Chapter 1

 

 

“Traumatic spinal lesion.” The lecturer yawned and glanced languidly around the room, then pounced. “Nikki – will you sum up for us, please?”

Nikki Browne, preoccupied with a few traumas of her own just then, blinked rapidly and blushed. “I’m terribly sorry, I didn’t quite catch. . .” she said breathlessly. “C-cc-could you repeat the question, please?”

She saw his thin mouth tighten, his eloquent eyebrow rise slightly as he said, slowly and clearly, as if addressing a foreigner, “Traumatic spinal lesion – a description, Nikki, please.” He took a deep breath. “Unless, of course, you’re suffering from a touch of post-traumatic amnesia yourself?” he suggested, mildly.

Nobody laughed at the joke: most of the students in the group had felt the sting of this man’s sarcasm one time or another, though Nikki Browne had suffered more than most. Now she sat, speechless with embarrassment, her mind utterly blank – his comment about post-traumatic amnesia was nearer to the truth than he could ever have imagined. Of course she knew the symptoms, the causes and the outcomes of spinal lesions – she had good cause to – but she couldn’t talk about them, not here, not to the intimidating Mr Jenkins.

He sighed deeply. “Well, perhaps you should make a note.” He stared at her unopened file. “Can anyone tell me the symptoms of traumatic spinal lesions?” he asked without much hope.

Some bold soul made a halting suggestion, someone else added to it and, as they spoke, Nikki made an attempt to write. But her hand was trembling, her eyes blurred and the result was an illegible mess. At the end of the session she fled.

“That was Horrible Huw – you don’t want to take any notice of him,” Katie Harding told Nikki as they sat with Barbara and Claire in the kitchen at Kelham’s, their student house. The first-year Kelham’s group were always known as “les Six”, though in fact there were only five of them in residence that term: Jan Buczowski had been granted compassionate leave so that he could go back to central Europe and see his family.

Claire Donovan, who missed Jan more than she ever admitted to the others, clucked sympathetically at Nikki.

“Will you have some more coffee?” she said. “You look as if you need it.”

“Thank you, no.” Nikki shook her head miserably.

“Don’t let him get to you,” Katie advised breezily. “He’s only on a short-term contract – he’ll be gone before we have first-year exams.”

“How on earth do you get to know these things?” Barbara Robinson asked. “I’d have thought staff contracts were top secret.”

“Not if you’re on the union executive,” said Katie, grinning. “There are no secrets from us.”

“I’ll bet!” smiled Barbara. Katie Harding was renowned for her enthusiastic participation on several student committees.

“If you’re so powerful, why don’t you get something done about Huw Jenkins?” Claire Donovan was most indignant. “Just look at the state he’s got Nikki into!”

They all turned to look at Nikki, who was certainly in a state – face flushed, hands shaking, a hint of tears.

“I’m all right, really I am,” she protested, alarmed at the prospect of Katie, that well-known fearless activist, taking up her problems. “And anyway, I’m out on placement next week. Please - don’t make a fuss.”

“I’m not fussing,” Claire protested.

“No, no, of course you’re not,” said Nikki quickly. “I shouldn’t have said that. Sorry, Claire.”

“You shouldn’t have said that either,” observed Katie.

“What?”

“ ‘Sorry’ – you say it far too often. That’s what encourages bullies like Jenkins.”

Nikki flushed. “If one’s made a mistake, one should apologize,” she said stiffly.

“And even if one hasn’t?” smiled Katie. “Oh, Nikki, you can’t take the blame for everyone else’s mistakes, you know.”

“I don’t,” Nikki protested. But even to herself it sounded hollow. That was the root of her problem in college, in the hospital – even at home. Especially at home. Her mind shied away from the thought, like a highly-strung horse. She shook her fine, ash-blonde hair off her face and blinked rapidly several times.

Barbara was watching her. “Forget all about Horrible Huw,” she advised. “Come out with us for an evening. Relax.”

Nikki shook her head. “It’s kind of you to ask, but I must get this work done.”

“Do it tomorrow, or even Sunday,” Katie suggested pointedly. They all knew Nikki went home most weekends without taking so much as a book or a file with her, though, as Katie pointed out, there couldn’t be much else to do in the depths of the country.

