Eye for an Eye

for Beth to retire, but sometimes she would stretch out and read. Light spilled into the hallway as an inner door was opened and the main door unlocked.
    The rings under Beth’s eyes looked as dark as bruises. Her hair had an unkempt style he could not remember seeing before.
    ‘Did I wake you?’ he asked.
    She shook her head. ‘I wasn’t expecting you.’
    From the heaviness in her words, Gilchrist realized she had been dozing. He was about to ask for Leighton’s digital photograph when she blinked, heavy and slow, turned her head and stared back along the hallway. For one disconcerting moment, he wondered if he was interrupting her evening with Armstrong, but then she swayed, and he realized she had been drinking.
    ‘I spoke with Leighton,’ he said.
    ‘Sorry?’
    The word had been spoken with effort, but left no taint of alcohol in the narrow space between them. He hated having to ask, but said, ‘Are you alone?’
    She nodded, as if speech was beyond her. Then she frowned, as if remembering something from a long time ago, and pushed the door toward him, the move so unexpected that he almost had no time to shove his foot in the way.
    The door bounced back.
    Beth looked at the tiled floor in dazed surprise. She pushed again, but the door hit Gilchrist’s foot and she stumbled against the frame.
    Gilchrist leaned forward, pushed an arm behind her knees, and lifted her. By the time he placed her on her bed he knew what had happened.
    He called an ambulance.
    ‘Can you identify the problem?’
    Gilchrist picked up the plastic-backed foil from the floor by the bedside table. ‘Cuprofen,’ he said. ‘Ibuprofen tablets. Maximum strength. Both packs. That’s twenty-four in total. She’s conscious. But only just. Get someone here as fast as you can.’
     
    ‘Mr Gilchrist?’
    Gilchrist opened his eyes. The doctor’s hair was snowy white, as if to match his gown. A navy-blue waistcoat and starched shirt with tightly knotted tie made Gilchrist run his tongue over his teeth. He pushed himself up out of the chair.
    ‘There’s no need to get up.’
    ‘It’s better if I stand.’ His spine seemed to have locked, and the fire in his side refused to let him flex. ‘How is she, Doctor ...’ – he eyed the name tag – ‘Ferguson?’
    ‘Resting. We’ve pumped her stomach and given her a sedative. She’s sound asleep.’ The corners of Ferguson’s eyes creased. ‘Your fast action went a considerable way to saving her life.’
    Gilchrist nodded. After calling for an ambulance, he had managed to make Beth swallow a large glass of warm salted water, then held her head over a plastic basin and pushed his fingers to the back of her throat. But by the time she made it to Accident and Emergency she was unconscious with skin the waxy pallor of the terminally ill.
    ‘Can I see her?’ he asked.
    ‘I think we can arrange that,’ Ferguson said. ‘But it’s important she rests.’
    Gilchrist followed Ferguson as he strutted along the corridor, his firm steps as tight and precise as his shirt collar. They passed a row of curtained consulting rooms and entered a ward that rang with the clatter of cutlery and the rattle of trolleys. The smell of vegetables and cooked meat did nothing for him, and he knew he would have to force himself to eat later.
    Ferguson led him to a small anteroom. ‘Five minutes,’ he said. ‘That’s all.’
    Beth’s eyes were closed. A clear drip was connected to her left arm. A monitor stood at the opposite end of the bed, with a wire that led to one of her fingers. He took her other hand and pressed it to his lips. Her skin smelled fresh, felt oily smooth. He was deeply troubled that she had been prepared to step to the edge of her psychological precipice and take a leap that would end her life. He saw, too, how close he had come to doing that with his own life after Gail left him.
    He knew for sure that when Beth had needed him, he had not been there for her.
    ‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered.
    Her dark lashes fluttered, as if her subconscious had heard his voice and was signalling her awake. But after several seconds she settled, and he laid her arm by her side and left the ward.

CHAPTER 30
     
    Cricket bat.
    It seemed such an odd weapon, but in the hands of someone wild enough, a cricket bat packed a punch and a half and took a lot of stopping.
    Gilchrist touched his wounds, felt the evidence of his recent beating at the hands of a crazed batsman. Except that the man who had