57
Tuesday 23rd April
Sage could see blue sky overhead. She could hear her own sobbing breath, and Chloe crying. She could feel some knot of pain in her belly, and smoothed it with one hand, dreading feeling a cut or blood. But there was no injury there, just the burning pain of her cut palm. There was a wide hole where the well had been, a bowl shaped depression in the mud made as it collapsed.
‘He hurt my arm!’ Chloe wailed, crawling over to Sage, rubbing her small chest and wiping her face with her sleeve. ‘And the bad man fell down.’
Sage became aware of Felix’s voice as if a radio had been turned up. ‘That’s right: Bramble Cottage on the High Street, Banstock. Yes, he’s been stabbed. No, no, I won’t. Hurry!’
She glanced over at Nick, who lay unmoving, Felix kneeling over him. She pushed herself up with her good hand to kneel, then stood, shaking. She held out her uninjured hand to the crying child. ‘It’s all right, Chloe. Stay with me.’ Chloe huddled against her. She looked over the blonde head to Felix. ‘Is he…?’ Please, please let him not be dead.
Nick’s eyes were open, and he was looking straight at her. Just when she’d convinced herself he was dead, he blinked, and managed to croak a word.
‘Sage?’
She let go of Chloe and knelt beside him, her good hand cradling one of his. ‘Don’t die.’
‘The… the baby,’ he whispered.
She glanced down at her bump, smudged with blood.
‘It’s fine, it was just a cut on my hand.’
Felix looked at her belly, then looked down further. ‘Sage, you’re bleeding. Lie down.’ His voice had a quiet authority, even though panic had added an octave.
Sage dropped a hand to a wet patch on her jeans, lifted bloodied fingers. Bean. She looked back at the terrified girl. ‘It’s all right, Chloe. Help is coming.’ She sat down, her limbs shaking.
Chloe ran to her, hunched into her side. ‘I want my mummy!’ Sage realised Felix’s hands were bracing either side of the knife in Nick’s chest, applying pressure. She lay on her back, and the child cuddled against her side. She could feel slow surges of liquid pulsing out of her, feel the world become simpler. It became about in and out, breathing in the quiet air, feeling the cold rain spit on her face, watching clouds scud overhead. Nothing seemed real, just Nick, Bean.
The paramedics arrived a few minutes later, and divided their attention between Nick and Sage. Then the police, some firemen testing the ground where the well had been with poles, and finally Judith and Pat. Judith didn’t speak, just scooped up Chloe and rocked her. The child’s crying slowed and stopped. Finally Judith put Chloe down, then crouched next to Sage as a paramedic took Sage’s pulse.
‘Are you OK? Oh, God, the baby.’
‘I think… I think I’m OK.’ Sage felt as if she was thinning, becoming transparent. Only Nick kept a part of her anchored. ‘Is Nick—?’
‘They’re working on him.’
Suddenly the pain returned, gripping Sage’s belly, and a gush of hot fluid was forced out. Sage could feel rivulets of tears streaming from her eyes without the energy to sob. ‘Elliott tried to kill my baby.’
* * *
The next few moments seemed stretched apart, like knots in elastic. The siren of the ambulance in the dimmed interior, a voice speaking to someone else. The banging of doors as the trolley was pushed through. The pain of a needle ‘just a scratch’, squirming and burning into a vein in her arm, then peace came, with death, or sleep. She slowly emerged into sounds, lights, voices.
‘There you are.’ A woman’s face was suspended over Sage. ‘You’re going to be a bit dopey, you’ve had a lot of painkillers. But you are going to be fine, and your baby is doing well. He’s small but he’s strong, just premature.’ The woman smiled as Sage tried to untangle syllables that didn’t make sense. ‘It’s OK. Go back to sleep.’
Sage felt herself relax. She did as she was told.
* * *
She woke in a quiet room, darkened but with a nightlight over the bed. A nurse was beside her.
‘What happened?’
