The South Coast of England from Brighton to Bognor Regis is sometimes known as the Costa Geriatrica.  It is a complacent self-mocking term used by innumerable London civil servants who retire there to watch each other crumble away.  The climate is balmy, the undertaking trade is discretely buoyant and the traffic moves sedately on the roads.

Out there was the world he knew. In here was another world. When Grace left that first evening, Graham tidied his locker.  His clothes had gone back with Grace.  The toothbrush, towel, the magazine she had bought  him, all these he looked at carefully and put away. He felt a desperate affection for these simple things that had come with him as if they represented his only friends in this new place.  The doctor from the outpatients, the nurses there who had taken his blood, the receptionist, all those people he had come to like in the hospital, seemed so far away now.  He had not seen any of them on the ward.  The evening sky outside was darkening, and a nurse came to pull across the curtains over the great plate-glass windows.  He got onto his bed first of all in his pyjamas.  He put on the old dressing-gown that he had since they moved to their present house - was it fourteen years ago.  Opposite his bed was a wall of curtains.

It brought to mind leaving on the train, the platform awash with couples parting. Duncan was two then, and Grace was pregnant. So much unknown.  He felt that mystification again now.  Then too there were fears of death.  It had been wartime, and they may never meet again ‑ lost forever. There was no space, to know what to say. Time had closed into a tight ball. The train had shuddered and jolted inches forwards and gradually it was pulling out of the station away, away. He looked at them looking, his wife, his little son. 

Deadened, he had sat back in a seat after waving from the carriage window, wondering how they would get on at home, making their lives without him.  The night had become dark he pulled down the blind over the window shutting out the other world outside. 

The long, limp hospital curtains now hung before him as if a screen for these old memories to play out upon. Then, that miserable journey, he had not slept on the hard horsehair seats. He jostled the unknown soldier next to him, supporting each other's upright balance. When he had got off the train and walked onto the early morning ferry to Larne the crisp air, and the blue-green deserted mountains chilled his spirit yet again.  This world was foreign, deserted. He had looked at the others as if they were zombies, as he felt himself, cut off from life, as they went aboard, all on the grim business of the war. They dispersed to the submarine bases, the anti-aircraft installations, the small aerodromes from where they tried to hunt the enemy submarines. They were tasting a kind of freedom, the freedom of loneliness it seemed. Belfast would become this mysterious new home. 

He placed the magazine, that Grace had bought for him, on the locker beside the bed, to remain as if it were his only memory. It remained unopened and now he almost felt a disloyal as if he were neglecting her thoughtfulness to him. He glanced at a few pages. Why did she have to buy these things. The people who write the columns will say anything, and he sucked the air through his teeth in disapproval.  It was important to keep his mind focused. Roaming through the junk of his memory... it served no purpose.  But there was so little going on in the ward, and his thoughts were darting to different things as he was  trying to sleep.  He had put the magazine away, ‘how was Grace managing the bolt on the front door?’  He should have seen to it long ago.  Now she would struggle with it on her own so far away.

What would the doctor find tomorrow! He owed it to Grace to let them find out what it was.  She was not worried; she always believed in his strength, reassured him it would be all right.  But no one knew. No one knew what was wrong; even the doctor had found it interesting. And, chilled by the thought of tomorrow’s investigation, he drifted into his first night's disturbed sleep.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

The view was a monotonous November grey, some bare trees stood unmoving in the concrete compound of the hospital.  Inside, the pale curtains draped themselves against the aluminium frames of the picture windows. Each of the four beds in `C' alcove faced the world beyond where their inmates had come from.  Would any of them return out there? And if so for how long.  He had had 78 years, a goodly time.  But the last week had happened with such speed.  Investigations, what would they find?  Grace had packed the things he needed, and they had driven here, neither speaking, silently aware of an unknown future. Perhaps they had been ill-assorted for marriage, but neither of them dwelt on the thought. They had been happy - happy for them -  at least for these last 13 years since they’d moved here from London.  And at their age, you never knew how long it would go on.  They had silently driven along the coast, neither thinking those thoughts, though they were known, and both knew the other felt the same. Grace had left quickly. It was an opportunity to shop; practical as ever. Life as usual.  Grace was economical and opportunist.


 

Staff Nurse Timpton had moved in quickly and turned down the bed in crisp fashion to welcome his body. “Thank you, Nurse”'  She whisked off, her slipstream leaving Graham holding his pyjamas. 

“She's the best of them. said a voice from the bed beyond his, A ghastly pale face; a body motionless in bed. “She's like our boy's wife.” the voice continued.  “And they've both got a couple of young ones, about the same ages. Anthea, this one is called.  She doesn't like being joked.”  His strained features hardly looked capable of humour.  “She always comes when you want something - when it's her shift. They change over at one-fifteen.” Graham sat on the edge of his bed listening to this old boy.  He looked very near the end.  “Can you give me a shove up the bed?  It feels better like that,” he said heavily.  Graham did his best to pull the feeble body; “One of the vertebras,” he said briefly. “They say its given way.” The moist old eye in the worn skin looked him over shrewdly.  “Have we met before?”  Then he turned back to face the wall again, away from the damp grey outside the window. “I was Home Office,” he said as if to himself now, as if talking to his own pain, “for most of my time.” 

