being around when I needed him. I longed for him to be there to talk to, to soothe my hurting knee, to ease my troubled brain, and to take away the horrors in my memory. But still, I couldn’t cry for him.
The one o’clock news programme started on the television and I realized that I was hungry. Apart from a couple of pieces of French bread at the racecourse and a chocolate bar at the hospital, I hadn’t eaten since Friday night, and that meal hadn’t got past my stomach. Now that I thought about it, hunger was a nagging pain in my abdomen. It was one pain that I could do something about.
I limped gingerly into the kitchen and made myself a Spanish omelette. Food is often said to be a great comforter, indeed most people under stress eat sugary foods like chocolate, not only because it gives them energy, but because it makes them feel better. I had done just the same at Bedford hospital. However, for me, food gave me comfort when I cooked it.
I took some spring onions from my vegetable rack, diced them into small roundels, then fried them in a pan with a little extra-virgin olive oil. I found some cooked new potatoes hiding in the rear recesses of my fridge, so I sliced and added them to the onions with a splash of soy sauce to season and flavour. Three eggs, I thought, and broke them one-handed into a glass bowl. I really loved to cook and I felt much better, in both mind and body, long before I sat down on my sofa to complete the experience by actually eating my creation.
Carl called sometime during the afternoon.
‘Thank God you’re there,’ he said.
‘Been here all night,’ I said.
‘Sorry, should have called you earlier.’
‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘I didn’t call you either.’ I knew why. No news was better news than we feared.
‘What happened to you?’ he asked.
‘Hurt my knee,’ I said. ‘I was taken to Bedford hospital and then home by taxi late last night. And you?’
‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘I helped people to get down at the far end of the stand. Police took my name and address, then they sent me home.’
‘Did you see Louisa or Robert?’ I dreaded the answer.
‘I haven’t seen either of them,’ he said, ‘but Robert called me this morning. He’s all right, although quite badly shaken up. He was asking if I knew what had happened to Louisa.’
‘Wasn’t Robert in the box when the bomb went off?’
‘He said that the bomb was definitely in box 1 and he was behind the folded back dividing wall in box 2 when it exploded and that protected him. But it seems to have left him somewhat deaf. I had to shout down the telephone.’
I knew how he felt.
‘How about Louisa?’ I asked.
‘No idea,’ said Carl. ‘I tried the emergency number the police gave out but it’s permanently engaged.’
‘Any news on anyone else?’ I asked.
‘Nothing, except what’s on the TV. How about you? Heard anything?’
‘No, nothing. I saw the American woman organizer, you know, MaryLou Fordham, just after the bomb went off.’ I could see the image in my head. ‘She’d lost her legs.’
‘Oh God.’
‘I felt so bloody helpless,’ I said.
‘Was she still alive?’ he asked.
‘When I saw her she was, but I don’t know if they got her out. She had lost so much blood. I was finally led away by a fireman who told me to go down.’
There was a pause as if both of us were reliving the events at the racecourse.
‘What shall we do about the restaurant?’ Carl asked at length.
‘I haven’t even thought about it,’ I said. ‘I suppose the kitchen’s still sealed. I’ll start sorting it out tomorrow. I’m too tired now.’
‘Yeah, me too. Didn’t get much sleep last night. Call me in the morning.’
‘OK,’ I said. ‘Call me tonight if you hear anything.’
‘Will do,’ he said, and hung up.
I spent the afternoon sitting in an armchair with my left leg supported by a cushion on the coffee table. I seemed unable to turn the television away from the news channels so I watched the same, not-new news, repeated time and time again. The Arab prince theory gained more credence throughout the day, mostly, it appeared to me, because there was nothing else to report and they had to fill the time somehow. Middle East experts were wheeled into the studio to make endless meaningless comments about a speculative theory for which they