EPILOGUE
The glass of hot milk and cinnamon is going cold on Doctor Megan Straub’s bedside table, a thick skin forming on its untouched surface.
She is sitting up in bed, reading by torchlight so as not to wake the skinny, Asian-looking man who dozes next to her, here in the largest bedroom of this modest apartment on the outskirts of Keighley, forty-five minutes from the hospital where her patients lie in a sleep that mocks her own insomnia.
‘Mercy,’ she reads. ‘From the Latin word for “merchandise”. A price paid.’
She frowns, and wonders at the mercenary origins of a word associated with divine intervention. Could it be bought? Could the centuries have dulled people’s understanding of the true nature of the concept? Could there be a way of influencing the seemingly random, scattered distribution of the Almighty’s pity?
She feels troubled. Confused. Finds herself analysing concepts that seem too big to unpick. Wonders, for an instant, if prayer is ever anything more than a desperate plea for favour.
Doctor Straub is suddenly unsure whether she should have taken the book. Whether she should have left it untouched, sitting among the scattered snowstorm of papers on the carpeted floor around Anne Montrose’s hospital bed. Would the bull-chested policeman with the soft eyes and the easy blush be returning to gather up the gospel that had sent him sprinting from the room?
Despite the heat rising from the naked man at her side, Doctor Straub shivers and tucks herself more firmly inside the expensive quilt. She angles the torch to better illuminate the ruined pages of the holy book. Tries to make sense of the scribbles and jagged graffiti. Wonders why she cannot put it down.
She turns the book slowly, like a wheel. Through the mess of violent scribbles, there is some sense to what at first appears to be muddled hieroglyphs. She wonders if it is her own long experience of reading other doctors’ handwriting that allows her to make out a meaning in the blocks of ink.
She looks away. Screws up her eyes and attempts to locate a memory. She remembers the quote. Hippocrates? Yes. The man whose oath marshals her profession.
Doctor Straub peers closer. Locates another strand of meaningful writing.
She finds herself wondering who might have written these words — at the venom and fury that had caused them to drive the pen into the paper with the force of a knife.
Doctor Straub closes the book.
She has given up on sleep. Is surprised she even went to the trouble of going to bed. She shouldn’t be here, really. Should be back at the hospital, waiting for news. Should be stroking Anne Montrose’s hand. Should be urging her to try again. To open her eyes …
She had already been on her way home when the call came through. It was one of the nurses on the ward, her voice breathless with excitement.
This evening, Anne Montrose had stirred. Her eyelids had flickered, and the read-out from the monitor showed a spiked increase in brain activity.
A dream? Dr Straub has often wondered what her patients see. What goes on behind the eyes.
Here, now, she wonders whether, wherever she is, Anne Montrose is happy.
Wonders, too, whether she will ever get the chance to ask her. To talk to somebody who has come back.
She locks her teeth and feels a tension in her jaw. She does not want to let herself get carried away. Is trying to contain her excitement. But somewhere, in the unscientific part of herself, she fancies that, before dawn, Anne Montrose may experience a miracle.
Softly, so as not to wake the man at her side, she slips out of bed and pads across the varnished, hardwood floors. She opens the bedroom door and makes her way into the living room, with its white leather suite and tasteful black and white photographs.
She switches on the large plasma TV that dominates the imitation chimney breast and lowers the volume as she flicks through the news channels. The clock in the corner of the screen declares it well past midnight.
Drowsily, Doctor Straub settles on one of the twenty-four-hour rolling news stations. There are hundreds of homes in Scotland without electricity owing to the storms. A police officer has been taken to hospital with minor injuries following an incident at the Humber Bridge Country Park which saw a vehicle explode and destroy a nearby administration block. One person is believed to have died in the incident. In other news, a decorated British army colonel has been arrested in West Yorkshire by officers looking into the death of Daphne Cotton, who was murdered several days ago in Hull’s Holy Trinity Church. Officers say he is not being questioned about the murder, but about withholding vital evidence linked to this and several other cases …
To her left, nestled on a tower of books, Doctor Straub’s telephone begins to ring.
Quickly, for fear of the noise waking her partner and robbing her of these moments of thoughtful solitude, she jumps up from the chair and answers the call.
‘Doctor Straub?’ The voice is breathless and excited. ‘Doctor, this is Julie Hibbert. I’m sorry to call so late, but I thought you would want to know …’
‘It’s no problem, Julie,’ she says, and there is a tremble in her voice. Could her patient be awake?
‘It’s Anne Montrose, Doctor Straub,’ says the nurse.
‘Yes?’
‘I think it must have been an anomaly. She’s stabilised. Returned to her standard brain function. Heartbeat regular. Whatever caused her to flicker, it’s gone.’
Doctor Straub thanks her. Replaces the receiver.
Settles into the chair and leans her head against the cushion.
She gives an almost imperceptible shake of her head, and then closes her eyes.
