A Trick of the Mind (16 page)

‘Is there anything I can do for you before I go?’

‘You’re not going?’

‘Patrick. Listen. I will get whatever you need, I will do whatever I can, but I need to tell you—’

‘That you’ve work to do. I know, Ellie, I don’t want to hold you up. But it’s just that, now I’m here, I do wonder how I’m going to manage.’

For the first time he was letting his defences down, revealing some vulnerability about what had happened to him. My intention to reveal the truth retreated again as my heart went out to him.
What else could I do but stay with him, make sure he’d got food in, drink, that he was comfortable and would manage with his wheelchair and on his crutches in the flat? Looking at him,
sitting helplessly in the middle of the massive room, in the wheelchair, I tried to imagine what it must be like having to come to terms with such a devastating injury. To be restricted to a
wheelchair after having been so healthy, so fit and sporty.

‘How am I even going to unpack, sort myself out?’ he said now, a small wail entering his voice. ‘I’d only just got back from Corfu when I left that weekend. I
hadn’t even had time to unpack. There’s my suitcase, look! Through there in the bedroom. How am I going to put everything away with these crutches?’

I wanted to say I would help, that I wanted to, but where were his usual friends? It was obvious the woman he believed I was, the one he had met in the pub, had left the scene – but what
about his family? If they were to arrive, or to call him, how would I explain my presence?

‘Patrick, look, I’ll check you’ve got food and so on, but then, isn’t there anyone else . . .?’

‘There’s no one else, Ellie.’

‘But your family? Surely they must be beside themselves worrying about you?’

‘I don’t have any family,’ he said.

‘I mean your mother . . .’ I said, remembering the thought that had come to me in the hospital, what a doting woman she must be.

‘I haven’t got parents, I don’t even know my mother,’ he said.

‘Oh.’

I followed him as he wheeled his way across the vast floor to the bedroom, instinctively knowing not to ask him any more, for now.

‘Please, darling, would you open the suitcase? Help me put my things away?’

The bedroom was almost completely taken up by a huge bed with a view out of the floor-to-ceiling window over the river. On the opposite walls were sleek tall cupboard doors. I did as he said,
still wondering when I should tell him I wasn’t the right person to be taking out his clothes, some expensive, folded T-shirts – Ralph Lauren and Hugo Boss – and some fine linen
pyjamas, putting them into the drawers, unable to resist the temptation to put them in my special colour order, a lifetime’s habit that was hard to break and that became insistent when I was
nervous. Then there were more casual clothes in the bottom of the case, sailing shoes, a wetsuit squished into a bag.

‘Where do you want me to put your wash things?’

‘They can go in the bathroom, over there.’ I realised then there was another door disguised in the black wall.

I did as he said, laying out his things in the beautifully tiled en suite bathroom, dimly lit, with its stone sink and little lights around the mirrors. I went back to his room, fished the rest
of the things out of his bag, putting his little alarm clock by his bed as he instructed me and then I stopped.

There in the bottom of the bag was a framed photo of a pretty woman dressed in white lace, holding a bouquet of flowers. And beneath it, a black leather album.

I swung round. Patrick was there, gazing at the photo over my shoulder.

And something seemed to descend over his face, a kind of loosening – the moment of recognition.

He looked at me, then back at the photo.

‘Who is this, Patrick?’ I asked. My voice had gone weak. It came out as a whisper.

‘Oh shit,’ he said. ‘My memories are all topsy-turvy. I thought I’d told you, but I can’t have done. Everything’s gone so misty.’

‘Told me what, Patrick?’

‘That, Ellie, is my wife.’

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

I left. I told him I was sorry, that there had been a mistake, and now I’d seen that he was OK I had to go.

I ran down the stairs, onto the warm riverside street and fell into my car. My hands were trembling. I clutched the steering wheel tight as I drove. I cursed the traffic lights – every one
seemed to be on red as I crawled back up the gridlocked East India Dock Road towards Mile End.

My body was processing the new information slowly, like a drug gradually taking effect in my veins. A drug whose effects I couldn’t predict.

Patrick had a wife!

