Secrets to Keep

CHAPTER SEVEN





Aidy did sleep well that night. As soon as her head touched the pillow she was cast into oblivion as quick as a gas light being doused. If her mind hadn’t been filled to capacity by other matters, she would have had room to realise that her restful sleep was all thanks to her grandmother secretly adding a generous measure of one of her sleeping potions into the drink she had made them both before they retired.

She woke the next morning an hour earlier than she normally would have, at five instead of six, as though her subconscious was telling her it wasn’t just herself she had to get ready for the off now, but her siblings too. It wasn’t fair to leave that task to her aged grandmother. The fact that she awoke in her mother’s bed was an instant reminder of Jessie’s death, and on top of that grief Aidy was stricken anew by the memory of what had happened with Arch.

The near-physical pain of it all made her want to do nothing more than go back to sleep, shut it all out, and pray that when she awoke it would all have been just a terrible dream. She couldn’t do that, though. People she loved needed her.

Mindful of not disturbing her grandmother, Aidy carefully eased aside the bedcovers and slipped out of bed. It wasn’t until she was pulling on her underslip over her knickers and brassiere that she spotted Bertha’s side of the bed was empty. A frown settled on her face. She had obviously had a restless night and Bertha had sought the refuge of the sofa so that she could sleep.

Washed and dressed now, Aidy made her way down the stairs. As she neared the bottom, she was surprised to hear sounds of life. Someone was up and about. Arriving in the back room, she saw that the range was lit, a pan of bubbling porridge sitting on one of the plates, and the person responsible for saving her all this trouble, in the process of setting the table.

On spotting Aidy, Bertha beckoned her over. ‘Morning, love. Sit yerself down and I’ll mash you a fresh cuppa. I wasn’t expecting you up for another hour at least.’

She did as she was bidden, responding, ‘I wasn’t expecting to see you up and about, Gran.’ Then in an apologetic tone she added, ‘I’m so sorry my tossing and turning disturbed you.’

Having put dishes and cutlery down on the table, Bertha bustled over to the range to give the thick creamy porridge a stir. ‘It didn’t, me duck. You slept like a log, didn’t move all night.’

‘So why are you up at this time? I have to be, but you don’t.’

Bertha turned to face Aidy, her face set firm. ‘I was up and about before, helping yer mother see the kids off to school and her off to work, and I’ll do the same for you. And I’ll still be doing what I can around the house, same as I did for Jessie. Porridge won’t be much longer. While yer eating it, I’ll rouse the kids.’

Aidy smiled warmly back at her. The worrying prospect of how she was going to manage moneywise without Arch’s help was daunting, but how could she have assumed that all that went into running the house and looking after the occupants, making sure they were clean and fed, would be entirely hers to bear, too, when she had a grandmother of the special type she did? The kids would do what they were capable of also, she had no doubt of that.

‘Thanks, Gran,’ Aidy said softly.

On arriving down for their breakfast, the children all tentatively poked their heads around the doorway that led into the back room from the stairs. It was apparent they were checking that between the time they had gone to bed and now, there had not been a change of heart and Pat and Jim Nelson had after all moved in to take over their care. The relieved expressions on all their faces were very apparent. They were far from their normal lively selves, though, very subdued in fact, doing what was asked of them without any quibbles, obviously all still very much grieving the loss of their mother.

Mid-morning, as she was bent over her machine amongst fifty machinists, all labouring away in a large, windowless, dust-filled room, the booming voice of the department’s forewoman cut into Aidy’s thoughts.

‘There’s approaching two million unemployed in this country at the moment, Mrs Nelson, so getting a replacement for you won’t be any trouble. Now, I appreciate you lost your mother only days ago, but the boss doesn’t care about that. What he does care about is getting orders out, which we aren’t going to do with the amount of time you are taking to sew a sleeve into one dress! Two minutes forty-five seconds is the allotted time. You’ve been on that one fifteen, to my certain knowledge.’

