Dick Francis - For Kicks

Something, perhaps it was only my obvious weariness, made him give me a suddenly professional, impartial survey.

"All right," he said, and bent down to Elinor.

I waited behind him while he examined her, and when he turned round I noticed he had decorously pulled down her rumpled slip so that it reached smoothly to her knees.

Thenobarbitone and gin," he said.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Self-administered?" He started opening his case.

"No. Definitely not."

"This place is usually teeming with women," he said inconsequentially.

"But apparently they're all at some meeting or another." He gave me another intent look.

"Are you fit to help?"

"Yes."

He hesitated.

"Are you sure?"

"Tell me what to do."

"Very well. Find me a good-sized jug and a bucket or large basin. I'll get her started first, and you can tell me how this happened later."

He took a hypodermic syringe from his case, filled it, and gave Elinor an injection into the vein on the inside of her elbow. I found a jug and a basin in the built-in fitment.

"You've been here before," he observed, eyes again suspicious.

"Once," I said: and for Elinor's sake added, "I am employed by her father. It's nothing personal."

"Oh. All right then." He withdrew the needle, dismantled the syringe, and quickly washed his hands.

"How many tablets did she take, do you know?"

"It wasn't tablets. Powder. A teaspoonful, at least. Maybe more."

He looked alarmed, but said, "That much would be bitter. She'd taste it."

"Gin and Campari… it's bitter anyway."

"Yes. All right. I'm going to wash out her stomach. Most of the drug must have been absorbed already, but if she had as much as that… well, it's still worth trying."

He directed me to fill the jug with tepid water, while he carefully slid a thickish tube down inside Elinor's throat. He surprised me by putting his ear to the long protruding end of it when it was in position, and he explained briefly that with an unconscious patient who couldn't swallow one had to make sure the tube had gone into the stomach and not into the lungs.

"If you can hear them breathe, you're in the wrong place," he said.

He put a funnel in the end of the tube, held out his hand for the jug, and carefully poured in the water. When what seemed to me a fantastic amount had disappeared down the tube he stopped pouring, passed me the jug to put down, and directed me to push the basin near his foot.

Then, removing the funnel, he suddenly lowered the end of the tube over the side of the bed and into the basin. The water flowed out again, together with all the contents of Elinor's stomach.

"Hm," he said calmly.

"She had something to eat first. Cake, I should say. That helps."

I couldn't match his detachment.

"Will she be all right?" My voice sounded strained.

He looked at me briefly and slid the tube out.

"She drank the stuff less than an hour before I got here?"

"About fifty minutes, I think."

"And she'd eaten… Yes, she'll be all right. Healthy girl. The injection I gave her meg imide is an effective antidote. She'll probably wake up in an hour or so. A night in hospital, and it will be out of her system. She'll be as good as new."

I rubbed my hand over my face.

"Time makes a lot of difference," he said calmly.

"If she'd lain here many hours… a teaspoonful; that might be thirty grains or more." He shook his head.

"She could have died."

He took a sample of the contents of the basin for analysis, and covered the rest with a hand towel.

"How did you cut your head?" he said suddenly.

"In a fight."

"It needs stitching. Do you want me to do it?"

"Yes. Thank you."

"I'll do it after Miss Tarren has gone to hospital. Dr. Pritchard said she would ring for an ambulance. They should be here soon."

"Dr. Pritchard?"

"The lecturer who fetched me in. My surgery is only round the corner.

She telephoned and said a violent blood-stained youth was insisting that Miss Tarren was poisoned, and that I'd better come and see. " He smiled briefly.

"You haven't told me how all this happened."

"Oh… it's such a long story," I said tiredly.

"You'll have to tell the police," he pointed out.

I nodded. There was too much I would have to tell the police. I wasn't looking forward to it. The doctor took out pen and paper and wrote a letter to go with Elinor to the hospital.

There was a sudden eruption of girls' voices down the passage, and a tramp of many scholarly feet, and the opening and shutting of doors.

The students were back from their meeting: from Elinor's point of view, too soon, as they would now see her being carried out.

Heavier footsteps came right up to her room and knuckles rapped. Two men in ambulance uniform had arrived with a stretcher, and with economy of movement and time they lifted Elinor between them, tucked her into blankets, and bore her away. She left a wake of pretty voices raised in sympathy and speculation.

The doctor swung the door shut behind the ambulance men and withqiymore ado took from his case a needle and thread! amp;d sew up my forehead. I sat on Elinor's bed wmleffie fiddled around with disinfectant and the sticking f "What was the fight about?" he asked, tying knots.

"Because I was attacked," I said.

"Oh^He/ihifted his feet to sew from a different ^pvt his hand on my shoulder to' steady him self. He felt me withdraw from the pressure and looked at me quizzically.

"So you got the worst of it?"

"No," I said slowly.

"I won."

He finished the stitching and gave a final snip with the scissors.

"There you are, then. It won't leave much of a scar."

"Thank you." It sounded a bit weak.

"Do you feel all right?" he said abruptly.

"Or is pale fawn tinged with grey your normal colouring?"

"Pale fawn is normal. Grey just about describes how I feel." I smiled faintly.

"I got a bang on the back of the head, too."

He explored the bump behind the ear and said I would live. He was asking me how many other tender spots I had about me when another heavy tramp of footsteps could be heard coming up the corridor, and presently the door was pushed open with a crash.

Two broad-shouldered businesslike policemen stepped into the room.

They knew the doctor. It appeared that he did a good deal of police work in Durham. They greeted each other politely and the doctor started to say that Miss Tarren was on her way to hospital. They interrupted him.

"We've come for him, sir," said the taller one of them, pointing at me.

"Stable lad, name of Daniel Roke."

"Yes, he reported Miss Tarren's illness…"

"No, sir, it's nothing to do with a Miss Tarren or her illness. We want him for questioning on another matter."

The doctor said, "He's not in very good shape. I think you had better go easy. Can't you leave it until later?"

"I'm afraid that's impossible, sir."

They both came purposefully over to where I sat. The one who had done the talking was a red-headed man about my own age with an unsmiling wary face. His companion was slightly shorter, brown eyed, and just as much on guard. They looked as if they were afraid I was going to leap up and strangle them.

With precision they leaned down and clamped hard hands round my forearms. The red-head, who was on my right, dragged a pair of handcuffs from his pocket, and between them they fastened them on my wrists.

"Better take it quietly, chum," advised the red-head, evidently mistaking my attempt to wrench my arm free of his agonizing grip as a desire to escape in general.

"Let… go," I said.

"I'm not… running anywhere."

They did let go, and stepped back a pace, looking down at me. Most of the wariness had faded from their faces, and I gathered that they really had been afraid I would attack them. It was unnerving. I took two deep breaths to control the soreness of my arm.