The Undertow by Peter Corris Page A

allow her to get about. She pointed to a chair and drew her wheelchair up in front of me so that our knees weren’t far from touching. She was in her fifties, good-looking in a fair, faded kind of way, and very thin. She wore a neat grey dress and black shoes that looked expensive. In fact nothing in the room looked cheap.
    â€˜Have you ever been in a wheelchair, Mr Hardy?’
    â€˜Once or twice.’
    â€˜I’ve been in one for twenty years. I had a car accident.’
    â€˜I’m sorry.’
    â€˜Yes, so am I, but I was lucky. The man who hit me was very wealthy and heavily insured so I wasn’t left destitute. That gets all that embarrassing disability stuff out of the way.’
    â€˜I’m not embarrassed,’ I said. ‘In your place I’d probably be a cringing alcoholic mess. You’re not and I admire you.’
    â€˜That’s kind, but you might surprise yourself. Pray God it never happens. Now what did you want to know about Dr Heysen and poor Dr Bellamy? I am intrigued.’
    An interesting choice of words, I thought, and it clearly indicated whose side she was on. But the lie about a book being written had struck the right note. Bookcases in the sitting room were filled to bursting. I squinted at the titles.
    â€˜I’m interested in the missing medical records for Rafael Padrone. Do you remember anything about that?’
    She paused, and for a minute I thought she was going to close up, but she was only collecting her thoughts. Some of them must have been pleasant because she smiled and something of the prettiness she must have had in her youth came back into her face. ‘I remember quite a lot. I particularly remember the police officer who interviewed me. Do you know that he sat in my office and smoked without asking my permission and that he picked his teeth.’
    â€˜Cassidy,’ I said. ‘You can say whatever you want about him because he’s dead. I’m told he wasn’t mannerly.’
    â€˜That’s putting it mildly, but I have nothing more to say about him. Well, he asked for the Padrone file and I looked for it and couldn’t find it and he became very rude. He virtually accused me of stealing it. “Why would I do that?” I said, but he wasn’t the sort of person to reason with.’
    â€˜Do you know who took the records?’
    â€˜I have a very good idea. Another policeman came who was more polite, but I still didn’t tell him my suspicion.’
    â€˜Why not?’
    The rejuvenating smile again. ‘I wasn’t a middle-aged cripple back then, Mr Hardy. I was a lively woman. I was a very good dancer.’
    â€˜I believe you,’ I said. ‘Also intelligent.’ I pointed to the bookcases. ‘I can see George Eliot, Trollope, Lawrence, Waugh, Martin Boyd . . .’
    â€˜Have you read them?’
    â€˜Bits of, not as much as you. I was more Conrad, Stevenson, Maugham, Hemingway, Idriess.’
    She nodded. ‘Some strange things went on in that surgery. I was concerned, but it was a very good job, well paid, convenient to where I lived, and I liked Dr Bellamy very much. I wasn’t medically trained, I couldn’t judge the . . . ethics.’
    â€˜Yes?’
    â€˜I’m guessing, from glimpses of some of the people I saw arriving after hours, but I know Dr Heysen had developed techniques for removing tattoos and scars. I suspect he also . . . altered people’s appearance.’
    That wasn’t what I was expecting but was still interesting, maybe even more so. I couldn’t understand why this outwardly respectable woman wouldn’t have said something about it to the police, once the shit had hit the fan.
    She put on the spectacles she wore on a chain around her neck, stared directly at me, and I had to struggle to look her in the eye. ‘I was in love,’ she said.
    â€˜With Heysen?’
    â€˜That conceited cold fish?