Muscular."
"All the more reason for doing as I suggest!"
"In short," Paul concluded, ignoring the comment, "I picture her as
being rather like you."
He didn't stay to see the effect of the words.
His hand shook as he pushed the key into the lock of his car. The wind
had dropped, but that hadn't made the air any warmer -- only ensured
that the drizzle would stay in this vicinity instead of moving on.
-- That woman! I'd like to do to her what Mirza suggested doing to Holinshed!
He let the car roll to the edge of the pub's carpark. There he paused,
struck by a minor problem. Faberdown was a stranger hereabouts, on his
own admission; he'd said no more than "woods half a mile away." And the
pub was sited at a crossroads.
-- Must be the Cornminster road. Coming into Yemble by any other route,
he'd have passed a house with a phone long before he reached the Needle
in Haystack. In which case . . .
The woods Faberdown meant must be a neglected copse which he passed daily
going to and from the hospital, with a gateway adjacent into which a car
could conveniently be run while the driver relieved himself. It was part
of the grounds of what had once been a fine private house, burned to
the foundations in the depression years and never rebuilt. Speculation
was still rife locally as to whether the owner had fired it to collect
the insurance money.
-- I wonder if the attack was really unprovoked!
The idea sprang from nowhere, but seemed like such a dazzling access of
insight he was about to drive in the direction of Cornminster without
further ado, convinced he would find some harmless imbecile wandering in
search of kindly treatment. That was ridiculous. The salesman's arm had
really been broken and his eye had been blacked with a heavyweight punch.
He swung the wheel the other way, towards the hospital.
-- Thank goodness Iris left me the car. Otherwise long horrible walks in
rain like this, endless standing at bus-stops with the feet squelching . . .
She would have been entitled to take it, of course. It had been bought with
her money, not his.
He swung past the big blank-and-white sign identifying "Chent Hospital for
Nervous Disorders"; the gatekeeper peered out with a startled expression
meaning what's Dr Fidler doing coming back at this time of night.
The building itself loomed sinister with its mock battlements. Relic of a
Victorian miser's dreams of grandeur, it was about as unsuitable for use
as an asylum as any in Britain, half make-believe castle, half ill-conceived
afterthoughts such as the high-security Disturbed wing in red brick and
the inevitable tall chimney crowned with its spiky lightning conductor.
But it had been left for a mental hospital by heirs grateful that the
owner had finally been certified insane after making their lives hell
well into his eighties, and with the shortage of facilities one had to
be satisfied with what one could get.
-- Though the impact of it on a patient arriving for the first time
must be disastrous! Imagine being delivered here in a state of acute
anxiety, for instance, and seeing those turrets and crenellations, and
then hearing that iron-studded oaken door go thud behind you! Christ,
the effect on the staff is bad enough!
He braked the car with a grinding of gravel and marched up to the forbidding
entrance. It was locked after six, but a key for it was among the many
which constituted his burden of office. In the ball he found himself
face to face with Natalie.
"Paul! What are you doing here? Never mind, I'm glad to see you."
Blank, he stared at her. "You won't be when I tell you why I've come."
"This alleged escaped lunatic?"
" Is it one of our patients? I didn't think It could possibly -- "
She made an impatient gesture. "Of course not! I've been
"All the more reason for doing as I suggest!"
"In short," Paul concluded, ignoring the comment, "I picture her as
being rather like you."
He didn't stay to see the effect of the words.
His hand shook as he pushed the key into the lock of his car. The wind
had dropped, but that hadn't made the air any warmer -- only ensured
that the drizzle would stay in this vicinity instead of moving on.
-- That woman! I'd like to do to her what Mirza suggested doing to Holinshed!
He let the car roll to the edge of the pub's carpark. There he paused,
struck by a minor problem. Faberdown was a stranger hereabouts, on his
own admission; he'd said no more than "woods half a mile away." And the
pub was sited at a crossroads.
-- Must be the Cornminster road. Coming into Yemble by any other route,
he'd have passed a house with a phone long before he reached the Needle
in Haystack. In which case . . .
The woods Faberdown meant must be a neglected copse which he passed daily
going to and from the hospital, with a gateway adjacent into which a car
could conveniently be run while the driver relieved himself. It was part
of the grounds of what had once been a fine private house, burned to
the foundations in the depression years and never rebuilt. Speculation
was still rife locally as to whether the owner had fired it to collect
the insurance money.
-- I wonder if the attack was really unprovoked!
The idea sprang from nowhere, but seemed like such a dazzling access of
insight he was about to drive in the direction of Cornminster without
further ado, convinced he would find some harmless imbecile wandering in
search of kindly treatment. That was ridiculous. The salesman's arm had
really been broken and his eye had been blacked with a heavyweight punch.
He swung the wheel the other way, towards the hospital.
-- Thank goodness Iris left me the car. Otherwise long horrible walks in
rain like this, endless standing at bus-stops with the feet squelching . . .
She would have been entitled to take it, of course. It had been bought with
her money, not his.
He swung past the big blank-and-white sign identifying "Chent Hospital for
Nervous Disorders"; the gatekeeper peered out with a startled expression
meaning what's Dr Fidler doing coming back at this time of night.
The building itself loomed sinister with its mock battlements. Relic of a
Victorian miser's dreams of grandeur, it was about as unsuitable for use
as an asylum as any in Britain, half make-believe castle, half ill-conceived
afterthoughts such as the high-security Disturbed wing in red brick and
the inevitable tall chimney crowned with its spiky lightning conductor.
But it had been left for a mental hospital by heirs grateful that the
owner had finally been certified insane after making their lives hell
well into his eighties, and with the shortage of facilities one had to
be satisfied with what one could get.
-- Though the impact of it on a patient arriving for the first time
must be disastrous! Imagine being delivered here in a state of acute
anxiety, for instance, and seeing those turrets and crenellations, and
then hearing that iron-studded oaken door go thud behind you! Christ,
the effect on the staff is bad enough!
He braked the car with a grinding of gravel and marched up to the forbidding
entrance. It was locked after six, but a key for it was among the many
which constituted his burden of office. In the ball he found himself
face to face with Natalie.
"Paul! What are you doing here? Never mind, I'm glad to see you."
Blank, he stared at her. "You won't be when I tell you why I've come."
"This alleged escaped lunatic?"
" Is it one of our patients? I didn't think It could possibly -- "
She made an impatient gesture. "Of course not! I've been
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