            

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

He sat back on his own bed and the Nurse came round for routine checks, tightening the cuff on his arm. “Not much blood left in me, I expect,” he tried to be light-hearted.  She did not emerge from her heavy effort, so no response came. His mind flashed: the finger clutching his bare arm, the crimson varnished nail, so cruelly painted; where had she got nail-varnish in the wartime? Not that, he told himself; why did he still cling to that old memory.  The Nurse took the earpieces out of her ears.   

“She's a flighty one,” came the frail voice from the next bed. “Told me all about her boyfriends,” and with a despairing laugh, “as if I were interested. They have a different life nowadays.” He seemed exhausted by the thought and relaxed into silence.

They do things differently. Graham thought of Duncan; truly they did have it very different. He  hadn't wanted it for himself, and nor had he begrudged Duncan, well…  not until Duncan had let himself down. Graham sat still sinking into thoughts about Duncan.  It had been such a shock when it had first happened, and still a shock eight years on.  Lesley had come down with the grandchildren in a terrible state.  It had not been a question of understanding it; it simply could not be understood.  They did things differently.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

The thoughts left a sense of doom and a tense damp feeling in his skin as if he had been sweating slightly.  He thought of Grace, at home, on her own.  He hoped she had locked up properly before she went to bed. He thought of Lesley, on her own, Duncan's wife, now ex-wife - since Duncan had left her... he had just walked out. That's what Lesley had said.  She just came down to Grace with the grandchildren. It had been inexplicable.  Ever since then it was as if everything had gone wrong with the family.  Somehow, they – he and Grace - had all got tangled up in the friction and quarrels.  Duncan had never been able to explain himself, and yet he had always been so responsible, a Doctor, one who knew about people, about children's upbringing.  Graham caught himself.  There was that little stirring in his stomach that he felt when one of his tempers was coming on.

Thoughts went round and round, stirring his living flesh, churning up emotions and moods that continually needed controlling.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

He lay on his back staring. Duncan was middle-aged, and even middle age was different for Duncan's generation.  He seemed so boyish. Perhaps, for Graham, it had been the war years. That's what Grace had said - "We had the war, dear; they don't understand that.  It made us... serious.  More serious than they are now". Nowadays they do what they want. When Graham  was young, it was the economic depression, unemployment, insecurity.  Well, there is unemployment now; but look at the social security; it is a featherbed. In his own generation you had to work for everything. Nothing fell into your lap, and he was proud in his achievement. Not like that now; all this pushing and shoving and getting in first.  In those days, he had been able to feel closer to people. He would never have known Rose like that in any other circumstances.  It just shows, does it not? Why does Rose keep coming to his mind?

Even young and still at school, he had known that if he wanted to have some security, he would have to go out and work hard to get it.  He had gone to night classes and got his exams well enough.  The civil service was secure.  And he had saved to marry. They had bought their own house in 1933. There had been things that had gone wrong of course.  Grace's first child had been born a dead one; but the next year Duncan had come along and he had been healthy, more or less. Of course, he had worried them when he was three and nearly caught his death of a cold. It would have been a great blow. Grace might not have been able to bear it. She had been on her own then because he had gone back to his station, in Aberdeen, after the new baby, Tony, was born. She had not said a word to him about Duncan’s illness until the little chap was out of the critical phase.  He had been cross with Grace for not telling him - but proud of her at the same time for managing their little family on her own.  It made him feel that they, and the home, such as they had, was safe with her.  It had made it all the more difficult when he had found himself with Rose that evening.

The  nurses were beginning to stir. Those thoughts of his, the heavy and light thoughts of the past, seeped back into the underground of his mind. He felt set apart from these young ones.  He was tired and they should care for him.  Grace had always said it had been a hard life for them as a couple, and they had a right to enjoy themselves now he had retired - that was why they had moved down here to the south coast.  Of course, they had enjoyed themselves at times all through; he was sure of that. Though there had been rows and difficulties in the family.  Tony had been surly and difficult at times - and Duncan of course... he was the one for a fight.  But Grace had always been patient and tolerant.  She never lost her temper.  Why was it so difficult that she never lost her temper? It was the great asset the family had was Grace being so even-tempered.  He knew he was not so himself.  It often made him feel worse - but he must not complain.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

Sister Timpton sailed down the ward at about 7 o’clock. "Come along, Mr Dawson,” she called, “You really must get tidy in the morning,” and she swept by him.  The nurses, he had begun to realise, are at their hardest in the morning, as if they have to reassert their authority all over again for the coming day.  Graham did not feel disposed to go along with it. He noticed the boiling feeling in the pit of his stomach, and he resented that they should give him the problem of dealing with that turmoil there. But what could he do? His lips tightened. He asked when she expected the doctor to come round.  It was urgent in his mind. “We look after you in here,” she coolly replied, and as she did so, her hands went to the top of his pyjama trousers and started to roll them down.  He was surprised by the elegance of her fingers and the gentleness of her touch. He felt a warmth, though stern, as she peeled away the cloth.  “The doctor will come when you are ready to be looked at.” She pushed his pyjama jacket up from his tummy.  He was now exposed from his ribs to his hips in front of her. And she parted the curtains and bustled out. She left a gap in his privacy and occasionally, as he waited, he could see other patients moving around He lay back. 

