing that he must have been. Otherwise he wouldn't have been able to give such detailed instructions in the phone message.
Hal nodded, but he said nothing.
There was a concrete ramp up to the green mortuary door, with a metal rail beside it.
I went up the ramp and tried the handle. It moved downward very easily, but it had no effect. I pushed, and the door stayed unmoved. I pushed again, and still it stuck.
“Locked,” I said, relieved. I hadn't really fancied actually going in there.
“Now what?” asked Hal, looking around. There was nothing much to see, only buildings and drainpipes and a clutter of bins in one corner.
“We'll have to try looking in the windows,” I said.
“No!” said Hal. “I'm not peeping in windows at a lot of dead bodies.”
He had a point, I suppose. And anyway, the windows
were very high up. You'd need a ladder to look in. That reminded me.
“Well, then,” I said, “in that case, we need to find the van.”
We looked all around. There were lots of places where you might easily park a little van, but no sign of the van we were after. We went around every corner, and when we looked around every corner, there was no little white van. It really was very mysterious. We walked up and down alleyways and behind buildings. We checked the visitors' car park and the staff car park and the consultants' car park. No white van. We looked along a yew-lined gravelly roadway leading away from one of the car parks. A few cars had been parked there, even though the car park was fairly empty. But no little white van.
“There's no point in hanging around here,” Hal said.
“No,” I said, “I suppose there isn't. Let's go and get some food.”
I was reluctant to leave all the same. As long as we were in the hospital grounds, we had some chance of spotting the van, or Alec, but once we set off for town, the world was just too big, there was too much room for uncertainty. And yet, if I didn't eat something soon, I knew I was going to collapse. My knees were wobbling already with hunger.
We went back out through the pedestrian gateway and unlocked the bikes. The security man looked up as we rattled the chains. He gave us a friendly little wave.
We waved back.
W
e met this guard as we cycled back toward town. He was coming toward us on a bicycle. He was one of those cool guards, in shorts and a cycling helmet and a shiny yellow top.
He raised his hand when he saw us. I suppose it was because we were on bikes; he probably thought we were all part of some big Cycling Movement or something like that, all soul mates or kindred spirits.
I don't know what possessed me, it must have been the friendly little salute, but I gave him a desperate wave and shouted, “Guard!” at him.
He put a foot under him and skidded to a halt a few feet beyond us. I got off my bike and walked it back to him. Hal put his foot down and looked over his shoulder.
“What can I do for you, young lady?” asked the guard.
“Well,” I said, “we sort of ⦠er ⦠lost someone.”
Hal gave a strangled little cry, but I ignored him.
“We saw him driving into the hospital,” I said. “But he never came out.”
“Well,” said the guard, “this does happen. It might not
be a case of loss. I mean, was he sick, for example? Or going to visit someone? Or is he a doctor, or what?”
“He's a painter,” I said.
“Ah,” said the guard with a grin. “A painter. Was he going to paint the hospital?”
“That's right,” I said. “At least, that's what he thought he was doing, only they weren't actually expecting him, see.”
“Right,” said the guard. “Hmm. Is there any more you can tell me?”
“No,” I said. “That's it. I was just wondering, how long do you have to be missing before you are a Missing Person?”
“Well, it depends,” said the guard. “How long has this person been missing?”
“About three-quarters of an hour,” I said.
“That long, eh?” said the guard. I could see he thought this was funny.
“It may not sound very long,” I said, “but it is very mysterious.”
“Indeed,” said the guard. “I see.” He didn't see at all.
“And who is the Missing Person?” asked the guard.
“His stepfather,” I said, pointing at Hal.
The guard suddenly looked a bit more serious. Seems if you've just mislaid a miscellaneous someone, it's kind of funny, but if it's a parent, that's a different matter.
“And did ye try ringing him? I take it he has a mobile phone?”
“Er, no,” I said. “I mean, yes, he has, but we didn't.” We couldn't very well ring him, I thought. We weren't supposed to know anything about this visit to the hospital. As far as he was concerned, we were still at home having our breakfast, and anyway, Hal didn't even talk to him, much less ring him up. But I couldn't tell the guard that. It was all too complicated.
“Well,” said the guard. “That'd be the first move, I'd say. The mobile phone.”
Then he peered at Hal. “Are you â¦?” he called.
Hal stared at him. He looked a bit scared.
“Ah no, you're much bigger,” the guard said.
Hal went on staring. He had started to shiver, though it wasn't very cold. A bit breezy, maybe.
“And, sure, it was years ago. But then, of course, you
would
be much bigger, wouldn't you?”
He made about as much sense as Hal does on a bad day.
“It is you, isn't it?” the guard went on.
“He's himself all right,” I said, since Hal wasn't making any attempt to answer these very peculiar questions.
“You're the little lad whose dâ ⦠Hal, that was his name. Are you Hal?”
Hal nodded.
The guard grinned, pleased with himself to have worked it out. Whatever “it” was. “Stepfather, eh?” he said. “Well, that's great, so it is.”
Hal still said nothing.
