To Have and To Hold

Minutes later, Lois scurried down the corridor. She hadn’t been told of Carmel’s involvement and when she saw her sitting there beside the priest, she was surprised, but as she drew closer and saw the bedraggled and bloodstained state of her, she became alarmed.

‘What is it? What’s happened to you?’ she cried.

‘Nothing,’ Carmel told her. ‘This isn’t my blood, it’s Paul’s.’

‘Paul’s?’

‘What have you been told?’

‘That Paul has had some kind of accident.’

Carmel hesitated and then said, ‘He has a head injury that was bleeding quite badly. I don’t know if he was injured anywhere else, it was too dark to see.’

‘Why? Where was this?’

‘I found him in an entry off Whittall Street, not far from St Chad’s,’ Carmel said. ‘I think he was attacked.’

‘Is he badly hurt?’ Lois asked in a voice so low it was almost a whisper.

‘I don’t know,’ Carmel said sorrowfully. ‘That is why I am waiting—to find out.’

She was suddenly overcome by the enormity of it all and the self-control she had kept a tight rein on began to dissolve. Her voice broke as she turned anguished eyes to Lois and cried. ‘Oh, Lois, what am I to do? I couldn’t bear to lose Paul now.’

‘Hush,’ Lois said, holding her friend’s shuddering shoulders as she wept. ‘I’m sure he will be all right.’ But she was aware she was only hoping.

‘It’s the not knowing anything that gets to you in the end,’ Father Donahue said.

‘Yes,’ said Lois. ‘No one seems to understand what loved ones go through, sitting in corridors like this, not knowing anything hour after hour. I fully understand that the doctors hate being harassed when they are busy with a patient, but someone could come out now and again and tell you something. You will find that when my uncle comes he will not be content to wait around. If there is no one to tell him anything when he arrives he will go and find out for himself.’

Lois was absolutely right. Paul’s father was a big man with quite a ruddy complexion. His hair was almost black, as was the moustache he sported above his wide and generous mouth, but it was his wife that Paul had got his looks from. Emma was still a very beautiful woman, with creamy skin, a rosebud mouth, and dark blonde hair.

Lois introduced Carmel and the priest to Paul’s parents. Carmel saw that though Emma’s blue eyes and Jeff’s dark, rather brooding ones, were filled with concern, Emma was also alarmed at the state of Carmel. This didn’t lessen when Lois explained that it had been Carmel that had found Paul injured in the entry and that was why she was covered with blood. Carmel was heartily glad she had recovered her composure a little and stopped crying, though she could do little about her puffy eyes, for she had the impression that appearance meant everything to Paul’s mother.

‘And how is Paul now?’ Jeff demanded.

Lois shook her head. ‘We’ve heard nothing since we arrived.’

‘Well,’ said Jeff, ‘I’ll not stand for that. I’ll find someone to tell us something, or my name isn’t Jeffrey Connolly. Come on, Emma, we deserve to be told what’s going on.’

‘Told you what he would do,’ Lois said as they watched Jeff authoritatively push open the door they had been sitting outside and march through it with Emma on his arm.

‘I’m glad he has,’ Carmel said. ‘It’s awful just sitting here.’

‘Don’t I know it?’ said Lois, morosely.

Jeff was back in a relatively short space of time to tell them that Paul had been severely beaten.

‘A right bloody mess he is,’ he said angrily. ‘Beg your pardon, Father, but it’s the thought of what some madman has done to my boy.’

‘I fully understand,’ the priest said. ‘Was it theft?’

‘Yeah, so they say. Everything was lifted from him,’ Jeff said. ‘They say he probably put up some sort of resistance and that was why the attack was so severe but, God Almighty, Father, you should see him. He has quite a few broken ribs and his body and face are a mass of bruises, but, of course, it’s the head wound and him still being unconscious that’s worrying them. They are preparing him now to go down for X-ray. I just popped out to tell you, like. Oh,’ he said to Carmel, ‘the coppers have been informed, so they might pay you a visit, as you found him.’

‘I can hardly help them,’ Carmel said. ‘I mean, I saw nothing.’

‘Well, they will probably come and question you anyway,’ Jeff said. ‘You know what the police are like. I’m going back inside now, because I want to be there when the X-ray results come back.’

‘And I am going to phone Daddy,’ Lois said, and Jeff nodded his approval.

