Meantime, when the doctor called a nurse to undress the patient, it was the very same one who had tended Maddy some seventeen years ago. On seeing the scars, Cathy recognized her immediately; though she was deeply shocked at the way her former patient had deteriorated.
Interrupting the doctor, she explained how, “This lady was a patient here about seventeen years ago, when I was young and newly qualified. Apparently she was involved in a terrible accident, though they never found out exactly what happened.” She recalled how many times she had tried to keep in contact, but that Maddy had been so unresponsive that she eventually gave up trying.
“Her name is Sheelagh Mulligan, and she works here at the hospital,” she informed him. “She does the night shift, cleaning the kitchens and so on.”
With the examination over, the young doctor ordered that Maddy should be treated for iron deficiency. “I’m not surprised she keeled over,” he told Betsy and Robin. “She’s badly anemic. Added to which, she appears to be underfed – wasting away, more to the point.”
“But will she be all right?” Betsy was concerned.
“She will if she takes care of herself,” he replied brusquely. “I shall recommend that she stays in for forty-eight hours, until we see how she is.”
While Maddy slept, Betsy suggested that she and Robin should go back and start putting the house in order for her. “And we’ll need to get the window mended,” she reminded him.
He agreed, wholeheartedly.
A short time later, having made sure that Maddy was still asleep and mending, they returned to the house. “I ought to find a nightie for her, and some clean clothes,” Betsy said. As an afterthought she suggested, “If needs be, I’ll go to town and buy something.”
Their first task was to blitz the house, which they did, hoovering and dusting in every nook and cranny. “I’m not sure we ought to be doing this,” Robin said worriedly. “Our neighbor is a very private person. She might take offense at us going through her house.”
Betsy was more pragmatic. “According to what the doctor said, she’s as weak as a kitten, not taking care of herself and probably not eating properly. She might well be cross at first, but if we do a good job, she’ll realize we were only trying to help.”
They did not stop until the rugs were dust-free and fluffy; the kitchen was given a good scrub and even the windows were thoroughly cleaned. Then while Betsy carried on upstairs, Robin measured for the broken window and went out to get some glass cut and a bag of putty.
When he got back, he found his girlfriend standing upstairs by the open wardrobe door, her attention taken by something inside. “Did you find a nightgown?” he asked, crossing the room to her.
Betsy told him she hadn’t yet, but, “Look at this!” She gestured to the inside of the wardrobe.
Robin took a look, and there, pinned all over the inside of the wardrobe door, were a myriad of photographs; each and every one of the same young woman. Heavily made up for the stage, here she was wearing a long, tight-fitting pink dress; there she was clothed all in black and looking absolutely stunning. In each of the photographs, she was onstage, sometimes jokingly posing, other times serious as she sang into the mike, or leaned down to talk with clients.
To Robin, she seemed strangely familiar, but he assumed he must have seen her on TV, or written about in the papers. Not for one moment did he connect her with his past, when he was a lonely little boy who had recently lost his mother…
“So, who is it?” He was suddenly very curious. “And why has she got these pictures all hidden away like this?”
Betsy had a theory. “Do you remember, a few weeks ago, when we heard that amazing voice coming through the wall, singing to our music?”
He couldn’t believe what she was implying. “Yes, I remember,” he said, “but you’re surely not suggesting that whoever was singing was her?” Incredulous, he pointed to the pictures. “Are you saying these are photos of her? Our poor little shabby neighbor?” He shook his head. “Never! Not in a million years.” But even as he said it, a door was opening in his mind, taking him back to a place and a time when a loving young woman called Sheelagh had brought music and warmth to his life, and to his father’s. And then she had vanished, taking her songs and her smile with her, never to be seen again.
“Look at her!” Betsy grew excited. “That slim figure, that long dark hair – and in the shop that day, you said you saw her eyes – ‘amazing eyes,’ that’s what you said. ‘Dark as night’!”
She opened the door wide. “Look again.”
“I am looking! And I still say you’re imagining things.”
But he was agitated; deeply moved. He studied the lovely woman in the pictures, relaxed and glamorous, and as he tried to relate her to the sad, neglected woman lying in the hospital bed, he saw a caption: The Pink Lady Cabaret Bar, Old Compton Street, Soho, 1976; Maddy Delaney, the Songbird, singing the blues…
There was a mystery here, something linked to himself and his father, and Robin was determined to find out what it was.
It was early evening, and Brad was ready to leave Brighill Farm to drive into Bedford. “It would be so good if I could change his mind,” he told Sue Wright, who was now employed by him as a secretary and jill-of-all-trades. “A man needs his son alongside him. Besides, who will I leave all this to, if he doesn’t want it?”
“You can’t make the boy do what he doesn’t want to do,” she chided, for the hundredth time. Her Dave had been a late starter, and she was simply thrilled that he was knuckling under and studying Physics at the uni. No way would she have tried to persuade him to give it up. “Just as you had a dream of starting your chain of veterinary clinics, so young Robin has a dream of becoming a fine doctor.”
Brad felt ashamed. “I know,” he admitted. “And I know it’s selfish of me to try and undermine him.”
“Then don’t.” Sue always spoke her mind. “Look.” She pointed to the clock over the cooker. “You’ve still time to have a cuppa and a slice of that apple pie.” Her other four sons were all married or living away, and she hadn’t got out of the habit of baking for a large family.
Brad gave a sigh, then with a shrug of his broad shoulders, he relented. “Oh, go on then. Get the kettle on, you big bully! I’ll run up to the office and collect that brochure I want to show Robin.”
A moment later, studying the new, shiny reprint of his clinic brochures, he sat with Sue at the table. “Do you ever miss the old days?” she asked him suddenly. “You know, when our lads were best friends at school? Life seemed a lot more simple than.”
When Brad made no comment, she looked him in the eye. “You still miss that Sheelagh, don’t you?”
He gave a little smile. “Does it show that much?”
“All the time,” she said. “And if I’m honest, I still miss her too. She was such good company, always smiling and helpful; she was a special person. I can’t believe she was only here for such a short time. But how cruel of her, to disappear like that, leaving you and the boy so worried and upset! We’ve never found out what happened, have we?” Sue shivered. It had been a mystery as total as the vanishing of the Marie Celeste. Sheelagh’s clothes and few possessions had been left behind… Sue sometimes secretly wondered if the poor young woman had died – or some such inexplicable thing.
Encouraged by Sue’s comments, Brad opened his heart. “You know how much I loved Penny,” he started. “When I lost her, I thought the world had come to an end. I could never see myself with anyone else.”
He leaned back in his chair, his thoughts returning to the lonely years before Sheelagh had arrived in his life. “Then Sheelagh came along, and wham! Almost without me realizing it, she crept into my heart. She gave me hope for the future.”