Dark Room

'Wouldn't it have been courteous to tell me before I spoke to the policemen that the accident happened several days ago?' He had a rather charming face, she thought, a little weary, but lived in and comfortable. Like his sports jacket, which had seen better days, and the cavalry twill trousers that drooped at the hem where his heel had caught it. He was the sort of man whom, in other circumstances, she might have chosen for a friend because he seemed careless of convention. But she was afraid of him and sought refuge in pomposity.

He balanced his fountain pen between his forefingers. 'In the circumstances, I thought it better to let you speak the truth as you understood it.'

'What circumstances?'

'You had almost twice the legal limit of alcohol in your blood when you crashed your car. The police are considering whether to charge you but I think they may let the matter drop after this morning. They tend to be somewhat skeptical of a doctor's diagnosis, less so of the patients themselves. I could see no harm in wringing a little sympathy out of PCs Gregg and Hardy.'

Her reflection smiled at him in the mirror. 'That was a kind thought.' She had never been drunk in her life, because she had watched Betty stagger about the house too often to want to emulate her. 'Could you pass me the ashtray?'' You got drunk and tried to kill yourself... 'Thank you.' She placed it on the bed in front of her. 'What exactly has happened to me, Dr. Protheroe?'

He leaned forward, clamping his large hands between his knees. 'In a nutshell, you left a car traveling at approximately forty miles per hour, gave yourself the sort of knockout blow that would have felled an ox, then continued under your own impetus, grazing your scalp, eye, and arms as you did so. The first miracle is that you're here at all, the second miracle is that you didn't fracture anything in the process, and the third miracle is that you'll be as good as new before you know it. Once your hair grows back over the torn flaps of skin that had to be stitched, no one will know you had an accident. The price you paid for all that, however, was concussion, one symptom of which is post-traumatic amnesia. You have been conscious but deeply confused for the last five days, and that confusion may persist on and off for some time to come. Think of your brain as a computer. Any memory that is safely filed has a good chance of reinstatement, but memories that you were too confused to store properly may never return. So, for example, despite the fact that you were conscious, you're unlikely to recollect your transfer here from Odstock Hospital, or indeed your first interview with the police.'

She looked past him towards the gardens that lay beyond her window. 'And is pretraumatic amnesia equally normal?' she asked him. 'I have no memory of the accident or what led up to it.'

'Don't be confused by the term 'post.' That's simply referring to amnesia after trauma. But with regard to what you don't remember, that's usually referred to as retrograde amnesia. It's not uncommon and seems to depend on the severity of the head injury. We talk about loss of memory,' he went on, 'when we should talk about temporary loss. Bit by bit you'll remember events before the accident, though it may take a little while to understand how the pieces fit together because you may not remember them in chronological order. You may also, although it's less likely, remember things that never happened, simply because your memory will have stored plans of future events and you may recollect the plans as real. The trick is to avoid worrying about it. Your brain, like the rest of your body, has taken a knock and needs time to heal itself. That's all this amnesia is.'

'I understand. Does that mean I can go home quite soon?'

'To your parents?' he asked.

'No. To London.'

'Is there anyone there who can look after you, Jinx?'

She was about to say Leo before she remembered that, according to her stepmother, he wasn't there anymore. Do yourself a favor, said the intrusive voice of cynicism. Leo look after you? Ha ha ha! Instead, she said nothing and continued to stare out of the window. She resented the way this man called her Jinx, as if he and she were well acquainted, when her entire knowledge of him resided in an avuncular chat about a condition that was rocking her to her very foundations. And she resented his assumption that she was a willing participant in this conversation when the only emotion she felt was a seething anger.

'Your father's keen for you to remain here where he feels you'll be properly looked after. However, it's entirely your choice, and if you think you'll be happier in London, then we can arrange to transfer you as long as you understand that you do need to be looked after. In the short term anyway.'

Her reflection examined him. 'Is Adam paying you?'

He nodded. 'This is a private clinic.'

'But not a hospital?'

'No. We specialize in addiction therapy,' he told her. 'But we do offer convalescent care as well.'

'I'm not addicted to anything.' You got drunk...

'No one's suggesting you are.'

She drew on her cigarette. 'Then why is my father paying four hundred pounds a day for me to be here?' she asked evenly. 'I could have convalescent care in a nursing home for a fraction of that.'

He studied her where she sat like a dignified, one-eyed Buddha upon her bed. 'How did you know it costs four hundred pounds a day?'

'My stepmother told me,' she lied. 'I know my father very well. Dr. Protheroe, so, predictably, it was the first thing I asked her.'

'He did warn me you'd take nothing for granted.'

The reflection smiled at him. 'I certainly don't like being lied to,' she murmured. 'My stepmother told me I tried to commit suicide.' She watched him for a reaction, but there was none. 'I don't believe it,' she went on dispassionately, 'but I do believe that Adam would pay a psychiatrist to straighten me out if he believed it. So what sort of therapy is he buying for me?''

'No one's lying to you, Jinx. Your father was very concerned that you should be in an environment where you could recover at your own speed and in your own way. Certainly we have psychiatrists on the premises, and certainly we offer therapy to those who want it, but I am precisely what I said I was, a doctor pure and simple. My role is largely administrative, but I also take an interest in our convalescent patients. There is nothing sinister about your being here.'