Thorn (9 page)

He arrived abruptly, churning up a spray of gravel from the drive beneath the wheels of his ramshackle car, parking it untidily and then erupting through Briar House's front entrance. It was impossible to avoid the thought that he brought with him an aura of exotic brilliance. Freda Porter was not given to fanciful notions, but when she visualised Dr Sterne (which she sometimes did when dropping off to sleep, or during a particularly tedious spell of night duty), she always pictured him permanently silhouetted against a kind of medieval stained-glass window that showered vivid jewel colours over him like a harlequin cloak.

Pouring the tea, she listened to Dr Sterne's request that a place be found in Briar House for the young relative of a business associate of his. It was a straightforward request, although the apparent need for speed was a bit surprising – ‘Tomorrow or, at the latest, the day after,' said Dr Sterne offhandedly, as if, thought Freda, half resentful, half complimented, he expected Briar House to be able to supply vacant rooms on demand, never mind the inconvenience to everyone and the staff shortage.

She explained, as she always did, that she did not cater for psychotic cases, nor for the
really
insane, only those who were a little distressed by the world. This having been made clear, she asked the nature of the young lady's problem. It was certainly good to hear that it was neither drink nor drugs this time. Dr Sterne, drinking tea with the brusque manner of one simply intent on refuelling (it could not be dislike for the tea which was grand and strong), said, ‘I don't know any details. Teenage hysteria, I expect. Probably breaking her heart over a boyfriend.'

Freda interposed a delicate question.

‘
Virgo intacta
if the GP's to be believed,' said Leo Sterne.

So it was not a case of an abortion undertaken for convenience and emotionally regretted afterwards. Freda changed tack and asked if a private room would be required. ‘That, of course, comes a little more expensive. But we have several double and even triple suites which quite often meet the case—'

‘Oh, they'll want a private room,' said Leo. ‘The family aren't without money. I wouldn't be here pleading the case if they were.'

Eccentric and distinguished men could be allowed their little jokes. Freda smiled indulgently and lifted the teapot in implicit invitation.

‘No, thank you.' The tea was so strong it was barely drinkable. Leo said, ‘I'll get them to bring the girl in tomorrow, then.'

‘And will you be attending her, Dr Sterne?'

‘God, no, I'm only making the contact as a favour for someone. I haven't the time or the inclination to pamper hysterical teenagers, Matron. I don't suppose I shall even see the child. In fact, I'm driving to Northumberland straight from here.'

‘Ah yes, we've all heard about your work with the Rackham Commission. What a busy and worthwhile life you lead. We should be grateful you can spare time for Briar House.'

The elephantine coyness of tone grated on Leo like a nail being scraped across slate, but he said, ‘I was dragged on to the Rackham thing protesting volubly, Matron. I've no patience with bureaucracy, and no time for it either.'

‘Oh, but such worthy work, surely.' It would not do to comment on the extremely public row that Dr Sterne had recently waged with a Government minister about the dreadful things he had found inside Thornacre. Freda permitted herself a small twinge of complacency. There was nothing like that at Briar House and she hoped Dr Sterne knew this. It was not beyond the realms of possibility that he might mention Briar House to Professor Rackham and the commission. ‘Excellent place, Briar House,' he might say. ‘An example to us all.' Or even, ‘My word, Freda Porter does a superb job there; we might consider her for a more responsible post sometime.'

This was a new and promising daydream; Freda tucked it away to be considered later on, smiled her company smile at Dr Sterne who was about to leave, and said they would look forward to receiving the new patient in time for supper.

Even though Dr Sterne had said he would not be attending Imogen Ingram, it would be only courteous to send him a little written report on the girl's progress from time to time. Freda flattered herself that she had something of a way with the written word. She could concoct a few very nice little letters, couched as businesslike reports, of course, but actually drawing Dr Sterne into the care of Imogen Ingram. And thus into the environs of Briar House and Freda herself.

Leo had fought against being part of the Rackham Commission, the body set up to investigate malpractice in mental institutions, but Professor Rackham had been one of his tutors and he had made it a personal request, and in the end Leo had agreed.

‘You'll counterbalance the bureaucrats,' Rackham had said. ‘Two of us will have more impact than one.'

