Read Online Toby's Room by Pat Barker - Free Book Online

must have muffled the sound of his approach. She took an involuntary step back.
    Instantly, he took off his hat. ‘Miss Brooke?’
    ‘Ye-es?’
    ‘My name’s Andrew Martin. I’m a friend of Toby’s.’
    Yes, she remembered seeing him on the steps of the medical school with Toby. ‘Is he all right?’
    ‘Well, no, not really, that’s why I’m here.’
    Fear slipped into her mind so easily, it might always have been there. ‘How bad is it?’
    ‘I think you should come.’
    ‘I’ll get dressed. You get back to him.’
    ‘No, it’s all right, I’ll wait.’
    She stepped back. ‘Well, at least wait inside.’
    He brushed past her. She closed the door, shutting out the dervish dance of flakes and shadows. He stood awkwardly, snow coating his shoulders as if he were a statue. Big, raw, red hands – he’d come out without gloves – a long nose with a dewdrop trembling on the tip, and a terrible, intractable, gauche shyness coming off him like a bad smell.
    ‘I won’t be a minute,’ she said.
    She ran upstairs, burst into her bedroom, snatched up the first clothes that came to hand, put on her coat and wound a scarf round her neck, all the time trying to think what she would need to take. She’d be staying all night; she might have to stay longer than that. Nightdress, then: soap, flannel, toothbrush, toothpaste, brush, comb. What else? She snapped the lock shut and carried the case downstairs.
    The snow on his boots had melted to a puddle on the floor.
    ‘Can we get a cab?’
    ‘No, I tried on my way here but they said they’re not taking fares.’
    London had become a silent city. For Elinor the stillness added to the strangeness of this walk through deserted streets with a man she didn’t know to a place she’d never been. How secretive Toby was, really. She hadn’t realized till now. He always seemed so laughing and open, so uncomplicated, and yet he’d never once invited her to his lodgings or offered to introduce her to his friends.
    ‘Has he seen a doctor?’
    ‘Two days ago, he said go home and go to bed.’
    ‘Which of course he didn’t.’
    ‘No, well, he had to go into college; he had an appointment with his tutor. And he didn’t seem to be too bad. But then last night his temperature absolutely shot up.’
    ‘What’s his breathing like?’
    ‘Quite bad, I think it might be pneumonia.’
    ‘Is there a telephone?’
    ‘I think the landlady has one, but she lives next door.’
    ‘It’s just I’ll have to tell my parents.’
    ‘No, you mustn’t, he doesn’t want them to know. He’s afraid if your mother comes she’ll get it herself.’
    ‘They’ve got a right to know.’
    ‘You talk to him then, he might listen to you.’
    Mother
would
come and nurse him. Surprising, perhaps, in such an indolent woman, but she’d have been on the next train.
    ‘Is term over?’
    ‘Finished yesterday. That’s why he wouldn’t give in, you see. He won’t take time off.’
    She caught the note of hero worship in his voice. When Toby was at school, he’d always had hero-worshipping younger boys trailing round after him, coming to stay in the holidays, taking him away from her. This Andrew might think he was special but he was merely the latest in a long line.
    They were climbing a steep hill now, which at least allowed her to stop talking for a while. The smell of sulphur that had hung over the city for weeks had gone; the air tasted crisp and sweet. With each step she pressed her foot down hard, relishing the squeak of her boots on the impacted snow. Odd, to be able to feel pleasure at such a time. She didn’t, even now, believe Toby was really sick, or in any danger. He never had been. Apart from the usual childhood things that everybody gets, she couldn’t remember a time when he’d been ill.
    The houses on either side were more imposing now, set well back from the road and screened by trees. She bumped into a low-hanging branch that sent snow cascading over her head and shoulders.