He thought of his mother who used to use the same steamy and starched manner. At one time, he had lain for weeks when he had been ill as a child.  Just before the First World War, he remembered, because he was convalescing when war was declared.  He had developed such a weakness in his legs and a fever in his head.  Nobody knew what it was. They could only afford to have the doctor once.  He had shaken his head a few times and whispered to mother.  She had been stony-faced and said nothing to him after the doctor had gone. His feet had, ever after, tensed up into a permanent claw-like shape.  His mother had never said anything. Duncan had been very interested in the shape of his father's feet. As a student at his medical school, he seemed to think that there was something special about the feet. Graham had recalled that there may have been others in his family who had deformed feet, extra high arches.  Duncan had got to medical school, so clever, they had almost not known what to do with him; so clever he had made himself unpleasant. He could make them feel such fools.  Mother had said, had warned Graham, it was no good pushing Duncan along.  The child should find his own way.  But if he had the gift of intelligence, Graham thought surely it should be husbanded and brought out.  Perhaps he had made a rod for his back by encouraging Duncan.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

He had had to wait all morning for the doctor to arrive. The afternoon began when it seemed the morning was only half-complete.  Lunch things were whisked away with a busy clatter and the thunder of the lift had echoed round the ward. A buxom nurse brought the bedpan.  She could make her body quiver in her starched uniform, which he did not like.  Some of the other men laughed and teased her like schoolboys. Men should control all that even if some women flaunted themselves.  Duncan must have been like that, letting himself notice girls.  It did no good in the long run.  Look where it had got him.

 

She bustled around the bed, tucked the laundered sheets tightly in again so that he was pinned frailly in bed like an invalid.  He felt managed in an old-fashioned way, his legs almost amputated by her enthusiasm with the sheets. “You had forgotten me,” he said morosely trying to be light about it. 

“Don't you worry about the Doctor,” she commanded.  “He'll come when he can.” The fresh creases of her uniform kept brushing against his fingers, or his cheeks.  He moved quickly aside from her close presence.  `Oh, sorry!  Did I knock you?” half mocking. “We're feeling a bit fragile today, are we?' with a momentary hint of quarrelsomeness in her voice, the slightest of threats. But then – “Don't you forget to call me when you want anything. Sister is off this afternoon, so I can make a fuss of you all today.” And she bustled off seemingly satisfied with settling him. But he felt very unsettled.The pain in his back was largely forgotten.  But sometimes it caught him off-guard as he turned, and then his head whizzed in a daze of wincing surprise. They had looked at his blood had told him it was "Myeloma".  Duncan had to explain.  But why should his blood hurt his back?  It did not stand to reason. 

In a stir, the air moved apart and the long ward was cleft by the speeding arrow of time as the Doctor, at last the Doctor, came straight towards him.  He homed like a missile towards his bed.  The Doctor made it no clearer; he said very little, and prodded his back as if it were hardly to do with Graham.  He was a stranger, and young and perhaps he was new.

In fact, the young doctor seemed more interested in the little nurse who was moving around him, fetching things, the blood pressure pump, or the tray with special instruments.  He told Graham there had to be more tests to look into his breastbone. Or his hipbone. He talked quickly and Graham felt inpatient.

He was proud of a long life he had lived.  Yet his two brothers, for ever his comparisons, and who he had outstripped all his life in all the achievements that meant anything, were both hale and hearty. What an irony if he, when he had done so well compared with them, should perish first.  The thought leapt darkly across his mind.  The thing to do was to wait until the consultant came round next.  Then he could know how long it would take them to get him better.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

“Your wife's here, Mr D,” the nurse said hardly bothering to put her head round the partition into the alcove.  Graham glanced back at his newspaper and then turned towards the opening into the alcove.  He put his pen down beside the bed and raised his hand carefully to take off his glasses. 

As Grace came into view he gave her a dignified smile, she pecked him on the cheek, “Hallo, dear.  You’ve got a paper, have you? I brought one in for you just in case. How are you?” she purred.  She made herself natural and at home beside his bed. “So, so,” he said noncommittally.

