The Miracle Inspector by Helen Smith Read Free Book Online Page B

nervous. You ever asked anyone a personal question, they assumed it was a trap. Quite right, too. But Maureen was game. She wanted him to declare that Christina was a miracle. So pretty much anything he said, she was going to play along. He thought she was going to say she had done something domestic and dreary. But she didn’t.
    ‘I used to read the news. On the local network.’ Christ! Now he was interested. ‘It might have led to something. I was only young. I actually reported on the attacks that changed everything – though I didn’t know how far-reaching the effects were going to be at the time.’
    ‘No one did.’
    ‘I had Christina very late.’
    ‘Yes. Or rather, I mean, you don’t look…’
    She laughed. ‘I know what you mean.’
    He realised that something had changed. He was talking to her as an equal. At first, he’d dismissed her as some worried old bag with a disabled daughter who couldn’t come to terms with what had happened to the child. But her situation was more complex than that. Here was a woman who had worked for a living, who’d once had a job. He was being awkward and she was being nice to him. He suddenly wished that he could tell her about Angela. His wife was the sort of person who ought to have a good job. Maureen had been on TV. His wife ought to have been on TV, with her voice. To hear her sing, it was like hearing the angels singing. No, that was a crap way of putting it. Maybe Maureen, with her journalistic background, would have a better way of expressing it. He tried to imagine Maureen, microphone in hand, reporting live on Angela’s singing, with respect and enthusiasm, and a neat turn of phrase.
    He couldn’t remember the last time Angela had sung anything. He would go home and ask her to sing.
    ‘I’d like to come back here, Maureen.’
    ‘Oh yes, of course.’
    ‘It doesn’t happen all at once. You don’t sit here and say yes or no, tick a box. It has to be assessed properly. You know?’
    ‘Of course.’
    Maureen was very calm but he could detect the eagerness. She was sharp, she had worked out that there was a chance. He hadn’t said no. She had realised that however many parts there were to the test, she and Christina were through to the next round.
    ‘Right, then.’
    ‘Could I ask you, then, sir…’ That rankled with him now and embarrassed him, that ‘sir’. She wasn’t a subservient, ignorant woman who called him sir by default, as he had assumed when he came in. She was an intelligent, desperate woman who was trying to flatter him.
    ‘You can call me Lucas.’
    ‘Oh, right. Thank you.’ She didn’t dare, though. Good for her. He’d have hated her for it. ‘Could you tell me, typically, how long? I mean, I’m not pressing you…’
    ‘I don’t know. Maybe a couple of months.’
    ‘Oh, right.’
    He didn’t want to toy with her. He wanted to do something nice. ‘The thing is – at the end… I mean, I can’t say…’
    ‘No. Of course not. Still, we’d rather live with hope. You see, I believe–’
    ‘What has she got? I mean, is it a disease?’
    Maureen’s face. Honestly. He hadn’t meant it like that. Her face twisted as if he’d just punched her in the guts.
    ‘I’m sorry. It’s just, we have to know. For the reports.’ They didn’t.
    ‘No. She’s… it was something in the womb. Or maybe at birth. You know how it is with the midwives now, the care.’
    ‘What’s the prognosis? Will she get any better?’
    ‘I don’t know.’
    ‘She won’t get worse, will she?’
    ‘Well, it’s not good, actually. Nobody thought she’d survive; that she’d be here this long.’
    ‘Oh, poor little thing.’
    ‘She doesn’t suffer.’
    ‘No. Good.’
    He went over to the child and bent over her, all smiles. ‘Goodbye, Christina,’ he said. He led Maureen outside.
    A sad thought had occurred to him. ‘Maureen, I’ve got to say this.’ Did he? Well, he’d started now. Besides, he liked the woman. ‘If you’re looking