Despite fighting hard to concentrate on her work, Aidy’s thoughts seemed always to be straying. She couldn’t stay focused on what she was doing. Coping with her emotions was proving hard, but rising above her pain was worry about just how she was going to keep a roof over her family’s heads, and them fed, clothed and warm, on only her wage and the little bit her grandmother made. Looking fearfully up at her superviser, she gulped. Somehow she had to stop her personal problems from interfering with her work. Because if she lost this job …

She blustered to her forewoman, ‘It’s the material, Mrs Hardwick. It … er … keeps slipping. And this new batch of cotton keeps breaking, so I have to keep stopping to re-thread my machine.’

Imelda Hardwick was the no-nonsense sort of forewoman. She had to be to keep harmony and production flowing between the fifty seamstresses, ten juniors and three runabouts under her charge, all with different characters ranging from the sweet and innocent to the hard-nosed types who’d sooner lash out via verbal abuse or with their fists than calmly talk over any issues they might have with another workmate. Having started in the factory herself on first leaving school, and progressing through sheer hard work and determination to better herself, Imelda had been in her present position approaching sixteen years and meant to keep her job until she had to retire. She would not allow anyone to jeopardise that for her.

She knew every trick in the book to defend bad workmanship, had heard every excuse to justify lateness, reasons for absence, causes for finishing early or attempts to cover any manner of other misdemeanours during working hours. The excuse Aidy Nelson had just given to justify her own slackness was a well-used one that would probably appease more gullible types of forewoman, not Imelda. But despite her formidable reputation amongst her workers, that only the most brave ever dare challenge, and to their own cost, Imelda did have a compassionate streak that would surface occasionally with those she felt deserving of it.

She had been landed with numerous school leavers over the years. She’d had to keep a beady eye on them, to judge their level of ability then use her own initiative in deciding what job in the factory these individuals were best suited for. Some were not cut out for factory work at all and were dismissed to try their luck in another profession, but others displayed real promise. Aidy was one of those. From the off, she had shown she was a strong character, never allowing the older stalwarts to use or abuse or get the better of her, and Imelda had admired that quality in her. Aidy was not a natural at any job she had been given, but had been eager to learn. Imelda was to discover that drive in her continually to improve her position was fuelled by a desire to help her deserted mother and to care for her siblings. Imelda admired that quality in her too.

In all the years Aidy had worked under her, she had never before given Imelda any reason to reprimand her for trying to pass off shoddy work, a bad attitude or timekeeping. This current lapse was obviously due to grief at the death of her mother. Imelda had lost her own a couple of years back, and although mother and daughter hadn’t been what could be classed as devoted, nevertheless she had been fond of her and the passing had taken her quite a while to come to terms with. Aidy had only lost her mother four days ago. Judging by the strain on her face and her subdued demeanour, she was suffering deeply. Imelda felt entitled to stretch the rigid factory rules and go gently on her this time.

Leaning over to whisper in Aidy’s ear so none of the other girls could overhear … not that it was likely over the loud buzz of fifty sewing machines plus the chattering of the workers … she said to Aidy, ‘With a headache as bad as you’ve got, I’m telling you to take the rest of the day off. Take tomorrow too if you need it, but I want you back in here Friday morning and I’ll be expecting what I normally get from you and no less.’

Aidy stared at her for a moment, digesting what her superior was telling her. When she finally did, she blurted, ‘Oh, I really appreciate that, Mrs Hardwick, you don’t know how much I do, but I’ve already lost three days’ pay from being off dealing with my mam’s death. I can’t afford to lose any more. I’ll buck my ideas up, really I will.’

Imelda looked thoughtfully at her. Of course Aidy needed every penny of her wage packet, like every other woman who worked in this factory, and the loss of even one penny of it could make a big difference. A penny short for the rent was a penny in arrears. A penny short of the cost of a bone for soup meant no nutritious broth for their evening meal that night. A penny short to make up a shilling for the gas meant they sat in the dark. A penny short for a bag of coal meant they went cold. She told Aidy, in a low voice, ‘I’ll see your pay packet isn’t short, in the circumstances.’

