Thursday legends

51

She couldn't wait any longer; she picked up the phone and dialled his number. It rang, once, twice, three times… she hung up before the answer machine could pick up the call. She looked up his cellphone number and called that, but a programmed voice told her simply that it was not responding.

'No, he isn't, is he, you smug bitch,' she snapped back.

She switched on the television; anything to distract her. Athletes raced round a tartan track somewhere. She had no idea where, or who they were, or whether they were competing for gold medals or gold coin, but she watched anyway.

The door buzzer sounded; not the entry phone call from the street, someone at the door itself. That bloody girl from downstairs wanting to borrow her hair dryer again. Once was enough, twice was too much, three times was going to get a dusty answer. She stepped into the hall, and swung the door open, ready to do some serious telling off.

He lifted her up in his arms as he stepped inside and hugged her to him, so tight that it hurt, but she didn't care. She stroked the back of his head as he buried his face in her hair, kissing her neck.

'I have been so… worried about you,' she whispered. 'I have had the most terrible feeling since yesterday morning. I've been imagining the most awful things.'

'Well, you can stop that right now,' he said, quietly, grinning as they looked at each other, as if for the first time, Karen frowning as she saw his swollen lip and the bruising on his face. 'I'm sorry, just turning up out of the blue, especially after the other day, but I had to see you; I needed very badly to see you.'

'Why?' she asked him.

'So that I could be absolutely certain, beyond the last shadow of a doubt, that I am still alive. And so that I could tell you something

… and ask you something.'

"There's a coincidence,' she murmured.

'Pack a bag,' he said.

'Where are we going?'

'Somewhere I should have taken you a while ago.' 'How much should I pack? How long are we going away for?'

'That's up to you. Pack as much as you like. But do it now; this can't wait any longer.'

'All right, I'll pack office clothes for Monday.'

He followed her into her bedroom, watching as she made selections from her drawers and wardrobe, fitting them into a big soft hold-all, and folding her work suit carefully on top. He grinned as he saw her police uniform hanging on the rail, and her cap on a shelf above. On impulse he reached for it and sent it spinning into a corner of the room.

'Why do we dress our women officers like waitresses in Miss Cranston's tea room?' he chuckled.

'Careful,' she protested, 'I might need that next week.'

'Why should you?'

'Because I'm not going to work for you any more.' 'How did you know I was going to fire you?' She closed the zipper on her hold-all, dropped it on to the floor and reached for him, taking hold of the top button of his crisp new white shirt. He caught her hand, gently. 'Not here. Let's go.'

She locked up and he led her outside, carrying the bag and squeezing it into the tiny boot of the MGF, which had already attracted the attention of a traffic warden. He showed the man his warrant card and shooed him away.

'Where are we going?' she asked him as he turned out into Nicolson Street. He gave her no answer, only a smile but she knew anyway. He drove urgently, as fast as he could through the Saturday afternoon traffic, cutting along Chambers Street, along King George IV Bridge to the Mound, down the hill and across Princes Street, along George Street and round Charlotte Square and finally down Belford Road and into Dean Village.

His garage door was open; he drove straight inside.

'I am so sorry, Karen,' he said, as he took her bag from the boot, 'that I have never brought you to this house before. It's typical of the blind, stupid and thoughtless way I've treated you.'

She shook her head. 'Not you alone. We've treated each other in exactly the same way.'

He took her hand and led her out of the garage, into the house and upstairs, to the living room. To his paintings. She had never seen them before. She gazed around his gallery. 'Andy,' she exclaimed, 'these are lovely.'

'This is the second part of my life-support system.'

'How long-have you had them?'

'I've been collecting for years, on and off. It was only when I moved here that they came together for me like this. They create something; I don't know what it is, only that I feel more at home among them than anywhere I've ever been before.'

'Okay,' she said, asking the begged question. 'What's the first part of your life-support system?' 'You are.'

She felt warmth that was almost orgasmic flood through her whole body and struggled in vain to keep it from showing on her face.

'Oh yes? And when did this come to you?'

'I began to realise about three days ago, but it came to me as a great certainty when I knew I was going to die. You guessed right, Karen; I've been in trouble. Serious, life-threatening trouble of my own making. It was very bad, and then it got worse, until there came a point when all common sense told me that there was no way out. I felt Death descending upon me and, as it did, all that filled my mind was you.

'I saw your face, I felt you with me and I knew all at once that, whatever logic told me about my situation, I could not die. So I declined Death's kind offer — You know how Death is always depicted as a great robed skeleton with a scythe? Actually he's a thin bloke with a gun — and eventually Bob Skinner turned up and, as he does, made everything all right'

'What happened to Death?' she whispered.

'He went away; for good. All that he's left me is a compulsion to brush my teeth every couple of hours. That'll pass, though.

'And you know what? You're still there, filling my mind, with your strength, and your warmth, and your goodness and your sheer bloody niceness. He tapped his chest. 'You've been in here for a while now, but I was too stupid to figure it out, hell-bent on making a virtue out of loneliness. It took Sarah Skinner, who is my best friend after you and Bob, to tell it to me straight.

'Now it's just so bloody obvious.'

She looked at him. That's what you had to tell me?'

'Not all of it.'

'What else, then?'

'I had to tell you I love you, before I could die.'

'And what do you want to ask me?'

'Forswearing all others, I wanted, want, to ask you to marry me. You saved my life, now I'd like you to live the rest of it with me. What d' you say?'

She frowned at him and his heart sank. 'I have to choose my words carefully here,' she began. 'I love you too. Yes.'

They gave simultaneous gasps of exultation and relief. The space between them closed in a second as they locked in an embrace.

'When?' she murmured.

'Soon as we can.'

'Can I stay here from now on?'

'Too right. We'll find a new place though; one that's ours together. This place has picked up some bad memories already, just like the last one.'

'That's all they are, though, memories. I've got my own, remember. We can live with them, no problem.' She reached for the top button of his shirt once again; this time he made no move to stop her.

'What about the job?' she asked. '… Sir.'

'You're not going back to my office, that's for sure. Do you want to chuck it?'

She nodded. 'Yes. It might suit the McGuires — they're zealots — but one copper in the house will be enough for us. I trained as a teacher before I joined up. I'll do some supply work, maybe… until I get pregnant, that is.'

He put his forehead against hers as she pulled his shirt free. 'Let's attend to that right now, shall we?'