Pestilence (7 page)

Chenhui Tang smiled when she saw Saracen come through the swing doors of A&E. She touched her head with her hand and said with a strong accent, “Your head…it is all right now?”

“Fine,” smiled Saracen. Conversation with Chenhui invariably involved a lot of smiles. They filled in the gaps where words should have been. “Are we busy this morning?”

“Yes, yes, busy,” said Chenhui with an exaggerated series of nods and smiles.

Saracen liked Chenhui and thought that she would make a good doctor. He respected her for that and would have liked to have known her better but the communication barrier between them was just too great. He had visited her once in her room at the doctors’ residency and had found it full of tutorial books on the English language. They had occupied an entire shelf along one wall, a monument to complete failure, he had thought at the time.

Alan Tremaine, who had been on duty during the night, signed off officially and handed over responsibility to Saracen with a report on the night’s ‘business’. There had been an accident in the local brewery resulting in several cases of severe scalding, a motor-cycle accident resulting in a fatality, the pillion passenger. The Police were still trying to contact relatives. They would probably turn up during the morning.

Saracen nodded and checked up on the present location of the burns cases in anticipation of phoned inquiries. “Anything else I should know?”

“The Police brought in a man at three this morning. He had ‘collapsed’ in the cells; hit his head on something…”

“Did it wash?”

“No other bruises on him.”

Saracen nodded.

“The X-Rays were OK, just knocked himself out.”

“Good. Off you go then.”

As the doors closed behind Tremaine, Chenhui came up to Saracen looking harassed. “You come please!” she said.

“I come,” smiled Saracen and followed her to the treatment room to begin another day.

The mid-morning admission of a housewife who had overdosed on Valium made Saracen wonder about Timothy Archer and how he was getting on. He had decided not to ask Nigel Garten about the Myra Archer case lest this be misconstrued, or more correctly, construed as unwarranted interference or even implied criticism. He did however resolve to check up on the case details recorded in the admission book when he got the chance.

He got the chance in the early afternoon when a lull developed. Nurses were chatting as they polished and tidied instrument trays and re-stocked cupboards and shelves. Chenhui sat with one of her English language books, her mouth moving silently. Saracen flicked through the pages of the admissions book and scanned down the entries for the evening of the twelfth. His index finger stopped on the entry for Myra Archer. Medic-Alpha Alert…Myra Archer, Flat 2, Palmer’s Green Court…Dead on Arrival…No known relatives…Medical Officer, Dr Chenhui Tang. There was no mention of a Post Mortem report.

Saracen closed the book and replaced it on the shelf. He went and sat down beside Chenhui who looked up from her book and smiled. Saracen glanced at the page she had been studying. It was headed, ‘At the Seaside’…How is the weather? The weather is fine. What colour is the sky? The sky is blue.

“Chenhui, do you remember a Mrs Myra Archer?” asked Saracen. He fully expected her to smile, repeat the name slowly and then look thoughtful. Instead her smile disappeared instantly, her eyes filled with something that looked like fear and she became so nervous and agitated that she dropped the book she had been looking at. Saracen picked it up and handed it to her.

“No…No Myra Archer,” said Chenhui, looking more and more like a frightened mouse.

“But…” Saracen stopped himself. “No matter,” he smiled, “It must have been a mistake. Forget it, it wasn’t important.”

Chenhui got up and excused herself leaving Saracen to look thoughtfully after her as she left the treatment room. “Now what was that all about?” he said quietly. It suddenly appeared as if Archer had been right. There had been something odd about the way his wife’s case had been handled. The question was what? He considered everything he knew about the affair. According to Timothy Archer there had been some kind of mix-up over which hospital his wife had been admitted to and, with Chenhui involved a misunderstanding was certainly on the cards. Had that been it? Had some failure in communication been responsible for a delay in admitting Myra Archer to hospital and, if so, had it been a serious delay? Could it have been responsible for her death?

If it had then there had obviously been a cover-up and Nigel Garten must have been involved for he was the one who had spoken to Archer. Saracen felt a hollowness creeping into the pit of his stomach. This was exactly the kind of situation he did not need in his life, not a second time.

His inclination was to do nothing and he tried to rationalise this course of inaction by telling himself that whatever he did it was not going to bring Myra Archer back to life. Any kind of enquiry would be sure to cause embarrassment, anguish and a great deal of unpleasantness. Chenhui might end up being dismissed; maybe even Nigel Garten too after a sacrificial inquiry by the Health Board for the benefit of the Press. He himself would establish his credentials beyond doubt as a viper who would never find another nest in medicine…Was that the real reason for doing nothing? he wondered. If someone had really died because of Chenhui it could happen again and, if it did, would it not be as much his fault as hers for having said nothing? “Shit,” said Saracen out loud.

As business began to pick up in A&E Saracen did his best to pretend to Chenhui that nothing was amiss. He had still not decided what to do for the best for both options seemed equally unattractive but, by tea time, he had come up with a third alternative. He would carry out an investigation on his own and reach his own conclusions about the death of Myra Archer. If he concluded that a foul-up had contributed to her death then he would speak out. If, on the other hand, he felt that she would have died anyway he would be content to let the matter rest.

The question now for Saracen was how to go about making enquiries discretely, how to find out what he wanted to know without having to make any direct approaches. That, he concluded, meant paperwork, always assuming that it existed for there was nothing more to be gleaned from A&E records. Myra Archer had been admitted as ‘Dead on Arrival’, no file would have been opened on her. That left the Post Mortem report which would record the exact cause of death, something that might or might not prove useful for Saracen’s purpose, and, as an afterthought, Medic Alpha’s log book. If there had been any untoward delay or mix-up it would be recorded in the log.

