Dead Heat - By Dick Francis & Felix Francis Page 0,59
came into view. The face smiled at me.
‘Mr Moreton,’ said the face again. ‘You’ve had a bit of an accident but you are going to be just fine.’
That was a relief, I thought.
Nothing seemed to hurt much but my body, strangely, didn’t feel attached to my head. I felt as if I was looking down on somebody else’s corpse. Oh no, I thought, surely I haven’t broken my back?
I began to panic and I tried to sit up.
‘Just lie back and rest,’ said the female voice, placing a restraining hand firmly on my shoulder. She looked into my face. ‘You’ve had a nasty bang on the head.’
Oh God, I must have broken my neck.
I tried to wiggle my toes and was rewarded with the sight of the blanket moving above my feet. Waves of relief flowed over me. I lifted my hand to my face and wiped the cold sweat from my forehead. All was well, I thought, even if the sensations were a bit unusual.
‘You’re probably concussed,’ she said. ‘You’re on your way now to have a brain scan.’
I hoped they’d find one.
I wondered where I was. I knew that I was in a hospital, but where? And why was I in a hospital? The questions were too difficult for my befuddled brain so I decided to take the easy option and do as I was told. I laid my head back on the pillow and closed my eyes again.
For the next few hours, I was dimly aware of being lifted and poked, of being talked about but not talked to. I just let the world get on without me.
I couldn’t remember why I was here. Rather worryingly, I couldn’t remember very much at all. Who am I, I wondered, and was comforted by at least knowing that it mattered. I decided that I probably wasn’t crazy. Surely, I thought, if I was crazy I wouldn’t know to ask myself the question in the first place. But, what was the answer?
Thoughts drifted in and out of my consciousness without any threads of connection. Come on, I said to myself, sort it out. There were clearly some priorities to make. Who am I? Why am I here? And where is here?
‘Mr Moreton? Mr Moreton?’ a woman called from my left and someone stroked my arm. Was Mr Moreton me? I suppose it must be. Did I really want to come back into the land of the living just yet? I supposed I should.
I opened my eyes.
‘He’s back again,’ said the woman. ‘Hello, Mr Moreton, how are you feeling?’
I tried to say that I was fine but it came out as a croak. The woman obviously thought it was a good sign that I had reacted at all. She leaned over me and smiled into my face. ‘Well done,’ she said. ‘You are going to be all right.’
Why did I think that she was trying to convince herself as much as she was trying to convince me?
I tried again to speak. ‘Where am I?’ I croaked.
‘Addenbrooke’s hospital,’ she said. ‘In Cambridge.’
I knew I knew something about Addenbrooke’s hospital, I thought. What was it? Memory circuits in my head flipped and flopped and came up with an answer: Addenbrooke’s hospital was where the food-poisoning victims went.
Why did I think that? Who were the victims? Would they be OK? I decided not to worry about them. They would be all right, I said to myself. The woman had said so, and I believed her. I closed my eyes again. I wasn’t yet ready to participate in the world any further.
When I woke next it was dark. There was a window on my right and it was black, with just a couple of yellow streetlights visible in the distance. I lay there looking out. I remembered I was in hospital, Addenbrooke’s hospital, in Cambridge, but I couldn’t remember why. I wondered what was happening at the restaurant.
‘Hello, Max,’ said a voice on my left.
I rolled my head over. It was Caroline. I smiled at her.
‘Hello, Caroline,’ I said. ‘How lovely.’
‘You know who I am, then?’ she said.
‘Of course I do,’ I said. ‘I may be in hospital but I’m not stupid.’
‘The doctor warned me that you might not remember who I was. He said that earlier you appeared not to remember who you were either. Seems you have been drifting in and out all day. How do you feel?’
‘Better for seeing you,’ I said. ‘But why am I here?’