Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy(83)

There was an odd, rubbery, slithering squeak, a giant splash – I mean, really like something huge had fallen into a large body of water – a muffled shout, then silence.

‘Right!’ said Imogen. ‘Shall we see what happened there and call you back?’

11 a.m. Just called Talitha to see if she had spoken to Daniel lately.

‘Oh God,’ she said. ‘Haven’t you heard?’

The thing is, Daniel has always had addictive tendencies, which have got worse as he has got older. There was a period when everyone was saying, ‘I’m so worried about Daniel,’ in judgemental voices, as he behaved increasingly outrageously at dinner parties. Various glamorous women tried to ‘fix’ him until eventually he was shipped off to a treatment facility in Arizona and returned looking fresh-faced and a little sheepish. As far as we all knew, he was fine. But it seems a recent break-up with the latest glamorous woman catapulted him into a dazzling spree, taking him through the entire contents of his 1930s cocktail cabinet in a single weekend. He was found in a terrible state last Monday morning by his cleaning lady and now he is in the drugs and drink ward of the same hospital where I went to the Obesity Clinic.

Oh God, oh God, and I let Billy and Mabel stay the night with him.

11.30 a.m. Imogen just called back. It seems that George, rather than, as claimed, being in his office slurping coffee, was in a dinghy on the Irrawaddy River to which he had retreated from his luxury indigenous-style houseboat in order to ‘get a signal’. Somehow, the swell from a passing executive speedboat had unbalanced the dinghy, catapulting George into the murky waters of the Irrawaddy, shortly followed by his iPhone.

George was fine, but the loss of the iPhone was catastrophic. I decided to leave Greenlight to deal with the aftermath and hotfoot it round to see Daniel.

2 p.m. Just back. Scary. St Catherine’s Hospital is a bewildering visual mix of Victorian prison, 1960s doctor’s surgery and the Yemen. I wandered, unfocused, until I found the right block, bought Daniel newspapers in the gift shop and a card with a duck on it saying: ‘Stay afloat’, adding in pen: ‘Dirty Bastard’, then impulsively put inside: ‘Wherever you go and whatever you do I’ll always love you.’ One doesn’t want to ENABLE, but I could imagine everyone was going to come in and tick him off.

The ward was a ‘locked ward’. Pressed on the green button. Eventually a lady in a burka appeared and let me in.

‘I’m here to see Daniel Cleaver.’

She didn’t seem to recognize the name, just another one on her clipboard.

‘Over there to the left. First bed behind the curtain.’

I recognized Daniel’s bag and his coat but the bed was empty. Had Daniel done a runner? I started trying to tidy up, then a strange tramp-like figure appeared in winceyette hospital pyjamas, unshaven, with wild hair and a black eye.

‘Who are you?’ he said suspiciously.

‘It’s me, Bridget!’

‘Jones!’ he said, as if a light bulb had come on in his head. Just as quickly it went out, and he stumbled over to the bed. ‘You could at least have told me you were coming. Might have cleaned up a bit.’

He lay down and closed his eyes.

‘Silly arse,’ I said.

He fumbled for my hand. He was making a very strange noise.

‘What happened? Why can’t you breathe?’

A flicker came into his eye, a glimpse of the old Daniel.

‘Well, the thing is, Jones,’ he said, pulling me over to him, ‘went on a bit of a bender, to tell you the truth. Pretty much drank through everything. I delightedly fastened upon what I took to be a bottle of crème de menthe, you know, the green stuff, drank the whole thing down.’ His face broke into the familiar rueful smirk. ‘It turned out to be Fairy Liquid.’

We both started shaking with laughter. I know it was a potentially tragic situation but it was pretty funny. But then Daniel started choking, making a wheezing noise, and bubbles started appearing out of his mouth. You could see exactly what had happened. It’s like when you run out of dishwasher tablets, and think it would be a good idea to put washing-up liquid in instead and it all froths up inside.

The nurse rushed over and sorted him out. Then he picked up the card and opened it. For a second he looked as if he was going to cry, then he shoved it back down on the table, just as a glamorous leggy blonde appeared.

‘Daniel,’ said the blonde, in a way which made me want to flick my hair at her and give her nits. ‘Look at you! You should be ashamed of yourself. It has to stop.’

She picked up the card. ‘What’s this? Is this from you?’ she said accusingly. ‘You see, this is his problem! All his bloody friends: “Dear old Daniel.” It’s just completely enabling.’

‘Best be off then,’ I said, getting up.

‘No, Jones, don’t,’ said Daniel.

‘Oh, please,’ snorted the girl, just as Talitha appeared carrying a basket of edible gift items, wrapped in cellophane and topped with a big bow.

‘You see? You see?’ said the glamorous girl. ‘This is exactly what I mean.’

‘And WHAT do you mean by that . . . sugar?’ said Talitha. ‘WHO exactly are you and WHAT does this have to do with you? I have known Daniel for twenty years and slept with him, on and off, for most of them . . .’