The Lifeline Page 3

  Lawrence Deacon dragged another pot towards him. ‘Bit of an odd cove, isn’t he?’

  ‘Jacob’s a very good gardener.’

  ‘Unlike myself. Dr Harvey thinks this sort of thing will speed up my recovery. I hope he’s right.’

  ‘I’m sure he is. Gardening can be very therapeutic. I can speak from experience.’

  ‘I’ve never done any before and, to tell you the truth, I can’t say I’m enjoying it much, but at least it’s better than watching daytime television. Have you ever done that, Colonel?’

  ‘No, never.’

  ‘It’s a fate worse than death.’

  The Colonel remembered visiting an old people’s home and seeing the inmates all fast asleep in front of a blaring television set.

  ‘I know what you mean.’

  ‘What made you start gardening, Colonel?’

  ‘Buying a cottage with a jungle attached. Something had to be done.’

  ‘Are you married?’

  ‘My wife died some years ago.’

  ‘Sorry to hear that. Is that why you moved to Frog End?’

  ‘One of the reasons.’

  ‘My wife, Claudia, is thirteen years my junior and will certainly outlive me. It’s better that way round, in my opinion.’

  ‘I agree.’

  ‘Us men aren’t supposed to be much good at coping alone, are we? Women seem to manage better. Claudia runs a gift shop in Dorchester and I’ve been finding it hard to get through the days on my own without her. We don’t need the money but she seems to need the shop, though I don’t understand why.’

  ‘Do you have any children?’

  ‘We had one son but we lost him when he was a teenager. Otherwise, life might have been very different.’

  It was the Colonel’s turn to express sympathy at what had to be every parent’s worst nightmare.

  Lawrence Deacon crooked his right arm round another pot to shift it closer.

  ‘We don’t talk about him any more. Haven’t for years. Claudia has her shop and I used to have my work. Now, I seem to have nothing. There’s not much point in looking forward and none at all in looking back.’

  ‘I think you’ll find that gardening can help in all sorts of ways.’

  ‘Did it help you get over the loss of your wife?’

  ‘It made it easier to live.’

  ‘I haven’t lost my wife yet. But I’m wondering how long she’ll stay.’

  The Colonel watched another cutting make the trip, shakily but successfully, before he left to walk home. He doubted if anything he had said to Lawrence Deacon had done any good. The man seemed embittered by the hand he had been dealt in life – the death of his young son, his stroke, and the evidently shaky relationship with his wife. It was unlikely that he would find much comfort from re-potting rosemary cuttings.

  As he let himself into Pond Cottage, he could hear the phone ringing. When he picked up the receiver in the sitting room he heard his daughter-in-law’s voice at the other end of the line. She always spoke loudly as though he were rather deaf.

  ‘Hallo, Father. How are you?’

  He had tried, but failed, for several years to get her to call him Hugh.

  ‘Fine, thank you. How are you, Susan?’

  ‘Oh, we’ve all had dreadful colds and Edith’s has gone to her chest. It’s been quite worrying. The new doctor refuses to give her an antibiotic.’

  ‘I don’t think they like to use them too often.’

  ‘Well, as I said to him, Edith is very delicate. Eric was just the same at that age. His lungs were very susceptible. Fortunately, he seems to be growing out of it, though you can’t be too careful with children, can you?’

  ‘No, indeed.’

  There was a happy medium, he supposed, between caring too much and not caring enough, between being over-protective and being neglectful. Hard for any mother to gauge, though he thought that Laura had always got it right. Susan’s next question was one that he always dreaded.

  ‘When are you coming to see us, Father?’

  He was ashamed that he went so rarely. He found the highly polished and pin neat house in Norwich depressing. Susan’s health-conscious vegetarian meals verged on the inedible and the lack of alcohol in any form, let alone whisky, was a severe trial.

  He said, ‘I was hoping you might all come and stay here with me. The cottage is quite civilized now.’

  ‘Not with Edith’s chest, Father. I couldn’t take the risk. We do worry about you on your own, you know. It would be so much better if you were nearer us.’

