'Or it might just be over the cusp into Virgo,' added Sylvie.

'Even better,' said Fran. As discreetly as she could, she eased the shameful list from the table and shoved it into her pocket. The house discussion was now clearly moribund; two against one had suddenly turned into three against one with the baby hitting well above its weight.

'We should crack open a bottle,' she said, heavily, getting to her feet. 'I think there's some white in the fridge.'

'What about the meeting?' asked Peter, dragging his eyes from Sylvie. 'We ought to carry on with the meeting.'

'Why? What's the point?' The words came out more sharply than she intended, and the happy look faded from Peter's face. She struggled to make amends. 'I mean, let's just leave it for today. Let's pick it up another time.'

'If you're sure.'

'Yeah I'm sure.' She managed a glum smile. 'Let's celebrate.'

'Ace in the hole,' said Spencer, when she phoned him later that evening. 'They were playing with a concealed card. Totally unfair.'

'Yeah, the b.a.s.t.a.r.ds.' Out of a sense of mild melancholy, she was sitting in the dark, watching the rain slant across the lit square of Iris's kitchen window. On the table in front of her sat Mr Tibbs, his eyes disconcertingly fixed on hers, the pupils huge and depthless.

'And are they happy about it?'

'Very.'

'And are you?'

'Give me a while. For me it's not a baby, it's a lifetime in Dalston.' Mr Tibbs seemed to be leaning towards her and she shifted the chair so that she was turned away from him.

'So when are they off?'

'It depends whether he gets the Norwich job. But they're going on holiday next month, so at least I'll get the house to myself for a couple of weeks. I b.l.o.o.d.y can't wait, honestly Spence, I'm going to run up and downstairs in the nude, and flush the toilet every ' A sudden wet roughness enclosed her ear and she jerked her head away. 'Get off.'

'What?' asked Spencer.

'It's the cat, he was trying to stop it.'

'What's it doing?'

'Trying to lick my earlobe he's got a thing about earlobes.'

'Why?'

'Because I smear Whiskas on them.'

'What?'

'I don't know, do I? Maybe he finds them attractive. Duncan always did.' Mr Tibbs was moving towards her again, neck outstretched and a vaguely l.u.s.tful look on his face, the tip of his tongue just visible. Repulsed, she gave him a light shove and his back legs slid off the edge of the table, rapidly followed by the rest of him. He hit the floor with a thud and the light snapped on to reveal Sylvie standing in the doorway, hot-water bottle in hand.

'Tibbsy,' she said piteously.

'He's OK,' said Fran. 'He just fell off the table.'

'You pushed him. I saw you.' She knelt and the cat crept towards her with a death-rattle mew.

'You'd better apologize,' said Spencer, in Fran's ear.

'He was sucking my earlobe,' said Fran.

'He can't help it. The vet thinks he was weaned too early.'

'So he thinks my ear's a nipple?'

'Apologize,' said Spencer.

'He's only a little cat and you hurt him.'

'I didn't mean to and I'm sorry.'

'Well done,' said Spencer. 'Phone me back.' She had hung up the receiver before she realized that Sylvie was crying, blotting her tears into Mr Tibbs's orange fur.

'I'm sorry, Sylvie,' she said again. 'But he is a cat and they land on their feet. It's not like shoving a baby off a table.' It wasn't, she realized immediately, a happy a.n.a.logy. 'Not that I meant to shove him off,' she added.

'You said you'd look after him,' said Sylvie in a small voice. She wiped her face with the back of one hand.

'Did I? When did I?'

'When we go on holiday.'

'Oh then. Well of course I'll look after him.' She tried to hide her exasperation. 'I'm not going to hurt him, Sylvie. I work with animals, I know about them, he'll be fine. I'll boil bits of chicken and everything.'

'But looking after him doesn't just mean feeding,' said Sylvie, sententiously. She was stroking the cat with long, even gestures. 'He needs to feel loved as well. Don't you, Tibbsy? I couldn't leave him if I thought he might be unhappy, I'd have to cancel the holiday.' Tense with ecstasy, Tibbsy thrust out his hindquarters and waggled his r.e.c.t.u.m in Fran's direction.

'Honestly,' said Fran, 'I'll be lovely to him.'

'Really?' Sylvie gazed up at her.

'Really.' And then, because she still looked doubtful, 'I absolutely promise.'

Sylvie nodded slowly and then got to her feet, brushing a few stray hairs from her fingers. 'I wish we got on better, Fran,' she said. 'I wish we could be friends, but I know you think I'm silly and oversensitive about things.'

Fran stood paralysed, nailed by the truth.

'My granny always used to say that I had one skin too few so I feel everything more, and I know I can often sense things that other people can't, and that makes me different.' She smiled gently, her eyes still shining from the tears. 'And I know it's hard for some people to tolerate differences.'

'Now hang on just a cotton-picking minute...' Fran wanted to say, but managed by dint of ma.s.sive self-control not to. Instead she nodded dumbly.

Sylvie started to unb.u.t.ton the cover of her hot-water bottle. 'Sometimes I even wish I could have that thick layer between me and the world that other people have. But then I feel I'd miss so much. It would be like watching a rainbow wearing dark gla.s.ses.' She shook her head sadly and fiddled with the screw top of the bottle. 'You couldn't do this for me, could you Fran? It's a little bit stiff.'

