Authors: Minette Walters
Alan listened to the quiet tears at the other end of the line. ‘I wouldn’t worry too much,’ he said with a calm he didn’t feel. ‘Jinx is an
extraordinarily tough young woman’ –
even he hadn’t realized till now just how tough
– ‘and I’m confident it’s only a matter of days before her
memory returns in full and she’s able to set minds at rest.’ He thought for a moment. ‘Presumably we’re talking about speculation and not fact? If there were any evidence
against Miss Kingsley the police would have confronted her by now. Am I right?’
Simon fought for composure. ‘As far as I understand it, yes, but we’ve been told very little. Sir Anthony’s known since Saturday morning and he said that Leo had
been bludgeoned to death . . . The same way Russell Landy was.’
‘Does Jinx’s father know Meg and Leo are dead?’
‘I don’t think so. Dad and I think their intention is to hit Jinx while she’s vulnerable, but we can’t see justice being done that way.’
Alan was curious. ‘You’re being very generous to her, Mr Harris.’
‘Things aren’t as straightforward as they might seem,’ Simon said tightly. ‘We’re worried about my mother, and we don’t want Jinx’s suicide
on our conscience. She’ll be under a lot of pressure when the news breaks and what she’s tried once, it seems likely she could try again.’
‘Well, on that score at least I don’t think you need worry,’ said Alan slowly. ‘If I had any doubts at all about her mental equilibrium you’ve just laid
them to rest. Thank you for letting me know, Mr Harris.’
He said goodbye and replaced the receiver with a thoughtful frown. What on earth was going on here? Did Adam Kingsley know? Is that why he’d sent Kennedy?
God almighty!
Were he and the clinic being dragged into some sort of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice? ‘
SHI
-
IT
!’ he roared at Dürer’s
Knight,
Death and Devil
. Why the hell had he agreed to take the bloody woman in?
He sought out Veronica Gordon, the sister in charge. ‘I’ve had it up to here,’ he told her, chopping at his throat. ‘I’m going AWOL for a few hours.
If there’s an emergency, get Nigel White to deal with it.’ He thought for a moment. ‘But if it’s an emergency concerning Miss Kingsley, call me on the mobile. No,’ he
corrected himself, ‘we’ll go one step further where she’s concerned. I want her checked every half-hour without fail. Got that? A physical check by you or one of the nurses every
thirty minutes, and if you’re worried at all, page me. OK?’
Veronica nodded. ‘Any particular reason?’
‘No,’ he growled, ‘just a safety precaution. Her father sent his blasted solicitor over to give me an ear-bashing, and he’s put the wind up me. I don’t
want to be sued for negligence if she takes it into her head to do something stupid.’
‘She won’t,’ said the woman with confidence.
‘Why are you so sure?’
‘I’ve watched her. Everyone does exactly what she wants, including you, Alan, and people like that don’t hang up their boots lightly.’
‘She’s already had one go.’
‘Balls!’ said Veronica with an amiable grin. ‘She may want her Daddy to think she did, but if it had been a serious attempt she’d be dead. My guess is there
were a lot of hidden agendas at work when she threw herself out of her car, and a little fatherly sympathy was one of them. Mind you,’ she added thoughtfully, ‘she didn’t research
the science of movable objects hitting solid Tarmac very thoroughly. I’m not convinced severe concussion and amnesia were part of the original equation.’
Alan shrugged. ‘It may not be part of the endgame either. You don’t have to be Einstein to fake amnesia, Veronica.’
She looked at him in surprise. ‘Are you saying she’s a fraud?’
‘Not necessarily,’ he lied. ‘I was merely stating a fact.’
‘But why would she bother with anything so elaborate unless she had something to hide?’
‘Perhaps she does.’
Fergus was leaning against Protheroe’s Wolseley when the doctor emerged into the warm late afternoon and approached across the gravel. He gave a perfunctory nod towards the
older man and ran a hand over the bonnet. ‘I thought it might be yours,’ he said. ‘I noticed it when I visited Jinx the other day. Do you want to sell it?’
Alan shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not. We’ve been together too long to part so easily.’ He put the key into the lock. ‘Have you seen Jinx, or are you on
your way in?’
‘Just waiting. She’s wandering about the garden somewhere. Miles has gone looking for her. Did Kennedy give you a roasting then?’
‘Is that what he’s employed to do?’
