Sixty-One Nails Part 65

"This is crazy, you must see that. "

"Please, Sam?"

For a moment, he was debating within himself, then his shoulders fell. "OK," he lifted his hands in a gesture of uselessness. "I just hope you know what you're doing."

"Elizabeth?" she asked, turning to the woman standing between us and the bed.

"What are you intending to do?" she asked.

"Initially I just want to see how bad it is," Blackbird told her. "If I can't help him then I'll tell you. I won't lie to you."

"It won't hurt him, will it?"

"Not this part. Bringing him back, though, may not be as easy." She stood aside. "You can take a look."

Blackbird walked around the side of the bed, looking across at Sam, standing with his arms folded in challenge.

She paused. "What do they call you, Sam-who-keepssecrets?" Blackbird asked him.

"Veldon. Sam Veldon." He looked at Claire's crestfallen expression. "What?"

Blackbird smiled. "Are you a policeman?"

"No," he said, the lie in his tone apparent immediately to me as it must have been to Blackbird. "Something similar?" she asked. "What's it to you?" he challenged. "Will you have to write a report of this? "

"That depends what you do," he said.

"Claire said you know how to keep secrets. Is she right?"

"I have kept secrets, yes."

"You must promise me," she said to him quietly and evenly, "you will tell no one outside this room what transpires here, by whatever means. Are you willing to make that promise?"

"I don't have to promise you anything." His stance was rigid, arms crossed, feet square. "Then I must ask you to leave," she said.

"On whose say-so?" he challenged.

"She's right, Sam. You have to promise," Claire insisted. "This must never be spoken of."

"What are you?" he asked Blackbird. "Some kind of witch?"

The intake of breath through my teeth drew everyone's attention, rather than Blackbird, so they missed seeing Blackbirds eyes narrow and her chin come up at the use of that word. The temperature in the room dropped and I could feel the magic p.r.i.c.kling across my skin as she directed her anger back at Sam.

"Use that word again, Sam Veldon, and you will regret it for the rest of your short little life." She was moving slowly around the bed, stalking towards him, each tread increasing the pent-up tension building in the room. Claire bustled past me and pulled the door open, bustling him out of the room and pus.h.i.+ng him out into the corridor. "No," she insisted. "It's for your own good. Go and wait in the rest-room; have a cup of coffee, start smoking again, anything. Just don't say anything. At all. Do you understand? Nothing."

He looked into her face, frustration written across his features and then made a noise between a grunt and a sigh, turned suddenly and stalked away, leaving her standing in the doorway. She retreated and closed the door again.

"I'm sorry, Veronica, he can be so stubborn. He won't tell anyone, though. It's not in his nature."

Blackbird appeared unconcerned now that the object of her anger had left, dismissing it with a wave of her hand as the sudden cold dispersed.

"What's his given name?" she asked, looking at the figure on the bed.

Claire shot another warning glance to Elizabeth.

Blackbird spoke gently to Claire. "If I'm going to help him, I will need his name."

She looked uncomfortable and then said, "I know," earning a puzzled look from Elizabeth.

"It's Jerome David Checkland. Jerry for short," Elizabeth said.

Blackbird moved back around the bed, bypa.s.sing Elizabeth and focusing instead on the young woman beside the bed.

"And you are his daughter, yes?" she asked.

The young woman nodded. "Deborah Checkland," she confirmed.

"May I? I need to hold his hand."

Blackbird moved to sit on the edge of the bed and Deborah released her father's hand. Blackbird lifted it from the covers, cradling it in her own. She closed her eyes and the room warmed, taking on the heaviness that comes on long languid days. For a moment, the air over the bed s.h.i.+mmered like heat haze.

"Jerry?" Her voice sounded m.u.f.fled, suppressed by the heavy air. "Jerome David Checkland, can you hear me?" The silence deepened, so the background noise of the hospital faded, replaced by a summer day's laden stillness. The figure on the bed lost some of his pinched expression. His face relaxed and the lines smoothed on his forehead.

"Jerome David Checkland, I summon you to me. Be called."

The heaviness deepened and then relaxed. Blackbird opened her eyes again.

"Well, that would have been too easy, wouldn't it?" she told us.

"What's wrong with him?" asked Deborah.

"He's trying to return, but he is either being prevented or he doesn't know the way. I suspect he is being held against his will. If he is to break free then he will need our help. "

"What can we do?" asked Elizabeth.

"I can bring him here, but only for a few moments. If we are to release him then we must persuade the one who holds him to let go, and they have every reason to keep him." She stood again.

"What will persuade them?" Elizabeth said.

"We need to offer them something sweeter, something to tempt them."

"Like what?"

"Like your daughter."

Deborah looked at Blackbird, and then at her mother, who was standing with her mouth open.

"No!" Elizabeth said. "I am already losing my husband. I will not lose my daughter as well. Deborah doesn't need to be involved in this," Elizabeth said firmly, walking around to join her and finding Blackbird positioned between them.

"On the contrary," Blackbird replied. "She may be just the lever we need."

"I'll do whatever needs to be done," said Deborah.

"Wait, child, until you know what the price may be," Blackbird told her.

Deborah stood up and it became suddenly apparent how tall she was. She stood a head-height above Blackbird. "I am not a child and I won't be treated like one. I'm twenty-two and quite capable of making my own decisions, thank you."

"Stay out of this, Deborah," said her mother. "He's my father," she told them.

"Unfortunately, she has the right of it," said Blackbird, "and I called you child, not because you are childish but because you are his child and his bloodline. Blood calls to blood, and the ties of marriage mean that you are not of his bloodline, are you, Elizabeth?"

"No, well, obviously not," Elizabeth admitted, stepping forward to take Deborah's arm. She shrugged free of it, turning away to stand alone with her back to the wall. Elizabeth looked hurt by the snub but stayed by the bed.

"I am not suggesting we trade one for the other. Your daughter's presence will tempt her away from your husband. Blood calls to blood, as I told you. At the moment when that becomes apparent, I will have the opportunity to distract her and we should be able to pull them both back without getting caught. "

"Who do you mean 'her'?" Claire asked.

"Niall knows of whom I speak." I had been standing in the corner unnoticed, but now they all focused on me. "Niall has stood where your husband now stands. "

"Have you?" Claire asked.