Where was she? Surely he couldn’t possibly have forgotten such a fundamental detail about his life, however bad his amnesia. But why hadn’t she been in to see him? Come to collect
him? Why hadn’t the nurses mentioned her when I’d asked if he’d had visitors? And what about everyone else in his life – had he simply forgotten they existed too? Who did he
think I was and what did he think I was doing, now he had seen the photo and remembered? It was one thing for me to be posing as a girl he had recently met, quite another to be replacing a wife who
was out there somewhere, waiting to hear from her husband.

I needed to talk to Chiara.

The Mile End flat was empty and had the feeling about it that no one had been there for some time. It took me several tries to get Chiara to answer her phone and when she did
she told me she was in the pub with the gang. I fed Pepper, kissed him and then ran down the stairs and along the Mile End Road to the Wetherspoon’s where we always met.

I was so relieved to find Chiara and the others I almost cried. I squished up next to her on one of the leather sofas, and she leant across and spoke into my ear. But what she said wasn’t
comforting after all.

‘We were supposed to be shopping together this afternoon. Did you completely forget? I’ve been texting and phoning you and in the end I gave up.’

I put my hands to my face.

‘Shit!’

‘When I realised you weren’t coming I asked Louise instead.’

‘Oh.’ I felt a pang of juvenile jealousy. Louise wasn’t her closest friend, I was!

‘I completely forgot about shopping with you,’ I said. ‘I’m so sorry, Chiara. Things have happened, stuff . . .’

‘
And
your mum’s been on the phone wanting to talk. You mustn’t leave your phone on silent! She’s been ringing me since midday asking where you are. She wants to
talk about your Aunty May’s house.’

‘I had to go down there this weekend. But my mum knew that, didn’t she say?’

‘Something’s up,’ Chiara said. She was looking at me with concern but I could tell she was still resentful that I’d let her down. ‘Tell me what’s going on
with you. You look petrified. As if you’d seen a ghost. I haven’t got long.’

Finn and Louise and Guy were on the other side of the large table, and with the background noise of the pub couldn’t possibly hear our exchange.

I nonetheless spoke as quietly as I could.

‘I’m honestly so sorry, Chiara. The fact is, I got a bit . . . involved with someone. I met him down at May’s. I didn’t want to get in touch with him, or tell you until
it was well and truly over with Finn.’ I was glossing over the truth again.

‘I see.’

I told her he was a man who as it turned out spent weekends in Southwold but lived in Wapping but that it was far more complicated than I’d realised.

I wondered what Chiara would say if I told her, ‘He’s the one I ran over!’

I wanted to say, ‘And I just found out he’s married!’ but that would put him in a bad light when it was me who had deceived him, while he, poor man, had had no memory about
anything that had happened before I had appeared at his bedside.

He was the vulnerable one. It was me who had taken advantage of his amnesia! Me who had veiled the truth from him! What on earth must he have thought I was doing, visiting him in hospital,
taking him home, behaving as if I was someone he was close to? I’d lain with him on the bed, for goodness’ sake! We’d kissed! I’d let him believe we’d met before and
were lovers. My deception was a thousand times worse than I’d imagined!

‘Well that sounds exciting,’ Chiara was saying, her voice clipped. ‘You can fill me in when I’ve got more time. But I have to tell you’ – she lowered her
voice – ‘Finn wants to speak to you again.’

‘What does he want?’

‘He wants to give you some advice about your commission. He’s afraid it’s a dog-eat-dog world out there in New York . . . that you don’t quite know what you’re
letting yourself in for. With the commission you’ve taken on.’

‘Chiara, I need to move on . . .’

‘He simply wants to support you.’

‘He thinks he’s supporting me, but do you see why I find it stifling?’

‘I can see he’s a little over-protective of you, yes. I always have. But he cares. I said I’d let you know that he’d like to talk. There. I can’t do more than
that.’

‘Thanks, Chiara.’

She looked at me. ‘I’ve got to go. Oh, we’re viewing the flat tomorrow. The survey’s been done and Liam wants to measure up for curtains and so on.’

‘Exciting!’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Yes it is.’

But my heart dipped at the prospect of her moving out. All the heady fantasies of the last couple of weeks were proving to be just that – fantasies. Patrick was married. Finn didn’t
think I could deal with the New York art world. May’s house was full of trinkets that gave me an uneasy feeling. I was still living in a stifling flat in Mile End and unless I pulled myself
together and got on with my painting I wouldn’t ever earn enough to move somewhere nicer. Worst of all I was possibly the culprit in a hit-and-run incident in which a man had lost his leg. I
had told lie after lie.

