‘OK,’ I said. ‘Think it over, try and talk to Tina again, then take it from there.’
‘Right, thanks.’
We stood up. At the door Jimmy turned. ‘About the money – can I pay it in instalments, if it’s a fair bit? You don’t need it all at once?’
‘No problem. By the way, if you do want me to do the work I’ll need a photo of Tina.’
‘Yeah, right.’
He’d lit the fag before he hit the pavement.
I wrote up my notes so they’d make sense another day. Then I rang the number for Dr Goulden. An answerphone told me the surgery was closed, would open again at four o’clock and then gave me an emergency number to ring. That seemed a bit drastic so I hung fire.
There was a heavy metallic sky and an unnerving pressure that made my eyeballs ache. The storm broke just as the kids emerged from school. Resounding cracks of thunder and great belching rumbles had half the playground in hysterics. The raindrops were the extra large variety that bounced as they hit the pavement. It kept it up for half an hour but even then didn’t have the decency to move on and dry up. Instead drizzle settled in. I closed the curtains and lit the lamps.
I got through to Dr Goulden’s receptionist who arranged an appointment for the Monday afternoon. I explained we weren’t patients but needed to see the doctor about a member of the family at Homelea. (Not strictly true but I didn’t want to fail at the blood-relatives hurdle.) As it was, the computer couldn’t cope with information outside of its programme, it needed a patient, so in the end the appointment was made in Lily Palmer’s name.
Dr Chattaway, Agnes’ GP and formerly Lily’s, didn’t have an appointment system. It was turn up and wait. I asked the receptionist when the quietest surgery was.
‘Oh, it’s always busy,’ she said, ‘but Monday’s by far the worst.’
When I rang Agnes she suggested we try Tuesday morning. ‘We’d still have fresh in our minds what Dr Goulden said…and I wouldn’t want to leave it any longer than necessary. So, Tuesday, I think.’
‘Fine, I said. ‘When I see you on Monday we’ll fix up a time for the Tuesday morning. And once we’ve seen both doctors we can assess where we’re up to.’
‘Whether it’s all a waste of time.’
‘No, I didn’t mean…’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said, ‘it’s difficult to remain even-tempered sometimes. I do appreciate your help.’
There wasn’t anything to do on the case until Monday. It was Thursday night. A three-day weekend then, one of the perks of part-time hours. And if I got some of the chores out of the way while the children were at school on the Friday there’d be more time for enjoying ourselves at the weekend proper. We’d go down to the park and gardens at Fletcher Moss. It often flooded in the winter but with wellies on, floods could be fun. I’d take Maddie and Tom swimming too or maybe to the pictures. My budget wouldn’t stretch to visits to the big plush cinemas but I could manage an occasional treat at the local picture house. I’d have to ring Cine City, find out what was on. Plenty to do, and more than enough to occupy my mind and stop me puzzling over Lily Palmer’s condition.