The Kelhamites often speculated on Nikki’s mysterious home life. Katie had long ago decided she must have a secret lover, some handsome aristocrat of the shires who rode to hounds; Barbara thought Nikki was under pressure from her family to drop her nursing training; and Claire, the only one of them to share Nikki’s passion for horses, decided Nikki merely went home to ride. The two men had no useful contributions to make: Jan Buczowski, a refugee from central Europe, couldn’t even begin to imagine the home life of the English landed gentry and Nick Bone, cool and charming to most women, seemed to go out of his way to avoid contact with Nikki Browne.

Aware of the speculative glances now passing between the girls, Nikki stood up.

“I’ll be busy all weekend,” she said. “So I’d better get on with my notes right now. Ciao!” Trying to appear nonchalant, she nodded to the girls and forced herself to saunter out of the kitchen.

Back in her room, Nikki surveyed the illegible scrawl left over from Huw Jenkins’ lecture. Just as well she didn’t need the notes, she thought. For she knew the symptoms of traumatic spinal lesions by heart, just as she knew most things she’d learned over the past year. The trouble was, faced with an exam paper or a questioning tutor, it all fled from her mind and she was left dithering, like the dingbat they obviously thought she was.

Nikki sighed, put the files away, and stood, as she so often did, gazing vacantly through the window. The fading light filtered through the stark silhouette of an ancient chestnut tree, its fat, shiny buds holding the promise of spring. She’d spent hours sitting by that window, looking through the branches out over the hospital grounds. Sometimes she felt that tree was the only thing that kept her sane. Strange to think she’d nearly missed out on that wonderful view – she had been booked into quite a different room when she’d first arrived.

So had Nick Bone – the very same room. The mix-up had occurred because of the similarity of their names, and Nikki had hauled her luggage up to the doorway of the large corner room at the end of the corridor only to be faced by books, equipment, toiletries, clothes – even sets of bookshelves, which someone was already erecting in her room! It was a spacious, bright room, and Nikki had already taken a liking to it – indeed had already settled herself at the dressing-table – when Nick Bone arrived to confront her. Even now, she could hear his first words.

“How may I help you?” he’d said, in a cool, mocking tone.

“Sorry,” she’d said, blushing and fumbling as usual. “So sorry, but there seems to have been some mistake. . .”

“Obviously,” he’d drawled. “But I don’t think it’s mine.” Then he’d turned to the door, standing back to usher her out. “I’ll help you move your luggage,” he offered.

Nikki could have wept. It had been a terrible day – packing up and leaving home, meeting the new students, who seemed so obviously brighter and more con. dent than she was, and now, after all that, she found herself homeless!

“Thank you,” she’d replied, knowing she sounded terribly hoity-toity – she always did when she was tense. “If you could just bring it in here. . .”

She’d never forgotten the expression on his face. It wasn’t mere irritation – not even anger. Outrage, that was it – as if she’d trespassed on his ground. His eyes had blazed with a cold contempt.

“Right!” he’d said. “I’ll get this sorted. . .” He’d whirled round, and was off down the stairs before she could protest.

She’d just sat there, staring through the mirror, until Katie Harding had found her – and had sided with her, which did nothing to cool the situation when Nick Bone arrived back with the room allocation list in his hand.

And of course she’d lost – or thought she had then. Certainly she’d never dared cross Nick Bone again. Even now, although they moved in the same circles and shared the same friends, they were always rather distant, wary of each other. But she’d decided long ago that she’d got the better room, with its view of the parkland through the branches of her favourite chestnut tree.

It was quite dark now; she could barely discern the shape of the tree against the window. Sighing, she picked up her bag and began, reluctantly, to pack for her weekend at home.

At noon on Saturday, Nikki stood outside Luddington Station, waiting to see whether the estate jeep had been spared to collect her. A squeal of brakes and a somewhat hoarse toot showed her that it hadn’t – her mother was driving the ancient Volvo.

“Nicola – over here!” Lady Caroline sounded as if she were calling one of the dogs. Except, thought Nikki, she was probably fonder of her dogs than of her daughter. She forced herself to smile brightly as she clambered into the passenger seat.

“Thanks for coming to meet me, Mummy,” she said, trying to keep the disappointment out of her voice. Bargery usually drove in to pick her up and they had a lovely gossip on the way to Luddington Hall. Bargery was actually interested in her work at St Ag’s – knowledgeable too: he’d been in the medical corps before becoming Daddy’s batman.

“I had to come in anyway,” said her mother, dismissing Nikki’s gratitude. “Judy’s lost the pups.”

