“A fiver says he will.”

“You’re on,” Clive said, taking a swig of tea. “That fiver’s got my name on it.”

Forty-one

Lois was there as ever on night-duty reception. Lois, pleased to see her and ready with a warm hug of welcome.

But then Jane caught her expression. “I’m too late,” she said.

“Yes. Karin died about an hour ago.”

Jane sat down. She felt tired, cold and frustrated. The storms had caused such appalling delays and rerouting that she was here at ten when she should have made it by five.

“Come into the kitchen, I’ll make you a hot drink. Have you eaten?”

“No, but I’m not hungry. I should go and see her.”

“Have this first. No hurry now.”

No. No hurry. Karin had waited for her as long as she could but Jane had let her down. It was not her fault, of course it was not, but she felt guilty nevertheless.

The fluorescent lights hummed as Lois switched them on and poured water into the kettle.

“Poor Jane. Nothing more upsetting.”

“I wanted to be with her. She wanted me to be with her.”

“I know.” She did not give out false comfort. Lois was a realist.

She set down a mug of tea and a plate of biscuits. “Dunk one,” she said, “I know you said you weren’t hungry but somehow a dunked biscuit always goes down.”

It was true. Jane followed her out to the reception foyer. From the far end of the corridor she heard murmured voices, saw a light. A door closed.

“Do you know about Dr Deerbon?” Lois asked, back behind her computer.

“Yes, Cat told me. I was hoping to see her but I can’t very well go up to the farmhouse at this time of night.”

“I should think you of all people probably could. Why don’t you ring now?”

Jane hesitated.

“She might be glad of it, you know.”

“Has she heard about Karin?”

“Not my place to ring her.”

Jane wondered what she could say to Cat, out of the blue, at ten thirty at night. Looked at Lois. Lois nodded.

“Look, go into the relatives’ room, I’ll switch the phone through.”

It was picked up on the second ring.

“It’s Jane,” she said. “I’m at Imogen House.”

*

Ten minutes later she was sitting beside Karin McCafferty. The nurses had not yet moved her body, though the syringe pump and drip stand had been taken away. The lamp was on. They had closed the door.

Karin looked like a moth under the bedclothes, her skin fine, and almost transparent over the bones, her hair brushed and tied back, lying on the slightly raised pillows. Jane took her cool hand and put it to her own cheek.

“I know you won’t blame me, but I should have been here. I wish I had been. I’m sorry.” Karin’s eyelids were faintly blue, like those of a newborn baby. She was beautiful in death, as she had been in life, but remote. Sometimes, Jane had been with the dying and the newly dead and had had a powerful sense of their presence. But not now. Karin was as far away as it was possible to be and had left no trace of herself behind.

Half an hour later, she was sitting with Cat beside a low fire in the farmhouse sitting room, a whisky in her hand, the rain lashing against the windows.

Cat was leaning back, eyes closed, her face drained of everything but exhaustion.

“A patient who was nursing her mother at home said to me, “I’m way beyond tired.” And this will get worse. It’s like lying down while someone rains blows on you but somehow each blow hurts in a different way.”

“How are the children?”

Cat shook her head. “The saving grace there is Judith Connolly. My father has been seeing her and she is amazing—calm, strong, easy-going, got the measure of him perfectly and fantastic with all three of the children. She’s fast becoming my rock, in the absence of Simon.”

Jane took a swig of her whisky. “Absence? But I saw him on the television news.”

“Yes, you did. That’s one reason for his absence and obviously the chief one—it’s tough for him. But what makes me mad is his stupid attitude to Judith. Si was always Mum’s blue-eyed boy but Mum is dead and he can’t take someone else being at Hallam House.”

“Doesn’t he see that it’s helping your father?”

Cat snorted. “He doesn’t choose to see. It’s a good job he’s so tied up with work and I’ve got Chris to worry about or I’d really lay into him.”

Jane said nothing. She had not been sure what she would feel, coming back here, hearing about him. Everything ought to be overshadowed by Karin’s death and Chris’s illness. She was acutely aware of Simon, nevertheless. He was associated so closely for her with this house and with his sister. Jane’s memories were more vivid than she ever expected.

“I never knew what happened exactly with you two,” Cat said now. “And feel free not to tell me.”

Jane set down her whisky glass. “I ran away,” she said. “That’s what happened.”

“You sure? Only it’s usually the other way round. Simon is the one who runs.”

Jane shook her head. “I ran. I didn’t know what I felt. I was in a very confused and fragile emotional state and I couldn’t cope with another factor being added to the mix. It ought to have helped but it made things worse.”

“A lot had happened to you. Awful things.”

“I needed to sort myself out.”

“And have you?”

“Not altogether. But I think I am slowly working my way towards it—whatever itmay be. I thought it was going to be the abbey. I really did want to make that work, but I knew straight away that it wouldn’t. I knew when I lay in bed in my room there on the first night. I struggled on for six months and I’m glad I did.”

“One down, so to speak.”

“Yes. I feel much more confident about the next move. I want to do more academic work.”

“You mustn’t bury yourself in a library, Jane, you’re too good with people. A library is as bad as a convent.”

“But a library combined with students and a hospital is about right, don’t you think? I don’t deserve my luck.”

“As to that, which of us deserves what we get?” Cat shook her head, her eyes filling with tears. She got up and pushed the last of the logs together so that they burned up bright again. “Australia is as far away as a sunlit daydream.”

“Did you like it?”

“Not really. But we were happy together, and it was different, which always shakes you up. Looking back, it seems idyllic, frankly.”

“How is Chris coping? I don’t mean physically.”

“I don’t know. How strange that sounds. But I really don’t. At the moment, he’s just pretty doped and getting through the days, sleeping a lot, waiting for the radiotherapy to start. Everything else is just beyond him. And you know Chris c he doesn’t philosophise, he just gets on with it. The worst thing is, I can talk to patients about dying. I do talk to them. I think it’s important. I get them to tell me what they feel, I get their relatives to do the same. But I can’t do it with Chris. We talk about what’s going to happen medically, but otherwise c I can’t and he doesn’t. We have never ever had anything we couldn’t talk about, even if we argued. We often argued. But now there is this. It’s frozen us, somehow. I feel as if I’m acting a part. This isn’t me, this isn’t Chris, this isn’t us.”

“It’s strange. Karin believed so passionately in alternative medicine that she rejected everything you and I would accept—and probably Chris too.”

“Definitely Chris. He’s an evidence-based man. He won’t consider anything else. When it comes down to it, you know, not many doctors do.”

“What would you blame for Karin’s death? That she refused orthodox treatment?”

“Cancer is what I blame for her death, Jane. It’s what I will blame for Chris’s. But the longer I’m in medicine, the more I see of it, it becomes clear that what we know about cancer goes on one line that reads as follows: “You get it, or you don’t. You get better, or you don’t.” There’s another thing c I feel it ought to be me, I feel guilty. But inside, I’m just relieved that it isn’t me. That it’s someone else again, even if the someone is my husband. I’ve escaped. There now, I’ve said it.”