‘So unless he has someone at home to care for him-someone to help him do his exercises and make sure he’s safe-then he’ll have to go to the city. A few months of institutionalised living will make him unlikely to be able to care for himself again, and meanwhile someone has to care for the farm.’
‘The farm could be sold.’
‘No. That’s unthinkable.’
‘Why?’
Tess thought that one through. ‘I don’t know,’ she said slowly. ‘Or maybe… Maybe I do. From the time I was little, my dad talked of this place as home. He was homesick, but too pig-headed and proud to ever think about returning. Instead, he passed on his love to me. By the time I saw the farm and met Grandpa I was sixteen and felt like the place was where I belonged, and the three months I spent here as a teenager cemented that impression. I love it.’
‘You’re a farm girl?’ There were things that needed doing, but still Bill lingered. Tessa was desperate to talk to someone and he let her talk.
‘No way. I was raised in the city, but maybe I’m a farm girl at heart. That was why I decided to go into family medicine-so I could move to the country.’
He quirked an eyebrow.
Tess grinned. ‘OK, so I’m an idealistic twit!’
He smiled. ‘Don’t knock it. Idealistic twits are valued in this hospital.’
‘You mean, that’s what Mike is?’
‘Hey, I didn’t say that.’
‘No, but…’ Tess hesitated. ‘Maybe you don’t have to. Mike has a medical practice which must take all his time and more, but somehow he organised his work so he could spend a night searching for Grandpa. When we arrived back here last night, there were two more patients to be seen before he went to bed, and I don’t have to ask why he was up so early this morning. He was paying now for his time off last night. He’s some doctor. He has the most wonderful car and the craziest dog…’
‘Sounds like he’s won a heart,’ Bill said with a chuckle. Then, as a buzzer sounded down the hall, he grimaced and waved a hand in farewell. ‘Duty calls. I’ll leave you to your plans, then, Dr Westcott, and I’ll be very interested to know what they are.’
‘And so will I,’ Tess muttered as the door closed behind him. ‘Because if you’re making plans around Mike, then you’re an airdreamer, Tess Westcott.’
And then she swerved to look down at the bed. Henry was stirring-and he was watching her.
‘An airdreamer…’ Henry’s voice was a slurred whisper, but it was enough. Tessa’s face burst into joy, and she buried her face into his shoulder.
‘Oh, Grandpa…’
‘I thought you were a dream,’ he whispered into her mass of hair. ‘My Tess. An airdream… Is that the same thing?’
‘Nope.’ She lifted her head and looked at him, long and lovingly. ‘I’m real. I’m a hundred per cent accounted for. I was just making plans.’
‘Plans?’
‘Plans for me. Plans for you. And…’ she took a deep breath ‘…plans for Mike Llewellyn.’
‘I see.’ The ghost of a twisted smile played on Henry’s face.
‘I bet you don’t see at all.’ She lifted her grandfather’s gnarled old hand and rubbed it against her cheek. ‘I don’t see things very clearly myself. I only see that you’re alive. I have you back again.’
‘And you’re here, girl. If you knew how much I’d wanted you…’
‘Oh, Grandpa.’ Her voice broke with emotion. Then she caught herself and managed a glare. ‘Hey, haven’t I always told you to be careful? What do you mean by taking yourself off to that cave to have a stroke?’
‘Is that what I’ve had?’ The left side of Henry’s mouth wasn’t working properly. Each word was a twisted effort. ‘A stroke?’
‘Looks like it.’ Tessa’s voice softened and her hand gripped her grandfather’s with love. ‘It’s a mild one, but definitely a stroke.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah. So, why the cave, Grandpa?’
‘I was feeling lousy,’ he told her, his mouth forming each word with care. ‘I had a king-sized headache I couldn’t shake. I knew you were ringing Saturday night so I took the afternoon to visit the cave. Just in case…’ He grimaced. ‘It was like…if it was something serious I could say goodbye.’
‘So if it was something serious you could lie for five days without medical help!’
‘Do you have to be bossy?’ Henry’s voice was a frail thread, and she chuckled.
‘Yeah. You know me, Grandpa.’
‘The original Miss Bossy-Boots.’
He fell silent, exhausted, and it was ten minutes before he spoke again. Mike had told her to ring him when Henry woke but Tess resisted. There was time enough in the future to let the world break in. For now she was content to be alone with Henry.
‘So what plans are you making for Mike Llewellyn?’ he whispered at last, and she started.
‘Oh, nothing.’
‘Tell me.’
‘Well, it’s just that Mike is overworked, overgenerous and over-endowed with niceness-plus, he has more than his fair share of good looks.’ She twinkled. ‘And I need to stay here and look after you but I also need an income. So…’
‘So?’
‘So I might just have chosen myself a partner,’ she said simply. ‘If he’ll have me.’
‘And if he won’t?’
‘Then we’ll just have to think of a way to make him change his mind.’
CHAPTER FOUR
BY TWO that afternoon Mike was starting to get anxious that Henry hadn’t woken. When he finished surgery he intended to go back to the hospital, but just as he was leaving the clinic there was an urgent call from Eileen Fraser. Reg Fraser was close to death.
Reg had terminal lung cancer. He’d been dying for months, cared for by three sisters of whom Eileen, at ninety, was the oldest. The Misses Fraser had taken care of Reg around the clock every since he’d become ill, and he couldn’t have had better care anywhere.
Now it sounded as if the end was very, very close. Eileen was distraught. No, they didn’t want Reg to be admitted to hospital, not now, but, yes, they needed help. For the first time since he’d become ill, Reg seemed distressed.
Mike had no choice. He packed his bag and headed for the Fraser farm, and this time he left Strop behind.
Reg wasn’t distressed. He’d lapsed into a coma and started Cheyne-Stokes breathing. Mike reassured the elderly ladies that all this meant was that Reg was so deeply unconscious his breathing was almost a muscle spasm rather than the effect of a conscious message to the brain. He died half an hour after Mike arrived-a peaceful, settled death that was just how Mike had hoped it would be.
‘Oh, Reg…’ Miss Eileen fluttered forward as her brother’s breathing finally ceased. The sisters kissed their brother in turn and then fetched the coverlet that, Mike gathered, they’d spent the last six months embroidering for just this occasion.
He couldn’t leave. He spent the next two hours drinking tea and eating home-made biscuits while the sisters went through every aspect of Reg’s illness with him, step by step. It was an important time for them if they were to come to terms with what had happened, and Mike couldn’t begrudge it to them. The undertaker was booked to call later that evening. There was no hurry. No hurry at all…
Mike ended up looking through faded family photographs with the sisters commentating. ‘This is Reg on his first
