Lemonade and Lies (12 page)

I didn’t feel brave. But maybe necessity makes heroes out of normal people (or fools). The impact of the jump, the shock of the ice-cold water, temporarily froze my limbs, leaving me to bob uselessly at the mercy of the current.

I’d never tried to swim in such freezing water before, and without a wet suit. The clothes beneath my jacket stuck to my body. And the puffer coat that had been so useful in the cold Norwegian air suddenly inflated like an oversized life-jacket. Great for thrashing around like a stranded porpoise in. Useless for trying to swim.

I started to peel the jacket off clumsily, slowly. The clock was ticking away manically for both me and Jamie, but all I could manage was this farcical slow-motion thing that wouldn’t help either of us.

The coat came away with a struggle and bobbed off by itself like some silver Michelin Man trapped by the current.

I thought about what I’d done. It was reckless, went against all logic. And probably meant that instead of one body being fished from the Oslo Fjord, there would now be two. But sometimes you just have to spit in the face of logic.

At least I wasn’t out in the open sea and within minutes the ferry would have been back at the Oslo quayside. Call that a plus, then. Not much of a swell to fight, either. Another plus. Minuses:  freezing cold water that could finish you off in minutes rather than hours. Yes, definite minus there. Jamie couldn’t swim, had no lifebelt on and bizarrely was only wearing a thin, summer tee-shirt. Ergo – I had to get to him quickly. Did I say ergo? Proves how far off normal I’d slipped on the scale.

Okay. I gave up on the reflection bit. Too many reasons why we’d both end up at the bottom of the fjord.

It would be dark soon, and then there’d be little chance of anyone finding us. I made my lungs take a few long calming breaths and forced my arms to cut through the water in the direction I’d last seen Jamie. If he was conscious and uninjured from the jump, he might have thought to raise an arm, to help rescuers find him.

I stopped swimming for a second and tread water, searching for some proof that he was still alive and able to think coherently. Jamie wasn’t stupid. He was a policeman, used to sticky situations. He’d know what to do.

I wondered how he’d make out in this harbour water though. It was foul, polluted with diesel from the ferries and small boats that plied through it every day. Had he managed to keep his mouth shut when he jumped? I was already feeling sick from the amount I’d swallowed.

Not only did I have to fight the exhaustion of swimming in these conditions, but my own psyche. It was natural I guess to harp back to my brother and if I’d thought about him while on deck, I’d never have jumped. But right now that’s all I could think about. The cruel and heartless way the sea had taken him, making me powerless to help him.

Hang on, though. That was shite, wasn’t it? It was crazy to personify the sea, it didn’t pick its victims; they chose themselves. The sea was a formidable power, a force, but a neutral one and not malevolent. It took no sides. It didn’t give a damn one way or the other who violated its rules, who survived, who didn’t. It was pure cause and effect. Surprisingly, the thought made me feel better. Maybe there was a chance.

I could see Jamie. Hallelujah! He was lying on his back, head tilted upwards, face out of the water. Seeing him floating there, looking so vulnerable, I prayed my aching arms would find the strength needed to eat up the distance between us. It looked about fifty yards or so, but my brain had become sluggish and I might have misjudged it.

Come on! Get a bloody grip. It’d be okay. I was a life-safer for God’s sake. I was qualified. Sure! When I was a teenager and fit.

I tried to fight my body’s urge to shut up shop. It would be simple to close your eyes and give up, allow the waves to pull you under. Instead, I kicked my legs as forcefully as they would go and told my tired arms to listen to the small, insistent voice in the back of my head that said I could do this. And suddenly Jamie was there, almost within grasp.

But a heavy weight pressed down painfully on my chest each time I took a new breath now. It meant I could only take small, shallow breaths, and that just wasn’t good enough. Not for Jamie. The next time I raised my head to get a bearing, he collided with it and I grabbed him.

I turned on my back and pulled him carefully towards me, trailing him backwards through the water, my hands supporting him under the chin. His limp body was almost on top of mine. And I used my legs as the engine. It was one of the ways of saving an unconscious victim. At least that was the theory of it.

But the practice was far more difficult. Especially when you substitute the warmth of a swimming pool for the bone-eating cold of a Norwegian fjord at dusk.

An agonizing pain shot through my arm, and it was only then I realized I’d been swimming with a caste on my wrist. It wasn’t possible. I couldn’t do that, could I? Suddenly my whole arm felt like lead, and I was faced with the impossible task of moving what remained of the waterlogged plaster through the water.