She saw the quizzical look that Aidy gave her, knew she was wondering how her forewoman could manage to get the wages manager to sanction payment for work she hadn’t done. Imelda wasn’t about to divulge to her that worksheets were often lost by slipshod junior clerks en route from the factory floor, and figures were often redone from the forewoman’s say so. There were always discrepancies in the output of garments too, with articles mislaid or pilfered, so if the output and hours didn’t quite match, for someone in Imelda’s position it was easy to write off any discrepancy.

‘Go, before I change my mind,’ she ordered her charge.

Bertha was busy washing and drying small brown bottles in readiness for filling with a new batch of one of the potions she was in the process of brewing. An eye-wateringly pungent smell was filling the kitchen, originating from a large blackened pan of simmering nettles and dock leaves and other peculiar-looking ingredients.

Bertha’s interest in natural remedies had been sparked as a young girl by an old friend of her grandmother’s. The old woman had lived in a ruin of a cottage surrounded by fields and woods a couple of miles out of town. How her grandmother had become friends with the wizened old creature in the first place would always remain a mystery to Bertha, but she would periodically pack a basket with home-made food and, taking her granddaughter along for company, set off on the two-hour journey to visit her.

The inside of that cottage was a source of wonderment to young Bertha. The low-beamed ceiling was lined with hooks from which hung bunches of wild flowers and vegetation in varying stages of drying out. Rows of shelves on the old wattle walls were crammed with bottles and jars containing ready-prepared potions and ointments. A basket of strangelooking fungi stood by the hearth. A rickety table at the back of the room was where the old crone made up her concoctions from a tattered if meticulously detailed recipe book, using a pestle and mortar and a set of weighing scales. The cooking up of her potions was done in a cauldron-like pot hanging from a hook over the fire. Bertha’s grandmother always returned home from these visits with her basket filled with an assortment of potions, ointments and pastes which she’d use to help ease, or hopefully cure, the ailments suffered by herself, her family and close friends.

How the old lady went about making her potions and what went into them fascinated the young Bertha. On one visit, forgetting her manners, she bluntly asked the old lady. Delighted that a youngster was interested in her pastime, she happily answered her questions, and from then on during each visit would enlighten Bertha further on the healing and soothing properties of different plants, flowers and fruits, and how she used each one or combined it with others, with a pinch of this or that, to make up cures which covered just about every ailment. She wasn’t, though, just an authority on the beneficial properties of what Mother Nature produced, but also on everyday products found in household pantries, which could also be used in the making up of healing and soothing concoctions.

It was with great sadness that on one visit Bertha and her grandmother arrived tired from their long journey to find the cottage deserted. On enquiring after the old lady’s whereabouts with her nearest neighbour, they learned that she had died in her sleep a few weeks before. Much to Bertha’s shock, though, the neighbour had been keeping for her a sealed box with her name scrawled on it in the old lady’s spidery handwriting. Curiously opening it up, she found inside the recipe book, pestle, mortar and scales.

Even at that tender age, Bertha was very touched by the old dear’s bequest to her and determined to put it to good use. The recipe book became her favourite bedtime reading and, as soon as she was allowed to go out alone, she would roam the countryside gathering her ingredients. She set up what she called her ‘potion room’ in her grandmother’s outhouse, cooking up her ingredients in a battered old cauldron on an antiquated oil stove begged from her grandfather. It took her many failed attempts to perfect each concoction, using her long-suffering family as stooges. They all lost count of the number of rashes and sores they endured from her mistakes. But her perseverance finally paid off and soon word of her successes began to spread around the neighbourhood. People began calling in, requesting her to help ease their complaints.

When she was young, the locals labelled her ‘the potion gel’. When Bertha married it was changed to ‘the young wife’. Now she was reaching the end of her life, she was known as ‘the old woman’.

