Excerpt: Phantom of Philosophers

Astin Redcross knew the day would come. He just hadn’t been bargaining on it happening today though.

Jules had called at nine thirty that she was checked in, and the plane was still on time, but that might very well change. He took a moment of indulging in the anticipation, sitting in his office, the window open to the quiet of Neville’s Court. They were having some wonderfully splendid days, and Astin thought that the day might very well end with a walk along the backs. Jules did like to walk through Cambridge in the evening.

He got his coat, locked his office, and took the inside route to Neville’s Gate, collecting his bicycle along the way. Trinity Lane lead him out into Trinity Street, and he made for home. It would have been more logical if it had happened at St Andrew’s Street: the traffic there was nearly always merciless, but he crossed it safe and sound. It was nearer to home that he became suddenly aware of falling. He knew about fainting, all too well, and that sometimes the blackness could be fought, but this was definitely not one of the times. He came to because the sirens were too loud, and someone was talking to him and putting a brace around his neck.

‘I’ve got to pick up Jules,’ he whispered.

‘You’re not picking anyone up today, mate,’ the paramedic told him, probing his arm. The weird thing was he couldn’t quite feel it, and he thought his hand wasn’t supposed to be at the angle it currently was, looking very much like it was separated at his wrist except for the skin. He couldn’t feel it, of course, and he thought he didn’t want to try wriggling his fingers, or anything dense like that.

He didn’t afterwards remember Jeremy being there, because he was quite certain he fainted again right then and there, but Jeremy Lucas was in the ambulance with him when he came to again. He looked awfully pale, which wasn’t strange, considering the ambulance was moving so much it made even him queasy, and he was lying down, firmly strapped to a stretcher.

‘Jules is at the airport,’ he reiterated. ‘I’ve got to pick her up.’

‘I think you need to take it easy,’ Jeremy said weakly.

‘She won’t know what’s keeping me.’

‘I’ll call the estate when we get to the hospital,’ Jeremy promised.

‘Why? She won’t be there,’ Astin protested, wondering what in God’s name was going on. ‘Stansted, she’ll be at Stansted in about an hour.’

Either he fainted again at that point, or someone sedated him, he didn’t know, and no one told him afterwards. He was rather grateful because the ride in the ambulance really had made him feel rather ill.

__--~~*~~--__

The total amount of luggage Juliette Winterborough brought fit into a single suitcase. She could have just gone with hand-luggage, but she had figured beforehand that it wasn’t too much of a bother to check in a little bit earlier, and rolled a suitcase into the airport, checking it in. On the other side of the Channel it was already waiting for her by the time she took the underground rail service that went to and fro between the actual airport and the terminal and arrived at the luggage collection point. She was out into the main hall pretty quickly, and thought to spot Astin almost at once, except it didn’t turn out to be him at all. Face to face with the man she wasn’t quite sure how she could have mistaken him for Astin, except perhaps for the fact that they shared a rather large amount of genes and had exactly the same eyes.

‘Coincidence?’ she asked carefully.

‘No, I’m afraid not,’ Howard Redcross said, his voice dangerously quiet in the bustle of the airport, and looking immensely tired. ‘He’s at the hospital. I haven’t seen him yet myself, but Jeremy Lucas called that he kept saying he was supposed to pick you up. He, uhm, apparently he was hit by a car on his way home. Jeremy said he was not in a life threatening condition, but the injury’s serious.’

Jules found herself hearing very little, after that, mostly because there was a strange kind of static pumping through her ears. Howard took her bag, handing it to someone else, then took her arm and led her out of the hall, into the bright sunlight, and rather quickly into a car. Jules thought you ran the risk of getting a rather large parking fine if you parked your car there too long, but Howard didn’t seem to be really bothered with it. The man who had taken her luggage from Howard was dressed in a nondescript blue suit, and Jules didn’t think she knew him. He put her suitcase into the back of a dark green Rover 75, and Howard held open the door to the backseat to the car. He closed the door once she was seated, then walked around the car himself, where the young man held open the door for him, and he got in beside her.

Trying to regulate her breathing, trying to cling to what Howard had said, that Astin wasn’t in a life-threatening condition, she tried to control herself. All the same, she felt the tears burn in her eyes. Howard wordlessly handed her his handkerchief, then took her hand a moment and pressed it, his eyes fixed firmly in front of him.

‘Jeremy called the estate after they arrived at the hospital. I would have gone to the hospital at once hadn’t he informed me you were due to arrive.’

‘Thank you for picking me up.’

‘He won’t forgive me if I sit at his bedside, knowingly having left you at an airport, unaware of what had happened,’ Howard said, a small smile on his lips. He let go of her hand.

‘What happened,’ Jules asked, ‘do you know?’

‘Apparently he was on his bicycle, pretty close to home, and got hit by a car. I don’t know if it was his fault, or the driver’s fault, I just know there’s something very obviously wrong with his right arm, and Jeremy was with him in the ambulance. He was on his way home because he was picking you up, I’m assuming?’

Jules breathed and nodded. The Rover was very obviously speeding where it could while still on the motorway.

‘I would have driven myself,’ Howard said, making it sound like an afterthought, ‘except I think I wouldn’t have been able to keep my mind on it, which is why I asked Towers to drive instead.’

Towers seemed to look back at them through the rear-view mirror a moment, and smiled. If it was meant to be a comforting smile, it wasn’t entirely successful, but Jules appreciated him trying. Something began vibrating, and Jules watched Howard fumble for a mobile phone, which was difficult because it was in a trouser pocket and he was wearing his seatbelt, which turned out to be in the way.

