Doctor Knows Best (9 page)

Megan suddenly remembered the phrase Giles had used during their conversation at dinner;
they say history always repeats itself…
He had suffered divorced parents and an unhappy childhood, and now it seemed that his own child was suffering.

Long after she had gone to bed that night, Megan lay and puzzled about the situation between Giles Elliott and his wife's family. She was sure that was the clue to Joanna's unhappiness, not just the fact that her mother was dead.

She turned restlessly. She had always imagined herself falling in love with a man who would love her and her alone, no one before or after. But in her heart of hearts she knew that was a romantic dream for teenagers only. The harsh reality of life was that there wasn't a choice. Someone came along and you fell in love, regardless of their suitability. There is only one thing to do, she thought finally. Just regard him as a friend and don't get emotionally involved! Although quite how she was going to manage that she didn't know, and spending Christmas with him wasn't going to make it any easier.

Chapter Five

The week preceding Christmas passed quickly. Two of the pupil nurses fell sick and as she was lucky enough to be off for the whole of Christmas Megan felt obliged to volunteer for extra duties. This meant working for three evenings until nine o'clock. The day before Christmas Eve was the day of the unit's Christmas party. It was to be held in Megan's office which had been emptied of its furniture for the occasion.

Juliet Moore and some of the other nurses from the evening and night duty rotas came in laden with home-made goodies. They soon transformed the office with Christmas decorations and balloons, and a huge bunch of mistletoe which Juliet hung in a strategic position over the doorway.

“No harm in hoping,” she said with a wicked wink. “You never know, I might get kissed by Giles Elliott himself.”

“Yes,” sighed one of the pupil nurses new to the department, “he is absolutely gorgeous, isn't he? I've never seen anyone so dishy.”

“He has been married, you know,” remarked Megan in a voice as casual as she could muster, busying herself with pinning up paper-chains, “and he has a daughter nearly as old as you.”

“Oh, I don't mind that,” answered young Sally cheekily. “I've always had a penchant for older men.” She struck what she imagined to be a sophisticated pose. “Do you think he'd fancy me?”

“Not if you look like that,” piped up one of the other girls. “You look as if you've got a prolapsed disc, standing like that!” She ducked quickly as Sally threw a piece of holly at her and screeched with laughter.

“Girls!” remonstrated Megan. “I know it's Christmas and you are all feeling festive, but don't forget we still have patients coming in all the time.”

“Not too many, I hope,” giggled Sally, who had already had one glass of sherry. “What will they say if they are looked after by tipsy nurses!”

“There won't be any tipsy nurses,” answered Megan firmly, “because if there are you'll have me to deal with.” The firm tone of her voice left the juniors in no doubt of the consequences if they should overstep the limit.

The party got under way just before noon and soon the office was babbling with laughter and conversation. It. had to be a prolonged lunch-time affair, for work carried on as usual, everyone popping in and out of the party as their job permitted. Luckily it was a slack day so most of the staff were able to enjoy the proceedings.

Giles Elliott came in and wedged his tall figure into a corner beside Megan, who was eating a sausage roll. “I thought sausage rolls made you scream!” he said, raising his eyebrows.

Megan blushed, remembering her remark of the evening of the revue party. “Well, these are rather special,” she had to admit. “Juliet Moore made them and her cooking is absolutely mouth-watering.”

“In that case I must sample one,” he said, reaching out a long arm and removing a sausage roll from the plate Sally was carrying past.

Juliet Moore battled her way across the room and joined them. “Do you like them?” she asked, watching him bite into it.

“Delicious,” was his verdict. “Although I knew it would be. If Megan gives a sausage roll her seal of approval it must be good.”

Juliet laughed. “Thank you, that's very high praise indeed.” She sipped her glass of wine. “Are you going home for Christmas, Megan?” she asked.

“Yes,” said Megan, wondering what on earth they would all say if they knew Giles Elliott was going to spend it with her. “What are you doing?”

“Oh, I'm home for Christmas Day,” answered Juliet, “then I'm working Boxing Day and the day after. The money will come in useful for the holiday we are planning next year.”

“Are you planning to go somewhere exotic then?” asked Giles.

“Only Majorca,” said Juliet, “but with a family it is pretty expensive, so we need all the extra pennies I can earn.”

“I have some very good friends there,” said Giles. “They run a delightful little restaurant near the beach at Puerto Soller. You must visit it; they make the best paella on the island.”