For years her charges for these remedies had just covered her outlay in producing them, as she was content to be helping others, but on her husband’s retirement and with their savings gone to help their daughter through her own difficult time, Bertha had no choice but to up her charges to make herself a little profit. These days one or more of her young grandchildren would accompany her on country expeditions, to help her gather and carry back her ingredients which were then hung to dry in the outhouse. But the preparing and cooking up was done now in the more hospitable environment of the kitchen when all the family were out, either at school or at work. Bertha could have taken the easier option and bought all her requirements from a herbalist in town, but she refused to pay what she perceived were their extortionate charges and as a result have to put up the cost of her finished products.

To her dismay, though, and despite her trying to encourage them, none of her family, including her daughter, showed the slightest interest in what she did. It was her sad conclusion that, when her time came to meet her maker, her knowledge would die with her too and the old lady’s treasured recipe book lie gathering dust on a shelf.

At her unexpected return home, Bertha shot Aidy a worried look and demanded, ‘What’s happened? Why are you back at this time?’

Aidy explained to her.

When she had, Bertha smiled. With the likes of Pat Nelson in mind, she said, ‘So there are some nice people in the world after all. Cuppa?’

On being awarded some unexpected time off by her benevolent fore woman, Aidy had decided not to waste a minute of it. The first thing she ought to do was sit down with a piece of paper and a pencil and work out the family budget from now on. She knew it was going to be tight, but it was how tight that worried her. Still, her mother had managed to keep them all on what she earned, which was less than Aidy did, so she was determined to manage.

On first walking through the back door, she had almost keeled over at the smell that met her. If it was true what her grandmother was always telling her, that the worse her remedies stank the better they were for you, then in this case whatever she was cooking up would instantly destroy the most virulent disease known to man.

Anyway, Aidy couldn’t stay here while this smell was as strong as it was. She needed to pay a visit to her marital home, to collect the rest of her belongings. A surge of sorrow swamped her then. It was something she was not looking forward to. She had been so happy in that house, under the impression that she and Arch would eventually raise their children and grow old together there, and that wasn’t going to be now. But she knew that to dwell on what might have been would only make her more miserable than she already was, if that were possible. She needed to get this visit over with and start looking ahead.

Hopefully, though, by the time she returned with her belongings, whatever her grandmother was cooking up would be done and the stench from it gone.

She told Bertha, ‘I’ll have a cuppa later, thanks, Gran. I need to go …’ she was about to say ‘home’ but the house she had shared with Arch was no longer that, ‘… back to my old house and collect the rest of my stuff.’

Bertha looked at her for a moment. Going back to the home she had shared with Arch and been so happy in was going to prove very difficult for Aidy. She offered, ‘My brew needs to simmer a while yet, so would you like company?’

Aidy smiled fondly at her. ‘Yes, I’d like that, Gran.’

Meanwhile, hands on her wide hips, Pat was surveying the contents of Aidy’s well-stocked pantry. No reason for her to be putting her hand in her own pocket to feed herself and that lazy good-for-nothing she was saddled with. He currently lay sprawled in the armchair by the fireplace, having a doze before he made a strenuous effort to get himself off down the pub for the lunchtime session while she was in that stinking hole of a public toilet, earning the money to pay their way. Never mind, at least she had all this food at her disposal. She should have been on her way to work right now. Her delay was down to the fact that she just couldn’t bring herself to shift her huge body out of the comfortable bed she had slept in last night.

Compared to her own ancient mattress, her son and daughter-in-law’s wooden-framed bed had been like sleeping on a cloud. Pat didn’t feel any shame that after she’d insisted Arch should give up his own bed to his parents, and not yet having found the funds to buy a bed for the spare room, he’d been forced to spend an uncomfortable night on the lumpy sofa.