I panicked and we both went under, the weight of Jamie pushing me down into the waters of the fjord until I thought I’d never resurface. But that was stupid. When I hadn’t thought about my injured hand, I’d been able to swim okay. It hadn’t been an elegant style and it wouldn’t win any medals for speed. But I’d made my way through the waves in a duck-like fashion, well enough to stay afloat at least.

When we both got back to the surface, my body was shaking with cold and fear. It took a massive effort to confront the panic, to use logic. I was exhausted. Frightened. My arms had little strength left in them. But then I’d already done all the swimming I needed to – with my arms anyway. Now they were only needed to keep Jamie’s head out of the water. My legs had the important job now, would be doing the hard work, and they were both intact.

It seemed to work. At least the panic retreated and I managed to set up a rhythm, forcing myself to count leg pulls. The tally had already reached double figures. And although it was monotonous counting like this, it would keep me focused, keep me awake. That was my real fear. The thought of slipping into unconsciousness and drowning both of us.

As long as I counted and we kept heading in the general direction of the shore, we’d be okay. But we were moving painfully slowly. And when I dared swivel my head round to look behind me at the harbour lights dancing up and down in the distance, they weren’t getting much closer. Maybe it was an optical illusion. But in my heart, I knew it wasn’t.

I wouldn’t have the strength to make it all the way. Not without help, and hauling Jamie’s dead weight. Not that he was a heavy man. He was taller than me, sure, but he was only a lightweight.

Still, I was a lightweight myself and I was tired. I smiled. I’d thought of something funny. Thank God it hadn’t been David who’d gone over the side. I’d have stood no chance with that giant, but then he could swim. The thought made me suddenly angry. Why hadn’t he gone in after us?

I gritted my teeth and wanted to cry. But didn’t. For I knew now that I was finished, had no more left to give. And crying wouldn’t help. I had plenty of reasons to. Apart from the pain in my wrist, there was the splitting headache from the cold. I’d also bitten down on my tongue when I’d dived in, and could feel its painful swelling filling my mouth. I was feeling sick as well from the diesel-contaminated water I’d swallowed. And my legs had lost most of their strength. Now they were only flailing weakly, not enough to move me and Jamie far.

But all that physical stuff was nothing compared to the mental pain when I thought about my kids losing a mother. I let go of Jamie. Felt him drift slowly away from me, and knew the end wouldn’t be long now.

An intensely bright light flooded my vision, obscuring everything else, boring painfully into my eye sockets. Was this the amazing light that came with death? A light that mesmerised with its unearthly colours, its tranquillity, and all encompassing joy?

People spoke of such things, but I’d always shied away from the embarrassment of words like ecstasy. Besides, this light brought neither peace nor bliss. Only pain, pricking at my raw, salt-stung eyeballs until they felt as if they’d been coated in grit. This was it then. The point of no return.

What, no rerun of life flashing before your eyes as the water took you under for that third and final time? That couldn’t be right. I had only been under once. I let go of the puzzling thought and closed my eyes. Gave myself permission to give up the fruitless struggle and snuggled deeper into the soft, delicious mattress beneath me. It was warm. I would never be cold again.

*

The next thing I remember was a massive man looming over me, his huge hands pumping my chest, and his mouth so close to mine that he’d obviously given me the kiss of life. You manage to live thirty-two years quite happily without having to be resuscitated by anyone, then bang, Viktor Kabak enters your life and it becomes commonplace.

Throwing up in front of strangers isn’t dignified, but I was getting used to it and felt slightly better once the filthy harbour water had left my stomach.

The man wiped my face with a rag and carried me below, placing me gently on a bunk in a tiny cabin. He stripped the wet clothes from my body. And tucked a blanket around me. In flawless English delivered with an elegant Norwegian accent, he ordered me to sleep. I did what I was told. I don’t always. But this time – I was happy to oblige.

“Pure stupidity! Neither you nor Jamie own a brain cell between you.”

The verdict was harsh. But if David Ovenden needed to vent his anger on someone, then I was the obvious choice. I was here, available, whilst Jamie was in hospital. I’d escaped that bit. Had been able to recuperate in the more pleasant surroundings of the Bristol Hotel.

“Well? Haven’t you got anything to say?”

He wasn’t only angry, he was frustrated. And I guessed that had as much to do with his own ego, as my lack of brain cells. He was a male, a strong swimmer, used to rip tides. Yet some skinny runt of a female with a broken wrist had beaten him to it.

“You’ve said enough for both of us,” I said, trying to match his anger, but my heart wasn’t in it. I was just happy to be alive. My kids wouldn’t be orphans. Wouldn’t have to live with their grandparents.

“Jill, you could’ve died out there.”