‘It depends on Dad’s mood. I told him you were pretty high-handed with me on Saturday, so I thought maybe he’d ordered his Rottweiler in to remind you who foots the
bill. I also told him I reckoned you had the hots for Jinxy.’ He peered at Alan out of the corner of his eye, judging his reaction. ‘Dad was bloody cross about it, so I’m not
surprised he sent Kennedy over.’
Alan gave a snort of amusement. ‘I doubt you have the bottle to tell your father anything, Fergus.’ He pulled the car door open. ‘As a matter of interest, how did
you know Kennedy was here?’
‘I saw him leave.’ He yawned. ‘Miles wants to meet you. I promised I’d keep you here till he got back.’
‘Another time perhaps.’
‘No, now.’ Fergus caught at his arm. ‘We want to know what’s going on. Does Jinx remember something?’
‘I suggest you ask her.’ Alan looked down at the restraining hand. ‘You’re welcome to come and talk to me any time you like, just so long as you make an
appointment first. But at the moment’ – he placed his hand over the young man’s and prised it off his arm – ‘I’ve more important things to do.’ He smiled
amiably and eased in behind the wheel. ‘It’s been nice meeting you again, Fergus. Give my best wishes to your mother and brother.’ He shut the door and gunned the Wolseley into
life, before spinning the wheel and roaring away down the drive.
When Sister Gordon did her rounds at nine o’clock that evening, she found Jinx standing by her window watching the remnants of the day burn to crimson embers.
‘Isn’t it beautiful?’ Jinx said without turning round, knowing by instinct who her visitor was. ‘If I could stand and look on this for ever, then I would have eternal
happiness. Do you imagine that’s what Heaven is?’
‘I guess it depends on how static you want your Heaven to be. Presumably you’ve watched this develop from a simple sunset into glorious fire, so at which point would you
have stopped it to produce your moment of eternal happiness? I think I would always be wondering if the moment afterwards had been more beautiful than the one I was stuck with, and that would turn
the experience into a hell of frustration.’
Jinx laughed quietly. ‘So there is no Heaven?’
‘Not for me. Bliss is only bliss when you come upon it unexpectedly. If it lasted for ever it would be unbearable.’ She smiled. ‘Everything all right?’
Jinx turned away from the window. ‘Exactly the same as it was half an hour ago, and the half-hour before that. Are you going to tell me now why it’s so important to keep
checking on me?’
‘Perhaps the doctor’s worried that you’ve been overexerting yourself. You put the fear of God into me this afternoon with that wretched walk. It was too far and too
long.’
‘It wasn’t, you know,’ said Jinx idly. ‘I spent most of the time hiding.’ She smiled at the other woman’s surprise. ‘I saw my brother coming
and dived for cover in one of the outside sheds.’ She glanced back towards the window. ‘Dr Protheroe told me he was expecting a visit from my father,’ Jinx lied easily. ‘So
do you know if Adam ever came? I thought he might pop in afterwards to visit me.’
‘I believe his solicitor came,’ she said, plumping up the pillows and smoothing the sheets, ‘but I don’t think your father did.’
Jinx pressed her forehead against the glass. ‘Why hasn’t Dr Protheroe been to see me?’
‘He’s taken himself off for a few hours’ R and R. Poor fellow,’ she said fondly, wishing as she often did that she hadn’t saddled herself with Mr
Gordon. ‘He has a lot on his mind one way and another, and no one to share his problems with.’
Jinx wrapped her arms about her thin body to stop the shivering.
Did he have Leo and Meg on his mind? And was it Kennedy who’d told him?
Sister Gordon frowned. ‘You’ve been at that window too long, you silly girl. Quickly now, into your dressing gown and into bed. No sense catching pneumonia on top of
everything else.’ She clicked her tongue sharply as she opened the dressing gown and slipped it over Jinx’s shoulders. ‘You were lucky that young couple arrived when they did on
the night of your accident or you’d have started pneumonia then.’
‘It was certainly convenient,’ said Jinx impassively.
Tuesday, 28 June, Nightingale Clinic, Salisbury – 12.05 a.m.
