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'Blame me, Alex, I kept her talking.'

'And I came out for a breather, which sounds rude but isn't meant to!' Suddenly glad to see him, Anna took his outstretched hand, agreeing at once when he suggested that she might like to say goodnight to one or two guests who were on the point of leaving for home.

'I should be one of them. I don't want to be late, and I know Janet doesn't,' Simon put in, walking with them back up the path to the house.

'You're very quiet,' Prue remarked to Anna when they were driving home. She, Prue, being the alcohol abstainer, was in the driving seat.

'Parties exhaust me.'

'They shouldn't at your age.'

'Even so, they do.' Anna folded her arms in her mohair stole, bearing its tickly feel.

'I had a nice chat with Mr Easter and that pretty cousin of his. Fancy them being related!'

Anna nodded wordlessly. She was consumed by thoughts of Simon but in no way did she want to discuss him, and was relieved when Prue went on to talk about Charles Marriner and how much he seemed to have aged.

Having
lain awake until four a.m., Anna was deep in sleep when her telephone rang at half-past seven. Stretching out an arm, she croaked a hello into the receiver, blinking sleepily at her clock. Who on earth could be ringing at this hour? It must be an alert at the hospital. The call
was
from the hospital, but it was Alex, telling her that his father had suffered a heart attack.

'Oh, Alex, how awful! How is he now?' Sliding her legs out of bed, she reached for her robe and stiffened herself for the worst possible news.

'He's in Intensive Care,' Alex went on. 'I'm ringing from there. I'm told it was a myocardial infarction, I've been here all night. Imogen and I found him on the bathroom floor when we were clearing up after the party. Anna...' his voice altered slightly '.. .could you possibly come? I know it's a lot to ask, but I'd.. .1 could do with your company.'

'Alex, of course,' she drew a quick breath '—of course I'll come! I'll be with you in twenty minutes, maybe less!' Putting down the phone, she washed and dressed at lightning speed and bolted down the stairs, startling Prue, who came out of her flat, a mug of tea in her hand.

When she heard the news she shook her head. 'He didn't look well last night—grey, I thought, and sort of strained. I felt he was pushing himself.'

'I'll ring if I can and let you know how he is.' Anna bent down, slipping back the bolts on the main front door and going out into the clear, bright, ordinary morning over to the garage to get her car.

It was only just eight o'clock but, being high summer, the town was already stirring. Car parks were filling up; family parties laden with beach paraphernalia were filing across the road; hotels and guesthouses were opening windows and doors. Anna was reminded of the Sunday she had met Simon down on the beach, nearly two months ago, and had gone home to breakfast with him.

Fancy thinking of that now, though, at a time like this. She filled up with guilt. Yet how could she help thinking about him when he sat in her mind and her heart like a flickering image that would never let her rest? She loved him; she knew that now; she had known it last night—
during
the night when she'd lain awake, hour after thinking hour.

Turning into the hospital yard, she parked in her usual place and was hailed by one of the porters, trundling a bed into Cas. 'Can't you keep away from this place, Sister?' His approving and lustful eye followed her slender pink-jeaned figure as she made for the entrance doors.

An unshaven, hollow-eyed Alex rose from one of the chairs in ICU's waiting-room. 'Bless you for coming!' he cried.

'How is he...what have they told you?' They sat down together.

'They say "stable". I've just been in; he knew me and raised a hand. He's being nursed flat, which surprised me. Surely he ought to be raised up to get his breath better? I realise they must know what they're doing—' Alex gripped Anna's hands '—but it struck me as being so strange, and I didn't feel I could ask.'

'He'll be being nursed flat at present because his blood pressure is low,' Anna explained, trying to reassure him yet be truthful as well. 'After a heart attack blood pressure falls.. .it's one of the things that happens.'

'He's seventy-three. He could die, couldn't he?' There was horror, rather than panic, in Alex's voice. He had faced the worst.

'Seventy-three's not old these days, and Charles is basically strong,' Anna told him, wanting to take the fear from his face.

'We've always been close.'

'I know.' She leaned forward and kissed his cheek.

'You go in and see what you think.'

