‘Kate? Where are you? Are you near home?’ It was Alexis, but Alexis as I’d never heard her before. Even in those few words, I could hear panic. And panic meant only one thing.
‘Davy?’ I said, my fear rising instantly to equal hers.
‘Kate, can you get home? Now?’
‘What’s happened?’ I was already skirting round the back of the community centre, crossing a scrubby playing field and heading back to the car. ‘He’s not…gone missing?’ My immediate terror was that, somehow, someone had discovered who had driven off with the drugs and that Davy was either a hostage or the potential victim of a vicious reprisal.
‘No, nothing like that. It’s just…’
I could hear Chris’s voice saying in the background, ‘For God’s sake, Alex, give me the phone, you’re only winding her up.’ Then Chris’s voice replaced Alexis’s. ‘Don’t panic,’ she said. ‘Davy’s come back to the house and he’s in a bit of a state, like he’s high on something. I think he might have been given drugs or something, and I think we ought to take him to hospital. How long will it take you to get home?’
I was at the car, switching the alarm off, shoving the key in the ignition, all on automatic pilot while I digested what Chris was saying. I felt as if I’d been punched in the stomach. Taking Davy to hospital was the nightmare scenario. There was no way we could do it without everything coming on top. Angie would discover that not only was her ex-husband in jail but her son had been put at risk by said ex-husband’s fancy woman and her lesbian friends. The chances of Richard ever seeing his son again without a social worker shrank to the size of a terrorist’s conscience.
Chris cut into my racing thoughts. ‘Hello? Kate? Are you still there?’
‘Yeah, I’m here,’ I said, powering down the street and heading back towards the Manchester road. ‘Look, you can’t take him to hospital. Oh shit, this is the worst possible thing…Give me a minute.’ I thought furiously. On the other hand, if he was really ill, we couldn’t not take him to hospital. The one thing Richard would never forgive was if I let anything happen to Davy. Come to that, I’d have a hard job forgiving myself. ‘How bad is he?’ I asked.
‘One minute he’s shivering, the next he’s sweating. He keeps going off into crazy giggling fits and he keeps pointing at nothing really and giggling and then cuddling up to us,’ Chris said. There was a note of desperation in her carefully controlled voice.
My brain had finally accessed the relevant information. ‘Give me five minutes, Chris,’ I said.
‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘He’s not at all well, Kate.’
‘Please. Five minutes, max.’ I cut off the connection before Chris could argue any more. I pulled up with a screech of rubber and the blast of a horn from the car behind. I flipped open my filofax and found the number I was looking for. I punched the number into the phone and moved back into the traffic. Sinful, I know, but getting to Davy was a greater imperative than the interests of other road users.
If anyone could help me, it was Dr Beth Taylor. Beth divides her time between an inner-city group practice and a part-time lectureship at the university in medical ethics. A few years ago, she had a fling with Bill which lasted about three months, which is probably a record for my business partner. Now, she’s Mortensen and Brannigan’s first port of call whenever we’re investigating medical insurance claims. She also repairs broken bits of Brannigan from time to time.
The phone answered on the second ring. ‘This is Beth,’ the distant voice said. ‘I’m not here right now, but if you want me to call you back you can leave a message after the tone. If it’s urgent, you can try me on my mobile, which is…’ I keyed the number into the phone as she recited it, then ended the call and dialled her mobile, praying to God she not only had it with her but was also in a decent reception area.
The phone rang once, twice, three times. ‘Hello, Beth Taylor.’ I’d never heard a more welcome sound.
‘Beth? It’s Kate Brannigan.’
‘Hi, Kate! Long time no see. Which I suppose is a good thing, in your case. Is this a professional call? Only, I’m on my way to play hockey.’
I bit back the frustrated sigh. ‘It’s an emergency, Beth.’
‘What have you done this time?’ Underneath the warm humour in her voice, there was no mistaking the concern.
‘It’s not me. It’s my partner’s son. The friends who are looking after him think he might have been given drugs.’
‘Then it’s not me you want, Kate, it’s the casualty department at MRI. You should know that.’
‘Beth, I can’t. Look, I can’t explain now, not because I’m not prepared to, but because there isn’t time. Please, Beth, I need this favour. I’m on my way back to my house now, and as soon as I get there, I’ll tell you why I can’t take him to hospital unless it’s a matter of life and death,’ I pleaded.
‘If it’s drugs, it could well be that,’ Beth warned.
‘I know, I know. But please, you’re the only doctor I know well enough to trust with this.’
There was a moment’s silence. ‘I shouldn’t do this,’ she said with a sigh. ‘It’s against all my better judgement.’
‘You’ll go?’
‘I’ll go. Where is he?’
‘He’s at my house. You remember it?’
‘I remember,’ Beth said. ‘I’ll be there in about ten minutes. Oh, and Kate?’
‘Yeah?’
‘You owe Crumpsall Ladies Hockey Club a round of drinks for every five minutes I’m late for the game.’ The phone went dead before I could tell Beth it would be worth every penny.
I rang Chris straight back and told her Beth was on her way. The relief in her voice told me exactly how much fear she’d been hiding when she’d spoken to me before. ‘Thank God!’ she exclaimed. ‘He’s just been sick. We’re really scared, Kate.’
‘It’s not your fault, Chris. This would have happened whether Richard had been there or not, believe me. Look, phone me if there’s any change, OK? I’ll be back as soon as I can.’
I might have broken all records driving to Sheffield. But I shattered them driving back.
I barrelled through my front door like the Incredible Hulk on speed. There wasn’t a sound from anywhere, and it took me less than ten seconds to discover they weren’t in the house. I ran through the conservatory and yanked open the patio doors leading to Richard’s living room. Still no one. By now, I was convinced they’d had to rush him to hospital. All the way home, I’d been plagued by a vision of Davy lying in the subdued lighting of intensive care, more tubes than Central London coursing in and out of his little body.
I crossed the room in half a dozen strides and hauled the door open, cannoning into Chris, who stepped backwards into Beth, who continued the domino effect with Alexis. ‘Ssh,’ Beth said before I could say a word. I backed into the living room and the other three trooped behind me. Alexis shut the door.
‘How is he? What’s happening?’ I demanded.
‘Calm down,’ Beth instructed. ‘Three deep breaths.’ I did what she told me. I even sat down. ‘Davy’s going to be fine. I’ve just given him a mild sedative and tranquillizer which have calmed him down and sent him to sleep. He’ll probably be more or less zonked out till morning. He might feel a bit groggy tomorrow, but basically he’ll be OK.’
‘What was the matter? What happened?’ I asked.
‘He presented like someone who has absorbed a significant amount of an hallucinogenic drug,’ Beth said. ‘Nothing life-threatening, thank God.’