The White Dove

She had no idea. She took his cold hand and held it, bitterly thinking that she was completely useless. She had marched along Oxford Street, singing and shouting and feeling proud of herself, yet now she was needed for something real and she was failing them. Jake was going to die here on the pavement outside St Martin-in-the-Fields because she didn’t know how to save him.

A knot of people had gathered round them, and she looked up at the faces. ‘Does anyone know any first aid?’

They shook their heads, sympathetic but unhelpful.

‘Nah. Ambulance’ll be along just now.’

The seconds ticked by and Jake didn’t move. Amy went on holding his hand and found herself praying. Please God, let him be all right. Please God, let him …

The miner came back again.

He knelt down on the other side of Jake and felt his wrist, then turned his head to one side. Amy was surprised by the gentleness of his scarred hands.

‘I didn’t know what to do,’ she said, ‘I’m sorry …’

‘Nothing you could do,’ he answered without looking at her. ‘He needs hospital.’

Almost at once they heard the siren. The ambulance was ploughing up through the crowds on the east side of the square. Amy looked up and saw the high white side of it with the reassuring red cross.

‘Thank God,’ she said, and the miner looked up and smiled in relief for the first time. I know you, Amy thought.

The ambulance-men came running with their rolled-up green canvas stretcher. They spread it out beside Jake and lifted him on to it, then hoisted his weight up into the dark mouth of the ambulance.

From the folding metal steps the miner jerked his head at Amy. ‘You’d better come too.’

She scrambled in and the doors slammed behind them. They sped away in the direction the ambulance had come.

The miner leaned back against the hard wooden bench opposite the stretcher. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said. ‘Your man will be all right.’

‘He isn’t my man,’ Amy said. ‘I just know him.’

The man was still smiling, and she knew why she recognized him. He was the tall miner who had marched under the Nantlas banner, and had smiled out over the crowds in his enviable certainty.

‘How do you know he’ll be all right?’

‘I’ve seen enough head injuries,’ he answered abruptly.

The ambulance was slowing again. Charing Cross Hospital, Amy thought, and again: Thank God.

Light flooded in at them as the doors swung open. The stretcher was lifted and carried out and they followed behind it into the hospital. Another ambulance had arrived immediately behind them, and the hallway was full of hurrying people in white uniforms. Two nurses came forward to meet Jake’s stretcher as it was lifted on to a trolley. His hand hung limply at one side. One of the nurses peeled back the ambulance blanket and Amy’s coat. She held it out briskly to Amy. ‘Do you know this patient?’

Amy opened her mouth, but the miner forestalled her. ‘His name is Jacob Silverman. I am a relative. I will look after his things for him.’

Smoothly he removed a worn leather wallet and a little book from Jake’s pocket, and smiled at the nurse.

‘I’m afraid you can’t do that …’ she began, and then shrugged.

‘We’ll wait out here until the doctor has seen him,’ the miner said. The nurses wheeled Jake away, and Amy watched them until they disappeared around a maroon-tiled corner.

‘Shall we sit down?’

There was a double row of hard wooden chairs down the length of the hall, and they found two empty ones side by side.

A man passed them, supported by two others, his nose streaming blood.

‘Quite a fight,’ Amy’s companion said. He was flicking quickly through Jake’s little book, and then through the few papers and notes in the old wallet. He frowned at one piece of folded paper and slipped it into his own pocket, then closed the things up again.

‘Did you see what happened?’ he asked.

‘Two men were holding him. Another man hit him with something that looked like a metal bar. There was a policeman on a horse right beside them. Who’d want to do that to Jake?’

The man was looking at her. Amy saw him looking at her face and hair, and then at her hands. She was surprised to find that she was still clutching her handbag.

‘How well do you know Jake?’

‘I met him once at Appleyard Street.’

‘And what were you doing at Appleyard Street?’

Amy felt a prickle of resentment. Why, after what had just happened, was this man questioning her?

‘Just visiting,’ she said coolly.

‘I see. Just a tourist?’ His voice was equally cool.

‘I suppose so.’ His suspicion aroused her own and she looked squarely at him.

‘What did you take from Jake’s pocket?’

The miner grinned. ‘Can’t you work that out? If you know who Jake is, and what he does?’

They sat in silence after that. Amy watched the nurses coming and going, moving quickly but unhurriedly. It seemed a very long time.

At last a doctor came round the corner. A nurse beside him pointed to them.

‘Are you Mr Silverman’s friends?’

They nodded.

‘There’s nothing to worry about. He has some concussion, but there is no skull fracture and he should regain consciousness before too long. We will have to keep him here for a few days, of course. I understand you are a relative?’

‘That’s right.’

The doctor’s eyes flicked over the dark clothes and the lamp at the man’s belt, but he said nothing. ‘In that case, perhaps you would inform his next of kin. You may say that the sister in ward two may be telephoned for news of him in the morning.’

‘Thank you.’ The man held out Jake’s wallet and book. ‘I said that I would take care of these for him, but if he’s going to be conscious soon he might worry about where they have gone. Will you take them for him?’

The nurse held out her hand and Amy and the miner turned away. Still in silence they went out and stood in the hospital courtyard. The clouds of the afternoon had all drifted away and the sky was the colour of pearl, pink-tinged in the west.