The Wolseley swung through the clinic’s gates, its headlamps scything a white arc across the lawn. It was after midnight and Alan slowed to a crawl to avoid waking the
patients with the crunch of wheels on gravel. He felt no relief about coming home, no sense of welcome at his journey’s end, only a growing resentment that this was all there was. The
temporary euphoria that a bottle of expensive Rioja over a meal of langoustines in garlic butter had given him had evaporated during his careful drive home to leave only frustrated depression. What
the hell was he doing with his life? Where was the satisfaction in ministering to a clutch of rich bastards with over-inflated egos and no self-control? Why hadn’t Jinx told him Meg and Leo
were dead? And why couldn’t he get the damn woman out of his mind?
He drummed an angry hand on the wheel, only to wrench it in alarm as the lights picked out the white flash of a face, inches from the nearside wing, disembodied against the blackness
of the trees bordering the drive.
Shit!
SH
-
I
-
IT
!
His heart set up a sturdy gallop as he slammed his foot on the brake and brought the crawling
car to an almost instantaneous halt. Half-hourly checks, he’d said, and she was out here dodging bloody cars.
‘Jinx,’ he called, fumbling open the door and hauling himself out and upright with a hand on the car roof. ‘Are you all right?’
Silence.
‘Look, I saw you.’
God help him if he’d hit her
. He used the red light thrown by his rear lamps to scan the grass verge behind the car, but there was no
huddled body there. ‘I know you can hear me,’ he went on, staring into the trees, searching for her. He walked round to lean against the passenger door. Sooner or later she would have
to move and he’d see the flash of the white face again. ‘I think you’re a fraud, Jinx. The amnesia’s crap and I don’t believe for one second that you tried to kill
yourself. It was a set-up, pure and simple, designed to get your father on your side, and it sure as hell worked, even if you probably did yourself rather more damage than you intended. So are you
going to tell me what it’s all about?’ He waited. ‘I should warn you I’m feeling pretty bloody ratty at the moment, and my mood isn’t improved by hanging around in my
own sodding drive because one of my patients wants to play silly buggers. But don’t expect me to give up tamely and leave you here. You move one muscle, girl, and I’ll catch you. So are
you going to show yourself or are we going to wait this out till daylight? Your choice.’
There was a blur of movement, so quick and so close that he was completely overwhelmed by it. He lurched to one side but pain exploded in his shoulder as the solid metal head of a
sledgehammer tore his arm from its socket. He ducked away from another arcing blow and scrambled round the bonnet of the car towards the open door of the driver’s seat. With an instinct born
of desperation, he threw himself behind the wheel and slammed the door. But as he reached across his chest to force the gear clumsily into reverse, the sledgehammer burst through the windscreen
towards his face.
Amy Staunton looked at her watch. ‘What’s Dr Protheroe want half-hourly checks for anyway?’ she grumbled. ‘The girl’s been fast asleep since ten
o’clock.’
‘Ours not to question why,’ said Veronica Gordon. ‘Ours just to do or die. Finish your tea. I can’t see five minutes making much difference here or
there.’
He didn’t know if it was sweat or blood that was pouring down his face. As the car accelerated backwards, he only knew that he was in agony. With a sense of unreality he
watched the figure –
a man
– vanish into the darkness before the Wolseley’s back-end piled into a solid oak tree.
What the hell was going on?
The door handle of number twelve rattled and the door was pushed half-open as the black nurse looked into the pitch darkness inside. She heard something and, with a start of fear,
she felt about for the light switch. ‘Are you all right, love?’ She flooded the room with light, glanced at the bed where Jinx was threshing her sheets into a tumbled mess, then looked
towards the french windows where the curtains flapped in the breeze. Tut-tutting impatiently, she crossed the room to close and lock the windows, then went to the bed and placed a gentle hand on
the woman’s forehead.
As though galvanized by an electric shock, Jinx sat bolt upright in the bed, mouth sucking frenziedly for air.
She couldn’t breathe . . . Dear God, she couldn’t
breathe . . .
She clutched at her throat in a vain attempt to dislodge whatever was blocking her airway.
But it was earth, filthy acrid earth . . . and it was killing her . . .
NO
-
O
-
O
!
She flung herself off the bed and burst through the bathroom door, wrenching at the cold water tap in the basin and ducking her head under
the icy water. She drew in breath on a gasp of shock and let the sweet, sweet water wash the taste of death away.
‘Oh, good God, girl,’ screeched the nurse, ‘what’s got into you? You being sick? What you been taking? What you doing with your clothes on? You was fast
asleep last time I checked.’
Jinx slumped to the floor and stared at her from red-rimmed eyes. ‘It was a dream, Amy,’ she whispered. ‘Only a dream.’