Having decided on a tin of stew to go with some mashed potatoes and tinned peas, she plodded back into the kitchen. The set of gleaming pans displayed on a shelf on the wall caught her eye. They weren’t new when bought from a junk shop by Arch and Aidy, but were in a damned sight better condition than Pat’s old battered, blackened and leaky lot that had been at least third-hand when she’d been given them on her marriage. She’d had to make do with them since, never having had the money to replace them.

She then glanced around and a surge of pure jealousy ran through her. Like they would at the Greenwood house, the better-off residents of this city would no doubt turn their noses up at this house, with its damp patches, cracked ceilings, patched up, rotting windowframes and white-washed brick walls; but compared to the almost derelict hovel she’d just moved out of, situated in a narrow alley between two factories whose chimneys constantly belched out thick clouds of black smoke, to Pat this place was a palace. Her daughter-in-law had the house and everything in it that she herself had always dreamed of having – before, that was, she had realised she was never going to get them through her own poor choice of husband. And now her spoiled daughter-in-law was throwing all her son’s hard work in achieving this back in his face. She had returned to her former home to care for her family, selfishly expecting Arch to go along with it all.

A disagreeable pout disfigured Pat’s already ugly face. After Aidy’s reaction yesterday, Pat was well aware that her own chances of moving into the Greenwood house were very slim. She could intimidate and bully most people, but much to her chagrin Aidy had proved immune to her threats. Aidy wasn’t stupid. She had known from the off what Pat’s real aim was. Damn the woman! Why had Arch had to choose a woman like her and not a little mouse like her two other sons had chosen? If he had, Pat would have been well and truly established in her dream home by now.

Then suddenly an idea struck her and a gleam lit her piggy eyes. Maybe her hopes of bettering herself were not all lost. She might have lost out on the Greenwood house, but why shouldn’t she have this one instead? It might be smaller, two-bedroomed against three, but like the Greenwood house it was in a better part of the area than her old place, among a much better class of people. And, as a bonus, the furniture and furnishings in this house might be second-hand or junk-shop bought, but they were definitely in better condition than anything the Greenwood house boasted. Yes, this house would do Pat nicely, and another bonus was the fact that she didn’t have to put up with any other troublesome residents, like noisy kids and sharp-tongued old biddies. Whether Arch decided to stay here or move in with his wife, she didn’t care any longer. So long as he didn’t expect her to look after him in place of his wife if he did stay put.

Her ears pricked as she heard a key scrape in the front door. Wondering who it could be with a key to the house, as both Arch and Aidy would be at work, she plodded her way from the kitchen to the back room, throwing her snoring husband a look of disdain as she passed him by. On reaching the door leading into the parlour, she stopped short, hearing voices. Then she recognised the voices and pulled a face. It was her daughter-in-law and her grandmother! So Aidy wasn’t at work today then. It was a good boss she’d obviously got who allowed her four days off for a death in the family, unlike Pat’s own. She would have had to beg for just a couple of hours’ leave to attend a funeral, no matter how close a relative had died.

A malicious smirk curved her lips. She was about to get her own back on her daughter-in-law for quashing her original plan to better her living conditions.

On walking into the back room, Bertha behind her, Aidy stopped short, her face displaying shock to see her father-in-law sprawled fast asleep in an armchair. The top button of his shabby trousers was undone to reveal grubby underpants, the smell of his unwashed feet wafting up to greet her, and her mother-in-law, fat arms folded under her monstrous bosom dressed in her shoddy grey work dress, staring at them stonily from the kitchen doorway.

‘To what do I owe this honour?’ she demanded.

Aidy gawped at her. ‘Excuse me, Mrs Nelson, but this is my house. I should be the one asking you what you’re doing here, by the looks of things making yourselves very much at home?’

‘Well, yes, I am meking meself at home, ’cos this is my home now. My son needs looking after since his wife has put her own family above him.’ Pat sneered at Aidy. ‘Some wife you turned out to be! If he’s any sense, he’ll have n’ote more to do with yer and find someone else who’ll be a proper wife to him. You can rest assured that I won’t hold back from telling him that meself.’

