everything… and that in a matter of hours.
“Only this morning he knew me perfectly well,” she said. “He walked up the stairs under his own steam, recognised that the room we entered was my room, and was concerned because he felt he had no right to turn me out of it. Of course I told him it didn’t matter about it being my room, and he looked so relieved at the prospect of getting into bed. I’m sure he was normal at that time.”
“But since then he has had a long sleep.” Hannah went upstairs alone to see the invalid, and Charlotte had no opportunity to find out what transpired at the interview because the doctor arrived before she left the room again and he suggested, quite kindly, to Charlotte that it might be a good thing if she remained downstairs while he conducted a fresh examination of the patient.
“After all, he is only a very casual acquaintance, isn’t he?” he said, in the same kind and detached voice. “I mean, it’s upsetting enough for you to have your house turned into a temporary nursing-home, and you don’t want to be harrowed by all the medical details as well.” “Oh, but he’s an old friend – ” Charlotte protested.
The doctor’s eyebrows arched.
“I mean, I knew him years ago,” Charlotte explained.
The doctor smiled.
“In that case, he should remember you. But if you really mean years ago then you must have been very young at the time.”
“I was only a child.”
Dr. Mackay shrugged.
“Then if there’s been a very long interval between your childish knowledge of one another and your present acquaintanceship he’s still not much more than a virtual stranger to you, is he?” he observed reasonably. And Charlotte realised that what he meant was that unless there was some particular reason why Tremarth should have her firmly imprinted on his mind she was no more likely to affect his present state and assist his return to a normal one than any of the other people around him
– including the doctor himself if it came to that.
Charlotte allowed him to go upstairs to the invalid with an odd feeling of resentment, nevertheless, and when he had departed and Hannah passed on to her the information that he was not seriously concerned about the patient’s lapse, and expected it might last for several days unless something happened to jog his shrouded memory, she could not refrain from arguing somewhat perversely that it did seem to her extraordinary that Richard wasn’t able to recall her.
“But why?” Hannah asked, studying her with rather more intentness than usual, as if she was suddenly intrigued.
Charlotte shrugged.
“Oh, I don’t honestly know why. Except that he was very annoyed with me recently, and when you’re annoyed with a person you're less apt to forget them than if they happened to be someone else,” she argued without very much conviction herself, However.
Hannah went on studying her with a certain unconcealed interest.
“Apart from that is there any very good reason why he should remember you?” she asked.
Charlotte appeared suddenly confused by the direct question, and actually developed a slight pink tinge in her cheeks while she denied the imputation emphatically.
“Oh, no, of course not!… Why,” she added naively, “we don’t even like one another.”
“You mean you don’t like him?”
“Oh, I don’t dislike him at all!”
“But you think he was annoyed with you for good reason?”
“He wanted Tremarth…”
“Well, he must have wanted it very badly, for his subconscious took over and literally forced him into that crash the other night. If he wasn’t dwelling on you he was dwelling on Tremarth… and now it seems very likely that he’ll remain a patient here for weeks.”
“Oh, do you think so?”
“Well, perhaps not weeks. But it could be one or two weeks. Do you think you can afford to keep him all that length of time, and provide the various extras that will be necessary?” “Of course,” Charlotte replied, with a considerable amount of surprised emphasis this time. “Of course,” she repeated.
Hannah smiled somewhat curiously and turned away.
“Well, if you’ll forgive me,” she said, “I’ll go and have another look at him.”
Charlotte made a careful inspection of the contents of the kitchen and the larder, and by the time she was rejoined once more by her friend she had already drawn up a long list of essentials that would have to be obtained from the village store if the patient’s physical wellbeing was to be maintained. Hannah took the list from her and arched her eyebrows a little at the sight of such items as chicken in aspic and fresh strawberries if available, and she suggested that there were probably some strawberries in the garden if they went searching for them. And a more economical buy than chicken in aspic – which the village store was hardly likely to have in stock – would be a couple of fresh chickens from the local butcher, which they could keep in the larder and turn into various things like soups and casseroles when the need arose.
“It might even be worth a trip into Truro,” she suggested, “if you really mean to stock up. I can’t see the importance of strawberries, but you’re bound to get them there if you really want them.”
Charlotte was immediately captivated by the idea, and then it occurred to her that this would mean leaving the patient. She looked anxiously at Hannah.
“We can’t do that, can we?”
“I can’t but you can,” Hannah replied, with the faintest of genuinely amused smiles. “I’m in charge, don’t forget. You’re free to do more or less what you like.”
Charlotte objected at once that they would have to take turn and turn about, and then it apparently struck her that she was putting forward a line of argument with which neither Dr. Mackay nor Hannah herself would be likely to agree. The most that she would be permitted to do was sit with the patient occasionally, and apart from that it was her job to look after the domestic side. She agreed after a hesitation of several seconds:
“Oh, all right, I’ll go into Truro tomorrow. You must make me a list of any medical requirements you’re likely to need, and I’ll make out a really comprehensive list of the things I think are needed.”
Hannah smiled at her more kindly.
“Don’t spend all your money,” she advised. “Remember he’s a rich man and can afford to be looked after, but you’re only a poor working girl.”
Charlotte said without having the least intention of doing anything of the kind:
“I can always present him with a bill when he leaves! ”
Hannah allowed her to have a peep at the patient before she went to bed – in another of the many bedrooms at Tremarth that she had hurriedly got ready for herself – and she found him lying with his eyes closed in a room that was illuminated very, very softly by a bedside lamp.
At first she thought that Richard Tremarth was asleep, and she was resisting an impulse to tiptoe to the side of bed to make sure when his eyes opened swiftly, and he turned his head sideways to regard her. “Oh, so it’s you! ” he said.
Her heart gave a quite extraordinary bound, and with a note of relief in her voice she exclaimed, “Oh, so you do remember me!” Richard Tremarth looked faintly bored, and then he began to look slightly puzzled. She was so obviously delighted because he seemed to know something about her.
“Well, I’ve seen you before, haven’t I?” he said. “You’re the redheaded young woman who calls herself Charlotte Something-or-other I’m afraid I don’t seem to have a very retentive memory at the moment, and I’ve forgotten what your surname is. But I’m sure you told me! ”
“Woodford,” she murmured, advancing very cautiously to the side of the bed. “Charlotte Woodford.”
“Ah, yes.” He lay looking up at her, and apart from the fact that they had a slightly abnormal look about them his eyes shone with very subdued humour. “You asked me whether I’d seen you before, and I had to tell you the absolute truth that to the best of my knowledge you’re an absolute stranger. That other young woman, too… I didn’t know her from Eve.” “She… we’re friends,” Charlotte explained. He nodded, and winced very slightly because it obviously hurt his head.
“That’s what she said,” he said. “I must say I find her soothing and rather comforting. Is she a fully trained