When the door had closed behind Paul’s father, Carmel asked incredulously. ‘Have you a phone right inside the house?’

‘Yes,’ Lois said. ‘Lucky, aren’t we? It was put in when I began training, for Mother, you know, but it’s handy now.’

When Lois had gone, Carmel turned to the priest. ‘I think I’ll leave now,’ she said. ‘I know at least that Paul isn’t dead and no one is likely to know any more for some time. Anyway, this is a family time. If the police want to see me I would like to get out of these clothes and have a bit of a wash first.’

‘I don’t blame you,’ the priest said. ‘I’ll wait on a wee while longer.’

‘All right, Father. Good night then.’

Carmel had only just washed and changed into clean clothes when Sister Magee knocked on the door to tell her there was a policeman downstairs to talk to her and that she had made her office available.

Carmel thanked her and ran down the stairs. The policeman had been seated, but he rose as she came in. ‘I honestly don’t know what I can tell you,’ she said, taking a seat the policeman indicated. ‘I mean, I am not being awkward or anything, but I had just come from the church and I neither saw nor heard anything till that first groan.’

‘Just tell us everything in your own words,’ the man said, ‘and we’ll go from there.’

Carmel told him all she remembered. Sometimes the policeman stopped her to go over a point, but still, she was done in only a few minutes. ‘That’s about it. I don’t know whether that helps or not,’ Carmel said.

‘You never know in a case like this with no witnesses,’ the policeman said.

‘One thing I did think odd,’ Carmel said. ‘Paul was in an entry in a side street. Haven’t the other recent attacks being in the city centre and the victim just left there?’

‘We don’t think Dr Connolly was attacked in Whittall Street at all,’ the policeman told her. ‘We won’t be sure of where he was attacked till first light and we think he put up one hell of a fight. The doctors have verified this. Possibly because he retaliated, his attacker or attackers really laid into him. Probably thought they had done him in, didn’t want him found too soon and dragged him to the entry. We’ve been up and seen the scuff marks and spots of blood on the pavement leading away from the city centre. You saved that young chap’s life tonight.’

Carmel flushed in embarrassment. ‘Oh, surely…’

‘Straight up, the doctor told us himself,’ the policeman said. ‘He said the young man had lost a lot of blood and if you hadn’t heard him and used your expertise to stop the bleeding, he wouldn’t be here now. So, you can feel right proud of yourself. I bet that Paul Connolly will be grateful when he hears about it.’

There was a sense of unreality about the next couple of days as the news of the heroism of Carmel flew round the hospital. Carmel thought the whole thing silly. It was what anyone would have done, she said; it was nothing special.

Each day she asked after Paul but as she couldn’t claim any special relationship with him she was only told that he was ‘satisfactory’ or ‘as well as could be expected’. Lois learned little more and Carmel cancelled her holiday, not wishing to be far from the hospital while Paul lay critically ill. She knew that his condition would remain critical until he regained consciousness. This happened four days later. It was Lois who told her and she also said the first indications were that there was no brain damage.

‘He still has to be careful, of course, because he has been well bashed about,’ Lois went on. ‘And then whatever he was hit with fractured his skull, but he is now off the official danger list, though it will be weeks yet, they say, before he will be completely recovered. Anyway, because there is no brain damage, and providing he continues to improve, he is allowed visitors from tomorrow. Paul is asking to see you and, I’ll tell you, if it had been anyone but you I would have been as jealous as hell.’

Carmel had the urge to grasp Lois by the waist and dance a jig around the room, but she contented herself with a hug. ‘Oh God! That is the best news I have heard in ages.’

When Carmel did see Paul the following evening she was shocked, but managed to bite back the gasp of dismay. He was lying flat on his back with foam pads supporting his head, immobilising it. Almost a week after the attack, the bruising was well out on his face, which was a mass of colours from mauve to green, his nose looked as if it had been broken and his bottom lip had been split open and was stitched but swollen to twice its normal size. He also had a bandage swathing his head and smudged blackness was around and underneath both eyes, but the eyes themselves, as soon as he realised she was in the room, lit up with delight.

Carmel saw the pain still reflected in those eyes and felt immense pity for Paul and how he had suffered and was still suffering, but she knew he’d hate to guess her thoughts and so instead she said, ‘Hello, Paul. What did the other fellow look like?’