‘That’s a joke, you looking after anyone. Yer can’t even look after yerself,’ cried an outraged Bertha.

‘Who asked you to stick yer nose in?’ Pat bellowed back at her.

The booming of his wife’s voice woke up Jim. ‘Can’t a man get no peace from you women?’ he asked, bleary eyed.

‘And you can shurrup too, yer lazy, good-for-nothing, fat pig!’ Pat yelled at him.

Jim quickly deduced that his wife was in the mood for a fight and hurriedly heaved his body out of the chair, pushing past her to get into the kitchen. Seconds later the back door was heard to slam shut.

Meanwhile Aidy was saying to her in a warning voice, ‘Don’t speak to my grandmother like that, Mrs Nelson.’

Pat glared back at her. ‘I’ll speak to anyone how I bleddy well like in my own house. Now, what was it that yer came for?’

Aidy was speechless. Was Arch mad, allowing his mother and father to stay! Knowing her mother-in-law, though, he more than likely had had no choice in the matter. But already Pat was calling it ‘her’ house and not Arch’s. His parents had been here barely half a day and their slovenly behaviour was evident. Pat hadn’t bothered to clear the breakfast dishes and it was getting on for noon. Beside the chair Jim had just vacated was a crumpled newspaper and several empty beer bottles. Aidy doubted the bed had been made, or would be before they got into it again. And she guessed that Arch had been made to give up their bed to her in-laws and it’d been one person who had used the pile of spare bedding at the side of the sofa.

It wouldn’t be long before the Nelsons turned this house into the smelly, dirty pigsty they’d left behind. But Pat was right. Aidy didn’t live here any longer. Who Arch invited in from now on was his choice. That didn’t stop her feeling distressed to see that all the hard work and effort they had both put into making this house a lovely home was going to be destroyed if her in-laws occupied it for any length of time.

Not that she felt obliged to inform Pat why she was here, regardless Aidy told her, ‘I came for the rest of my belongings.’

With visions of some of the bits and pieces she’d already earmarked for the pawn disappearing, she warned Aidy, ‘Just make sure it’s only yer own personal stuff and nothing my son paid for. Well, hurry up and get ’em then! Oh, and make sure yer leave yer key on yer way out.’

Aidy felt a strong desire to point out to her mother-in-law that it wasn’t all down to Arch how nice this house was. If Aidy felt she wanted to take anything with her, then she was perfectly entitled to do so, but her need to get away from this odious woman was stronger. ‘Come on, Gran,’ she urged Bertha, heading off towards the door that led to the stairs.

Aidy might be under the impression that Bertha was following her, but she wasn’t. She was incensed to see how disrespectfully Pat Nelson was treating her granddaughter and wasn’t going to stand by and let her get away with it. Giving Aidy long enough to be well on her way to the bedroom, Bertha wagged a finger in Pat’s direction. ‘Now I don’t know how you wangled yer way in here … and I’m pretty sure your poor son’s already regretting it, but …’

Bertha got to say no more. Pat was upon her, grabbing her by the arm and dragging her towards the front door, yelling, ‘I ain’t listening to your foul gob inside me own four walls.’ She had manhandled Bertha to the door by now. Wrenching it open, she pushed the old lady out, still yelling at her. ‘Ever come back here uninvited and you’ll get the reception yer getting now.’ She slammed the door shut then, seemingly unbothered that a last hard shove had caused Bertha to lose her balance and land heavily on the hard cobbles outside.

Hearing the loud commotion, Aidy came running down to find Pat just arriving back in the back room. Seeing her grandmother nowhere in sight, she demanded, ‘Where’s my gran?’

Pat smirked at her. ‘Well, the mouthy old bag ain’t in here, that’s fer sure. Now I want you out too, whether yer’ve got yer stuff or not.’

And Aidy wanted to get out much more than Pat wanted her out. Her mother-in-law was dressed in her lavatory attendant’s work dress so she must be going out today. Aidy decided she would return later, when Pat wasn’t here, and collect her belongings and whatever else she was of a mind to take, without any interference. Spinning on her heel, she headed towards the front door.

