Gary was detailed to ride with Mitch. ‘Human interest stories,’ said Dryden. ‘Talk to everyone. Plenty of names. Get their ages. Get their stories, this flood, the last one. Got it?’
The junior reporter nodded happily. ‘I can’t swim,’ he said, still smiling.
‘You won’t get the chance,’ said Dryden, unhelpfully.
Humph was parked up outside
Her condition was unchanged. There had been no further movement. The nurse who showed him in radiated that almost telepathic signal which tries to dampen false hopes. They exchanged brave smiles.
Dryden asked to see Kathy.
She was sitting up in bed in a red and white striped nightshirt. Dryden felt acutely embarrassed to find himself sitting on the bedside. They held hands awkwardly when the nurse left them alone.
Dryden was clutching a bunch of insipid winter flowers. ‘I bought these at the shop at reception at the last minute. They’re crap.’
This was the crucial point, thought Dryden. Either this was a personal visit and they talked about them or he cut straight to their lives as they were before.
He blew it. ‘So you’re going to sue the bastards. Well done.’
Kathy had expected no more. ‘Bloody right I am. This doesn’t hurt by the way’ She touched the eyepatch.
‘Henry thinks you should drop it. His OBE may be in danger. Services to arse-licking.’
Kathy laughed and grimaced with the pain.
‘Doesn’t hurt, eh?’
Kathy’s face was blotched red and purple with bruising and her upper lip was dotted with butterfly stitching.
‘You look great,’ said Dryden.
Kathy looked at her hands.
Dryden coughed. He was just aware enough of his own awkwardness to know he was making a total hash of the visit. ‘I need your help.’ He knew he was making a mistake but he ploughed ahead anyway, regardless of all feelings, but mostly Kathy’s. ‘Laura could be in danger. Someone is trying to stop me covering the Lark murder story. She’s in Flat 8. I’ve let the nursing staff know you’re an old friend of the family. When you have time, and they let you out of bed, I’d appreciate it if you’d sit with her. Watching brief.’
The silence told him he’d taken too much for granted. He realized now how inappropriate the request was. He tried to recover the situation: ‘I’m…’
‘No. It’s OK. Let’s just get through this, eh? Then talk…’
Dryden brightened, that was nearly never. ‘Yup. Then.’ He stood. ‘Whoever it is has been pretty discreet so far. They want to frighten me: only me. Frankly, they’ve succeeded. I’ve got twenty-four hours at most. I’d feel better if you were watching out for me.
‘Don’t bother with anyone here, they think the Tower is Fort Knox and Laura’s about to make medical history by doing the come-back coma cha-cha. I’ll have a word, but it’ll make little difference.’
He went straight to Bloom’s office. He didn’t knock.
‘Mr Dryden, I must protest…’ Bloom was entering figures into a PC. They looked like accounts.
‘Just listen. I’m reporting an incident to the police. Someone has got into Laura’s room – twice.’
Dryden held his hand up as Bloom stood to argue.
‘I’m sorry. I don’t care if you can’t believe me. The police will call. I want it on the record now – at 2 o’clock – that I’m asking you to improve the security at this hospital. The windows need to be locked and the grounds properly patrolled. In particular I want a watch kept on my wife. If anything happens to her between now and the arrival of the police I shall hold you personally responsible. Is that clear?’
‘Don’t you want your wife to make a recovery, Mr Dryden?’
Dryden thought about hitting him then. In many ways he was close to the truth. But he needed action, not gratification.
He took a deep breath. ‘I don’t want her harmed by anyone, Mr Bloom. It is
Bloom reddened and picked up an internal phone.
21
Humph nosed the cab into the northern gale. For five miles the road ran beside the main river. The ice was breaking up and the wind was making waves, piling the frozen shards against the banks. The water was a foot, maybe eighteen inches, from the top of the banks. Even now, as the floods rose inland, the Fens could be saved if the water could escape quickly to the sea. But the north wind was holding up the tide and bottling up the water in the rivers. The cloudscape was being ripped apart by the gale, leaving gaping holes of winter blue between the shreds of lead-grey nimbus. Seagulls were torn across the sky, screeching southwards.
The night came from the north too. As they drove, dusk killed the colours in the landscape and replaced them with sepia. There was little traffic and they were soon on the outskirts of King’s Lynn. Around them stretched the sink estates of the 1950s and 1960s. Grey rain fell on thousands of identical roofs. Dryden heard ‘Little Boxes’ playing in his head.
