Chapter 34
William went back to his room. He slipped off his jacket and undid his tie. There were a few things he needed to do, one was book his car in for a complete garage service, he’d decided to drive to Phoenix, and secondly, he thought about getting in touch with some Real Estate agents – he wanted a place of his own…his mobile rang.
“Hello?”
“William, it’s-“
“Quentin, what can I do for you?”
“Actually, it’s um, rather delicate, can we meet somewhere?”
“Not the hospital?”
“No”
“When?”
“ASAP”
William’s stomach muscles tightened
“Well I’ve got to nip into town, there’s a coffee bar by the park, The Espresso Pump, do you know it – the lunchtime rush should just about be over now?” William said looking at his watch
“That’s fine, I’ll see you there in an hour” the line went dead.
********
“I thought you’d better know. Ford Denton came up to me after the hearing – apparently Drusilla saw you getting into Mrs Summers car after your argument on Christmas day, she’s accused you of ‘seeing’ and that’s being polite, one of your patients”
William sighed and shook his head, just his bloody luck…
“Okay, yes she DID see me, did I spend Christmas with the two Summers women, what of it?”
“So it was THE Summers’ girl then”
William played with the froth on top of his cappuccino.
“Yes. Will anything come of it do you think? – I mean I sign off as her doctor on Thursday anyway”
“It would have been better if you’d have either told me, or signed off before, could make things a little…how shall I put it, sticky for you”
William gave a resigned shrug
“It’s not as if I have any burning desires to work at the Lacey again though Quentin, I’ve already told you that”
“Yes, I know, but if what you said to Dr Gupta was true”
William frowned
“What I said? – What was that then?”
“About putting down some roots – I’m sorry, I only heard half the conversation, were you talking about California or”
“Oh, um, well yeah, I meant California, but I don’t follow”
“Well, if it got out about you seeing one of your patients…still severely frowned upon William, could be misconstrued as taking advantage, it IS a strike-offable offence you know, or at least it could prevent you from opening a clinic here in California”
“Skiving off?” William felt a hand on his back
“Huh – JOYCE!”
William turned and smiled at Joyce’s grin,
“It’s Mrs Summers, isn’t it?” Quentin said, not adding the ‘what a co-incidence we were just talking about you bit…
“So what brings you in here?”
“They do the best pastrami on rye around, and when the boss is paying!” Joyce said, holding up a take-out bag.
“Late night?” William asked
“Looks like it could be getting that way, Mr Duggan doesn’t buy me lunch
everyday – plus we’ve just had a shipment of Egyptian artefacts in, they’ll need to be unpacked, listed and catalogued, and it won’t do itself!”
“Oh, you work at Duggan’s Gallery, do you?” Quentin asked
“For my sins, yes, mind you, you meet some VERY interesting people, hold on…I forgot to show you this William – I’ve been carrying it around in my bag now since before Christmas”
Joyce put the take out on the counter and fished the photograph of a younger William Carling out of her purse.
“There you go, remember that exhibition you were talking about in Amsterdam, three- sorry it’s four years ago now we’ve had another new year, Felix Von Hendrikson – well there’s you, I actually remember taking that photograph” Joyce said
William took it off her and grinned
“Oh god, will you just LOOK at my hair!”
“You can have that one Will, I‘ve got plenty more when you um…well, whenever, oh god, is that the time, I better fly, bye!”
Quentin looked steadily at William until he looked up and saw him smiling at him.
“What?” William asked
“Don’t you see – that”
“This? What about it?” William looked back at the photograph
“Well if you knew Joyce Summers three years ago, and it was her that invited you to stay at her house for Christmas, then there’s no case to answer!”
William opened his mouth to say, ‘but we weren’t acquainted then’, but decided against it…no good shooting himself in the foot now was there?