Fran unscrewed the plug and handed it back.

'Thanks.' She reached forward and took one of Fran's hands. 'I'd love to start again, you know, and try and really be friends. I'm sure we could. I do admire you, you know, Fran. You're so...'

'Practical,' thought Fran.

'Practical,' said Sylvie.

16.

Identical Interest It's not just their 'good looks' that identical twins Robin and Tom Unwin (18) share, it's also their 'good books'. The keen readers spent last Sat.u.r.day pet.i.tioning outside Dalston Public Library against the reducing of library opening hours. 'We grew up surrounded by book's and the local library is very important to us' says Tom. His brother agrees. 'The library is an important local resource and it would be a crying shame if it had to close like so many other local libraries.' The twins who are both final year students at Broder8ck Gale Sixth Form College collected nearly 400 signatures including that of their mother Irish (39), to whom the boys credit for their love of literature. 'I'm very proud of the both of them,' she said.

The photo took up about a third of the front page of the Dalston Advertiser, was slightly out of focus, gigantically foreshortened and showed Robin and Tom clutching stacks of books and framed in the neo-cla.s.sical entrance to the library. Tom was standing directly in front of a bust of Shakespeare, and the wreath of laurel appeared to be resting on his own head. The books had been plucked at random from the shelves and the only visible t.i.tle was Silas Marner, a volume which Robin had dismissed as 'total c.r.a.p' after failing to get past page twenty for GCSE.

Alison, whose submitted report concise and racy had been completely ignored in favour of the confabulations that accompanied the photo, had been straightforwardly delighted by the feature. Iris had mixed feelings.

'But it's on the front page,' Alison had pointed out. 'A feature about library cuts on the front page.'

It had certainly caused a stir at the surgery; Ayesha had spotted it first, and been unflatteringly astounded by the twins' appearance. 'But they're totally nothing like you,' as she'd put it, several times. She had made photocopies and pinned them on both the staffroom and waiting-room noticeboards, the latter with a thick accompanying arrow pointing to Iris's name (the h crossed out), and the words 'OUR PRACTICE MANAGER!!!' written in the margin.

'I don't think she ever really believed in the twins until she saw the photo,' Iris confided to Spencer one lunchtime, as they ate their sandwiches in a corner of the staffroom. 'She thought it was a little fantasy of mine.'

'Something to fill in those empty hours when you're not at work?'

'That's right. She looks at me differently now as if I've suddenly become fully visible. It's quite disconcerting.'

'Have any of the patients said anything?'

'Oh yes, everybody says I must be very proud.'

'Of the both of them?'

'Of the both of them,' she agreed, gravely.

'And aren't you?'

She hesitated, grappling with unworthy emotions. 'I am,' she said eventually, 'but it seems so unfair. Alison and I worked so hard for those signatures. And the last book Tom read voluntarily was Teddy Bear Coalman.'

Her irritation was compounded a fortnight later when the boys received a letter informing them that they had each been nominated for a Dalston Young Citizens award, consisting of a certificate and 50 cash.

'I hope you'll spend it on books,' she said rather crossly, and was rewarded with loud laughter.

'You're jealous, Mum.'

'No I'm not. I just think you're operating under false pretences.'

'We're not,' said Tom, all injured innocence. 'We think the library should stay open, don't we Robin?'

'Yeah. Just as long as we don't have to go there.'

At work that afternoon, she unpinned the staffroom copy of the article to make room for a Department of Health memo on headlice treatment. She was deep into an administrative blitz, prompted by Dr Petty's absence. He was in Lisbon on a two-day drug freebie (or 'much needed international forum to discuss the place of Lamazol in the treatment of senile insomnia' as the brochure had put it) which meant that she could work in relative peace, free from the continual chatty interruptions in which he specialized.

She tucked the boys' picture into her handbag and stuck the headlice memo in its place, highlighting the key points with a marker pen. Then she drew three little boxes in the margin and stuck a post-it note on each of the doctors' in-trays, telling them to look at the noticeboard and tick the box when they'd read it. Her method was fantastically pedantic, she knew, but it kept office paper bills within reasonable limits, and moreover ensured that memos were actually read, rather than just photocopied, stacked and binned. The internal phone rang just as she had steeled herself to start the monthly drug accounts, and she picked it up with a twinge of relief.

'There's some Indian doctor calling for Dr Spencer,' said Ayesha. 'I told him to phone back after surgery but he says he wants to leave a message and I can't understand a single word what he's talking about so I told him you'd deal with it. All right?' Before Iris could answer there was a click, and the wail of an ambulance filled the earpiece.

'h.e.l.lo?' she said, cautiously.

'Good afternoon,' said a precise, slightly accented voice. 'I'm trying against tremendous odds to get a message to Spencer Carroll. I received a ' The siren was momentarily eclipsed by a gigantic voice shouting, 'Spleen. It's his spleen,' and the unmistakable crash of a hospital trolley hitting a door frame. 'Excuse me,' said the man, and after a few seconds she heard a door closing, pushing the noise into the background. 'I do apologize,' he said, a moment later, 'but that woman is beyond non-pharmaceutical methods of control. I had better talk quickly.'

