She means it. Nancy has always had the measure of people.
A couple of years ago, a man called Cameron Tandy had been admitted to the ward Nancy worked on. He’d been recovering from a road traffic accident in which both his legs had been badly crushed. He’d told all the nurses he was an eminent barrister, defending the innocent and the good. He was a good-looking chap, with his chiselled jawbone and broad shoulders. The younger nurses swooned and Nancy could understand why.
But she had seen something else. Felt it, in fact. A strange sensation, whenever she was physically near Tandy, that literally caused the hairs on the back of her neck to stand up on end.
The next day, two detectives turned up at the hospital unannounced, demanding they be allowed to question him over the disappearance of an eight-year-old boy. Turned out Tandy had been struck off as a barrister four years earlier and now appeared as an entry on the child sex offender register.
Nancy had known Tandy was evil when everyone else had been fooled, just like she now knows that Joanne Deacon is not. Whatever the evidence is pointing to at the moment, Nancy is convinced that there’s more to it all.
Three years ago, Nancy tried to help little Evie Cotter when she’d been covered in wasp stings. Now she’s going to try and help her again.
Nobody knows if Evie is alive or dead, but Nancy feels strongly that, whichever one it is, the most important thing is to get her back to her mother.
And Joanne Deacon is the key. She is the only key they have.
64
Present Day
The Teacher
Harriet sits by the window, using her fingertips to lift the net away from the glass, just a touch. She doesn’t want anyone to know she’s here. Watching. She doesn’t want to draw any attention from any of the surrounding properties.
She has good reason.
The street is quiet today, and what a blessing that is. Late last night, Harriet had peered out of the window into the small front garden to find two drunken young men urinating on her hydrangea shrub. Once they’d had a little shake and put themselves away, they staggered off down the street, no doubt heading for one of the overcrowded bedsits at the bottom end.
It’s a relief to note there’s nothing much to see out there today.
Harriet glances down at her hand and watches as her fingers tremble, the movement transferring itself to the fine net curtain, setting it quivering.
It’s definitely getting worse, the shaking. And not only in her hands – sometimes her arms and legs begin to tremor, too. It’s most unsettling and can be altogether embarrassing, for example if she’s at the supermarket checkout or the post office counter.
She can’t bring herself to make an appointment with her GP though. Not with them all knowing what happened.
A figure appears at the gate and Harriet instinctively lets go of the net, allowing it to fall into its loose folds, no longer needing to be razor sharp and perfectly equidistant now that her mother is gone.
Part of her stiffens at the prospect of a visitor, but the other part of her sinks when she sees it is not. She shrinks back behind the curtain, though still upright and flexed in the armchair. A rattle at the door and then the thud of the newspaper hitting the mat allows her to relax again.
Harriet hasn’t ventured up to the top floor of the house for many weeks now. She can’t face it. She tried to be prepared and to do her best according to her mother’s instructions and it has all gone horribly wrong.
She blames herself. She should never have listened to her mother and allowed her to erode her innate feeling of what was right and decent. But of course she did, and now she is left with the consequences.
None of her mistakes can be reversed.
It’s easier to see things clearly now her mother has gone, although it’s far too late to redeem herself. She can’t put things right, can never turn back the clock. Her only option is to lock the room and stay out of it. Pretend the mistake never happened. Which is far easier said than done.
Harriet always thought she’d move out of the house when her mother passed, move to a smaller, newer property – perhaps one of those eco houses on the other side of the river.
All hopes of that crumbled when her mother’s plans failed. She can’t move forward, can’t go back. Harriet is trapped. Trapped by the grisly contents of the locked room on the third floor.
65
Present Day
The Nurse
A number of years back, Nancy read a couple of fascinating medical academic articles detailing a procedure whereby a paralysed patient, unable to move apart from a single blinking action, could begin to communicate with medical staff via the use of a letter board.
Nancy can’t ask whether the hospital owns such a letter board, for fear of drawing attention to herself. She can’t discuss her idea with any of the doctors either, because they’re all convinced that Joanne Deacon is brain dead and it suits Nancy for their opinion to remain as such, just for a couple more days.
Firstly, Nancy needs time to coax Jo into relearning the action of blinking so that she can perform it at will. Nancy had witnessed that single blink and this is proof enough that Jo has the capability to repeat the action.
When she gets home after her shift, Nancy feeds Samson, makes herself two slices of buttered toast and a coffee and sits down with her laptop. Samson purrs and rubs against the bottom of her legs. She reaches down and scratches his ears, his warmth and loyal affection slowly easing the tension of the day from her bones.
‘Sorry, buddy, you’ll have to wait for your fuss tonight,’ she says regretfully, booting up the laptop.
She googles ‘letter boards’ and finds a simple and suitable idea that will serve her purpose – at least to begin with.
She has brought home a small sheet of white card she found on the ward desk and now she proceeds to draw a clear, neat grid with the use of a black marker pen and a ruler.
Row 1: A E I O U Y
Row 2: B C D F G H J
Row 3: K L M N P Q R
Row 4: S T V W X Z
She holds the grid at arm’s length and studies it.
This is it for now.
This is all she can do.
* * *
The next day, when she gets up to the ward, DI Manvers and two uniformed officers are already in Jo Deacon’s room. She hovers outside the door.
‘Dr Chance is in there with them,’ another nurse tells her, with only mild interest. ‘They want to question a patient in a vegetative state, how crazy is that?’
‘I suppose they have to at least try,’ Nancy says. ‘There’s a lot at stake.’
‘Well, in my opinion, the sooner they turn her off the better,’ her colleague whispers. ‘As far as I’m concerned, that so-called woman in there is a waste of a good respirator.’
Presently, the door opens and the officers come out. Nancy nods to them and stands aside.
‘Regretfully, there’s very little prospect of anything changing,’ Dr Chance explains. ‘It’s more a case of how long we leave things the way we are.’
‘Do keep us informed.’ DI Manvers shakes his hand. ‘We’ll try and track her sister down, as you suggested.’
‘She only came to visit once, as far as I’m aware,’ Dr Chance replies. ‘There must have been some kind of mix-up when her details were taken. We’ve been unable to contact her since.’
They walk away down the corridor and Nancy slips into Jo’s room.
‘It’s just me,’ she says, closing the door softly behind her. ‘It’s Nancy.’
She walks over to the bed and leans over Jo Deacon’s face.