The Breezes by Joseph O'Neill

Author:Joseph O'Neill [Joseph ONeill]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780007383719
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers

11

Merv is being treated in a hospital just outside Rockport city. It is an isolated, dark-bricked, turreted old building and for panoramic reasons, one supposes, its founders located it right on the precipice that overshadows the Rockport yacht haven, giving the place the bleak, looming air of a Central European schloss. We approached it by a narrow road that ran alongside the edge of the cliff. Below, to our right, was the city in its basin and, to our left, on the exposed flatland in front of the hospital, stood a wind farm, the propellers planted in the arid earth in parallel rows, blades spinning sweetly in the plentiful sea wind.

We arrived just after three o’clock. There was a moment of quiet after the car stopped. An ambulance drew up to the hospital entrance, its roof light turning orange again and again. Neither of us felt like moving.

Pa tapped me on the shoulder. ‘Look,’ he said, pointing. I looked: way below, a train, slithering carefully through gardens and allotments into North Rockport Station. Pa checked his watch. ‘Bang on time,’ he said.

We got out of the car and walked into the reception area and Pa asked about seeing Mr Mervyn Rasmussen in intensive care. First floor, take a right, take a left, go down to the bottom of the corridor, the receptionist said, then wait in the waiting-room.

‘Hold on a moment,’ Pa said, just as we were about to set off. He dashed outside and came back moments later with a bouquet of daffodils and a get-well card with a joke. It could be worse, the front of the card said. I looked inside it for the punchline: I could be ill and you could be listening to me complaining!

BEST WISHES FOR A SPEEDY RECOVERY, MERV, Pa wrote. WITH BEST WISHES FROM THE BREEZES. He signed his name and Rosie’s, and then I signed. ‘OK,’ he said worriedly. ‘I suppose we’d better get going.’

We walked without speaking. We turned one corner, then another. Finally, after what seemed like half an hour going down a long corridor, we reached the intensive care waiting-room. It felt like an airport lounge full of delayed passengers. The atmosphere was one of exhaustion and camaraderie and domestic informality, the visitors unkempt, walking around in socks, eating snacks, dipping into bags for belongings. A television was on in the corner. There was a low hum of conversation.

Pa said, ‘There she is. That’s Mrs Rasmussen – Amy. And that’s Merv’s boy,’ he whispered. ‘He’s called Billy.’ We approached them. ‘Amy,’ Pa said. He gave her a big hug while Billy and I stood awkwardly by.

‘Billy,’ Mrs Rasmussen said, ‘you remember Mr Breeze?’ Pa and Billy shook hands. ‘And you must be John,’ Mrs Rasmussen said. We shook hands. Then, after a moment of hesitation, Billy Rasmussen and I shook hands, too. Billy was a big-shouldered, brown-skinned man of about my age. His hands were enormous. He kept half grinning, as if there were something comical about the situation.

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