Gallery Whispers

9

Olive Mcllhenney was not an easy woman to take off guard. Her husband had been trying for many years to achieve this, but with very few successes. However when she opened her front door, and saw who was standing on the step, a green Barbour thrown over her shoulders to protect her from the rain, her normally imperturbable expression changed to one of complete surprise.

'Dr Skinner,' she exclaimed. 'Come in, quick, out of the rain.'

'You remember me then,' said Sarah, as she stepped into the narrow hall way of the semidetached villa. The two women had met only once, at a social event more than a year earlier.

'Of course I do. Here, give me your coat. What brings you here, anyway?'

As well as being unshakeable. Olive was quick witted. Even as she was hanging the waxed cotton rain-coat on one of a row of hooks behind the front door, she answered her own question.

'Has that husband of mine been talking to you?' she asked, quickly: too quickly, for the cough took her unawares, racking her body, sending colour to her cheeks, making her visitor realise how pale they had been before, and highlighting the contrast of the dark circles under her eyes. She produced an inhaler from the pocket of her cardigan and took two quick puffs.

'No,' Sarah replied, truthfully, as the fit subsided. 'Neil hasn't said a word to me. But my husband has been worrying about him, and this afternoon, finally, he made him tell him what was wrong. So if you want to blame anyone for this visit, blame Bob.' As she spoke, she followed her hostess into the living room, where Lauren and Spencer were watching Grange Hill, intently. Neither turned as the two women passed through into the kitchen, although the chocolate-point Siamese cat which lay on the floor between them did flick an ear in their direction.

Olive's complexion had paled once more, after the paroxysm.

'Maybe I shouldn't say this to you, but Neil never has trusted doctors,' she said, as she closed the door on the children. 'He's just being silly.

My GP says I have a touch of asthma; that's why she gave me the inhaler.'

'And does it help?' asked Sarah, very quietly, catching her eye as she did so, not allowing her to look away.

'No, it doesn't,' she answered, in a whisper.

'No, I didn't think it had. Olive, I'm here as a friend, and the last thing I want to do is to undermine your confidence in your relationship with your family doctor, but I have to ask you; have you had a chest X-ray recently?'

The other woman shook her head. 'Not in the last seven years. My last one was clear, though,' she added, quickly.

'Has your doctor suggested an X-ray?'

'No.'

'How long have you had this cough?'

Olive frowned, leaning back against a work-surface and looking at the ceiling. 'I suppose it would have been around the end of June when it started. I had a bit of bother when we were on holiday just after that. Neil and I like to walk, but I found that I was getting short of breath if we went too far. We gave up on the walks, and the problem went away. I put it down to a chest infection at the time.

'Then at the end of September, it came back. I went to see Dr Jones then. She said it was probably asthma and gave me the inhaler.'

'I see.' Sarah paused. 'Listen Olive, I have to be honest here. If you were my patient I'd have sent you for an X-ray straight away, to eliminate certain possibilities if nothing else.' She glanced at her watch. 'I have a friend who works in the chest clinic at the Western. I checked with her earlier; she's on duty now, and she'll fit you in.

'If you like, I could take you along there. Best have this cleared up, yes?'

Olive Mcllhenney looked at her shrewdly. She knew exactly what was being said; what her visitor meant by 'certain possibilities'. She had smoked too many cigarettes in the years between ages fifteen and thirty-four not to have been aware of them. Still, those were possibilities for others, not for her.

'Well,' she said at last. 'If it'll reassure that big daft bugger of a husband of mine, why not. Hang on here a minute. I'll ask my neighbour to keep an eye on the kids and the cat, till Neil gets home, then I'll write a note for him, and we can be off.'

She moved towards the back door. 'That sure is a lovely cat,' Sarah remarked, casually.

'Samson? Yes. The kids spoil him rotten.' As she turned to answer, Sarah noticed, for the first time, a small lump on the right side of her neck.