Survival of Thomas Ford, The by John A. A. Logan Read Free Book Online Page B

not look at Lorna. He sighed out air, then sucked in a breath greedily. He blew out quickly twice. He laughed.
    “Come on,” he said. “I’ll get you a coffee up in Starbucks.”
    Jimmy chose the high seats by the window. Lorna was sipping coffee and watching Jimmy watching the people pass by. It was disconcerting, the attitude he had to the passing crowd, as though he was watching television and these people passing were only half-real to him. Sometimes Lorna would see someone in the crowd notice Jimmy staring. The person would look back at Jimmy but Jimmy would not react, he would show no awareness that he was being looked at. He would just continue to grin like an Alsatian dog on a hot day. Lorna looked away from Jimmy, down into her coffee. At that exact moment Jimmy turned his black eyes on her.
    “Did you talk to that man again at work?” he said.
    “Who?”
    “That man you said you’d talked to. The one who had the accident out near Drumnadrochit, at Loch Ness. His wife died in the car eh?”
    Lorna frowned.
    “Thomas Ford? He’ll have gotten out today. Gone home.”
    “Aye,” said Jimmy. “You were saying you got talking to him eh? That he was quite nice.”
    This was the third time Jimmy had asked, over the weeks since he had found out that Lorna was cleaning in Intensive Care when Thomas Ford was there. The first time had made sense to Lorna, because Jimmy had been reading in the paper about the crash and he had asked her if she had seen the man whose photo was in the paper, at the hospital. But now there was something strange to Lorna, about Jimmy asking, and the tone of his voice when he asked.
    “Did he ever say anything to you about his wife?” said Jimmy. “Or about the crash, how it happened?”
    Lorna watched Jimmy. He blinked. He grinned. He lifted his mug to take a drink of coffee, but he swallowed before he drank.
    “No, Jimmy, of course he didn’t.”
    “I don’t know,” said Jimmy. “Stressful situation. People will talk about anything, after an accident like that. Bonnie lassie like you, Lorna. Shoulder to cry on.”
    Lorna shook her head and looked out the window, into the crowd of faces

Chapter Eight
     
    The Accident and Emergency staff couldn’t believe that this was Thomas Ford back again. They recognised him right away. The story of a man escaping from a car that crashed into a freezing loch and sunk didn’t come along every day around there. The Indian doctor was asking Thomas about the pain, but Thomas’ eyes were darting around the ceiling like twin flying insects.
    “Mr Ford? Mr Ford? No, Jill, call ITU and tell them Mr Ford’s on the way back up.”

    By the time the bus arrived at the hospital there was only five minutes left before the start of Lorna’s shift. The west theatre was still undergoing its rapid clean and detox, to ready it for the spot-inspection that hospital admin had been forewarned was to happen. Jimmy was curled forward on the seat beside Lorna. Sweat glistened on his forehead. Lorna had an arm round him as they got off the bus. She half-carried him to the reception for Accident and Emergency. Finlay, who was sitting, still waiting for word to come back about Thomas, looked up as the girl and young guy tottered through the double doors. At first, Finlay thought they were drunk, but no, the young man seemed to be in pain, his guts.

    Five minutes later, Jimmy found himself lying back on a trolley in a room full of people, looking at the ceiling.
    “Hey,” he said, “I don’t think I should be here. It was my girlfriend. I just had some pain and she made this big thing of it.”
    Jimmy’s shirt was off. He noticed a nice-looking young nurse and stared at her. He hoped she was impressed by his tight abdomen and healthy pink torso. But she didn’t meet his eyes. Then his stomach started that whooshing pain again.
    “Whhoooooo!” went Jimmy. “Hey though, I think I’ll be fine eh?”
    “Mr McCallum, I see you have deep bruising here on