'Alex, I'm not a cardiac nurse and I may not be allowed...' she started to say and then, seeing a senior nurse crossing to the outer doors, she made the enquiry and a few minutes later was walking into the big square room where every patient had his own special nurse and where monitors blipped away behind beds, their readings repeated on the screens of a major console at the central nursing station.

The sounds were many and various—the hum of a ventilating machine, the crackling and gurgling from suction equipment, the buzz of strip lighting, the movement of the nurses in their special light uniform and, occasionally, the agitated voice of one of the patients demanding to know where he was.

As Alex had said, Charles was being nursed flat—his long, bony torso naked, apart from a drawsheet placed across his loins. There was a tracheostomy set beside his bed and a defibrillating machine; a drip ran into his right arm and a blood pressure cuff lay nearby. His eyes were closed, his face half-obscured by an oxygen mask. When Anna asked how he was she was told that he was still severely shocked, and was being given blood pressure-raising drugs through the intravenous line.

'How do you think he is?' Alex was pacing the floor when she returned to the waiting-room. 'Did you ask, and what did they say?'

'That there isn't very much change,' she answered carefully, 'but he's no worse; he's not sliding backwards, and everything possible is being done. Now, look, Alex—' she made him sit down '—why don't you go home and get some sleep, or at any rate rest, then come back this afternoon? I'll stay here till lunchtime and ring if there's any change, but there may not be, not for several hours, and you'll be ill if you go on like this.'

Expecting to have to cajole and persuade him, she was relieved when he said, 'OK, for a few hours, so long as I know you'll be here.'

'I will, I promise. I'll come down with you and ring for a taxi.'

'Yes, I came in the ambulance last night.' He got unsteadily to his feet and followed her out to the lift, bumping tiredly against her. 'You're such a support,' he told her down in the yard, 'and please don't—' he shook his head, deep lines pulling his brows '—tell me that's what friends are for. I'm minus one of my skins this morning, and I can't take painful truths.'

'Oh, Alex!' Alarm sifted through her... Don't let him expect too much... Don't let him think, begin to think, imagine he's in love with me.. .because I'm not with him. I only wish I were...

'This looks like my taxi,' he said more calmly as one of the town's Streamline cars sleeked its way into the yard.

I'm sure I don't need to worry, though, she thought as she waved him off. He's just overwrought, over-emotional this morning, which doesn't surprise me a bit. I care about him but I don't love him, and there's a world of difference between the two feelings. Going back inside, she made her way to the lifts.

She was allowed to see Charles again once the doctors had been. She noticed at once that he was looking more comfortable and was no longer lying flat. 'His blood pressure's coming up nicely, and his pulse is regular,' she was told by his nurse, who was checking his drip. Charles was deeply asleep.

Slipping back into the waiting-room, Anna was surprised to see Imogen Rayland there, trim in the blue suit she had worn at the show but looking far less composed. 'How is he?' She let go of the door and came fully into the room.

'Doing very well; all the signs are good.'

'Thank goodness for that; I'd like to see him... Any chance, do you think?' She perched on the edge of a chair.

'He's sleeping at the moment, but you could ask over there.' Anna indicated the nursing station, which was situated slantwise in the corridor to give a full view of every bed. One of the senior sisters was seated behind the big curved desk, reading a sheet that looked like a print-out. Imogen took a good look at her back.

'I shall say,' she said, 'that I'm a relative.. .they won't know I'm not.' And with that she walked towards the station, spoke to Sister and, rather to Anna's surprise, was taken through to see Charles. Well, there was one thing, she thought, she doesn't lack nerve—telling a fib to get in. Still, if he's awake he'll be glad to see her, and quite expect that after four years of close living with the family she
feels
like a relative.

*

By Tuesday evening Charles was well enough to be transferred to the cardiac ward, which made visiting easier, and Anna slipped in when she could. Either Alex or Imogen were there every day, sometimes bringing Tom who, although delighted to see his grandfather, got restless in the ward.

Seeing him there on Thursday evening when she went off duty, Anna offered to take him down to the shop for an ice-cream or a Coke. Half expecting him to turn her down flat, for she still hadn't got Tom's measure, she was pleased when—after a considering silence—he said, 'All right,' and crossed to her side.