Graham looked at the basket she had brought and watched her bringing things out.  “It's very good of you,” he said warmly, familiarly. “There's a young chap along the corridor went down for papers.  A lot of the men in here smoke,”

I brought your dressing gown in,” she explained unnecessarily, “and your slippers.”  Grace's homeliness was infectious.  He remembered the separations from her in the wartime, coming home to quiet domestic routines, little Duncan always very serious, and the baby Tony who took up so much of Grace's time in those early days.  She would say the same then – “How are you dear?” 

And he would reply, “So, so,” never liking to tell her how he hated being away from home. 

And she would continue, straightaway “I've done some baked potatoes.  Come along Duncan, clear the table for me.  Daddy is ready to eat.  We'll all eat together today, shall we?”  Her quiet formal organizing never let out how relieved she was to have him back, perhaps she did not let herself know it exactly.  It had been a question of carrying on as normal for all of them in those days; the whole country did.  Grace had played her part, was be an exemplary model of the stoical spirit of wartime. 

Once, he had shown Duncan the gun out of his kitbag, and the small boy had looked carefully at it, not sure if it was a toy his Daddy had brought. It seemed his parents were anxious with it, “Be careful now”, his father had said.  Duncan had taken it thoughtfully as if a little overwhelmed.  Grace had looked out of the corner of her eye as she poured the tea into the cups. 

As soon as he had put it down on the tablecloth, she had said swiftly, “Drink up your tea, Duncan, there's a good boy. Let's show Daddy how grown up you are.” And Duncan had drunk his tea in small swallows, putting the cup down with a slight gasp for breath. His mother had said previously there was something important to talk about now he was five. He had started school and he could do many more things for himself, and could help with little Tony, and did not need to shout and cry anymore.

Graham had been proud of his eldest son.  Yet he sometimes felt a little uneasy about Grace’s way of talking to him.  He never knew exactly what it was about, Grace and Duncan being serious with each other, but he felt uncomfortable.  He had often told her to be more disciplining with the boy. Yet proud he was. And how glad that their oldest had in the end been a boy.  But that was another thought that had to be controlled. Grace would have thought of first baby, the dead one, them little girl. Grace would have been hurt by his thought.

Grace interrupted these reminiscences. She had sat in the robust hospital armchair, “Are they looking after you all right, dear?'” 

“Well enough,” he replied, “can’t grumble.  The food isn’t up to much.  But they're trying hard.” 

“Oh,” she replied. “They're trying hard, of course they are.  Dr Rees was so chatty wasn't he, in the clinic.  He took so much time with us.  To tell the truth,” Grace smirked, “I think the out-patient Sister got a bit fed up with the amount of time he was taking with us.”  Then she continued without a change in her voice, “Has he been round to see you yet?”

“No,” said Graham, “I only came in…” he thought “yesterday, wasn't it?”  He was suddenly slightly puzzled.  He felt he had been lying here for weeks.  “A young lady came round and took a lot of blood from my arm.” He said it partly to calm himself. “She used several syringes. I said to her ‘What are you going to do with it?’  She was from the pathological laboratory.  Anyway it’s someone else's blood isn't it; can't be mine after all those transfusions.”

“It's the pathology department,” Grace corrected him.  “Dr Rees said they would have to test your blood while your here. I don't see what it’s got to do with my back.”  Graham drew in his breath, “It's your bone marrow.”  Grace, still patient, “They have to test that, as well.  How is your back, dear?”  She could ride out his tetchiness by ministering her care. She looked down sadly to her lap where she was still holding the slippers.  She looked up again at Graham's face. “I thought I should ring Duncan last night, too.” 

 That would have been difficult for Grace.  He was grateful.  She always did the phoning, and he was glad she had dealt with Duncan.  He wished, for a reason that escaped him, that he had been able to speak to Duncan. Her eyes were slightly watery. “He seemed very touched,” she said, “He wanted to ring Dr Rees. Sort of doctor to doctor, isn't it?” She continued, somewhat coolly, “I expect he will.” There was a pause. “He said he will come to see you on Sunday, in the afternoon.” And she added, coyly, “I thought you wouldn't mind.”

Graham felt the knot in his stomach tighten.  What would he say to Duncan?  There was nothing to say. Yet there was everything.

Grace was looking at Graham in a plaintive. and slightly accusing way, “Don't get onto...,” she fumbled with her words, “don’t get into any arguments.” He knew he should not lose his temper. 

“He's too full of himself,” he snapped. “You would have thought he could control himself.  He’s 45 and still treats us like…” 

“Lesley said the grandchildren are fine.”  Grace blatantly stepped in, and Graham could see that she was trying to control his outburst before it happened.

But he wasn’t going to be controlled, and he turned up the pressure, “He has become too big for his boots. Doctor’s think they are tin gods,” he said crushingly. “I don’t mind who he is. If he wants to come and see me, he can. If he wants money, he can ask for it,” he raced on grandly. 

“Ooh,” Grace interrupted, “I am sure he only wants to see how you are”.  She tried to soothe the conflagration as if with an inflammable fire-beater.  Graham snorted as if nobody could add a worthwhile word to the crescendo of his implied accusations.  And then he stopped himself, as if realising that Duncan was not present, and no use if he was not present to hear it. 