“Oh, Mummy! I am sorry. . .” As soon as she’d said it Nikki remembered Katie’s comment about her habit of apologizing, and she stopped. Katie was right, of course, but then Katie had never met Lady Caroline. “Is Judy all right?” she asked.

“Oh, she’s sleeping it off in the back there,” her mother said dismissively. “But Nikki – the stud fees, the vet’s bill, the clients let down. . .” She put her foot down hard and the car shot over the brow of the hill. “How I’m expected to run a business with no capital to fall back on. . .”

It was a familiar refrain and Nikki turned away and watched the familiar sweep of the road as it curved down to the river. The old Volvo was draughty and she took a long, deep breath, letting the earthy scent of newly-ploughed land and the dank river smell sweep over her. She let the breath go in a deep sigh.

“You sound tired,” her mother accused her.

“It’s been a busy week,” Nikki hedged. She never admitted to her mother how hard she found college life. No point in offering her ammunition – she had enough of her own.

“Well, it’s been pretty frantic here, I can tell you,” her mother said. “You’ve been well out of it.” She made it sound as if Nikki had been away on holiday.

“Accountants?” queried Nikki.

“All over the place,” her mother exaggerated. “Your father’s been terrible all week.”

Nikki didn’t reply. She knew her father was never “terrible”, only silent and brooding, like the countryside around them now. They were at her favourite spot: everything she could see at this point belonged to her father. Fields, woods, hills, the very valley along which they travelled, even this stretch of the river, reddish-brown and swollen after the winter rains – all of it belonged to the Luddington estate, and most of it was losing money. No wonder Daddy was so often silent and brooding!

They drove over the old bridge and in through the huge wrought-iron gates at the lodge, empty and awaiting conversion into holiday cottages. Along the lime avenue Lady Caroline put her foot down and the car swept up to the impressive main entrance in a swirl of gravel, shooting through an archway and into the stables courtyard.

“Give me a hand with Judy, will you?” her mother said, opening up the back. Together they lifted the cage and carried the somnolent dog to an empty stable.

“Water,” Lady Caroline ordered.

Nikki filled a bowl from the old brass tap in the corner and placed it beside the half-conscious dog.

“I’ll just go and say hello to Jasper,” she called. But Lady Caroline had already set off across the courtyard, without waiting for her daughter.

Nikki walked past several empty stables until she came to the one at the end; she opened the half-door and stood leaning against her horse. He turned his head and nuzzled her hair with his soft, dry nose, snickering gently as if to reassure her.

“Hello, Jasper,” she whispered. “I’m home!”

After the usual scratch lunch – Bargery’s Scotch broth with cheese and beetroot sandwiches – Nikki sat back from the table and examined her father’s lean, careworn face anxiously. Were those merely weathering veins or was his blood pressure up? Heart attacks were caused by stress. Oh, if only I could come up with some brilliant idea that would save us all, she thought.

She wasn’t worried about herself. She had her nursing grant and a fairly comfortable life at Kelham’s. But her parents were country people – County, too: they knew no other way of making a living except from the estate. And then there was William. Nikki looked across the vast dining table to where her younger brother sat, absent-mindedly fiddling with the control of his wheelchair. He caught her glance and smiled sweetly, apologetically.

Again Nikki remembered the previous evening at Kelham’s: “ ‘Sorry’ – you say it far too often,” Katie had told her. She’s right, Nikki thought to herself. Maybe the family motto should be “Apologies for existing”. Except for Mummy, of course – she never saw any need to apologize for anything.

“Nicola, are you listening?” Lady Caroline was holding forth. “I was saying that if only you’d give up this nursing nonsense and come home, we might be able to pull something together.”

“Mummy, we’ve been into all that over and over againflat least I’m not a drain on the estate,” Nikki pointed out. “And what on earth could I do if I came home?”

Her mother shrugged. “You could give riding lessons,” she suggested. “Help me with the kennels, work in the estate office. . .”

“But I know nothing about estate management,” Nikki pointed out. “And we’ve no hacks.” They were down to three horses now, her parents’ hunters and her own Jasper, none of them suitable for learners.

“If you’d done a secretarial course instead of insisting on going off to that hospital. . .” her mother went on.

Nikki said nothing – always best when her mother took this tone.