‘Oi, yer key!’ Pat boomed out.

Aidy stopped short, spinning back round to find her holding out one meaty hand in readiness to accept the house key. Eyes narrowing, she said stonily, ‘I’ll give my keys over when I’m good and ready to, Mrs Nelson, and it will be to Arch, not you, as it’s his name on the rent book.’ With that she hurried on her way.

Opening the door, she froze in shock at the sight that greeted her. Sprawled on the cobbles, her old face creased in agony, lay her grandmother. A woman was bending over her.

Aidy crouched beside Bertha, crying out, ‘Gran, what happened to you?’

The woman who was with Bertha answered for her. ‘I seen it all, me duck. I was just passing, on me way to catch the bus into town, and I got the shock of me life when that big woman in there …’ she nodded her head in the direction of Aidy’s front door ‘… pushed this old lady out. Yelling at the poor old dear summat cruel she was. She don’t look a nice woman, I have ter say. She can’t be nice with a foul mouth like she’s got. Anyway, before I could stop her, the old lady had toppled over and come a right cropper on the cobbles. I heard a crack. I’m awful feared she’s broke summat.’

‘I wish yer’d stop talking about me like I’m not here,’ Bertha moaned.

Aidy’s attention turned to her. ‘Gran, can you tell me where you’re hurt?’

‘It’s … it’s me leg and arm,’ she managed to mutter through waves of excruciating pain.

Just who had been the cause of her grandmother’s fall and the resulting injuries flew from Aidy’s mind as the need to summon urgent medical attention took over. She did not at all like the thought of leaving Bertha on her own while she fetched the doctor and asked the woman, ‘I’m sorry to impose on you, but would you please stay with my gran while I fetch the Doc?’

Much to Aidy’s relief, she agreed. After assuring Bertha she’d be back as quickly as she could with the doctor in tow, Aidy raced off in the direction of his surgery.

Ty had just returned from his morning calls and was busy at his desk, updating the notes of the patients he’d just called upon. He’d had very little sleep the previous night, having been called out for most of it to deal with a breach birth, and it was only thanks to his skills that the child survived. As tired as he was, he was having a job focusing on his work. He was hungry, too, having had no time for any breakfast as he’d overslept and only just made it in time for morning surgery.

He hadn’t realised he’d dozed off until he was shocked awake by the door unexpectedly bursting open. A woman came rushing in, proclaiming, ‘You’ve got to come quick, Doc! It’s me gran, she’s hurt really badly.’

He stared over at her, sleep dazed for a moment, as he gathered his wits, then recognition of the intruder struck. This was the woman who had rudely erupted into his surgery only days ago. Now here she was, disrespectfully interrupting once again.

‘I see you haven’t yet learned to knock before you invade someone’s privacy. And it’s Doctor Strathmore,’ he told her.

Aidy hadn’t time for what she perceived as his pettiness right now. She reiterated, ‘My gran’s hurt really badly, Doc. You got to come and see her now.’

The woman hadn’t exaggerated how ill her mother was the last time she had fetched him so he had no reason to believe she was summoning him on a wild goose chase now. His first priority was to the patient.

‘Name?’ Ty demanded. Memory stirred within him of the last time he had asked her the same question and he added, ‘The patient’s name, not your own.’

Aidy’s hackles rose that he hadn’t given her credit for not making the same stupid mistake again. This man was so arrogant, so annoying. She inwardly fought with herself not to snap a response. After all she couldn’t afford to antagonise him and risk his refusing to have anything to do with her.

‘Bertha Rider. You’re wasting your time looking for her record card, though. Gran is very proud of the fact she’s never in her life suffered from anything bad enough to warrant seeing a doctor over. Well, until now, that is.’

Ty got up from his chair, pulled on his jacket and grabbed his bag, indicating to Aidy that she should lead the way to where her grandmother was.