Practice Makes Perfect

About the only palatable thing left in the house was the brandy, and he poured both of them a stiff measure and pressed a glass into her hand, curling her stiff fingers around the bowl and urging it to her lips.

She coughed and tried to lower the glass, but he made her take another sip, and then took it from her and placed it on the table within reach. Picking up his own, he downed a hearty gulp and then set it down on the table with hers.

Finally he met her eyes, and the pain he saw there made him doubt all his preconceived ideas about her being a cold-hearted, gold-digging little bitch. She looked lost, afraid, and absolutely desolate, and he felt self-loathing rise up like bile to swamp him.

He knew he ought to apologise, but there weren’t any words he could think of that would make things better, so he stayed silent while she watched him.

Ater a moment she struggled upright and walked over to the rain-lashed window, staring out into the chilly night while she nursed her brandy.

‘How?’ she asked after a long while, and he didn’t pretend not to understand.

‘Cancer,’ he said succinctly. ‘He refused a gastrectomy last October. That’s when I took over the practice. But you know all that——’

She shook her head. ‘No. No, he told me nothing. I knew he hadn’t been well—he told me he had ulcers and that you had taken over just until he was better, but he didn’t say anything about giving up, or … or …’

‘Dying?’ Sam said quietly, and watched as a shudder ran through her delicate frame.

When she spoke her voice was a harsh whisper, a mere thread of sound against the beating of the rain on the glass.

‘When?’

Sam ran his hand wearily over his face. ‘Two weeks ago tomorrow—in the early hours of Saturday morning.’

She shifted restlessly for a moment and then was still again, as if she wanted to run away and was holding herself there by a superhuman effort. ‘Did—did he know?’

‘Oh, yes. I think he knew almost from the beginning. At first he might have thought he had ulcers, but I think he must have realised quite quickly that it was more serious. He went into hospital in October for a gastroscopy, which confirmed it, but he knew it was too late. His actual death was caused by pneumonia, but it was only a matter of days.’ Sam paused, then added gently, ‘He was ready to go.’

Lydia nodded. ‘Yes, I can imagine. He hated feeling ill.’ She swallowed. ‘Where was he?’

Sam closed his eyes, remembering. ‘Here, where he wanted to be. He had a private nurse, but I got a locum in to cover when I knew it was getting close, and I stayed with him then till the end.’

Thank you——’

There’s no need to thank me!’ Sam snapped, much too harshly, and then more gently, ‘I did it for him, to give him dignity, and peace. He was a good man, and I thought the world of him.’

Her shoulders stiffened as the pain knifed through her, and she turned back to him, her soft grey eyes like pools of mist in her grief.

‘I think I’d like to go to bed now,’ she said in a voice brittle with control, and headed towards the door at the top of the stairs which led through to the main house.

‘You can’t sleep in there,’ he told her, ‘the power’s off and the place will be damp and freezing. Have my bed. I’ll sleep here on the sofa.’

He thrust open the bedroom door and flicked on the light. The quilt was rumpled where he had sat on it to tie his shoes, and his dressing-gown was flung over the foot of the bed, but it looked soft and inviting. She nodded briefly.

‘I’ll bring your cases up—I put them in the surgery,’ he murmured, and left her to it.

Lydia sat down on the edge of the bed and stared blindly at her feet. She couldn’t believe that Gramps was gone, that she would never again hear his big, hearty laugh or feel the warmth of his arms around her. He had always been there for her, when everything else had failed her, when her father had gone off and left her and her mother alone, when the pain had become too much and her mother had taken her life—always, through it all, he had been there to catch her when she fell and kiss her better. And now …

She was dimly aware of Sam coming back into the room, of him helping her to her feet and easing off her mac, and then, when she still stood there, taking off her blouse and skirt as well, then pushing her gently down on to the bed and covering her with the quilt.

She was shaking, either from the cold or from shock, and he came back moments later with a hot water-bottle which he tucked into her arms. She thought he smoothed back the hair from her face, but she wasn’t sure because the touch was so light and she seemed disconnected from her body, as if it belonged to someone else.

Gradually her shudders died away and sleep claimed her exhausted mind.