The shop was crammed, as it always was at five o'clock in the evening, but with Tom—who had no compunction about pushing—they got through to the counter and presently bore a can of Coke and an iced drink-on-a-stick out to the garden beyond, which was as crowded as the shop.

Anna wasn't all that surprised to see Simon for she knew that he had a habit of buying his evening paper at the shop. Even so, the sight of him standing there with a doctor from Paeds, outlining something in the air with his rolled-up paper, very nearly brought her to a grinding halt and she was glad his back was turned.

The two long plank seats were taken, so she and Tom perforce had to sit down on the parched grass. Anna welcomed this as, with legs all round them, they were hidden from Simon's view—even if he turned round and stopped drawing pictures in the air.

Since the night of the party he had only been up to the ward on two occasions—once to see new patients and once for the teaching round, during which she had disgraced herself by transposing two sets of notes. He had noticed the error at once, and said, 'Toller, not Taylor, please, Sister,' and he'd not made a public fuss.

She'd been grateful, but furious at
having
to be, and furious with herself for letting her attention wander just because he was in the ward. After the round he'd gone off, surrounded by medics, and she hadn't seen him since. Whether or not he knew about Charles, she had no idea, but she supposed he'd have heard through Amy Benson, who would have heard through Imogen.

She couldn't see him now but Tom could for, peering through legs and passing his tongue carefully over his ice on a stick, he was making a study of who was there, and he soon picked Simon out. 'That man with fawn hair, over there by the wall,' he confided to Anna, 'was at our party on Saturday. He came with Mrs Mapleton before I'd gone to bed.'

'He's a doctor here, or rather a surgeon. His name is Mr Easter,' Anna supplied, shifting a little to let someone get to the shop.

'His feet are moving; he's coming nearer.'

'I expect he's going home.'

'Aren't you going to get up and speak to him?' Tom was already on his feet. He was still hidden by the students in front but, as luck would have it,
they
moved to let Simon pass and his attention was immediately caught by Anna scrambling up from the grass, the little boy at her side. He stopped at once.

'It's Tom, isn't it?' He spoke directly to the child, who nodded unsmiling, plugging his mouth with his ice. 'Looks a good and cooling thing to have on an evening like this. I wouldn't mind having one myself.' And now he was looking at Anna. 'Happy families time, I see!' he said pleasantly enough, but with a quirk to his mouth that she didn't like very much.

'Not as happy as it might be, considering that his grandfather is a patient in Cardiac Care.' She turned round to throw her empty Coke tin into the bin.

'Grandpa's been very ill. Dad slept at the hospital
all night,'
Tom put in.

'I didn't know that... When did it happen?' Simon's expression had changed.

'He suffered a myocardial infarction late on Saturday after we'd all gone home. He was in ICU until Tuesday, then transferred to the cardiac ward.' Anna was guarded in what she said, mindful of Tom—leaning against her, all ears, and not missing a thing.

'Dad's with Grandpa now, and when he comes down we're going to the Sea Life Centre,' he piped up, wiping a sticky hand down the front of his jeans.

'Sounds fun.' Simon's expression was still hard to read.

'There'll be seahorses there.' Tom's tongue was loosened.

'But not the sort you can ride.'

'Course not,' came scathingly, then, 'Here's Daddy now!' Off Tom went like a speeding rocket, as Alex's immaculate, questing figure appeared in the door of the shop.

'I wouldn't,' Simon said in the few seconds Anna and he had to themselves, 'have made such a fatuous comment if I'd known Charles was ill.'

He meant the quip about happy families, Anna realised, and gave a little shrug. 'What amazes me,' she said, 'is that you
didn't
know. I would have thought Imogen would have told Amy Benson, who would have passed the info to you.'

'Amy is in Wales on holiday this week, Staying with her mother. She departed the morning after the party.'

'Oh, well, that explains it, then.'

'I suppose
you
didn't think to tell me?'

'Oh, I did, several times,' she said, 'but it wasn't all that easy to buttonhole you this week, so in the end I gave up.'