  He said mildly, ‘I’m not on my own. I live in a village with people monitoring my every move.’

  ‘But they’re not your kith and kin, are they? It’s not the same thing at all.’

  He knew what was coming next. His daughter-in-law launched into the attack.

  ‘I happened to hear yesterday of another bungalow near us that’s just about to come on the market. All in apple-pie order. No horrid stairs, of course. Gas-fired central heating. Two good-sized bedrooms. Modern bathroom and kitchen. Double glazing to windows. Small, easy-care, paved garden.’

  The estate agent’s details were obviously close to hand. He waited.

  ‘It would suit you down to the ground, Father. You could view it when you come to stay. It’s only round the corner.’

  The battle of the bungalows had been going on for some time. He had countered every ploy of Susan’s to lure him into buying one in Norwich and abandoning Pond Cottage, which she considered unsafe and unsuitable for someone of his advanced and decrepit age. He knew that she acted from the best of motives but it had to be stopped.

  He said gently but firmly, ‘I appreciate your concern, Susan, but there’s no need for you to worry about me. I like living in Frog End and, as I’ve mentioned before, I very much dislike bungalows.’

  ‘There are no stairs.’

  ‘I’m aware of that but stairs provide useful exercise. It’s good to have them.’

  ‘Oh, well, in that case …’

  She wouldn’t give up, he knew, and time was probably on her side. Instead, she altered course.

  ‘Are you eating properly?’

  ‘Yes, very well.’

  ‘And taking those vitamin pills I told you about?’

  He lied without hesitation. ‘Of course.’

  ‘It’s very important to take good care of yourself.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘I read an article in the paper saying that Vitamin B is very good for arthritis.’

  ‘Fortunately, I don’t have arthritis.’

  ‘A lot of people your age do, Father. It can happen.’

  ‘Yes, I know.’

  Pages rustled purposefully.

  ‘I’m just looking at my diary. The best time for you to come and stay with us would be after the summer term ends, otherwise you wouldn’t see much of Eric now that he’s at school all day.’

  ‘How about a weekend before? I could take him out somewhere.’

  He had been planning to take his grandson to one of the old wartime bomber airfields in Norfolk ever since their visit to the Bovington Tank Museum near Frog End had proved so successful. Some of the old runways, control towers and buildings still survived, he knew, and they could have a happy time driving round abandoned perimeter tracks and exploring together. Perhaps even roaring down a potholed runway, pretending to be taking off on a bombing raid. Susan, however, was most unlikely to approve of the idea and the trick would be to slip the leash with Eric on some false pretext. The male bond forged between them among the Bovington tanks would ensure secrecy.

  ‘Not in term time, I’d afraid, Father. He gets much too tired. I have to make sure he gets plenty of rest at weekends.’

  ‘I’ll come in the holidays, then.’

  ‘That would be best. I’ll think of something nice for us all to do together. We could go to the seaside, perhaps, if the weather’s warm enough.’

  Sadly, the bomber airfields might have to wait.
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  He said heartily, ‘That sounds like a very good idea.’

  The conversation petered out. He replaced the receiver, regretting that his relationship with his well-meaning daughter-in-law was not closer. Laura would have handled things so much better.

  Thursday was curled up asleep at the end of the sofa – the end nearest the fireplace, and his place for most of the winter. Now that it was spring, he would probably take a walk in the garden when he woke up. Nothing strenuous. A quiet stroll to survey his territory and check for any unwelcome intruders, with a lengthy pause at the pond to watch the six goldfish who had grown considerably in size since the Colonel had rescued them from a very small glass bowl in a pet shop. He fed them twice a day and they always swam up close to the pond edge. At the last count there had still been six, but they were growing tamer and bolder than was wise for their health and safety, given Thursday’s interest.

