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“I promise I won’t let on. I haven’t any money at the moment, haven’t anything except a pair of hospital pyjama trousers, but as soon as I can get hold of some money, I’ll pay you.”
She waved her hand in a doesn’t-matter sort of way, felt into her pockets, and produced a box, which she handed to me. “I was getting it for my son. He’s six and probably would think it worse than useless. You’re more than welcome and I’ll get him another. His birthday isn’t until the seventeenth.”
I unpacked the box, a bog-standard mobile phone with a charger and lead ending in a three-pin plug. Above my head were several sockets. I chose one and plugged in. The phone gave a satisfied bleep and the words “phone charging” appeared on the screen. I hid it under the bedclothes and hoped the trailing wire wouldn’t give me and the nurse away.
Supper arrived, a macaroni cheese, which wasn’t bad, and something they called Eton Mess that seemed to be a mixture of strawberries, meringue bits, and whipped double cream. Delicious but undeniably bad for the figure.
The phone beeped, and I was in potential contact with the world. Luckily I have an excellent memory for numbers and was able to input my parents’, Lex’s, and Jacob’s numbers. I tried Lex first but again got the “unavailable” message.
&
nbsp; My parents were overjoyed to hear from me. The police had told them I was unhurt but nothing else. Feeling that I should at least respect some of Duggie’s instructions about secrecy, I said I couldn’t tell them where I was but I’d lost my eyebrows and the police were looking after me. No, I wasn’t in prison and hadn’t done anything wrong. They were just looking after me and soon (I added optimistically), “I’ll be able to tell you where I am and you can visit me.”
Then I rang Jacob. “Where are you?” were his first words. “Are you badly hurt? When can I see you?”
I assured him I was almost as good as new. As far as to where I was, I couldn’t tell him precisely because they’d probably move me in a couple of days. “But you wouldn’t want to see me. I’ve got no eyebrows and my arms are all bandaged. I look like a half-unwrapped Egyptian mummy.”
He laughed, and it was a good sound, the best I’d heard for days. “Get my number and you can phone me whenever you want. I’ll keep it on vibrate rather than ring, so if there’s anyone with me I can just switch it off. And I’ll keep it between my legs. Could be quite an arousing feeling.”
He laughed again.
“By the way,” I said as casually as I could, “have you seen Lex recently? I seem to have lost touch and I’ve forgotten his number.”
“Are you sure you want to get in touch with him?”
“Of course, why on earth not?”
“I just wondered if it could be him….”
“Him, what?”
“No, nothing. Forget I said it. Just get better as quickly as possible.”
But of course he’d voiced my own suspicions and again I worried.
I couldn’t sleep until they gave me some knockout drops.
“It’s the pain,” I said, but it wasn’t.
A FEW days later, they moved me into a furnished flat in Glastonbury, with a view of the magnificent Tor with St Michael’s tower on top. I wanted to get out, climb the hill, visit the remains of Glastonbury Abbey, looted and closed down by that arch-dictator, Henry VIII, but of course they wouldn’t let me. I’d be too obvious a sight, they said. Children would probably run screaming from me. Actually I didn’t look all that bad. I’d found myself a mirror, and if I filled in my eyebrows with a makeup pencil, I’d look like a rather surprised campish queen. However, a long-sleeved hoodie would cover my arms and the medical gauze on the back of my head, and I insisted.
I don’t know how they managed it, but they changed my existing bank account into another one for John Gabriel Appleseed, and I got a credit card and the rest all in this new name. I would be able to withdraw money from an ATM, so that would be fine, as long as I could get away from my minder to purchase the new phone. For some reason, they wanted to keep me off the internet. I asked why and all they said was “Safer.” The old one I’d send back, still in pristine condition but without the SIM card, to the kind nurse.
I won’t do anything stupid, I promised, but knew privately I needed a smartphone. Nevertheless, they insisted that one of my minders accompany me. I had two, a rather dim bloke called Sam and a much smarter woman named Virginia. “Virgin for short, but not for long.” That was Sam’s idea of humour.
I decided that it would be easier to escape from Sam, so it was on his watch that I decided I wanted to visit the ruins of the great abbey.
He agreed. “Yeah, great, and we can have a drink in the pub on the way back.”
“Cool,” I said, bringing myself down to his level.
I got myself all decked out in the hoodie with the hood part over my head. I hadn’t bothered to fill in my eyebrows; I thought I looked sinister enough without.
“Actually, Sam, it’s such a warm, bright day, why don’t we have a drink before and after the visit?”
“Straight up, I wouldn’t mind leaving out the visit to your old ruin altogether.”
“Why don’t you do just that? I’ll have one drink, and then you can stay over while I look at the abbey and the thorn.”