‘Tell me,’ he simply said when answering it. He listened, and Jules listened too, but couldn’t hear anything and only got tenser watching Howard’s face drain slowly. ‘Give me a moment,’ he said finally, and put the phone in his lap. ‘They’ve taken X-rays, and about half the hospital has been in to see them, apparently, and they’re not quite decided. Julian Falkland tells me he suggests operating at once, or risk losing the use of the right hand. They haven’t been able to reach Dr Winston.’

Jules swallowed. The easy thing about being there when Astin was hit by a bullet was that everyone was pretty decided on getting the thing out, and there really hadn’t been any decisions to make, and when they did need to be made, James Winston had been there to make them for her. Then, of course, she hadn’t been important yet, not in the eyes of the rest of the family. Now, apparently she was important enough to make the detour to pick her up, instead of going straight to the hospital. Important enough to have a say in the matter.

‘What are the other options?’

‘Manipulation without surgery, but Falkland says the fracture is too complex.’

Jules nodded.

‘I think Astin would say rather safe than sorry.’

Howard nodded, and picked up the phone again.

‘Julian? Jules says better safe than sorry, and I agree.’ He listened, then addressed Towers. ‘How long?’

‘Thirty minutes, Sir, if we keep going as we are.’ As he said it he apparently accelerated as well.

‘Thirty minutes,’ Howard repeated into the phone, just before ending the call. ‘Right. Thanks, Julian.’

‘He’s going to try and wait for us, and then walk us through the surgery as it goes on. We can watch it, if we like.’ Jules grimaced, and Howard nodded. ‘Same here. We’ll just listen to him explain.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Falkland is an old friend of Astin’s, leftover from his medical days. Shared a house, through university. They used to be quite close.’

‘Part of the crowd?’ Jules asked, remembering the picture of the group of friends all too well. Jeremy, Ben, and James appeared to be the only ones still close to Astin, all the rest had drifted apart. Astin rarely talked about those days, except admitting he had been seriously off the track.

Howard nodded.

‘His best friend, I think, at some point.’ He took a deep breath, possibly suspecting he knew as little of his life back then as she probably did. ‘How are you?’

Jules smiled.

‘All right. I’m in that slightly uncomfortable space of time between a degree and the rest of my life, and I’m trying to make up my mind about what I’m going to do next. This was intended as a visit to help me clear my mind.’

‘I’m sorry it hasn’t started on the best of terms,’ Howard offered.

Jules shrugged and breathed deeply.

‘If he’s all right, it might not be so bad. He’ll need a hand for a while, and it’ll give me something to concentrate on.’

She was caught up in thought at that, and Howard was as well, and then suddenly they were where they were going. Howard was out before Towers was, and walked around to open the door for Jules, but she was out already by the time he got there.

‘Just park the car and wait,’ Howard said to the young man. ‘I’ll call.’

‘Yes, Sir.’

Together, Sir Howard Redcross and Juliette Winterborough walked towards the building, in which somewhere, Astin Redcross was waiting for yet another surgery. As they pushed through the doors, Jules contemplated if they would have to go through the process of trying to find out where Astin was, and then find their way through the labyrinthine ways of the large hospital, but a middle-aged man was leaning on a front desk, talking to one of the people behind it, and pushed away the moment he noticed Howard.

‘Sir Howard, I wish we could have met under better circumstances.’

Howard shook the man’s hand and turned to Jules.

‘Juliette Winterborough, Dr Julian Falkland.’

‘Nice to meet you, Ms Winterborough. Am I right in assuming you’re the Jules Astin keeps referring to?’

‘I’d guess so,’ she said, taking a deep breath, trying not to let the hospital get to her.

Falkland seemed to notice.

‘Let me take you up.’ He led them along, into an elevator, where he began explaining. ‘He broke his wrist quite seriously, and has some scrapes on his face and what we believe is a minor concussion.’ Several floors up they left the elevator, they walked through a long hallway and finally into a bright room with a very good view. In a corner sat Jeremy Lucas, looking haunted, and in the bed lay Astin Redcross, seemingly asleep. His face was grazed rather violently; it might have been the broken wrist everyone appeared to be worried about, but he had clearly made quite a fall as well. Jules smiled at Jeremy, and nearly burst out in tears at the welcome look he gave her.

‘Is he asleep?’ she asked, but before Jeremy could answer Astin reacted, turning his head to the entrance of the room and opening his eyes. His right hand was in a makeshift cast, no doubt until they would need to take it off again for the surgery. He made to lift it, wheezed with pain, then reached for her with his other hand and began blinking away his tears.

‘I wanted to come, but I couldn’t, you see?’ he said in a slurred voice.

‘He’s under medication,’ Falkland commented. ‘Conscious, but high as a kite. He’s been telling us he needed to go and to pick you up ever since he got picked up by the ambulance.’

‘I suspect it’s one of the reasons he doesn’t like anaesthetics,’ Jules said, smiling broadly at Astin, sitting down on the bed and touching his face.

‘At least one of them,’ Julian said succinctly. ‘We’ve given him a low dosage. It won’t hurt unless he moves it. He’ll be further anesthetised for the surgery.’

‘Who got you here?’ Astin asked her, ignoring the other conversations, making her focus on him again.

‘Howard did,’ Jules smiled.

‘Is he here?’

Jules nodded and looked at Howard, who walked up to the bed slowly.

‘I couldn’t help it,’ Astin said, emotional, looking at the older man. ‘I don’t even know what happened.’

‘It’s fine, my boy,’ Howard said, putting a hand to his shoulder, after shortly stroking his cheek with the back of his hand, a gesture only obvious to Jules and Astin. Jules choked up and bowed her head, and Astin lifted his left hand to cup her face.

‘I’m going to take you walking along the backs tonight,’ he said seriously.

Jules laughed and drew her sleeve over her eyes.

‘Not tonight,’ she whispered, smiling, through her tears.