Chapter Thirty-four

Bard stood at the Rio Airlines check-in desk; he was beginning to feel more confident. Everything seemed to be all right. There were no policemen at the airport, at the check-in. He looked at his watch: two-forty. Only just over an hour. Just as long as it wasn’t delayed. He thought of sitting in the plane, on the runway, waiting to move, waiting to hear his name called over the plane’s tannoy system, and felt sick.

He was next. He got out his passport, his ticket. The girl smiled at him. ‘Good afternoon, Mr Channing,’ she said, in thick, rolling English.

‘Good afternoon,’ he said. The name didn’t seem to be making any kind of an impression on her; she hadn’t reached for her buzzer, hadn’t looked up at him.

‘Just the one piece of luggage, is it?’

‘Yes, that’s all.’

‘Business trip?’

‘Yes.’

Just get on with it, for God’s sake. Don’t lose your temper, Channing, she’s just being friendly, that’s all.

‘Smoking or non-smoking?’

‘Non-smoking, please.’

A long wait while she tapped endlessly at her computer. A very long wait. He looked at his watch: two-fifty now. English time. God, flying was a bloody awful performance. Even if you weren’t trying to skip the country.

‘Ah,’ she said finally. ‘Ah, just a moment.’

Shit. Christ. This was it. He managed to smile. ‘Problem?’

A long silence. Then, ‘No, no problem. I’ve got one here. Window or aisle?’

‘Aisle, please.’

‘Fine. Right. Here is your boarding card, Mr Channing. Watch the screens for your gate. We board in about half of one hour. Have a good flight.’

A good flight. Well, maybe. Almost done it. Five to three.

 

Philip Drew decided to ring Bard just one last time. Just in case. You never knew …

 

Peter Stainforth looked at his watch. Five to three. He decided enough was enough. There’d be hell to pay if he let this one get away. He decided to call Drew once more, give him the benefit of the doubt, then put a port stop in motion. He rather liked Drew; he was tough, talked straight.

He reached out for his phone and knocked his tea over. It trickled slowly, steadily across his desk, over a report he’d been reading, down towards him and his newly cleaned suit.

‘Fuck,’ said Peter Stainforth, and started rummaging frantically through his drawers for something to mop it up with.

 

‘Please, please!’ said Francesca Channing to the air, to the sky, to any power that might possibly be able to hear her, help her, as she paced the grounds of St Andrew’s Hospital. ‘Please, Bard, ring. Please.’

 

Micky Brett was very bored. The flight to California had been delayed twice, and he had totally exhausted what the airport had on offer: which wasn’t in any case a great deal for a small boy of nine. He had already acquired a new transformer, a baseball cap that said Paris, and some popcorn; he had consumed two double burgers and fries and two strawberry milkshakes, and was now wandering about on a zigzagging course amongst the rows of weary, irritable people, half smiling at them, trailing his hand along the backs of the seats, occasionally bumping into their luggage, or even their feet. It was now his third circuit and people were beginning to recognise him, to grow wary, pulling their things towards them, looking at him crossly, looking rather pointedly for his parents; a couple of people even asked him where they were. Micky pointed vaguely towards the opposite end of the departure lounge from where they really were and continued on his course.

There was a man sitting on his own at the end of a row, reading a paper; a big man, not unlike Micky’s own father. Not unlike Micky’s father also, he was looking rather cross and edgy. He kept looking at his watch, then at the computer terminal; as Micky watched him, he suddenly disappeared in the direction of the toilets. His jacket was slung over the back of the seat next to him; as Micky passed, he brushed the jacket and it fell on the floor.

‘Whoops,’ he said, and bent to pick it up, glad the man wasn’t there. Something heavy slithered onto the floor out of the pocket: a mobile phone.

It was just like Micky’s father’s phone, which was a constant presence in their lives, at every table, on every journey. His mother hated that phone, said she felt married to it. This one was switched off. That had to be a mistake. The whole point of having a mobile phone was that people could get you all the time, Micky’s father had often explained that. You just didn’t leave it off, something really urgent might be needing your attention. Micky switched this one on again: and it rang.

Micky looked over at the toilets; there was no sign of the man. He decided this was a moment to show initiative: his dad would never have ignored a call like this, you just couldn’t. It might be urgent, might be business.

‘Hallo,’ he said.

‘Bard?’ said a voice. Crackly, distorted: obviously not in Paris. The Paris frequencies were very good, his father had said.

‘No, this is Micky Brett.’

‘Micky Brett? Is – is Bard Channing there?’

‘Not just at this moment. He’s – ’ Micky hesitated. His father had said never, ever say he was in the toilet. ‘He’s a bit tied up right now. Can I take a message?’

‘Micky, where are you?’

‘Oh, I’m at Charles de Gaulle. In Paris. Oh, hey, here he is now.’ He held out the phone to the man. ‘You Bard Channing? This is a call for you.’

 

Stainforth finished mopping up the tea, threw the unpleasant pile of tissues into his waste-paper basket, and reached for the phone to ring Philip Drew. The number was engaged.