When I didn’t answer, he relented and his booming voice softened slightly. “If it wasn’t for the police patrol boat, you would have.”

My white light hadn’t been anything spiritual, after all. Just the search light on a harbour patrol launch. But I was grateful beyond words for it. For the calm, efficient way they’d dragged me back amongst the living.

David’s reasoning couldn’t be faulted. Both Jamie and I might be dead now. I knew I’d been lucky. I could so easily have been unlucky. But I still believed I was right. Jamie couldn’t swim. What was I supposed to do? Leave him and hope he came in on the next tide?

“How’s the patient?” I asked chirpily. Being chirpy came naturally now. I guess that’s normal when the fates give you a second bite of the cherry. “Can I see him?”

David Ovenden had the kind of face that found it hard to hide the truth, and he was having a struggle with himself - about whether or not to tell me something. I wasn’t stupid, despite his previous claims.

“Maybe that isn’t a good idea.” His eyes turned towards an interesting stain on his shoe.

“But he’s okay, isn’t he?”

Silence. A silence so full of tension you could have bottled it.

“Jesus, David. Please tell me he didn’t die.” I felt panic rise up in my throat, threaten to choke me.

David backed away from me, but not before I’d grabbed a fistful of his sweatshirt and fastened myself to it.

“Calm yourself, Jill.” He took a deep breath. “He’s not dead.”

“Thank God,” I said and felt a tear trickle from the corner of my eye. The crying took me by surprise, but then Jamie was a friend after all. Maybe now that we’d seen each other naked in his room, and gone for a swim together in the Oslo Fjord, he qualified as more than a friend. “What’s wrong, then?”

It was a perfectly normal question. But still David seemed uneasy.

“Look, I promise I won’t get stupid or violent,” I said and loosened my grip on his sweatshirt, patted it reassuringly. An act of good faith. I followed it up with a smile to show him I was totally sane and could be trusted. He didn’t look convinced.

“C’mon David, how bad can it be?”

“He’s pretty fucked up, excuse the language.” He seemed relieved now that he’d got at least that much off his chest.

“Okay . . . in what particular way is he fucked up?” I spoke slowly, so he knew that I could be as rational as the next person. And didn’t usually attach myself to people’s clothes. But he was still struggling for words to describe Jamie’s condition.

“Well? Is he conscious? Are his lungs working? Is he on a respirator? C’mon David, what?”

“Those bastards have done something terrible to him.” There was disbelief in his voice even though his face said that it was true. “They’ve made a junkie out of him, Jill.”

“What!”

“He’s chasing the dragon. They’ve given him a fuckin’ heroin habit.”

*

My overriding feeling was of total uselessness. I looked at Jamie and instead of seeing the man who had been in control, all I saw was a train wreck. He cried. He pleaded with me to get him the stuff. He’d make it worth my while. It was hard to watch, for I couldn’t help him.

But there was one thing I could do. If heroin was Jamie’s new best friend, then I figured I should at least find out about it.
That doesn’t mean I tried it.

I phoned people. Went on Internet sites. They had things in common, stuff they all agreed on. But there was so much disagreement. You could become an addict quickly. You couldn’t become an addict – at least not in anything less than three months. You could be successful in rehab. You could do rehab, but still feel the irresistible pull of the drug, even though you’d been clean for years. Who were you supposed to believe? What the hell could we do for Jamie?

You could so easily become overwhelmed. So I went back to basics. I went to see him again in hospital and looked into his eyes, and tried to remember the man he’d once been. I could still see him in there. We had to get him home. I knew he’d be okay, then. They could fix it back there.

The men from Jamie’s team had already been recalled. In these austere times, it seems there’s only so much you can swing on a Met expense account. And although something was being put in train to bring D. I. James McDonald back home, we could see no sign of it.

The hospital was glad to get rid of him. They weren’t set up to deal with someone like him, an embarrassment. So, with a token explanation of his medical notes, he was discharged. They signed him out to my custody. At the time it seemed a mere formality. But later, when the full force hit me, I realized that David was right. My single remaining brain cell might not be up to the job.

Try taking a full-blown junkie on a plane. It wasn’t easy. And although the whole addict thing was distasteful to David, he came up trumps. He hated the idea of heroin. I wasn’t overjoyed either. Even so, he managed to get hold of some good, pure ‘H’ and I hadn’t quibbled or asked him where the filthy stuff came from. It kept Jamie happy for the flight and got us back to London.

For the first time in weeks, I didn’t give a single thought to Viktor Kabak or the rest of his Russian Mafia. David and I had enough trouble on our hands trying to get Jamie McDonald back home in the upright position.