A Room Full of Bones: A Ruth Galloway Investigation

enjoys the trip. It’s good to see a different view and, as the porters seem determined to take the longest route possible, he gets to see quite a lot of the hospital. Also, the move gave him an excuse to suggest to his mother that she go back to his house and get some rest. She agreed reluctantly, saying that she’d be back in the evening with a proper meal for him. ‘The muck they serve in these places is enough to kill you, so it is.’ As Michelle has also promised to bring him some food, Nelson foresees a clash of wills over the shepherd’s pie. Perhaps Michelle will be so tired that she’ll be happy to let Maureen do the honours. She’s good with his mum. Better than he is, anyway.
    The new ward is much more relaxed. Nelson’s bed isby the window and the nurses’ station is right at the other end of the room. He guesses, correctly, that this means that he is considered to be out of danger. His recovery really has been remarkable. He has been able to eat, drink and have a pee – the three measures of achievement in a patient. No one really knows why he has got better so quickly or what was wrong with him in the first place. ‘Last night we thought you were a goner,’ one of the doctors tells him cheerfully. Nelson smiles faintly. He likes a near-death experience as much as the next man but it worries him that so much could have happened while he was out of the picture, asleep, unconscious. He has thought about the prospect of death, all policemen have, but he’d always thought that he’d have a leading role in the drama: negotiating the release of hostages, foiling a terrorist plot, saving children from a burning house. He never thought, when the Grim Reaper came knocking, that he’d be fast asleep.
    Nelson’s first visitor of the afternoon is Clough. He comes bearing a bunch of flowers which he is told to leave in the lobby ‘due to health and safety regulations’. Nelson doesn’t know where to look. Cloughie bringing him flowers! He’ll be making him a friendship bracelet next. Still, he appreciates the chance to catch up. Clough tells him all about Operation Octopus, dwelling on his own heroism, and Nelson is suitably impressed. He always knew that there was something funny about the stables but he never thought that it would turn out to be the centre of an international drugs ring. That was smart detective work from Judy. Less smart, of course, to goskipping off in the middle of the night, alone, as a result of a text message. She was lucky that the whole thing turned out so well. Nelson particularly enjoys the bit about The Necromancer and the horse walker.
    ‘Honestly, boss, he was as big as an elephant. And his teeth! He attacked me but I managed to hold him off. I’m pretty strong when I’m roused. Bastard took a chunk out of my leg though. Do you want a look?’
    ‘No thanks.’
    ‘I think Johnson was pretty shaken by the whole thing.’
    ‘I bet she was.’
    ‘Some people thought I should have been put in charge but I don’t know …’ Clough trails off modestly. Nelson says nothing, though he would have put Clough in charge. Judy may be the better detective but Clough is senior and that counts for something. Nelson is a great believer in fairness; it comes of being the youngest of three.
    No sooner has Clough disappeared through the swing doors than another figure appears, a figure wearing a rather crumpled purple cloak.
    ‘Hallo Cathbad.’
    ‘Hi Nelson. You’re looking better.’
    ‘You didn’t see me when I was ill. At death’s door I was, wasn’t I love?’ Nelson appeals to a passing nurse.
    ‘So I hear,’ she says, straightening his sheet. ‘They’d given him up for dead in ICU.’
    ‘Quite an experience,’ says Cathbad, when the nurse has gone.
    ‘I can’t remember any of it,’ says Nelson. ‘I had these weird dreams though. You were in some of them.’
    ‘I know,’ says Cathbad.
    ‘What do you mean you know?’ says Nelson. He’d forgotten how infuriating Cathbad could be.
    Cathbad leans forward. He looks tired, Nelson realises, and rather unhappy, but still has plenty of his old force.
    ‘I know what was wrong with you, Nelson. You were cursed. You got in the way of a curse meant for Danforth Smith. It killed him but you were too strong for it. You were lost in the Dreaming, between life and death. So I came to rescue you.’
    ‘You … came to …’ Nelson is speechless. He has always known that Cathbad is more or less mad but this? This