Marion Lennox - Prescription-One Husband

‘You have such a delicate way of putting things.’ Fern grinned. ‘Are your mum and dad upstairs?’

They were, and their condition reassured Fern. Both were starting to recover. Mrs Harny was well enough to protest against Fern’s visit.

‘I don’t know how you’re coping, Fern, dear,’ she said sadly. ‘What a tragedy. It would have been such a beautiful wedding.’

‘It still will be,’ Fern sighed, but it was starting to seem so unreal that it was like a bad dream.

How could she go through it again?

Lizzy next.

This was the hardest.

As Fern started the car again, the telephone at her waist shrilled into life.

‘Yes…’

‘Fern, it’s Quinn…’

‘Auntie Maud? Has she arrested again?’ Fern’s breath froze in fear.

‘No, she’s fine,’ Quinn said quickly. ‘Hell, Dr Rycroft, I didn’t mean to scare you.’

‘Why…Then why are you ringing?’

‘Where are you?’

‘Outside the Harnys’. About to see if I can find Lizzy.’

‘Pete?’

‘Pete’s OK. He didn’t eat the oysters,’ Fern reassured him. ‘His mum and dad did but they’ve stopped being sick and are recovering. It seems once the oysters are out of the system they’re doing no lasting damage. Frank definitely needs observing, though-the vomiting’s made his diabetes run out of control and I’m not certain he’s stopped vomiting for good. Are you sure you have room for him at this hospital of yours?’

‘Four beds, all of them empty at the moment,’ Quinn told her. ‘Women’s and men’s ward.’

‘Good grief!’

‘“Good grief”?’ His voice rose in mock query. ‘Surprised that someone would put money into making a go of a medical practice in a place like this, Dr Rycroft?’

‘Yes,’ she said flatly. ‘I don’t understand why you have.’

‘And you suspect my motives?’

‘No. I…’

‘You’re just surprised,’ he said.

‘No one in their right mind wants to practise on Barega.’

‘You mean you don’t.’

Fern took a deep breath. ‘Was that…was that all you wanted to say to me, Dr Gallagher?’

‘No.’

To her fury Fern could hear the inevitable laughter in his voice again. This man thought life was one long joke. He’d found the events of the day one huge piece of comic theatre.

‘Well, what?’ There was fury in her voice and Quinn heard it.

‘I just wanted to say that I wish I could be with you,’ Quinn said, and the gentleness of his voice undermined her fury like nothing else could. It drove the air right out of her lungs and left her gasping. ‘You shouldn’t have to face Lizzy alone.’

‘I can cope alone,’ Fern managed.

‘I know,’ Quinn said softly. ‘But you shouldn’t have to.’

LIZZY wasn’t home.

Fern knocked once on Lizzy’s front door but didn’t wait for an answer. Lizzy would hardly be here. Not if there was trouble.

She’d be down on the hiding boat-a wreck of an old fishing boat that Lizzy had treated as a refuge since a child.

Below Lizzy’s house was an estuary, scattered with oyster leases and overhung at the sides with giant willows. Lizzy’s grandfather had planted the willows sixty years before on a cleared estuary bank but the natural rainforest had returned, pushing its way around and through the growing willows in an impermeable mass.

Not quite impermeable…If you knew the way…

Lizzy had shown Fern the way-when life had been bad for Lizzy as a teenager and she’d desperately needed a friend. She’d led Fern down through the rainforest to where the ancient boat still miraculously floated under the willows. Lizzy’s family had a proper fishing boat moored at Barega jetty. This boat was one only she and Fern knew of.

‘It’s my private place,’ Lizzy had whispered all those years ago. ‘When Dad’s giving me a hard time I come here.’

Lizzy’s dad had given her a hard time all too often. Her mum had departed, never to be seen again, soon after Lizzy’s birth and Lizzy’s dad had taken the brunt of his bitterness out on his daughter.

It wasn’t all Lizzy’s fault that she was half-crazy.

Fern climbed silently down through the undergrowth, knowing that Lizzy was just as likely as not to run if she knew that Fern was coming. Finally, when she reached the boat she swung herself swiftly down, blocking the door to the cabin with her body.

Lizzy was inside.

She was crouched like a half-wild animal. The tailored clothes that Lizzy had worn for the wedding had been replaced by her habitual torn shorts and shirt, and her hair was once again wild, frizzy and free.

She stared up at Fern, half defiant and half scared stiff and Fern’s heart went out to her crazy friend.

‘Oh, Lizzy, you dope,’ she said softly. She stooped forward into the cabin and took Lizzy’s hands in hers, drawing the girl close to her.

The half-trace of defiance died. Lizzy deflated like a pricked balloon and burst into tears on Fern’s breast

It was a while before Fern got any sense out of her. Even when she could finally talk, her words were muffled by incoherent sobs.

‘Oh, Fern, I’m sorry…I made them all sick and it was only because Sam…I thought…I thought it would serve him right-for taking off and leaving me-and he was going to marry me, Fern, and I love the toad and you shouldn’t be marrying him because it’s me…it’s me…He asked me!’

‘He asked you to marry him when he was twelve and you were eleven,’ Fern said firmly. ‘Lizzy, childhood promises don’t count and you know it’

‘Well, they count with me!’

Fern shook her head. She gripped Lizzy’s hand hard. ‘Lizzy, you know I wouldn’t marry Sam if I thought he wanted you.’

‘You don’t know Sam.’

‘No.’ Fern sighed. ‘Maybe I don’t. Not completely. But neither do you, Lizzy. All I know is that Sam and I want the same thing. We want security and we want to be away from the island. And you’ll never leave the island, Liz-not even for Sam.’

‘I’d be scared to…’

‘Well, there you are.’ Fern rose, knowing that she was in the best position right now for getting the truth-while she had drawn an admission from Lizzy. ‘Liz, what did you do to the oysters to make people sick?’

‘Oh…’ Lizzy hiccuped on a sob and gave a halfshamed grin. ‘You guessed it was the oysters?’

‘It’d be hard not to,’ Fern said with asperity. ‘For heaven’s sake, Lizzy, you didn’t salt them with anything poisonous?’

Lizzy shook her head. ‘Of course not That’d be stupid. I knew bad oysters make you vomit about four hours after you eat them, and I wanted to be sure what damage I did.’

‘So?’

Lizzy shrugged. ‘So I collected the oysters yesterday and left them out in the sun for a few hours. Then I stuck them in the fridge to make them freezing and get rid of most of the stink. They still smelled a bit off, though, so I added the garlic and bacon. I knew oysters like that wouldn’t be bad enough to make anyone desperately sick-I’ve eaten enough crook oysters in my time to know what the effects are.’

‘So you thought you’d just make people vomit and that would be that.’

‘And Sam wouldn’t get his pretty little wedding and his pretty little bride.’ Lizzy sniffed defiantly. ‘It’s not fair, Fern. Why are you marrying him? You know you don’t love him.’

‘Sam’s my friend, Lizzy,’ Fern said gently. ‘We both live in the city and we’re lonely. It makes sense.’ She sighed. ‘And your silly behaviour isn’t going to alter that. It’s just made a lot of people unhappy-and put people at risk for nothing.’

‘I didn’t put anyone at risk,’ Lizzy said sulkily.