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‘I’m all right.’ She saw the doctor remove himself tactfully from the room.
Malory pulled forward a chair, and sat down. ‘You’ve had a raw deal from the Templetons.’ He gave her a small, bitter smile. ‘Nigel nearly sent you off a bridge. I succeeded in throwing you under a van.’
‘It wasn’t like that.’ She moved her head in negation, and winced. ‘Is—is Harvey all right?’
‘Apart from being in total disgrace, he’s flourishing.’
‘Poor Harvey.’
‘Damn Harvey!’ he said with sudden violence. ‘You could have been killed’
I wish I had been. She didn’t say it, but he must have read it in her face, because he reached and took her hand in his.
‘You’re going to be fine,’ he said gently. ‘And so is the baby. Nothing matters but that.’
A lot of things mattered, she thought unhappily.
She said, ‘When they let me leave here, I’d like to go away by myself. You don’t have to see me again.’
It was his turn to wince. ‘We’ll talk about it when you’re better.’ He released her hand. ‘Your mother’s up in town, staying with a friend. May I tell her she can visit you this evening?’
‘Yes, that would be nice.’ And it would remove the onus of visiting from him, she thought. He wouldn’t have to sit here, pretending he cared.
But she’d forgotten his former ability to read her mind. He said, ‘Actually I’m almost camping here at the moment. Mrs Markham is in intensive care on this floor.’
She frowned, then remembered. ‘Oh, the Chromazyn patient. How—how is she?’
‘Not too good,’ he said curtly. ‘And her husband, who couldn’t praise us highly enough when the treatment began, is now threatening us with legal action, and the power of the press.’ His mouth curled. ‘Something on the lines of “They used my dying wife as a guinea pig,” or an equally tasteless angle.’
‘Why do you think it all went wrong?’
He shrugged tiredly. ‘God knows. We’ve been monitoring her treatment most stringently. We knew there could be a reaction if she took Chromazyn in conjunction with certain other drugs, so that’s why we had her in here, so that she couldn’t get her hands on even an aspirin tablet that wasn’t prescribed.’ He sighed. ‘Yet, even so, we obviously missed something.’
She said constrictedly, ‘I’m sorry. I know you all had high hopes of Chromazyn. I suppose all the tests will have to stop now.’
‘Of course. We can’t risk the same thing happening again to some other poor soul’ He got to his feet. I’d better go. I’ve been warned not to tire you.‘ He gave her another brief, formal smile. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow.’
She wanted to say, ‘You don’t have to,’ but she couldn’t force her lips to frame the words. Watching him walk away from her was like bleeding to death.
Her mother’s visit was something of an ordeal. Learning that she was to be a grandmother had diametrically changed Mrs Conroy’s attitude to Malory. She was full of plans for the baby, names for the baby, and maternal advice for Amanda. She’d even brought some samples of suitable nursery wallpapers with her, and was clearly itching to go to Aylesford Green and choose a room worthy of its future occupant.
If Amanda hadn’t been so unhappy, she would have laughed herself into stitches when Mrs Conroy had made her triumphant departure. As it was, she wept a little, and found herself on the receiving end of a reproving lecture from Sister as a result.
‘And your husband asked me to tell you that Mrs Markham seems to be taking a turn for the better,’ was her valedictory remark.
A stream of flowers and cards began to arrive, and Amanda felt a total fraud. She was stiff and sore, but perfectly well, and Dr Redmond had promised she could leave hospital the day after tomorrow. There were visitors, too. Jane came, and Peter Wilton, and Mrs Priddy, towing a subdued George in her wake. She was touched by their concern, but found herself wondering what they would think when they realised she and Malory had parted.
He was punctilious about seeing her, but his visits were difficult occasions, their conversational exchanges halting and stilted.
She didn’t want to remember their marriage like this, Amanda thought wretchedly each time he left. She wanted to hold in her heart Malory’s gentleness to her, the sense of belonging he’d taught her, as well as the other more intimate memories which tormented her more with every hour that passed.
She was sitting by the window, looking desultorily through a fashionable and very expensive babywear catalogue her mother had given her, when the door opened and, glancing up, she saw Clare standing there.