“No case…not even any ‘sticky bits’?” William asked
“No, not in the least bit tacky or sticky – or even any other adhesive quality you can think of”
“Good, well thanks for coming to me discreetly Quentin, I DO appreciate it”
“Not at all William. I doubt really if anything would have come of it, trying to find someone to take her seriously would be one thing, I mean I think everybody would have put it down to sour grapes…Well, I must go, keep in touch won’t you”
“Sure, bye Quentin”
Travers left the coffee bar and William looked again at the photo – how brilliant was Joyce’s timing? He smiled, slid the photo into his inside pocket and finished his coffee and left.
*******************
“I want to see the manager, NOW!”
“I’m sorry Dr Tate, but the manager is away at conference, I could book you in with –“
“Look, just get me SOMEBODY who can deal with this, I’ve NEVER been so humiliated in my life when I was told I’d got insufficient funds when I was shopping the other day!”
“Can I see that ma’am…if you’d like to take a seat” The banking assistant took the debit card off Drusilla and left.
Dru heaved a sigh and plonked herself down, boy was she in need of a drink………
“Dr Tate?”
“Yes?”
“If you’d like to come this way please…”
*****************
“And hold it…hold it…seven, eight, nine, ten – and relax!” Buffy gave a huge sigh and flopped back on the mat.
“There, wasn’t too bad, was it?” Sonia Richards, or ‘Miss Whiplash’ as Buffy had re-Christened her actually smiled at Buffy.
“That was our last session wasn’t it?”
“Yes” Buffy didn’t bother with the ‘thank god’, she hadn’t got the energy!
“When do you re-start your training schedule?” Buffy sat up and looked up at the physiotherapist.
“Actually, I don’t know. I’m not sure what’s happening with the academy to be truthful”
“Oh goodness, that’s right, your coach is that one that’s under scrutiny isn’t he?”
Buffy stood and draped her towel round her neck. She didn’t want to talk about Coach Angel so she held out her hand and said,
“Well thanks for all the agony!”
Sonia smiled and shook Buffy’s hand
“Remember what I told you, keep up with the massages after you exercise, that way you’ll keep the tendons supple”
“I will”
“And don’t worry about those little ‘fluttering’ type sensations, it’s all the little nerve ends knitting back together”
Buffy nodded and left
She went and showered and got dressed. Taking her mobile out of her bag, she missed a phone call from William, and phoned him back.
“Hi beautiful!”
“Hey gorgeous!” Buffy said grinning
“Busy?”
“Nope – got the rest of the day, no more Miss Whiplash, no more crutches – hey, she actually SMILED at me this afternoon, I reckon there is a human in there somewhere under all that military training!”
William chuckled and said
“Okay, now you know the park, want to meet me by the boating lake benches in say…half an hour?”
“Love to”
“’Kay then kitten, see you then – oh, have you eaten?”
“Not yet, no why?”
“Coz there’s a lovely little deli I could take you to if you can wait half an hour?”
“Sure – so I’ll see you in half an hour then”
“Bye kitten”
“Bye”
William smiled and tucked the information about a top floor apartment inside his jacket. Instead of taking a cab the ten blocks to the other side of town, he decided to walk it.
********************
“The error isn’t on our part, Dr Tate, we have been sending you letters, dated the third, the twelfth, the eighteenth and the twenty fifth, in fact another went out this morning for you to top up your current account from your savings account, that’s why it came up insufficient funds”
“Well why can’t YOU do it! It’s only a matter of moving money from that one to that one, what’s so hard about that?”
“Madam, Dr Tate, it’s YOUR money, we can ADVISE you, we can give you information and let you decide for yourself, what we can’t do is to pre-empt or take it upon ourselves to do such things unless you tell us”
Feeling a little sheepish, Drusilla calmed down, and then she said,
“I want some new cards please”
The under-manager frowned an asked,
“Why, these don’t expire until July 2008”
“I want to drop the doctor, and just have Drusilla Tate on them”
“I see”
“Not too much trouble is it?”