Suddenly he found in himself how much he really wanted to talk to Duncan about all sorts of things. What changed in that instant? 

Later Grace was beginning to gather her things. He would be on his own. Always loneliness took him back to that moment… 

After she had gone, his thoughts turned naturally to being alone those years ago, away from home, his family trying to get away from bombed London. And when that secret had happened. That moment with Rose. He did his best never to think of it. But then, he had to tell Duncan something of how he understood what had happened, what Duncan had done.

He wanted more than anything to tell Duncan about it, to tell someone about it.  Duncan seemed the only one who could now listen.  But then….  Could he be as bad as Duncan?  He turned his thoughts away and that night he asked the nurse for something to sleep.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

The day was bright.  The pale grey clouds were wisps in a clear blue sky. He ran his fingers through his hair.  It was greasy.  His heart ached now for those times which were surely gone.

            He wanted a bath, but simple amenities in the ward were difficult to arrange. His hair had always tended towards greasiness.  Normally, he would ply his hair with liquid paraffin to absorb the dandruff.  It was an old-fashioned remedy, but still the best perhaps. It always looked sleek, fashionable in those days  Grace used to complain of the smell. Somehow that had not mattered.  The smell soon went.  Rose had once suggested he should go to the doctor about his dandruff. That had been a long, long time ago, way back in the wartime.  He had looked at her, and she was not joking; she was worried for him.  He reassured her in the way that had always satisfied her. He used to smile, run his hand through his hair, then frown slightly as if he had it all in hand and had been thinking about the problem. She would smile, hold the bundles of letters or files in her hand, the robust skin of her working hands looked very capable.  He liked the practical no-nonsense style about her.  It reminded him of his mother. 

            The sun was progressing steadily round the corner of the far wing of the hospital building, like a ship rounding into the mouth of a harbour, like the fishing boats returning that time that he and Rose had walked down to the docks, in the evening after work.  They had both been shaken by the news of the plane that had gone missing on its way to the Orkneys.  He should have been on that plane and but for his flu he would have disappeared too.

            Somehow, they had gone for a stroll together outside the offices in Aberdeen. He had been transferred from Belfast, and there were two girls in office for the typing. Rose had a strong highland accent. He had decided to go to the shop downstairs for cigarettes. It happened that she had also been just going to the shops for something. So, in her bright manner, she suggested they wander outside. They found themselves at the waterfront and she had leant on the rail while he went for his cigarettes. Then he returned to her and they gazed in silence over the calm cool water. It was summer, even in the north here. She put her hand on his bare forearm for a moment. They had stood in silence watching the boats against the sky.  Then she smoothed his hair that was ruffled by the mild breeze off the sea in that calm summer dusk.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

After a couple of days, he had resigned himself to the routines of the ward. It was Tuesday. Duncan would be coming down on Sunday evening, all the way from London. Just to see an old man like this; it was surely not necessary.  What would he say to his son? Would he tell him? 

If only he had, on that previous occasion, when was it – five years ago, no seven, it must be – he considered when Duncan and Lesley had split up.  That previous time when Duncan had come down for the evening to talk together. It had been the right time. Duncan had been late on that occasion. Actually, it turned out he had not been coming at all until Graham had rung to ask what was happening.  Grace was away, giving her counsel to Lesley. The meal Graham cooked, was in the oven. And he did not arrive.  When Graham had rung, Duncan was as off-hand as ever. He never did give credit for what had been done for him all his life. Right from the start, he demanded and was given.  He simply took what was given from the word go. He did not even wash properly and had ended up with acne all over his face.

Graham had told him all these things. And look at what he had done with his marriage. Still just taking what he wanted, even in his forties. Graham was just coming home from the war when he was forty.  Their house had been destroyed by a bomb.  Even with the young family, Grace had just got a new house; done it all herself, she had been a wonder, and he had merely come home, ‘demobbed’ to meet his family safe and sound, perhaps the most wondrous moment of his life, or very nearly so. Apart from that other moment. Perhaps she had decided to go shopping just because she saw him leaving and wante to walk with him. He turned his mind away as usual. 

Duncan knew nothing of what they had been through all those years ago.  His life had been protected and so he always thought little difficulties were big ones.  When would he learn.  He would go back to Lesley. Grace was sure. But Graham felt that Duncan had to be put to rights about his weak character. It seemed at the time that he had listened to all that.  He had seemed chastened. And opening up a crack, he told Graham about his unhappiness.  He thought that Lesley did give him a decent life, or rather, what was it….  Graham turned the other way in his chair.  But… Sister Timpton was standing over him. She put him into bed in her formal manner. 

But, when he was settled again, and she has moved on to the next bed, his mind returned to that weekend. When Duncan had arrived for the talk, they went on till two in the morning.  Duncan could have gone on talking.  They had never really talked together like that, not before, not since. 