Sam turned off the light, pulled the door to and gave the sofa a dirty look. Pulling pillows and blankets out of the cupboard on the landing, he undressed to his briefs and wrapped himself in the blankets, stretching out as well as he could on the inadequately short two-seater.

By the time he had eaten the stew had been dried up and the potato hard as iron. Hunger chewed at his insides and guilt tortured his conscience.

It had taken him all of ten seconds to realise that he had made a dreadful mistake, that, for all her faults, and he was sure she must be riddled with them, she was not a gold-digger and her distress at her grandfather’s death had been not only genuine but frighteningly deep.

He had been quite worried about her when he had come up with her luggage, but she seemed to be sleeping now. He would have to apologise in the morning for the way he had broken the news to her, but he really believed she should have had his letters, the first telling her to come home to her grandfather, the second informing her of the date of the funeral.

He shifted on to his back, propped his legs on the table and crossed his arms over his chest. She still should have been here! She should have realised that he was ill and needed her. Damn it, day after day the old man had asked for her! If Sam had only realised that she hadn’t known he would have sent for her sooner.

The moon broke through a hole in the clouds and tracked steadily across the sky, and Sam lay and watched it, and wondered why old Dr Moore hadn’t told Lydia that he was dying.

He woke suddenly when the room was still in darkness, and lay for a moment wondering what had disturbed him.

Then he heard it again, a thin, high moan, an animal keening that cut through him to the bone.

Untangling the blankets, he stumbled off the sofa and into the bedroom, but it was empty. The sound came again, and he followed it downstairs and into the surgery.

He found her, curled into a ball on the old leather armchair at the desk, with her arms wrapped tightly round a cushion, rocking gently back and forth while the terrible sound of grief was torn from her throat.

Her eyes were dry and sightless, and she ignored him as he lifted her from the chair and sat down with her cradled against the broad expanse of his chest. She was wearing his dressing-gown but still she was shivering, and he hadn’t taken the time to pull on any clothes, so he stretched out and turned on the electric heater. It could be a long night.

Then, holding her close, he rocked her, brushing the hair from her eyes and pressing his lips to her crown as if he could take away the pain.

He could feel the tension building in her, and then suddenly the dam burst and the tears came, accompanied by huge, racking sobs that gradually died away to leave her spent and weak against his shoulder. She slept then, relaxed into the curve of his arms, and he stayed where he was, holding her quietly, until the dawn lightened the sky.

Then she stirred and sat up, embarrassed and bewildered, and he smiled slightly and let her go.

‘I—I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you. I couldn’t sleep. I just felt…’ Her hands fluttered helplessly for a moment before she clamped them together, ‘I wanted to be near him.’

‘I know. Don’t apologise, I often feel the same. Would you like a cup of tea?’

She nodded. ‘Please. I think I’ll just wash my face—perhaps I’ll feel better then.’

He led the way upstairs, and while she cleaned up he put the kettle on and pulled on his jeans and a jumper, suddenly conscious of his scanty attire.

When she emerged from the bathroom, her face pink and scrubbed, her hair brushed and tied back in a pony-tail, and looking about seventeen, he was shocked to feel himself respond to her.

Technically speaking, she was a scrawny little thing for all her height, weighing next to nothing, her face too small for those ridiculously large eyes, her mouth full and soft and vulnerable, and yet he wanted her. His dressing-gown was wrapped tightly round her slim frame, the belt accentuating her tiny waist. He was sure he could span it with his fingers, and his palms tingled with the need to cup the soft jut of her breasts in his hands. She should have looked ridiculous, but there was something about her, her quiet dignity, the graceful way she moved those absurdly long legs as she walked towards him, that lifted her above criticism and made her beautiful. Sam felt the unbidden surge of desire, mingled dangerously with the urge to protect and nurture, and when their eyes met it was as if she saw right through him, and he felt ashamed.

Tea,’ he said economically, and thrust a mug into her hand, taking his and standing by the window.

She sat down among the tangled blankets and sighed.

‘I’m sorry you had to sleep on this; it can’t have been comfortable,’ she offered, and he shrugged.