An Affair of the Heart (4 page)

Dr Anders
quickly added, “We suspect that it was Miss Sorenson’s body that Mr
Williams saw when he was brought in to identify his wife.”

There was a
brief silence while Barrett and Stanley absorbed this information,
both of them looking at WPC Foster with some concern. It was
obvious from their expressions that they wished that they could
have the rest of this conversation without her presence.
Tough
! Jill Foster thought to herself. She had no intention
of leaving.

“I think we
should get out of this corridor,” Stanley said.

“Good idea,”
Barrett replied. “Let’s find a less public place for this
discussion.”

Dr Clarkson led
the way down the corridor to a side room. It was an unoccupied
single bedroom. WPC Foster squeezed in last of all as Dr Clarkson
tried to close the door behind them. They all stared at her. She
decided to stake her claim before the protests began.

“I think it
would be beneficial for all concerned that I continue to be
present,” she said. “Particularly if this should come to court
later.”

Barrett looked
at Stanley. He nodded. “It would help in verifying that nothing
underhand was done, or intended,” he said.

“Alright then,”
Barrett said with a sigh as he turned to Dr Anders again. “You said
that they were identified at the scene of the accident. How could
they get mixed up by the time they got here?”

“They both
looked very similar,” Dr Anders replied. “The mistake could have
occurred after they were freed from their cars. Or Miss Sorenson’s
handbag could have been dropped and put back next to the wrong
body. It could have happened here, or at the scene of the
accident.”

“And there were
no photos in the handbag?” Stanley asked.

“Not as far as
I know,” Dr Anders replied. “But it wouldn’t have mattered. They
both had severe head injuries. There was a lot of blood, contusions
and lacerations. Trying to determine who was who from just a
photograph wouldn’t have been that easy in the circumstances.”

Stanley sighed.
“Okay,” he said. “It’s a big embarrassment, but I don’t think it
warrants mine or Eric’s presence here tonight. As far as I see it,
you just take Mr Williams to look at the body of Miss Sorenson. If
that is his wife as you suspect, then it’s just a simple mistake
that, in the circumstances, Mr Williams is not likely to pursue. He
would be more likely to sue if he had faced the trauma of his
wife’s death only to find her alive and well. He’d have been
outraged. But for that to happen, someone else would have had to
have been driving his wife’s car. So if that was the case, it would
have been an acceptable mistake to have made. That’s why the police
brought him in here in the first place, isn’t it? Either way, the
panics over.”

It was then
that Dr Clarkson dropped the bombshell. “Yes, that’s all perfectly
reasonable, Mr Stanley,” he said, glancing briefly at WPC Foster.
“Until you find out that Miss Sorenson was carrying an organ donor
card.”

There was a
long pause which was only broken when Stanley said, “Oh, shit.”

“What was
removed and where did it go?” Barrett quickly demanded.

“Just her
heart, one eye, and both kidneys,” Dr Clarkson replied. “The
heart’s already gone to Wythenshawe, but we put a hold on any
further transfers as soon as we learned of the mix up. Everything
we took out except the heart is still here in cold storage, but
they won’t last much longer. We’ve also subsequently received calls
for the other remaining organs as well.”

Eric Barrett
went over to the nearest telephone. “Nothing else is to be removed
from that body,” he said over his shoulder. “In fact, I think we
should put everything back. Even if we do lose the organs. We have
to be sure.” He picked up the phone and rang the Cardio-Thoracic
Unit at Wythenshawe.

WPC Foster
didn’t listen to his conversation. She was far more concerned with
something else. “Did you say her eyes?” she asked Dr Clarkson, with
a certain amount of unease in her voice.

“Yes, one eye
and both kidneys,” he replied. “The other eye was too badly damaged
in the accident. But, as I said, they’re all still here, so it is
possible to put them back in before Mr Williams gets to see
her.”