“None at all madam, I’ll get onto it right away, I’ll get some forms for you to fill in and – “
“Oh dear, look, is that the time, I um, can I take the forms away and send them to you, I’m late for another appointment?” She lied. The last thing Drusilla wanted to do was to write in public. She had the shakes so bad it would have been impossible for her to write with any legibility
After been brought the forms, Drusilla left. She opened her car door and got in. Throwing her bag on the passenger seat, she decided to go a different way home, there were several liquor stores on the way she planned and she wouldn’t have to keep relying on that bloody awful 7-11 with it’s nosy storekeeper for all her needs.
**************
Dru took a shopping cart and made her way straight to the booze, she put four litres of vodka, four litres of whiskey, two bottles of brandy and six two litre wine boxes of Chardonnay into it. Going to the freezer section she got herself half a dozen ready meals and then she got juice and mixers, bitter lemon, tonic and American dry ginger ale.
“Could you load it into my car please, I um, I have a bad arm”
“Certainly madam”
She was tempted to pull up half way home, but she resisted the temptation.
She made several trips up and down the stairs with the booze she’d bought, and once she’d bought up the last wine box, she slammed the front door and threw off her jacket, pulled the band out of her hair, took the scarf from around her neck and she put the stereo on loud, she opened the vodka, took a good long swig that made her catch her breath, and then another one. She fetched a tall glass, filled it half full of the spirit and then topped it up with orange juice.
Jumping Jack Flash by the Rolling Stones came on, and she suddenly jumped up singing and screeching at the top of her voice
“I was born, in a cross-fire hurricane!”
“Da-da dum...something la-la pouring rain-
But it’s alllllllllllllll righttttttttttttttt nnnnnnnowwwwwwwwww, in fact it’s a gas! It’s allllllllllllllllllllllrightttttttttttttt – Jumping Jack Flash is a gas, gas, gas!”
Dancing round, playing ‘air guitar’ she was on some sort of weird high – she felt wild and carefree, light-headed and when the song was over, she collapsed giggling on the sofa. She reached for her drink and downed half of it.
She swallowed and then a sob left her throat. She put her drink down and one sob followed another. She was bawling like a baby, feeling desolate and sorry for herself, she had no job, no savings to speak of, no references and no chance of ever getting a job in medicine again, well not legitimately, and her name was on a list that would identify her as struck off in any country of note – she’d be lucky if she could get a job inoculating little malnourished African babies…but then she couldn’t do that, the flies – eugh!
She’d been looking through her scrapbook and was still trying to remember some of the student’s names – there was this one guy, weird looking bloke he was, tall, thin with a shock of bright gingery red hair and a scruffy beard – he just upped and left half way through his finals – just never came back – nearly six years of study wasted. Everybody wondered what happened to him, then somebody about two years ago told her they’d seen him in South America, running an illegal abortion clinic……
She reached for her drink, and the phone rang. She couldn’t be bothered to stand up and answer it, so she let the answer machine do it for her.
“Hello Miss Tate, this is Ford Denton, I’ve made some enquiries about the information on Dr Carling you gave me, and I’m afraid nothing will come of it, Dr Travers assures me that Dr Carling and the mother of the patient, a Mrs Joyce Summers, the lady you say you saw Christmas morning giving him a lift is an old friend of his, they knew each other years ago – and there’s nothing in the rule book to say a doctor can’t stay at an old friends house – I’ll be in touch about my fee, goodbye”
Dru felt wretched. Wretched that she’d sunk so low as to saying what she’d said, wretched that nothing would come of it, wretched that HE had friends…somebody to talk to, to hold, to…love – it wasn’t much to ask was it? She’d had a few dates, doctors mostly, but they always wanted to talk shop. She’d been to singles bars, but as soon as they found out what she did, they backed off scared, too intellectual – a woman with brains going out with a road mender? So she’d tried NOT telling them, and found out they were morons, mostly beer-guzzling animals who’d say and do all the ‘right’ things until they’d found somebody dumb enough to take care of their little ‘Brads and Chelsea’s’ for them so they wouldn’t have to, someone who wash and cook and clean and have dinner on the table when they got in from work…
Downing her drink she quickly poured more, she wanted to blot it all out, she didn’t want to think it was too, too painful to think of anything right now.
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