Grateful for the change in conversation, Megan excused herself and moved across to where Johnny Cox was holding court to a bevy of giggling pupil nurses. She had been unsure of whether or not Giles would have wanted anyone in Casualty to know he was spending Christmas with her and her family. Anyway,
she
was quite certain that she preferred the rest of the staff to remain in ignorance, particularly the pupil nurses. Their minds only seem to run along the lines of the latest romance, real or imaginary, fuelled no doubt by the romantic stories they were always reading in all the women's magazines, she thought.

Johnny had picked off a sprig of mistletoe and was working his way along the line of giggling, blushing nurses, kissing them all one by one.

Megan sighed theatrically and crossed her arms. “You are incorrigible,” she said severely. “Breaking all these young hearts!”

“It is they who are breaking mine,” he said, dramatically clasping a hand to his chest. “With so many beautiful girls to choose from the strain is too much for me.”

You don't have to choose,” said young Sally. “You can take us all to the Mess party tonight. That solves your problem.”

Johnny's face fell and Megan laughed. “Serves you right,” she said. “You've got your just desserts.”

Johnny raised his eyebrows expressively. “Oh well, they say there's safety in numbers,” he said with a laugh. “Are you coming tonight?”

“No, I've got to work, and then get ready to go down to Devon tomorrow. Anyway, I'm too old for the high jinks they get up to at the Mess party.”

“Poor old lady,” said Johnny, holding the mistletoe aloft. “Am I allowed to kiss such an antiquated thing?”

Out of the corner of her eye Megan could see Giles Elliott looking at them. Was it her imagination, or did his blue eyes have a steely glint of disapproval in them? Some inner devil prompted Megan to throw her arms around Johnny's neck and kiss him back with unusual enthusiasm.

“Well, now I know it really
is
Christmas,” murmured a surprised Johnny. “I think that calls for an encore,” and without further ado he proceeded to kiss her long and thoroughly. “Are you sure you won't change your mind and come to the party tonight?” he asked.

“Quite sure, Johnny,” replied a slightly flustered Megan. She hadn't expected Johnny to react in the way he had, and hoped that he hadn't taken the kiss seriously—the very last thing she had expected or wanted.

She felt Giles Elliott's gaze cutting through the crowded room like a laser beam as she disentangled herself from Johnny's arms. “I'd better go back into Casualty and relieve someone else to come and have some fun,” she muttered, making her escape through the doorway.

Straightening her cap, which, as ever; was askew on her shiny brown hair, she marched purposefully into Casualty. The first person she saw was one of the elderly auxiliaries, Thelma, sitting morosely at the desk, idly flipping over some old X-rays.

“Your turn to join the festivities,” Megan said to her. “I'll take over here.”

“Really, Sister, are you sure?”

“Yes, of course, off you go,” replied Megan. “I'll shout for help soon enough if it gets too busy.”

The plump auxiliary scurried excitedly away. Christmas was the one time of year when all barriers were dropped in the hospital and all grades of staff fraternised with one another; it was something she looked forward to.

Megan watched her retreating figure, her fat legs encased in black stockings, the seams of which were invariably crooked. Today was no exception. She smiled slowly; good old Thelma, her sort were the salt of the earth. She worked hard for not much pay, never complained, not even when insults were heaped upon her by irate junior doctors, usually taking out on her their own inadequacies. She was always kind and understanding to patients and invariably ignored by the nursing hierarchy. Megan would have gladly had ten Thelmas for some of the new staff nurses she had had to tolerate over the years.

She wandered out to the reception area to talk to the girl at the desk, seeing that all was quiet. As she approached the desk the telephone rang and the girl picked it up. “Casualty, County General,” she said. She listened for a few moments, then said briefly, “OK.”

She turned to Megan, who by this time was standing beside her. “Badly injured baby, about ten months old, on the way in,” she said.

“Just the baby?” asked Megan. “Nobody else? Is it a road accident?”

“No, it's not an RTA,” replied the girl. “From what Ambulance Control
didn't
say I would think it's a battered baby, or to use the correct phraseology, a non-accidental injury.”

Megan heaved a sigh. “These cases always make me feel sick,” she said. “Let's hope it's not as bad as they say. I'd better go and warn Giles…Mr. Elliott, that a case is on its way in.” She left the reception area and walked quickly back towards the sound of the party, but before she reached the door of her office she met Giles Elliott in the corridor.

