‘Are you in pain?’
Lavinia closes the eye and nods slowly.
Margot pats her hand. ‘I’ll call an ambulance.’
Lavinia makes a noise of protest and waves her hand. ‘Too expensive.’
She’s right – it is. But there’s no other way to get her off this grass and to medical attention. Margot can’t carry her down to the street, nor does she have a car to drive her anywhere. One of the neighbours may be amenable to assisting them, but on the other hand Lavinia may want to keep her business private.
‘We don’t have another option,’ she tells her stricken aunt, then goes inside and makes the call.
The ambulance officers are kind and understanding – no doubt it’s their job, but Margot appreciates it all the same – and give a preliminary diagnosis of a broken leg, which is a shock.
They tell Margot they’ll take Lavinia to Royal North Shore Hospital, which is at least fifteen minutes away by car. There may be a bus, but Margot isn’t sure she can work out which one she’d need or where to get it from.
As the ambulance drives away, she realises that isolating herself from others means she’s vulnerable at such a time. She needs help.
After a fitful night’s sleep – prior to calling the hospital about a dozen times to ask for an update – she wakes and decides that she needs to be stronger. And what she really needs is to visit her aunt.
Yes, for a few seconds there in the garden she thought Lavinia was dead, and it felt like the world went dark and Margot couldn’t find her way in it. But Lavinia isn’t dead and no one can say when she will be. Or when any of them will be. So, Margot knows, she had best get on with things.
She rings the public transport telephone line and asks them to help her with the buses, then calls the hospital and speaks to Lavinia, telling her she is coming to visit after lunch.
There is, however, something else she needs to do first. She rings the number of the antiques shop.
After four rings she’s about to hang up, then the call is answered and it’s Stephen on the other end, saying hello.
‘Hello,’ Margot says.
There’s a pause, and she realises she needs to supply her name, which she’s forgotten to do because she so rarely makes phone calls.
‘Margot?’ he says.
‘Yes,’ she says, then, ‘I, ah … my aunt had a fall.’
‘Is she all right?’ He sounds concerned.
‘Yes and no. She’s not dead, but she has broken her leg.’
Another pause. ‘I’m glad about the not-dead part.’
‘Me too!’
Their conversation wasn’t awkward at dinner, and there’s no reason it should be now, so she decides to blame the phone. It’s standing between them, creating a barrier. That’s why she feels so shy.
‘Is she at home with you?’ Stephen asks.
‘No – she’s at North Shore.’
‘Ah. Well … that’s a good hospital.’
‘I hope so. I haven’t been there as a patient.’
‘My wife …’ Stephen clears his throat. ‘My wife was a patient there. They were very good to her.’
The unspoken part is that his wife likely died there, or that they couldn’t save her. Which is probably not the hospital’s fault. People die despite the best efforts of everyone involved. Except now Margot doesn’t know what to say. She didn’t know his wife. He barely spoke about her at dinner.
‘I’m sorry for mentioning that,’ he says, and she exhales. ‘You don’t need to hear about my wife’s illness while your aunt is in hospital.’