One of Us Read Online Free Page B

give up the tablets then, Kav man,” one of them said.
    “I want you to stay here for a few days, lie down, take it easy,” I said. “You lost blood, and you will be weak.”
    “Aye. Not as much blood as the bastard who did this will lose, mind.”
    “One day,” one of the other men said in a low voice.
    “Aye, one day, Nicky,” my patient said. “When we’re not having to pussy around keeping these fucking foreigners sweet. Not you, love. You’re sweet already.”
    I ignored them, held a dressing down, wrapped tape around it. I did not hear, I did not see, I did not understand. Life lived as furniture.
    On the second day, Corgan was there again, leaning against the wall, his presence filling the room. He did not say much, asked a couple of questions about what I was doing, how long things would take, how soon I would know if the wound was infected, what I would do if it was, when they could move him. Then he said nothing else, just watched, and I felt as if a spotlight was shining on to me and I was clumsy and my fingers fumbled everything.
    I worked, I slept, I was driven to the flat, I tried hard not to think much about what I was doing or the people that I was doing it for. One day, a man even bigger than Corgan opened the door without knocking. He stepped in, looked around. I could not have wrapped my arms around his chest. He should have been in a circus, lifting barrels full of showgirls, or fighting in a barn, with bare knuckles. He nodded to the corridor, and another man walked in. This man had nothing interesting about him at all. He was short, but not too short, slim but not skinny, his skin pale and his hair grey. His suit was expensive, his shoes looked even more so, but if he had walked straight out again I might have been able to remember the cut of his suit and the shine of his shoes but I do not think that I would have been able to picture his face.
    Everyone in the room had fallen quiet. He stared at me for a moment. His eyes were very pale blue, watery as if they stung.
    “Who is she?” he said. He spoke in English, but he was a long way from home.
    “She works for me,” Corgan said. “My new doctor.”
    The man had not stopped staring at me.
    “Is she one of us?”
    Corgan was about to say something, then he thought better of it. “Anna, go and wait down by the front door. Paul, go with her, make sure she stays there.”
    I would have said something, told Corgan that I was doing the job for him that I was meant to do, and that he could go and look for another doctor if I was not good enough, but I did not. I was scared of the small grey man with the watery eyes, because I saw the way that Corgan had swallowed when the small man came in the room, the way that Corgan had stared at me hard, sending a message. Shut your mouth. Say nothing.
    I turned to walk out, but the small man put a hand out and touched my arm. I stopped where I was, not looking at him, just looking at the door. It seemed a very long way away.
    “What do you know of what happened to this man?” he asked. There was silence in the rest of the room.
    “He was shot in the upper arm,” I said. “There was tissue damage but the bullet passed through the flesh and there were no fragments left in the wound. I think he might have some nerve damage but there are exercises he can do to regain proper use of his arm.”
    “That is not the question I asked,” he said.
    “It is the only question I have the answer to,” I said.
    He kept his hand on my arm for a long time. Then he took it away. I walked out of the room, and started to breath again. Paul followed me down the stairs, to make sure I did not do anything stupid. What, I do not know. I went out of the front door and sat on the little wall outside the house.
    Paul lit a cigarette. Then he pulled the packet out of his pocket and offered one to me. I just gave him a look.
    “Yeah, I know,” he said. “But I’ve known plenty of doctors who’ve liked a smoke and a