‘Psychiatry isn't about committees and reports and Government White Papers.'

‘No, but it's about stamping out cruelty and mismanagement and greed. If you won't do it for any other reason, do it for my sake, Leo. I'm too old to fight them on my own.'

‘That's unanswerable,' said Leo. ‘You cunning old devil.'

‘That's disrespectful,' said Professor Rackham. ‘Well? Will you do it?'

‘I'll have to after that,' said Leo. ‘But don't expect me to be respectful to the mediocrats.'

‘I don't want you to be respectful. I want you to be effective.'

He had done it, of course, and he thought that so far he had indeed been effective. There had been grim satisfaction in bringing to light some of the cases of abuse they had found, and there had been mischievous delight in some of the quarrels waged as a result. But the grimmest of all the places they had investigated had been the nightmare mansion they had found in Northumberland. Thornacre.

It had been built by a well-heeled mill-owner for his new young wife, around the time of the Regency. He had reportedly a roving eye, the wealthy industrialist, but also an ambitious disposition and he had married the lady for her society connections. The lady, for her part, had married for love and her disposition was wildly jealous, so that when she discovered the mill-owner
in flagrante delicto
with the between-maid, she attacked her hapless spouse with the nearest thing to hand. The nearest thing to hand had happened to be a meat cleaver and the mill-owner had died messily in the master bedroom, thus providing food for the local gossip for several generations. The lady spent the rest of her days shut away inside Thornacre's east wing with a keeper, eaten up by grief and helplessly insane. According to the local GP, she had died alone and mad, having spent the last thirty years of her life prowling the vast echoing corridors of Thornacre howling frenziedly at creatures who were not there.

There had been no children; if there had been, it was possible that Thornacre would eventually have passed to a normal family, and there would have been no haunted mansion silently growing into the dark legend in England's north-east corner.

‘Considering the place's history, I suppose we should have expected a few ghosts,' Leo had said, facing Professor Rackham over the latter's desk.

‘Oh yes. Yes, we should have guessed that the legend of that poor insane creature would have lived on.'

They looked at one another, and then Rackham said, ‘But it isn't the ghosts, is it, Leo? It's what you – what we – found there. How much are we going to make public?'

‘Not everything,' said Leo at once. ‘The public would never believe it.'

‘Dear God, no. There'll have to be a full report, of course,' said Rackham, after a moment. ‘And probably a White Paper.'

‘Oh, fuck reports and White Papers,' said Leo, who hardly ever swore and very rarely used obscenities. ‘The place was like something out of Dickens. You saw that. We all saw it. We need to focus on the immediate problems – getting some of the staff thrown into windowless prisons for starters, and preferably leaving them to rot.' He sat back in his chair, frowning, and despite himself Professor Rackham smiled.

‘That's got a very Biblical ring, Leo.'

‘I feel Biblical. I'd like to invoke plagues of boils and curses of pestilence. I'd like to burn Thornacre down and sow the ground with salt.' Oh no, you wouldn't, said a treacherous little voice inside his mind. Oh no, you wouldn't.

‘Let's stop thinking about what we found,' said Rackham, ‘and think instead about what we're going to do there. Let's think about exorcising the place, driving out the ghosts and laying the dark reputation.'

‘Winding up the rough magic,' said Leo, half to himself.

‘You always had a lyrical turn of mind. But, yes, if you want to call it that. Not bell, book and candle exorcism, but a purging. And then running the place as it ought to be run. How would you feel about doing that, Leo?'

Leo looked up, startled. ‘Me? Why me, for God's sake?'

‘Because you're the obvious choice.'

‘You're serious, aren't you?' Leo stared at the professor. ‘Yes, I can see you are. But I'm not a manager. I'm certainly not a bureaucrat. I'd be appalling.'

‘You'd be unusual but you might be what's needed.' Rackham tapped his pen thoughtfully on the desk. ‘Let's fold the anger up and put it aside for a moment, Leo,' he said, and Leo smiled inwardly, because this was one of the old boy's positive word imageries. It was the kind of thing Leo himself often used to help patients. Tidy up the anger/the bitterness/the bereavement. Put it away in a cupboard, throw it to the back of a drawer; we can always come back to it later if necessary.