            But even that long might had done nothing to get him back to Lesley.  It seemed he did not want to go back.  It seemed he wanted it easy. For the first time, Graham had a doubt in his mind about whether Grace was right.  Duncan wouldn’t go back, and Graham knew it. It felt conspiratorial. It had been a precious moment, for both of them.

            Perhaps he knew more of what Duncan felt than he had realised.  There was that time, so long ago now, the touch of skin. They both knew it perhaps. So different from everything else. Rose had wakened his own skin too.  Could he tell Duncan some time.  That would weld their link.  It would be the first time he had told it to anyone.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

Sister Timpton was on duty again.  He felt his inside grinding with scorn. “Now we are not going to get in the way of the nurses, are we?” she growled. 

“No”, piped Graham in an acquiescing manner which he would never have allowed himself to deliver, except that it quite automatically came out of him.  He felt all that way back to being a little boy again when his mother demanded to know what he had learned at school.  “Nothing”, he had often whispered, because it had been the easiest way of finishing the conversation without receiving the full voltage blast that seemed to be pent up in her waiting for him.

            He felt foolish, and he wandered grumpily to the stairs. A cleaner was scrubbing them equally joylessly and he slunk over her cleaned patch leaving the inevitable footprint tracks in his wake, without a word of apology that he might normally have given her.  She was, he thought to himself, a foreigner and not, therefore, like himself and his kin. Black people should know their place, he thought ungenerously. The problem is that these days people do not know how to be satisfied.

He was always argumentative as a lad, aggressive and argumentative.  Duncan is the same. There had been those scenes, abusing his mother, never a word to his father about any of this business, and now scarring the children for the rest of their lives.  Well, it was some years ago, but he kept it up even now. 

            How did he turn out like this? Graham pictured Duncan as a baby gurgling and chuckling when he was tickled, and what a concentration he had as soon as one put something interesting  into his hand, his teddy bear or a shiny teaspoon or whatever. Surely that was a sign of his intelligence. Why couldn’t he see how things had to be?  What a waste he had made of his life!

            In the morning. the air carried plumes of people’s breath outside the entrance doors of the hospital. Inside the foyer, turned and approached the shop. Grace had told him to get some paper handkerchiefs.  They were more practical than using his own and sending them home with her for washing and ironing.  How could he ever approach Duncan?  He had always shown contempt for his father – Graham sighed again, and he felt for the coins in his dressing-gown pocket.  Grace always said to him not to talk to Duncan; it never did any good. What had all his efforts to talk to Duncan achieved?  His old hands held the coins for the young lady in the shop as if he were a child spending his precious pocket money.  He let her take it, and silently took the newspaper and the tissues, holding them to his chest like part of his body.  He began to climb the stairs again.  It gave him exercise, he told himself, and it passed the time. 

            He looked down at his gnarled old hands carrying his things.  His thoughts flicked to Rose, when she had touched his arm. He thought whether she had touched his hand too.  Not then gnarled, old, and frail. She had touched a man’s hands that had then moved and felt different.  She had told him not to get so fretted and ruffled by the sergeant in charge.  Her face burned indelibly into his memory, her touch.  She had smoothed his hair for him.  Duncan had once said that loving and touching were the same. It touched a chord. Remembering his words somehow helped. It touched the link that they had had. When Duncan came at the weekend, there would be an opportunity to complete one of the unfinished scenes of his life, a scene that had been properly sentenced to abortion, and never properly carried out, and now perhaps he could honour his memory and Rose too, just before it might be too late.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

Sunday afternoon arrived and Duncan walked in, in a relaxed manner down the floor to Graham’s bed.  The large plate glass windows were darkening as the day outside dimmed.  The evenings were drawing in.  They shook hands warmly and firmly and Graham pointed him to the chair, but Duncan insisted on sitting on the bed, awkwardly; the invalid should sit in the comfort of the chair, They ended up both perched on the bed, one on either side. Duncan looked strained and enquired about his father’s health and comfort.  He had contacted Dr Rees by phone in the week  who said only the things that Graham already knew.

            Father and son found they could talk to each other.  It became fairly relaxed, but conversation rambled around Graham’s illness, the life on the ward, Duncan’s work, the journey down from London. “The doctors say I may go home on tomorrow – or Tuesday.  But the nurses don’t know.  They never say anything.  I don’t think they know very much”. 

“Ma will be glad to have you back again. She’s always worried.  She’s looking for a local gardener, someone to keep the garden going, she said? There must be plenty of people around. If she can find the right one.”

“I’ve lost a bit of height.  Have you noticed. 

“You’re shorter because the vertebrae of your back have got a bit squashed.”  Duncan demonstrated a squashing motion between the palms of his hands Graham took little notice.  Duncan always knew something; he was always telling you something.  But how did he know what was happening.  No-one around the hospital seemed to. Duncan looked blank in his eyes. He probably did not know quite what to say. Perhaps he thought the illness was a serious one and did not like to go on describing it.