“Well, well,” said the guard. “It's a small world.”
Which is rubbish. It's a very big world. It's Balnamara that is small, not the world.
“So tell me,” said the guard, “will yiz be all right now, for getting home? I mean, do you need ⦔
“Oh, we're grand,” I said. “We were just a bit puzzled. He's probably gone ahead home. It's not a problem. We'll find him. You're right, he's probably not missing at all.”
“Ye're not lost yerselves, are ye? Ye know the way home?”
“Oh yes. It's only about a mile, and we have our bikes,” I said cheerfully.
“Only, I ⦠I could get a ban-gharda for yiz, if ye need any kind of ⦔
Oh lordy, I thought. He thinks we're helpless. And now he's responsible for us, because we've told him we've lost our adult.
“No,” I said firmly. “We'll be fine, guard, thank you. We know our way home.”
“If you're sure,” he said doubtfully.
What age did he think we were? About seven, I'd say.
“Positive certain,” I said, with as big a grin as I could manage. I can do sweet little girl if I have to.
“Right,” he said, and hopped back onto his saddle. “If you really are sure. Now, listen to me, if this gentleman doesn't turn up by, say, this evening, you can come back to us. Give the station a ring. Or get your mam to do it, OK?
It's probably fine, but you never know, do you? You can't be too careful.”
I nodded. “Yes, we'll do that. We'll definitely let you know if he doesn't show up.”
“Right,” said the guard.
“Right,” said I.
“Safe home, so!” he called as he pedaled off.
“What do you think you are doing?” shrieked Hal as soon as the guard had disappeared. “Telling the guards about it! Are you out of your tiny mind?”
I thought he was overreacting. I'd only asked for a smallish piece of information.
“It wasn't âthe guards.' It was one guard.”
“It's all the same,” said Hal.
“Hal, he has disappeared, you know. He was there, and then he wasn't there and ⦔
“But he's not
missing
! He's just ⦠we just don't know where he went. Maybe he met a person he knew. Maybe he came across the canteen and thought he'd have some breakfast. Anything might have happened.”
“Exactly,” I said. “
Anything
. And I don't know about you, but in my family, if you are in trouble, you talk to a policeman.”
“We're not in trouble, Olivia. Not what you would call trouble.”
I wasn't so sure about that.
Just then, a squad car came zipping by, going
whee-hoo, whee-hoo,
with its blue light flashing and spinning.
Hal went paler than pale. I thought, if he goes any paler, I am going to be able to see through his skin and see all his bones and veins and everything, with the blood all pumping around. He really doesn't like the police. Anyone'd think he was a criminal or something.
The squad car came skidding to a halt at the hospital gate, and our friend in the glass kiosk didn't wait to hear what the story was. He lifted the red-and-orange pole and the squad car revved up again and disappeared into the hospital grounds spitting up a shower of gravel as it went.
“Well!” I said. “What's all that about, would you think?”
“They ⦠ohmyGod, Olivia,” Hal said. “They must be ⦠arresting Him. That'd be ⦠that'd be cool, Olivia, if he had to go to jail. That'd solve everything. I mean, my mother wouldn't want to marry a criminal, would she? And he might be in jail for
years
. I wouldn't have to go to boarding school; it'd just be me and her, like it used to be.”
Of course, it would solve nothing. Hal was getting a bit carried away.
“Why would they do that?” I asked. “He hasn't committed a crime.”
“I don't know,” he said. “Impersonation or something.”
“But he isn't impersonating anyone,” I said. “It was Larry that did the impersonating, and anyway, you can't really impersonate Clem Clanger, because he doesn't exist.”
“Callaghan, Olivia. Clem Callaghan.”
“It doesn't matter what he's called, he still doesn't exist. You can't impersonate a made-up person, can you?”
“Well, for something else then,” Hal said. “Maybe they're arresting Him for trying to get into the mortuary under false pretences.”
“But that's not a crime, is it?” I asked.
It didn't look great all the same, did it? First this funny little fellow with coloredy letters all over his van and a shiny face arrives at the local hospital and starts looking for the mortuary, with no sensible explanation for why. And then a guard arrives on a bicycle and accuses Hal of being himself only bigger, and then a squad car comes
whoo-
ing by and zooms into the hospital. It was all a bit unsettling, I have to say.
“How do you know what is a crime or what isn't?” Hal said. “It might be.”
“The guard was right, though, Hal. We should try ringing him. Maybe there is a perfectly innocent explanation.”
“But I never ring Him,” Hal said.
“Still, we could just hang up if he answers.”
“What'd be the point of that?”
“Well, at least we'd know he is alive. And not in custody. I mean, if you have been arrested, you probably wouldn't be allowed to answer your mobile, would you? I'd say it's worth a try.”
The phone rang five times. Then it clicked into the voice mail system.
Uh-oh. My words hung in the air. If you have been arrested, you probably wouldn't be allowed to answer your mobile, would you?
“Maybe he just didn't get to it in time,” I said. “Let's try again.”
This time the voice mail came on immediately. We didn't bother leaving a message.