“I was wondering where you had got to,” he said.

“There is a baby on its way in,” said Megan, not wasting time. “Non-accidental injury by the sound of it.”

Giles Elliott's face hardened. “Poor little beggar,” he said under his breath.

The baby arrived a few minutes later in the ambulance accompanied by the parents, a weak-looking, undernourished girl of about nineteen and a young punky-looking father with a shock of pink hair. Their story was that the baby had fallen out of her cot, but neither Megan nor Giles Elliott could believe it. But protocol forbade them from expressing an opinion at that time, and in any case the most urgent thing was to try to do something for the baby.

Gently Megan undressed the unconscious little body, carefully noting the various bruises on the fragile arms and legs and in the small of the back just above the area of the kidneys.

“I would say this child has been consistently beaten,” grated Giles to Megan through gritted teeth, “and now she appears to have been hit around the head.”

Megan said nothing. In spite of her professional training she was having difficulty holding back the tears. The little mite in her arms was so weak and defenceless— how could anyone hit a baby like this, she thought.

Carefully and quickly Giles Elliott made his examination. Then he said to Megan grimly, “This child is in coma, her breathing is stertorous, the heart appears all right but the pupils are fixed and dilated and I can't get any reflex actions.” He sighed and shoved his stethoscope in his pocket. “I'll ring for Mr. Mason, the neurosurgeon, and ask him to come quickly. Perhaps he'll think it worth scanning her, although I wonder. I think perhaps things have gone too far already.” He left the cubicle to make his way back to his office.

Megan called over Thelma, who had come hurrying back when she had heard there had been an admission. “You stay here with the baby. I'll have to speak to the parents, I suppose. Then they will just have to wait until Mr. Elliott and Mr. Mason can see them.”

“Is it bad?” whispered Thelma anxiously.

Megan nodded grimly. “Yes, I think it's very bad.” She swished the cubicle curtains tightly shut behind her and walked outside to the reception area where the mother and father were waiting.

“How long are you going to keep us waiting?” demanded the young father belligerently. “We've been here over half an hour already. We've got to get back—she's got to get me something to eat.” He indicated his pathetic little wife.

Megan could see that the young man was a bully; it was obvious from the frightened way his wife looked at him. Her panic-stricken eyes looked beseechingly at Megan. “Is my baby all right?” she asked in a quavering voice.

“Of course the baby's all right,” interrupted her husband. “That damned kid makes enough noise all the time! You're making a lot of fuss about nothing, you should never have called the doctor.”

“I'm afraid your daughter is very far from being all right,” said Megan gently, looking at the young mother and ignoring the father.

“Here, what do you mean?” he interrupted, pushing himself between Megan and his young wife.

“I mean, Mr. Smith,” said Megan, her voice taking on a harder note, “that your child is seriously ill and you are going to have to wait here for some time. Mr. Elliott has asked a consultant neurosurgeon to come down and give a second opinion. As soon as I have any news I will let you know. Now, if you will excuse me.”

He stood looking at her with his mouth open, all his previous belligerence evaporating. Megan suddenly felt very sorry for them both. She knew from reading the scant notes on the baby that the father was unemployed and that they lived in a bedsit. Poor things, she thought: neither of you is equipped to deal with married life and a baby and this is the tragic result.

She made her way back to the cubicle where Thelma was keeping watch over the child. As soon as Megan entered she looked up anxiously. “I think the pulse is weaker,” she said.

Swiftly Megan reached down and felt the tiny fluttering carotid pulse. Yes, it was weaker and uneven. “Get Mr. Elliott,” she said urgently, but even as she spoke the baby started fitting and then the heartbeat stopped. Automatically she pressed the cardiac arrest button by the side of the couch and within seconds the cardiac arrest team were there, quicker than usual as they were only a few yards away at the party in Megan's office.

Johnny Cox, the anaesthetist, was the first to arrive, for which Megan was thankful. He deftly slipped a small tube down the baby's throat and maintained the airway, something a less experienced anaesthetist wouldn't have been able to do so quickly. At the sound of the bell Giles Elliott had come running, and Mr. Mason the neurosurgeon was with him. Megan worked feverishly with the rest of the team, desperately trying to resuscitate the tiny scrap of humanity lying on the couch, but after twenty minutes Giles Elliott told them to stop.