            Graham changed the subject, going back to the garden. “We had some wonderful lettuces this year. The wet weather came at the right time.  I suppose you don’t take a lot of interest in gardening.”

“No.  We don’t have a garden in London. Lesley was keen on growing things in pots.  We had back extensions to the house, and terraces on various levels.  She grows lots of flowers in spring and summer.” Duncan seemed pleased to tell him. But now he lived in another house, in another part of London; how long had he been there?  Graham had never visited.  There was a silence.  Both knew that what he said about Lesley was now in the past, a dark boundary separating from the present. A sad moment crossed his heart.  And such a distance from his son, too; such a gap to bridge. 

He searched for something to say.  “How is the little girl?  Milly? 

“She’s three and a half, now.” 

“Is she really,” Graham was surprised. The little girl would see so many things he would not, and he had seen so many things that would mean nothing to her.  Where would there be any common interest? There was some strain between them. What did Duncan want to talk about? – not ordinary things. How could he recreate that precious link, step across that gap – could he do it again? He turned his head and a mass of tumbled and panicky thoughts sped away into a vacuum unexpressed and inexpressible between them.

            He turned his mind to the present, again, “Did you speak to Dr Rees?  He’s a very nice chap.  He does explain things to us.” 

“Yes, I did,”  Duncan nodded. “I think they know what they are doing. 

“Yes,” Graham responded doubtfully “I don’t know if they know what is wrong with me.”  He started off in his lecturing style. “The body is such a complicated thing.  They are so pressed with so much going on.  The young lad here - he’s a registrar to Dr Rees, a young Indian chappy. He is around till ten o’clock some nights  He told me yesterday that there was no room for me now.  I should be leaving. I said that Dr Rees expected me to stay till Monday.  I haven’t got my clothes.  Your mother will have to come in with my things.  It was late in the afternoon yesterday by then. The young chap didn’t look pleased. There seems to be some mix up about whose bed I’m in. Apparently, this is Dr Stephen’s bed. He laughed at the incompetence.

“I expect they have a pressure on beds at the moment.” 

“Well,” Graham continued in a slightly triumphant way, “This is Dr Stephen’s bed.  So, I’m told,” and he shrugged his shoulders in a dismissive way. He looked disconsolate too, as if heavily resigned to some sort of defeat which he had somehow deserved. Duncan said no more about it and looked either puzzled or uninterested. 

            He looked at his watch and said that he had to drive back to London, Graham felt he had lived through his moment that was special without it being that moment at all.  A sadness surprised him, but he left it aside. Duncan discussed the journey times. He hesitated and said, “Dad, I wanted to know how you feel.  That’s why I came down today.”  He hesitated, “I suppose I wanted to know if you find yourself thinking about what is happening - you know what I mean – with your illness.” 

Graham replied almost automatically, “It’s best not to think about these things.  I don’t want to worry Grace. You know.” He began again, in his pompous style, ‘We are all getting older. One could depress oneself if one let oneself think about it.”  Duncan waited for him to finish. Then he began making his farewells though they did not know if they would see each other again. They said goodbye as if there had never been an estrangement, and as if this was a regular weekly visit between father and son. He walked with Duncan slowly down the ward.  They were affable.  Graham felt relieved, embarrassed now by the thought of his self-revelation which thankfully had not materialised. It felt strangely like a release from a pressure in him to confess something to someone.

            He watched Duncan walk towards the stairs whilst he remained standing at the door of the ward. He felt so pleased and proud that his son had been to see him, his son a successful doctor in London.  As he turned away a peculiar dark colour spread across his mood like a filter removing part of the day’s light.  He did not know what this meant.  He tried to turn his thoughts to more sensible things.  He hoped he had advised Duncan best on the route back to London. Tomorrow, Grace would come in the afternoon.  There would be no need to buy a Sunday paper.

In the morning he crawled stiffly to the bathroom and washed and shaved slowly.  When he came back, he asked Nurse James what he could do to help.  It had become a routine in the morning to help with simple things so that the ward could get going early in the day.  Nurse James looked harassed.  He straightened the blankets with her like a child helping mother.  She thanked him as a mother would whose child is more trouble helping then if he was playing by himself.  She bustled off.  He returned to his bed.  It was Sunday. 

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

 “Bad mood this morning?” she chirped in a manner that was not a question but a dismissal. 

“Night was a bit disturbed.” He conceded. 

“Did you take your night sedation?” The flirty nurse asked. 

They were still waiting for the pathology tests.  The last one would be done today.  The doctor said he would come and do a marrow biopsy.  It meant boring into his hip bone.  He tried not to think about it.  He would be coming to the end of his stay. He felt a sort of glow.

The ward was quiet for a moment. Time was dragging. He slid off his bed again and sauntered along the ward looking for someone to have a word with.  One of them perked up a bit when he approached.  “The wife was saying last night she recognised you, Graham – from the dancing, isn’t it?” 

