The Dark Room Read Online Free

anything.’ ‘ You got drunk . . . ’
    ‘No one’s suggesting you are.’
    She drew on her cigarette. ‘Then why is my father paying four hundred pounds a day for me to be here?’ she asked evenly. ‘I could have convalescent care in a
nursing home for a fraction of that.’
    He studied her as she sat like a dignified, one-eyed Buddha upon her bed. ‘How did you know it costs four hundred pounds a day?’
    ‘My stepmother told me,’ she lied. ‘I know my father very well, Dr Protheroe, so, predictably, it was the first thing I asked her.’
    ‘He did warn me you’d take nothing for granted.’
    The reflection smiled at him . ‘I certainly don’t like being lied to,’ she murmured. ‘My stepmother told me I tried to commit suicide.’ She
watched him for a reaction, but there was none. ‘I don’t believe it,’ she went on dispassionately, ‘but I do believe that Adam would pay a psychiatrist to straighten me out
if he believed it. So what sort of therapy is he buying for me?’
    ‘No one’s lying to you, Jinx. Your father was very concerned that you should be in an environment where you could recover at your own speed and in your own way. Certainly
we have psychiatrists on the premises, and certainly we offer therapy to those who want it, but I am precisely what I said I was, a doctor pure and simple. My role is largely administrative, but I
also take an interest in our convalescent patients. There is nothing sinister about your being here.’
    Was that right? It didn’t feel right. Even the woman in the mirror found that one hard to swallow. ‘Did Adam tell you I am very hostile to psychiatrists and
psychiatry?’
    ‘Yes he did.’
    ‘Why does he think I tried to kill myself?’
    ‘Because that’s the conclusion the police have reached after their investigation into your crash.’
    ‘They’re wrong,’ she said tightly. ‘I would never commit suicide.’
    ‘OK,’ Protheroe said easily. ‘I’m not arguing with you.’
    She closed her eye. ‘Why would I suddenly want to kill myself when I’ve never wanted to before?’ Anger roared in her ears.
    He didn’t say anything.
    ‘Please,’ she said harshly. ‘I would like to know what’s being said about me.’
    ‘All right, if you accept that there’s a good deal of physical evidence to support the police theory, then the rationale behind it seems to be that you were upset by your
broken engagement. Your last real memory is saying goodbye to Leo when you left London two and a half weeks ago to stay with your parents at Hellingdon Hall. You probably don’t remember doing
it, but you’ve repeated that memory several times – to the police and to my colleagues at Odstock Hospital – and they have concluded, possibly wrongly, that it’s important
to you to preserve a happy memory over the memory of the night a week later when Leo told you he was leaving you for your friend, Meg Harris.’
    She considered this in silence for a long time. ‘Then they’re saying my amnesia isn’t entirely physical. There’s an element of face-saving in it. Because I
can’t bear to think of Leo rejecting me, I’ve wiped his shabbiness out of my mind and then gone on to forget my own weakness in being unable to face life without him.’
    Her choice of words was fascinating . ‘In substance, that’s what your father’s been told.’
    ‘All right’ – he saw tears glistening on her lashes – ‘if I was so distraught about Leo deserting me two weeks ago that I had to wipe the whole thing
out of my memory, then why am I not equally distraught learning about it all over again?’
    ‘I don’t know. It’s interesting, isn’t it? How would you explain it?’
    She looked away. ‘I was having too many problems adjusting to the whole idea of marriage. The only thing I feel now is relief that I don’t have to go through with it.
I’d say I wasn’t distraught the first time.’
    He nodded. ‘I’m prepared to accept that. So, let’s talk