 

Francesca walked back into the hospital room. Kitty was not there, she had been taken away from her, was somewhere else now, having needles stuck into her, having her arteries probed, strange substances pumped into her. She thought of her pain, her fear; thought of the greater pain and fear she would have to undergo the next day; wondered, still, if she was right to subject her to it; wondered, if she did not survive it, how she would possibly live with herself for the rest of her life. She felt absolutely and totally alone.

‘Ah, Mrs Channing!’ It was the well-spoken nurse. ‘I have the consent form here. I need your signature here, look, and – ’

‘I don’t think I can do it,’ said Francesca helplessly. ‘I’m sorry.’ She looked at the form, just an ordinary piece of paper, with words in what she supposed was English written on it, but which seemed to her to be totally incomprehensible, just a white piece of paper, at the pen the nurse was holding out for her and wondered how anything so dangerous, so deadly, could appear so harmless. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said again, ‘I really don’t think I can.’

The nurse looked at her, and there was, briefly, an expression in her eyes of total contempt, dislike, removed almost at once, replaced by the bland cool of earlier.

‘Oh, but you see, Mrs Channing, Mr Moreton-Smith can’t proceed until we have your signature. It is only a formality, of course, but – ’

‘No,’ said Francesca, ‘no, it isn’t only a formality. It’s exactly as you said, he can’t proceed until I sign. And I’m not absolutely certain, you see, that I want him to proceed.’

‘But Mrs Channing, you don’t understand – ’

‘Shut up,’ said Francesca fiercely, ‘just shut up. I understand perfectly. I’m just not sure what I want to do about it. You’ll have to give me a bit more time. It’s very important. She’s my baby, and I don’t want to be rushed. Now could you – could you please leave me alone. Just for a minute or two.’

‘Yes. Yes, very well. But – ’

‘Please!’ said Francesca. ‘Just go.’

The nurse left the room. It was a very nice, quite large room, with a bed for her and a cot for Kitty, and a wardrobe and a chest of drawers and some nice curtains, and a radio and a television: not at all how most people would imagine a torture chamber. Francesca sat down on the bed, which was rather high and very hard, and looked down at her hands, and told herself she was being ridiculous, that these people had Kitty’s best possible interests at heart, that she had to have this operation, that she would not get better without it; even managed to tell herself that babies were very tough; and still found herself quite unable to formally agree to her having it done.

Someone came into the room, a different nurse, and picked up the tray on which they had brought her lunch, the lunch she had not been able even to consider.

‘You should have eaten something, Mrs Channing,’ she said, sweetly concerned. ‘Shall I get you some tea?’

‘Oh – no. No thank you,’ said Francesca. ‘You’re very kind, but – ’

‘Well, if you change your mind, just press the buzzer, there, look.’ She smiled again, started to walk towards the door. Then: ‘Is that a phone?’ she said.

‘A phone?’ said Francesca, wondering what she could possibly be talking about.

‘Yes, ringing, can I hear a phone ringing?’

‘No, I don’t think so.’

The girl was gone before she realised that it was indeed a phone ringing, her phone, and picked up her bag, started rather half-heartedly as first, then more desperately, because of who she thought, perhaps, it just might possibly, probably, almost certainly be, probing into its depths, its messy, disorganised depths, trying to find it; found it, pulled it out, attached to some damp tissues, a receipt for something, tried to press the button, failed at first, her hand was shaking so much, finally managed it.

‘Hallo?’ she said eventually. ‘Hallo?’

But the phone was dead. Whoever it was had rung off. Whoever it was. And supposing it had been Bard, it could have been, calling just once more, trying just once more to talk to her, to make her listen; if it had been, then he had gone, really gone this time, he wouldn’t try again, he would have given up, she had failed him again, she had lost him, Kitty had lost him, they had all lost him, and it was her fault, her own stupid, incompetent, wretched, arrogant fault. The phone lay in her hand, hopelessly silent. ‘Bloody thing,’ she shouted, throwing the phone across the room. ‘Bloody, bloody thing.’

She sat down on the bed and burst into tears.

She heard the door open, looked up, saw Mr Moreton-Smith. He was looking rather stern, and as he came in, he tripped over her phone; he picked it up, handed it to her.

‘Broken I should think,’ he said, quite cheerfully. ‘Never mind.’

‘I do mind actually,’ said Francesca, glaring at him, feeling for some reason rather better, ‘and if you’ve come to ask me for that bloody form, I haven’t signed it yet.’

‘I haven’t, no,’ said Mr Moreton-Smith. ‘I’ve come with a message from your husband, as a matter of fact.’

‘Oh,’ said Francesca. There didn’t seem a lot else to say.

‘He’d been trying to get through on your mobile. He says he’ll be on the next plane from Paris and that there’s no need to worry about meeting him, because as far as he can make out, the police will do it. I imagine that’s a joke?’

‘I’m afraid it’s not,’ said Francesca, and she knew now what people meant when they said they didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, because she was at that moment doing both, quite hard, ‘but never mind. Did he say anything else?’

‘Yes, he did. He said to tell you he finds it hard to believe you can be so stupid and that he loves you very much. And that you are not under any circumstances to sign the consent form because he will obviously want to do that himself, after he’s spoken to me. All right?’

‘Yes, all right,’ said Francesca, ‘very, very much all right. Thank you. He really is quite impossibly arrogant,’ she added, to nobody in particular.