WPC Foster was
horrified by the casual tone in his voice. He didn’t seem to care
about the effect all this was likely to have on Alex Williams. She
had seen the way he had reacted and how he had looked when he had
learned of his wife’s death. He had been absolutely devastated. And
now all she could think of were those dazzling blue eyes in the
painting she had seen at the house earlier that evening. How would
Alex Williams react when he found out what they had done to his
wife? What would he do?

Barrett came
off the phone. “The recipient’s heart is already out,” he said.
“It’s too late to stop the transplant from going ahead now, not
without putting the recipient at too much risk. Especially as we
aren’t yet sure that a mistake has been made in the first
place.”

“I think we’re
pretty sure,” Dr Clarkson said.

“We need to
have the other body identified as soon as possible,” Barrett said
to Dr Clarkson. “Get those organs replaced and have the husband in
there as soon as you can.” Dr Clarkson nodded and walked quickly
away. Barrett now turned to Stanley.

“John, how
badly exposed do you think we are?” he asked the legal advisor.

John Stanley
took a deep breath. He looked far more worried than he had done
before. “If it is his wife,” he said carefully. “And we’ve removed
organs without his permission, and she didn’t leave any written
authorisation either, then we really are going to be in deep
trouble.”

“Do you think
he will sue?” Barrett asked.

WPC Foster
answered his question before Stanley could reply.

“He’ll
sue.”

Dr Jones sat
with Gina Carter in the waiting room. They were alone in the
silence and the stillness. They sat opposite one another, their
half finished coffee cups sitting on the table between them. Other
empty cups were also scattered about on the table. Some of them
were overturned.

Dr Jones knew
that this was always the worst time for Gina. It was the one time
when she couldn’t do anything to help her daughter. All she could
do was sit and wait. And pray.

“It’s going to
be alright, Gina,” Dr Jones said. “You know that Bloomfield is a
damn good surgeon. And he’s done this operation many times
before.”

“But not on my
Rachel, he hasn’t,” Gina replied quickly. She stood up and paced
around the room, moving between the other easy chairs and low
tables. She stopped briefly to pick up and leaf through one of the
dog-eared magazines that were scattered about. Then she discarded
it, and slowly worked her way back around the room, until she came
back to Dr Jones and sat down again.

Dr Jones
sighed. It was not the first time she had been on a tour of the
waiting room. So far, she must have picked up and discarded every
magazine in the room. He wished that there was something that he
could do to stop Gina’s torment. Anyone would worry at a time like
this; it was quite understandable and expected. But for Gina it was
different. She always wanted to do everything for Rachel, to always
be there for her. Now she was locked out, at the very time when
Rachel might need her the most.

“Rachel’s in
good hands,” he told her. “You know Bloomfield, you know what he’s
like. In fact you two get along so well, anyone would think that
you were an old married couple.”

“I know,” Gina
replied in a quiet voice. “But this isn’t like the other operations
Rachel has had. I worried just as much then, so I’m bound to worry
all the more now. And I won’t stop worrying until I can see her,
and hold her in my arms again.”

Dr Jones was
right, of course. She did know Ronald Bloomfield very well. He was
one of the few people who were not phased by Gina’s forceful
personality. And just like her, he was not shy when it came to
voicing his own opinions, either.

Gina Carter and
Ronald Bloomfield very often had what they themselves called
spirited discussions. To anyone else, they were knock down, drag
out fights. They would scream and shout at one another until they
were both red in the face. And the next moment they would seem like
the best of pals. They both had their own points of view, and
neither of them liked to back down. At the moment, honours were
about even. But the day was not quite over yet.

Gina liked
Bloomfield. He was straight up, honest. If he thought that you were
going to die, he would tell you straight out. Gina liked that. When
Dr Jones had introduced them for the first time, Gina had thought
that he would be pompous and arrogant. She was wrong, and it was
less than five minutes before they had their first argument. She
had felt a lot happier after that. And they had quickly got to know
one another, and what was most important to each of them. Now there
was no one else in the world who she would trust to do the
transplant operation on her daughter other than Bloomfield.

“I hate
waiting,” Gina said with sudden emotion. “I hate it! I hate it! I
hate it!” She sat with her head down, ringing her hands.