Lady Caroline opened her mouth and then, catching her husband’s clear gaze, closed it again. Nikki gazed up at the crumbling plasterwork on the ceiling and smiled. One up for Daddy! For a moment all was quiet.

Nikki turned to her brother. “You could take a training course and join the estate office,” she suggested.

Will merely smiled gently and shook his head.

“Of course he couldn’t,” Lady Caroline protested. “He couldn’t get around a college, and he’d never get that wheelchair into the estate office. Do talk sense, Nicola.” She turned an accusing gaze on her daughter. “And anyway, it’s a secretarial job – not at all suitable for a young man like Will. . .” She stopped as the full realization of what she’d said hung in the air.

Nobody spoke, though everybody knew what the others were thinking. What sort of job was suitable for a paraplegic like William?

Sunday morning was Will’s outing day. Nikki usually pushed him around the grounds in the wheelchair, carefully avoiding the stables, or took him out for a drive up into the hills where he enjoyed the broad vistas out to Wales. But much to her surprise, Will asked her to drive round the whole estate – the first time since his accident. Probably the after-effects of the accountants’ visit, she decided. And certainly he asked all sorts of pertinent questions, to which Nikki had few answers.

“You should come out here with Daddy,” she said. “He’d explain it all to you.”

Again the sweet smile, the shake of the head. “No, he wouldn’t,” said Will flatly.

And Nikki didn’t contradict him: they both knew their father’s way of coping with the tragedy was to ignore it. He didn’t fuss over Will, like Mummy, nor did he urge him on, as Nikki did. He merely treated him as if he were still a little boy, incapable of taking any part in the running of the estate. It was as if he thought his mind was paralysed, not his legs, Nikki told herself impatiently.

Yet, as they drove through the lanes, she saw that William already knew far more about the estate lands than she did – and more than their father even realized. If only they’d get their heads together, she thought, they might solve both problems – the failing finances of the estate, and the future employment of her brother.

“I could talk to him,” she offered, though she knew they both would hate it.

Will shook his head. “No point,” he said. “Let’s go home.”

Nikki hated the moment of departure, leaving behind her horse, who needed more exercise, and her brother, who needed her company.

“Coming to see me off, Will?” she asked, over-cheerfully. “Bargery’s driving.”

He was lying on a sofa, close to a sulky fire, with an old picnic rug thrown over him. He smiled and shook his head, opening up the newspaper and holding it before him. Almost like a shield, she thought. I’ll bet he’s not reading it.

Nikki sighed. She knew how galling it must be for him to be so dependent, a boy who’d gone cheerfully off to boarding school at the age of nine, loved all outdoor pursuits and lived an active country life of shooting, fishing and hunting until a year ago. . . She quickly suppressed the memory. Now he was stuck in Luddington Hall, unable even to get himself to bed at night. Her heart bled for him even as she attempted to stir him into some sort of action.

“Well, if you’re sure you won’t come. . .” she said finally. “I’d better go and wake Bargery from his afternoon nap or I’ll miss my train.”

He looked up. “If you had the car,” he said, “you could come down more often, stay longer. . .”

“No chance of that,” laughed Nikki. “Mummy needs the Volvo for the dogs.”

“There are other vehicles around,” Will pointed out. “I’ll talk to him about that.” He always referred to their father as “he” and “him” these days.

“Well, thank you, Will,” Nikki said, surprised and touched by his offer. “And perhaps you could talk to him about a job in the estate office at the same time?”

The same sweet smile, the same shake of the head. “No point, Nick,” he said, apparently cheerfully. “You heard what Mummy said.”

“Oh, you know Mummy,” Nikki said dismissively. “She’s just so pleased to have you back here, she never thinks about your future.”

“What future?” Will shrugged. “You’re the one with the future,” he said. “Off you go and get qualified – it might come in handy for us all some time!”

On the train Nikki remembered her brother’s words, and frowned. What on earth could he mean? Surely he wasn’t looking to her to nurse him? Cure him? Nikki shivered. What was it Katie had said? “You can’t take the blame for everyone else’s mistakes.”

And she was right, Nikki reminded herself. Will’s case would tax even the most dedicated, experienced nurse, and she was only a student, and a poor one at that. She suddenly remembered she had a tutorial with Sister Thomas next day and she groaned inwardly. What if Huw Jenkins had reported Friday’s incident? What if they were taking her off the course?

By the time the train pulled into Brassington Station Nikki Browne was wishing herself back at home. Almost.