‘Let's look at what could be done in Thornacre,' said Rackham. ‘At what good could be done.' He added craftily, ‘Supposing, of course, that you agree.'

‘Well, all right, supposing I did agree, what about my patients in London?' demanded Leo. ‘And the groups – the Students' Counselling Service and the Drug-Watch Centre?'

‘Hyatt could take most of the patients. Or Marshall.'

‘Yes, that's true.' Marshall had been another of Rackham's students; he and Leo had been good friends in their student days and they were good colleagues now. Yes, he could trust Marshall with them.

‘And you could set up similar groups as easily in Northumberland as you could in London. In fact,' said Professor Rackham, tightening his case skilfully, ‘it could be argued that a place like that has the greater need. In London help groups are ten a penny.'

‘You're a Machiavellian old bastard, aren't you?' Leo thought for a moment. ‘I'd need new staff right across the board,' he said abruptly. ‘Good registrars and senior house officers. Occupational therapists. And nurses – I'd have to have good nurses, including a matron.'

‘You could probably have all of that.'

‘Almost all of the present lot would have to go.'

‘They are going. They've all had notices served on them. Quite a few have had GMC summonses as well.'

‘Well, I hope they're all suspended for life.'

Rackham leaned forward. ‘Leo, listen. Nobody seems to have bothered about Thornacre for years. We both saw that. It needs a troubleshooter for a time.'

Leo smiled. ‘Now that's one of the few things I've never been called.'

‘And there's another thing,' continued Rackham. ‘Thornacre's never applied for any research funds. That means you could probably get grants. Even some of the drug companies – I don't mean the ICIs of the world, but some of the smaller firms. That place in Oxford, and there's somewhere in Wales that specialises in the sedative groups of drugs.'

‘But would you trust me with it?' Leo asked almost roughly. ‘Would anyone trust me with it? After what happened last year?'

Rackham made a dismissive gesture. ‘You were unwise and unfortunate last year. That woman was clearly hysterical. Or disappointed,' he added shrewdly, and despite himself Leo grinned. ‘Between ourselves, Leo, I suppose you didn't actually seduce her?'

‘I didn't.'

‘I didn't think you had.' Rackham paused. ‘Would you like to think about Thornacre? Perhaps a two-year contract?'

‘I don't need to think about it.' He did not. He realised that he wanted Thornacre more than he had ever wanted anything in his life. I could do it, he thought. I could turn that nightmare mansion into something
good.
Somewhere healing.

What would Thornacre be like with the darknesses chased away and the ghosts routed?

The undertaker's assistant thought this was the queerest job he had ever been assigned. Quite a posh house, it was, but an odd set-up all the same.

A double death, it was, and within hours of one another, so they said, on account of some kind of family tragedy. Well, you got queerer things in life, the assistant was bound to admit that you did, but if it hadn't been for the certificates being properly made out and all, old Huxtable might have asked a few questions about this one and reported things to the coroner, like he had done once or twice before. You couldn't be too careful in this business, and Huxtable's were jealous of their reputation. They wouldn't risk being mixed up in anything dubious.

It was unusual these days to be requested to casket the bodies and leave them in the house until the funeral service, but it wasn't altogether unheard of. And Mrs Caudle's instructions had been definite. Two nice oak caskets with brass handles, no expense spared – that was Hampstead for you – and both coffins to remain in this room until the funeral on Friday afternoon. Quite quick, that was; it would mean paying extra time to the gravediggers who liked to finish early on Fridays. But it could not be helped. Probably the family wanted to clear away all memories of the tragedy, whatever it had been, thought the assistant sagely.

It was quite like the old days to be preparing a laying-out in a house. The assistant was just old enough to remember the time when people kept their loved ones in the house with them until the hearse came to the door. It had been the way things were done. If you were well off you had the body laid out in the billiard room or the library for the family to pay their last respects; if you were poor, you used the front parlour. But people were squeamish about such things now; they could not bear the thought of being in the same house overnight with a corpse, they said, and insisted on it being carted off to the Chapel of Rest there and then. As if the poor dead body of your own husband or mother or gran who had loved you would do you any harm! The assistant agreed with the old ways and could not be doing with such tickle-stomached folk.