‘You had to have an emergency section and a transfusion, but you’ll be fine, and your baby’s a little bruiser. NICU sent down a picture.’ Sage lifted a hand to take the proffered photograph, and was surprised to find the back of her hand stuck with tape and bearing a drip. The picture was fuzzy, printed out on an office printer, and hard to see in the low light, but the nurse turned on the reading lamp. The baby’s creased features burned into Sage’s brain like a laser, never to be erased. He looked like her, he looked like Marcus, damn it, he looked like Nick. He was a real baby, not Bean, not a bump, he was a tiny person. Suddenly her gut tightened with the thought that he was too young, too small. She turned her face to the nurse, but the woman pre-empted her.
‘He’s four pounds, two ounces, and very strong. He came out yelling, which is always a good sign. He’s going to need a few weeks to fatten up and get more independent, but he looks like he’s going to be fine.’
‘Nick.’ The word cut through her thoughts. ‘The man that was stabbed. Do you know—?’
The woman’s face fell. ‘I don’t. But there’s a very nice policeman who wants to talk to you, and he probably does. He’ll be back in the morning. Is Nick the baby’s dad?’
‘No. He’s…’ Words faded away. Sage held the picture, and her life came back into focus. ‘Can I have a phone?’
‘Who are you going to call? It’s four thirty in the morning.’
‘Oh.’
‘I’ll be back before I go off shift, and I’ll help you call whoever it is that’s so important. OK?’
She was as good as her word, helping Sage call Felix just after seven.
‘Sage?’
‘Is Nick—’ the breath ran out.
‘He’s doing well. He had to have the knife removed in surgery, and his lung collapsed, but he’s going to be fine. The baby?’
‘I haven’t seen him yet, but they say he’s OK. They gave me a picture.’ She could hear the sigh at his end.
‘I tried to explain to the police about Elliott,’ he said. ‘I said he accidentally fell down the well while in a psychotic state, trying to kill you. I’m afraid he’s dead, Sage. The well caved on him.’
She settled back into her pillow. ‘I didn’t even think about him. He killed Steph.’ She swallowed. ‘Is his body out of the well?’
Felix fell silent for a minute. ‘I don’t know. I expect so, by now. Can I come and see you? The police are keeping me on the Island for a few days as a witness.’
‘Try and see Nick first, OK?’
They rang off and Sage tried to shift up in the bed, a burning pinch across her groin reminding her of the incision from the caesarean. The nurse took the phone from her and put a blood pressure cuff on her arm. ‘Was that the father?’
‘Oh, no.’ Sage suddenly felt a bubble of laughter float up at the idea. ‘No, the father is someone else.’
The cuff squeezed Sage’s arm for a long moment. ‘Your blood pressure’s still a bit low. You lost a lot of blood yesterday.’
‘I don’t feel too bad.’ Sage moved her shoulders, feeling the stiff muscles and a sharp pain in her neck. She looked at the skin on the inside of her wrist, where Elliott had hung on. It was purple and red with bruises and cuts. ‘Actually, I don’t feel great. I ache like I’ve been in a fight.’
The nurse smiled. ‘The police will be back shortly. I diverted them with the promise of toast, but only while I checked you over. Can I just have a quick look at your tummy?’ She folded the sheet down, and skimmed up the surgical gown Sage was wearing. Sage looked down at her puffy, half-deflated stomach. Above the surgical dressing her belly was covered with bruises and abrasions, red splotches as if blood had been drawn almost through the skin.
‘Ow,’ she whispered. The nightmare of yesterday came into focus. Elliott grabbing her arm, dragging her across the ground, Felix catching her around the waist.
‘They did say you were bruised.’ The nurse half laughed. ‘You can rest now, get better.’ She tucked the sheets in protectively. ‘Here come the police. I’ll give them ten minutes, then you really need to sleep before we take you downstairs to see your baby.’
The policeman that came in was a stranger, with an older female officer, but Sage hardly registered them beside the woman who barged between them.
‘Sheshe!’