'Right,' said Iris, for once empathizing with Ayesha. 'I'm listening.'

Spencer was also listening albeit not very attentively and watching Alfred Hickey's finger as it traced the route of an ancient byway that snaked right across the Sarum Road estate and over the railway line into the marshes beyond. The map on which it was marked was so big that it covered Spencer's desk and drooped over the edge at either end, and it was patched with white stickers each marked with a Roman numeral. These were cross referenced to a chart drawn up with six different colours of felt pen and covered in minute handwriting; Mr Hickey had propped it against the examination couch for ease of reference, and had thoughtfully brought a magnifying gla.s.s with him so that Spencer could read it in comfort. Eight minutes into the consultation he was still only up to V, and Spencer's attention was wavering.

'You can see,' said Mr Hickey, his nose hovering just above his finger, his eyes darting up to check that Spencer was watching, 'that the back gardens of numbers 1 through 15 were actually built right across the byway, whereas 17 to 31 incorporated the byway at the end of the garden, allowing partial access, but only partial. Of course, the key access point is the garden of Number 1' he p.r.o.nounced the words with loathing 'ab.u.t.ting, as it does, the... the ' he slid the map towards him, knocking Spencer's pot of tongue spatulae onto the floor ' the A44 which is the old trading route out to the west, previously the B243.'

His voice was a hoa.r.s.e vibrato, the result of a stroke which had also left him subject to bouts of extreme agitation, bordering on mania, and intermittent paranoia. Spencer knew his history almost off by heart, having whiled away several previous visits by surrept.i.tiously reading Mr Hickey's notes while pretending to listen to Mr Hickey's personal obsession. He was a regular visitor to the surgery, turning up at least once a week, but although he presented each time with a different symptom a painful elbow on this occasion, but ranging in the past from insomnia to piles the treatment required was the same in every case: twelve minutes of close attention to the latest round of his knock-down drag-out boundary dispute with the owner of Number 1.

'I've got a letter here ' Mr Hickey continued, opening a box file and rummaging through four years' worth of correspondence with the local council ' that clearly states that the fault lies with the original estate plans, but it's actually the owner of Number 1 who's blocked my application over and over again...'

Mr Hickey was one of several patients that Dr Petty had eagerly shovelled over to Spencer under the guise of offering him a full range of clinical experience; all of them could loosely be cla.s.sified as 'difficult' and most of them had initially resented being fobbed off with a trainee. Mr Hickey, on the other hand, had been delighted a fresh acolyte meant that he could start his explanations from scratch, and he had seized the opportunity with croaky intensity. And while it was sometimes hard for Spencer to feign concentration when he knew that there were another eight patients to see before the end of surgery, and only an hour to see them in, he at least had the feeling that he was providing a real service a pressure valve that kept Mr Hickey in the community for another week.

At a calculated ten minutes into the consultation Spencer directed an unsubtle glance at his watch, and Mr Hickey took the hint and with incredible slowness began to fold the map, talking all the while. At eleven minutes he starting packing his paperwork into the wheeled shopping bag that accompanied him everywhere, and at eleven minutes forty-five seconds he levered himself to his feet and, in an unexpected move, started taking off his jacket.

'Is anything the matter?' asked Spencer, thrown.

'My elbow,' said Mr Hickey, reproachfully, 'you haven't looked at my elbow yet.'

The knock-on effect of this omission was that evening surgery overran by twenty-three minutes and by the time Spencer emerged into the empty waiting room Ayesha had already slammed down the desk shutters with audible pique and was standing by the door with her coat on.

'Could you walk me to my car, please,' she said with deliberate over-politeness, before he could say anything. 'Your friend's outside.'

'Oh G.o.d, not again.' It was the third time in as many days. Sighing, he held the door open and Ayesha stalked past him into the darkness; there was an icy wind and he b.u.t.toned his jacket as he hurried after her. The car park was at the side of the building between the bins and the railway embankment, and sitting on the low wall that divided it from the road, his face pale green in the glow of a street lamp, was Callum Strang. He was in the middle of a coughing bout but managed a wave before gobbing on the tarmac.

'That is disgusting,' said Ayesha averting her head theatrically and opening the car door by touch alone.

'Shorry. Asha. I carn ' his lips laboured slowly to form the thickened words ' I carn...' He blinked a few times, appeared to forget what he had been about to say, and instead leaned forward and drooled a long, flecked string of saliva onto the right knee of his trousers. 'Shick,' he said, his mouth stretched ominously wide.

'My husband says I shouldn't have to put up with this,' said Ayesha, sliding into her car seat. Her voice was jagged with tension and Spencer could see her hands were shaking as she tried to insert the keys into the transmission. 'He says it's way outside my job description. He gets really mad when he hears about it, I have to hold him back.'

Spencer gestured hopelessly. 'I don't know what to suggest. You know he's banned from the surgery and I can't help it if he keeps turning up '

'You shouldn't even talk to him. I've seen you talking.'

'But I '