Lots of people had told Lissa what they thought she needed—a love affair, to get drunk, to go on holiday, to fall in love, to travel the world—and she hadn’t enjoyed any of that either. She weighed up what she thought Joan’s response would be.

“Is it a dog?” she said.

Joan smiled. “Well, that and a bit of fresh air, I would say. Lots of walks, lots of being out in the countryside. That’s a cure for just about anything.”

Lissa looked out the window, where it had clouded over ominously. “Doesn’t it rain all the time here?” she said.

“So what?” said Joan, stumped at the question.

She went back to her files and pulled some out.

“Cormac will send you his case notes,” said Joan. “These are just the current ones dished out.”

“So what kind of thing do you see around here, then?” said Lissa.

“Oh, the usual. Some diabetes care. Bit of stoma work. Vaccinations. Old. Farming accidents.”

“What?” said Lissa.

“People lose bits to tractors. More often than you’d think. That kind of thing.”

“What kind of bits?”

“Sticky-out bits,” said Joan matter-of-factly, walking into the waiting room and throwing open the unlocked door.

Lissa twirled around. “You leave your door open?!”

“Well, they’re very welcome to the Homes and Gardens back issues and the broken toy garage.”

Lissa stepped through in wonder. The old front room of the house was the waiting room, and it was thankfully rather cleaner than Joan’s car, although she suspected faintly that the dogs still did indeed get in here from time to time. There were toys, posters warning against smoking and drinking—nothing notably different from London, except that every other inch of the walls was covered in pictures of dogs and horses; there was a stag’s head on one wall and a stuffed greyhound in a glass case in the corner.

Lissa started when she saw it.

“Ah, yes. Cosmo.” Joan sighed. “Wonderful, wonderful animal. Could never let him go.”

“Doesn’t it scare the children?”

“Don’t be ridiculous! They love him!”

Lissa stared at the glassy eyes. “Are you sure?”

Joan snorted. “Here,” she said, indicating a whitewashed room, thankfully free of taxidermied pets. “This is Cormac’s office.”

“He gets an office to himself?”

“Aye. He’s got one up at the hospital too.”

“You’re kidding!”

Lissa normally did all her notes back in her room, and if she was lucky she got to squeeze into a staff room at one of the bigger practices every now and again.

Joan blinked. “There’s six rooms upstairs we don’t use at all.”

“Cor,” said Lissa. “In London this would be worth, like, millions.”

“Yes,” sniffed Joan with a tone of utter disdain. “But it would be in London.”

Chapter 21