‘I’m going to miss living with you,’ Chiara said. ‘I’m a bit nervous, truth be told, to be committing at last.’ She patted her swelling belly.
‘It’s all this little one’s fault! I’ll miss our chats. Our nights in.’

I hugged her. And felt her slipping away from me.

‘How’s the commission?’ Louise asked, the minute Chiara had gone, shouting to be heard across the noise of the pub.

‘It’s going well, thank you.’ I had hardly done any work on it.

‘I hear you’ve been working on the sitting-room floor. Is that working out?’

‘It has to, for now.’

‘I’d love to see what you’re doing sometime.’

She, Guy and Finn all shuffled round the table towards me. ‘Have you been to the Turner exhibition?’ Louise asked. ‘Finn, Guy and I thought we might go next week. If you fancy
joining us? It would be good for your inspiration.’

‘Thanks, I’ll see.’ I didn’t want to think about work now. I wanted to go home, nurse my misery. I was relieved when my mobile went and I could make an excuse to get
away.

‘I’ve just got to pop outside,’ I said, ‘I’ve got a weak signal in here.’

I stood on the hectic street, police sirens wailing and traffic rumbling past.

Patrick’s name had flashed up on my screen.

I stood for a moment staring into the ringing phone. Had Patrick realised that I knew nothing about him? That I was an imposter in his life? I needed to know. I picked up.

‘Hi.’

‘Why did you run off like that?’

‘Why do you think?’

‘I’ve no idea. You left me so suddenly, I was afraid I’d offended you!’

‘You’ve got a wife, Patrick!’

‘I thought you knew. You must have known.’

‘You didn’t tell me you were married!’

‘I thought I had! I’m dealing with such a lot. Please, bear with me. It was only when I saw the photo I realised I might not have told you before.’

‘About your wife?’

‘Yes. I’m sorry if I didn’t, but I’m telling you now, aren’t I?’

‘Isn’t it a bit late? After arranging to spend a weekend with me! After letting me kiss you and drive you home?’

‘Oh, Ellie,’ he said. ‘I was sure I must have said. My wife’s dead.’

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Although it was late, I found myself calling a cab and going back to Patrick’s.

He let me through the main entrance when I rang the bell, and I pushed open the door to his flat, which he’d left ajar.

I found him sitting in his wheelchair looking out over the little balcony, a bottle of champagne in front of him, from which he immediately poured a second glass.

He looked up at me, held out his hand, pulled me towards him and kissed me on the lips. I felt my hand go instinctively to him, stroking his head, loving the feel of his short glossy hair.

‘I was so afraid when you ran off like that . . .’

‘I’m sorry. I was shocked. You’re married . . . there’s so little I know about you.’

‘
Was
married, which I would have explained, if you hadn’t bolted like that!’

I ran my hand through his hair again, no longer able to hold back. I bent down and kissed the top of his head.

‘I’m back now though.’

‘I know, and I’m glad. Here. Sit down, have some of this Cristal. You need it after that shock.’

We sat side by side, our fingers intertwined, looking out over the river.

‘How did she die?’ I whispered, after a while. ‘She wasn’t . . . she couldn’t have been in the accident that night? Was she?’ I knew this was a crazy question
– it would have been mentioned on the news – but the thought would haunt me unless I asked.

He put a hand to his forehead, closed his eyes, frowned.

‘No. No, it was two years ago. I was so sure I must have told you.’

‘I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.’

He shrugged. ‘It’s OK. You don’t have to say anything. I’ve got over it now. More or less.’

‘What happened?’

‘Do you want me to tell you?’

‘Yes. But only if it’s not too painful.’

‘It was an accident at sea,’ he said.

‘Oh! I’m so sorry . . .’

‘I don’t really want to talk about it too much.’

‘Of course. I understand. How awful for you.’

There was a silence. I tried to take in what he had told me. I wanted to ask so much, what kind of accident, when, where. How appalling for him, to have lost his wife, then to be dealing with
such a devastating injury.