“Do you
remember what Rachel said to Ronald when they first met?” Dr Jones
asked her.

“Yes,” Gina
replied. “She asked him to put in a zip. Just in case anything went
wrong.”

“That’s right.
It made Ronald smile.”

Gina looked up,
staring Dr Jones in the eye. “Nothing is going to go wrong, is it?”
she asked him. “I don’t just mean now, but afterwards, as
well?”

“No! Of course
not!” Dr Jones insisted. “It was a good, healthy heart we got from
the donor. And she was a perfect match for your Rachel. Believe me,
once this transplant’s completed, all your problems will be
over.”

When Bloomfield
came into the waiting room to tell Dr Jones and Gina Carter that
the operation was over, Gina didn’t even wait for him to open his
mouth. She just took one look at his face and shot out the
door.

Bloomfield’s
smile broadened. “It went like a dream!” he told Dr Jones.
“Everything went like clockwork. It was as if that heart couldn’t
wait to get in there and start working again.”

Dr Jones took a
deep breath. “I’m glad,” he said, and he smiled too. “How is
Rachel?”

“She’s fine!
They’ve taken her into the ICU. She’ll probably stay in there for
the next day or two. But I’d bet that she’ll be back in her own
room, sitting up and talking, by Friday! Now we’d better get to the
ICU before Gina causes complete havoc!” He slapped Dr Jones on the
back and went out the door, not waiting to see if the doctor was
following him.

Dr Jones was
left on his own in the waiting room. He was so relieved. He hadn’t
expected everything to go so well. There was always some kind of
complication, no matter how tiny, that caused concern. But if
Ronald Bloomfield said that everything went like clockwork, then
everything had gone like clockwork.

“Come on,
Jones!” he heard Bloomfield calling from halfway down the corridor.
“Stop dawdling!”

Dr Jones smiled
as he went out of the waiting room, closing the door carefully
behind him. Rachel was going to be fine.

Dr Jones had
been surprised when Andrea Walker, the Chief Executive of South
Manchester University Hospitals NHS Trust, which included
Wythenshawe hospital, had summoned him to her office. He was even
more amazed when he got there. Not only were she and the Medical
Director present, but Ronald Bloomfield and two other people he
hadn’t seen before were also there. They all looked very serious
when he entered.

“What’s this? A
lynching party?” he said with mock humour as he closed the door
behind him.

“Not quite,
Philip,” Andrea Walker said. She gave him a weak smile that worried
Dr Jones far more than the thought of any lynching party. “You had
better sit down,” she went on.

Dr Jones did as
she asked, sitting down in the one remaining empty chair in the
room.

“You obviously
know Ronald Bloomfield and Gordon Murray,” Walker said to him,
indicating the surgeon and the hospital Medical Director. Dr Jones
nodded and greeted his two colleagues. Andrea Walker then indicated
the two people he didn’t know. “This is the General Manager of
Manchester Royal Infirmary, Mr Eric Barrett, and his Legal Advisor,
Mr John Stanley.”

Dr Jones stood
up and shook hands with the two men, one short and slightly fat,
the other tall and lean. He was beginning to feel very
uncomfortable. Something was going on, and whatever it was, it had
to be unpleasant for somebody judging by the people who were
gathered in this room.

“Gentlemen,
this is Dr Philip Jones,” Walker continued with her introductions
as the two men shook hands with the worried doctor. “It’s his
patient that concerns us.”

“My patient?”
Dr Jones repeated in a questioning manner.

“It’s Rachel
Carter’s heart transplant,” Bloomfield replied. “It seems that
someone has made a cock-up of the authorisation from the
donor.”

“Now, see
here!”

“That’s not
exactly true!”

Bloomfield’s
reply seemed to spark sudden life into the two men from Manchester
Royal Infirmary, who quickly protested at his choice of words.
Andrea Walker had to calm them down.

“Gentlemen,
gentlemen! Please let’s not argue about that now!” she said.
“Remember that this has serious implications for the patient, not
just for us, or our staff.”