  The challenge of providing a tempting alternative evening meal for the cat lay ahead and it was nowhere as easy as feeding the goldfish. The ritual seldom varied. Whatever the Colonel had bought with high hopes to match the high prices, the old cat would approach his dish with extreme caution and suspicious sniffs. If the Colonel were lucky, he would take a tentative nibble and then settle down to eat; otherwise he would simply walk away. It was anybody’s guess how Thursday had acquired his expensive and picky tastes, given his previously precarious existence.

  By contrast, the Colonel’s own diet was simplicity itself. Naomi had given him easy recipes and he had progressed from not knowing how to boil an egg to converting a few raw ingredients into a passable meal. But he had no real interest in cooking for himself. Naomi’s herbs were a nice and kind thought but were likely to remain purely decorative.

  TWO

  ‘How’s he doing?’

  Ruth said, ‘Not too badly. He’s not really very interested but he gets on with things. It was a good idea of yours, Tom. I just hope it works out for him.’

  She doubted that most GPs would take anything like the trouble that Tom took with his patients. He gave them far more than the customary hurried ten minutes. He looked at them rather than at the computer screen; he listened to them and he asked the questions that counted. Apparently, it was often the things that people didn’t say that were the most important – the vital bits they left out, let alone the lies they told. The biggest lie was usually about how much they drank. Tom often doubled the amount, sometimes even more, depending on his reading of the patient. He’d learned to judge people very quickly, he said. From the first time they walked into his consulting room, and often before they’d uttered a single word, he knew whether they would tell him lies or the truth. He needed the truth but the lies were understandable. They were born of pride, or shame, or fear. Whatever the reason, the truth had to be coaxed out somehow, if he was to help.

  ‘Lawrence Deacon was giving up, Ruth. Life can get too much for some people – too lonely, too difficult, too sad, too much of a struggle. It comes down to the same thing – they decide they don’t want to go on any longer. The only cure is to discover something that gives them a reason to get out of bed in the morning. Gardening can be a very good reason, can’t it? You found that out yourself. Nature can be a wonderful healer.’

  It was true that after her mother had died so horribly and everything had been so grim, the gardens of her childhood home had miraculously granted her a new lease of life. While she had been away working in London, she had never given them a thought, until she had gone home to care for Mama and noticed how sadly neglected they had become. She had decided to do something about it and the impulse had grown into a passion that had taken over and changed her perspective. She had been able to think more clearly and more objectively. She’d seen what a fool she’d been to waste all those years with a married man who had never had any intention of leaving his wife, and she’d seen what an idiot she’d been not to have appreciated Tom. Luckily, he’d stayed around until she’d finally had the sense to agree to marry him.

  She said, ‘Well, I’ve told Lawrence he’s only to do as much as he feels like and to stop and go home whenever he wants. I’ll keep an eye on him, Tom.’

  He put his hands on her shoulders. ‘Thank you, Ruth.’

  ‘I’m glad to help. But oughtn’t I to pay him?’

  ‘I think that would be a mistake. He might feel obliged to do more than he should or needs to. Let it be strictly voluntary.’

  She hesitated. ‘The only problem might be Jacob.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Well, you know what he’s like. Wary of strangers. He won’t go near Lawrence, let alone speak to him. I think he’s got it into his head that he might be after his job – that he’s a threat of some kind. I’ve tried to explain things, but he doesn’t listen.’

  ‘He’ll settle down once he gets used to him.’

  ‘I hope so.’

  Poor Jacob. Life hadn’t treated him kindly. Police investigations into Mama’s murder had revealed that he had been abandoned as a baby on the doorstep of a children’s home in a cardboard box that had once held packets of Jacob’s Cream Crackers – hence his first name. The word Crackers was unfortunate. Tom thought he had probably suffered brain damage at birth as well as emotional trauma. He had spent time in a hospital mental ward and more time wandering homeless, until he had somehow ended up like a lost soul at the Manor. Ruth had offered him a job in the gardens and a place to live in the old stable block. He trusted her, in as much as he trusted anybody, and she felt responsible for him. Mama, of course, had hated his strange ways and wanted to sack him but Ruth had let him stay on. The fact was that now she couldn’t manage without him.