Nigel Garten appeared in the Department at six thirty pretending that he had just had an exhausting and demanding day. He had ‘popped in’ to ensure that everything was running smoothly. Saracen assured him dryly that it was and smiled thinly when Garten announced that he would have to rush off again. “Dinner with the in-laws, old man. You know the form.”

Garten checked quickly through the mail lying on his desk before leaving and Saracen kept watch out of the corner of his eye to see if Chenhui would make any kind of approach towards him. To his relief she did not although he could not be sure whether this was because Garten appeared to be in such a rush or whether he had managed to convince her that his question about Myra Archer had been quite innocent. With a bit of luck, thought Saracen, her lack of English might have pushed her towards the latter view.

Soon after Garten had gone Tremaine and Prahesh Singh arrived to take over the night shift in A&E. Saracen went through the report with Tremaine and made a conscious effort to appear humorous and relaxed for Chenhui’s benefit for he could sense that she was watching him in what he feared might be a text book case of guilty conscience. When it was time to leave, he said good-night to her with an extra big smile then waited round the corner in the car park till Chenhui herself had left then he walked down the hill to the ambulance depot to look for a member of the Medic Alpha crew.

When he got there he found the rest room empty, the only signs of life being a thermos flask sitting in the middle of the table with its lid screwed on the wrong thread and a piece of grease proof paper that had recently held sandwiches. He looked out of the window and saw an attendant cleaning the windscreen of one of the vehicles.

“Where is everyone?” asked Saracen.

“Try the duty room.”

Saracen walked slowly through the corridor to the back of the building. He passed a room emitting bursts of static noise and looked round the door to see the sole radio operator engaged in conversation. He continued along to the door marked, ‘Duty Room’ and heard voices coming from inside. They were arguing about football. Saracen knocked and went in. The talking stopped.

“Can I help you?’ asked a short bald man in shirt sleeves.

Saracen looked around for a familiar face and picked out Leonard Wright, a driver he knew to be on the Medic Alpha rota. “Could I have a word,” he asked.

Wright followed Saracen out into the ambulance yard and asked, “What can I do for you?”

“I’d like to examine Medic Alpha’s log book if that’s possible,” said Saracen. Saracen thought he saw the smile on Wright’s face waver but it was only for a second and it could have been his imagination.

“What’s the problem?”

“No problem really. I just need some information about the time of the smash up on the ring road a few days ago. I forgot to make notes at the time.

Wright appeared to hold his gaze for a moment before saying, “I’ll get it.”

Saracen was aware that his pulse was racing. Lying was hard work when you weren’t used to it and the guilt of knowing that you were lying changed your perspective on everything.

Wright returned with the log book and Saracen smiled in what he hoped was relaxed fashion but he felt the strain at the corners of his mouth. Wright had opened the book at the correct page for the ring road accident. That made it more difficult for there was no excuse for thumbing through the pages. Saracen pulse grew even faster.

“I’ll just make a note of these,” he said stalling for time. He fumbled in his pocket for a pen and found an excuse instead. He left his pen where it was and said, “What a twit. I don’t seem to have a pen with me. I wonder…”

Wright held his gaze again and Saracen read accusation in it, or imagined that he did before Wright said that he would fetch one and turned to go back inside.

Saracen flicked through the pages with what he felt were five thumbs and found the entry he was looking for. Call to Flat 2, Palmer’s Green Court. Patient Myra Archer…severely cyanosed…suspect cardiac arrest…medical officer on board, Dr Tang. Alarm raised by neighbour, Mrs M. Le Grice. Time of call, 21.34 hours. Arrival at Palmer’s Green, 21.47 hours. Arrival at Skelmore General, 22.04 hours.

Saracen felt a strange mixture of deflation and relief. There appeared to be nothing wrong at all with the response of Medic Alpha, no suggestion of delay or mix-up. So why had Chenhui Tang behaved the way she had when the name of Myra Archer had been mentioned?

Saracen noted that the driver on the night of the twelfth had been Leonard Wright whom he now saw returning with a pen. He let the pages fall back but as he did so he felt the one he had been looking at come loose. There had been no reason for it to have done so apart from the one that flew into Saracen’s head. It was not the original page! It was a substitute that had been lightly glued in!

Saracen accepted the pen from Wright and wrote down some details of the motorway accident before returning it to him. “Good, all done,” he said, closing the book and handing that back too. “Much obliged.”

“No problem,” replied Wright.

Saracen walked out of the ambulance station with contrived casualness, conscious of every movement of his limbs and convinced that Wright was staring at him all the way up the hill to the gate but he steeled himself not to turn round and check.

Saracen made directly for the whisky bottle when he got in to the flat and took a big gulp. Just what the hell was he getting himself into he wondered. The thing seemed to be snowballing out of all proportion with first the suggestion of a cover-up and now the deliberate falsification of records. The question of what he should do next bothered him. Commonsense and a desire for self preservation said that he should drop the whole affair like a hot potato but he recognised that that was no longer an option. If he were to do that then the unanswered questions would gnaw at him until he finally did seek the answers put the matter to rest…or whatever.

It occurred to Saracen that there would have been a nurse from A&E on board Medic Alpha when it had answered the call to Myra Archer. Perhaps he could persuade Jill Rawlings to make a few discrete enquiries and find out what she could. He picked up the phone and dialled the Nurses’ Home. It was engaged, come to think of it, thought Saracen, it always was. He tried twice more before he eventually got through and asked for Jill. There was a long pause while distant voices echoed along corridors.

“Hello,” said Jill Rawlings’ voice.

“Hello Jill. It’s James Saracen. Are you free this evening?”

Jill Rawlings agreed to meet Saracen for a drink at The Blue Angel at eight.