Graham nodded. “Well,” Graham began modestly, “we’ve been going for years.  It is good for you, keeps you fit.”  He did not mention the nostalgia he and Grace always felt for their youth when they had been so keen on dancing.  The times when they had been courting, in fact, they had met originally at a dance. The civil service rowing club had a Christmas dance way back.  He could not remember exactly whilst he was talking to this man. It must have been 1930, say. Graham was reticent about the memories.  “Times have changed.  Things are not he same”, he offered, wanly. The man went into a rush of eager details, and a wish to prolong the contact.  Graham felt imposed upon, a garrulous old man, he thought, and began to pull away.

            “Did you hear what happened in the night to Frank?  Frank, in the bed just here.”  The man gestured to the next bed.  Graham felt annoyed at being held on to, but also, he was curious in a fearful way.  If he had avoided talking about the past too much because he was afraid of being drawn into his own thoughts and feelings, he was also fascinated in a repelled sort of way about the future, and what might be happening to him – like the others here.  One day someone would look at the bed he had been sleeping. Until that moment when he wasn’t asleep. He couldn’t think, He knew the man was going to say something dreadful about what had happened to Frank in the night. 

Graham had not known Frank, but he knew he would be affected by anything that happened to any of them in his ward.  The man continued in detail.  “It must have been after midnight.  There was a bit of a commotion.  I hadn’t properly got to sleep.”  It came tumbling out.  “Frank looked blue.  He dropped his glass of water on the floor.  There wasn’t that much in it, because I had checked it for him before lights out.”  He seemed jittery as he spoke. Graham did not take any notice. He was waiting of an impending horror, looking at the now empty bed.  “I got hold of the alarm bell and pushed and pushed, because I thought – ‘This is it for Frank’.  The nurse came, the black girl, at the double.  I’ll give her her due.   She was here in a flash, took one look and rang for the trolley team.  She was back in an instant, and we got him flat on the bed and the curtains pulled around.  I held his wrist for her while she rushed off to the clinical room and came back with a trolley full of all the things they use.  I’m surprised you didn’t hear it.”

            Graham made a consoling nodding movement of his head; he knew it had been the sleeping pill.  And he had already anticipated the end of the story and supposed that Frank was dead. There was no stopping the flow of anxious talk that masqueraded as brave assistance to the nurse.  Graham was relieved that at that moment another man strolled up to them, to see what was being talked about in this tense way.  Graham looked up as if help had arrived in the nick of time.  The anxious old man was rattling on and Graham could now fade away, and slide off.  When he had heard enough to be sure of Frank’s final outcome, he extricated himself and left the other two to swap disaster stories.

            He remembered those dead men. They had never been found. There had been a suspicious incident in the Orkneys.  It was suspected that some enemy parachute troops had landed to keep an eye on the navy’s movements.  Six men from the office had been detailed to go up there to support the police investigation, but the plane had disappeared in a storm just off the coast. There had been a lot of speculation. It had prayed on his mind. There had been a quiet man who Graham had begun to feel friendly towards. They had been going together – until Graham’s flu.

            The plane was missing, and there was a strange silence for a day or so. People spoke in hushed tones.  The typewriters clacked away inhumanly.  They had all seemed to come together in spirit, like the coming together of a congregation at the communion service. Rose did most of his work, and she reported to him all the news that there was – very little – or rather she reported to him the lack of news.  After a couple of days, people began openly to talk of the death of their colleagues. They talked of the deaths in war in general.  Rose had lost her father in the First World War, when she had been a very little girl. They would sometimes go for drinks all together after that when the work finished for the day, and the duty office could be on call from the bar.  It was just one evening when most of the people were off for the weekend, and the duty officer had been called back that he and Rose found themselves together again. She had moved along the pub bench to him, “Let’s go down to look at the harbour,” she had said.  Then he too had wanted to get away from the tense atmosphere. It was no good thinking about these morbid things.  So, she had taken him to look at the harbour at night. Quickly he was compelled to excuse himelf.

 

…..ooooo00000ooooo…..

 

Eighteen months later, Graham died after a considerable period of great pain.  Rose who had not thought of him for many, many years knew nothing of that timid, blustering man the war had thrown across her path momentarily, who had brushed her arm with such an electric signal to both of them, and who had blushed every day thereafter when they had been in the office together on their own.  She knew nothing of the thoughts he had harboured and puzzled over down the years, the thoughts that had been rekindled by his son’s own unblushing passions.  She knew nothing of the unadmitted wistful longings that the frail glance of her skin against his had coloured his years in between.  She did not know that they had finally been snuffed out in the midst of pain, during which she had been most thought about.  And even if she had known, she would not have remembered that tiny moment that had seemed so natural to her and which had seemed so unnatural to him.  She never knew she had created that moment so that it had lasted in the darkness of his shame for so long.  She would have marvelled at the prolonged memory it had lived in him for so long like an exotic butterfly confined forever to its chrysalis. 

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