  Tom said, ‘I’ve got another patient who could do with some gardening therapy as well. Do you think you could cope with a second one?’

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Her name’s Joyce Reed.’

  ‘I don’t think I know her.’

  ‘She’s new to Frog End. She and her husband have bought Lois Delaney’s old flat at the Hall. She needs some company.’

  ‘How about her husband?’

  ‘She’s a golf widow. He’s never there.’

  ‘I can’t do very much about that, can I?’

  ‘In a way you could. I’m hoping you might be able to take her off my hands occasionally. She’s in the surgery almost every day.’

  It wasn’t at all unusual, she knew, for women of a certain age to fall in love with their doctors, especially if they were doctors like Tom. It had happened several times and it was tricky for him to deal with tactfully but firmly.

  She said, ‘I don’t think gardening will put her off, Tom.’

  ‘I’m not the problem. She’s compensating for her golf widowhood by imagining she’s ill. Symptoms galore and every test under the sun. A GP’s nightmare. There’s nothing physically wrong, but she’s not satisfied. She needs something else to think about. Something to do.’

  ‘She might hate gardening.’

  ‘I haven’t even suggested it to her yet. I wanted to sound you out first. It’s a lot to ask, I know, Ruth. You’ve got more than enough on your plate.’

  ‘She’d probably think her doctor’s wife was looking for cheap labour.’

  ‘Yes, she might, but it’s worth the risk.’

  ‘You need someone else to talk to her about it, Tom. Somebody completely objective.’

  ‘Any ideas?’

  Sitting in his living-room armchair at Shangri-La, The Times newspaper held aloft, Major Cuthbertson was wondering whether he could risk a quick one before lunch was ready. Marjorie was still banging away with pots and pans in the kitchen, concocting one of her new recipes, and he could never be quite sure how long it would take. The only certainty was that it would be almost inedible. In the good old days, serving overseas, when they’d had cooks and servants a-plenty, he’d looked forward to meals and enjoyed his food, but those times were gone. Apart from the fact that the old girl couldn’t cook for toffee, his teeth wer
e no longer up to the challenge of some of the unidentifiable things that cropped up on his plate. And, whereas in the past there had always been an encouraging tincture or two beforehand, served deferentially from a tray, Marjorie had recently decreed an embargo on lunchtime drinks. He was now expected to do without. No alcohol should cross his lips until the clock on the mantelpiece – bequeathed to them, deliberately he suspected, by his late mother-in-law to spite him from her grave – had chimed its six silly chimes in the evening.

  He shook his newspaper till it crackled and turned another page. Yet another name from the past had dropped off the perch. Old Dusty Coleman, it seemed, was no more. They’d written some nice things about him and his medal but, if he remembered correctly, he’d actually been a bit of a bastard. Still, it wasn’t done to speak ill of the dead. And they were always ‘sadly missed’, even if everyone was delighted to see the back of them.

  He listened for the clatter of plates which would herald the serving of lunch, but pots and pans were still being banged around on the stove. If he was quick, he might manage one, and quick he had learned to be. He crossed the living room to the cocktail cabinet standing in the corner, lifted the lid and removed bottle and glass in a lightning movement that would have done credit to a fully paid-up member of the Magic Circle. The cabinet, which had been presented to him by the regiment on his retirement, played ‘Drink to Me Only with Thine Eyes’ loudly whenever the lid was opened but he had cut it off in mid-bar. He poured a hefty tot of Teachers – no need to bother with the soda – and replaced the bottle with scarcely another note being played.

  The Major sat down in his chair again and raised the glass. Amazing how the stuff warmed the cockles and stiffened the sinews in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. He had read somewhere that whisky was called the old man’s friend, and a damned good friend it was too. Never let you down, unlike some things and some people. He drained the glass, hid it behind his chair and picked up his paper, turning to the cricketing columns. Life was looking a whole lot better.

  Lunch, when it was finally ready, turned out to be surprisingly eatable. Some kind of minced-up meat and he thought he could taste an onion.