Surgeon at Arms (14 page)

Haileybury extended his large red hand. ‘An unexpected pleasure, Trevose.’

‘Is it so unexpected?’

The brigadier pursed his lips. ‘Won’t you sit down?’ Graham took a small hard chair and began, ‘Haileybury, do you know the one thing the powers-that-be in this war could do with me? They couldn’t court-martial me. They couldn’t put me in jail. They couldn’t even tell me off. The only way they could save themselves the nuisance of my existence was to sack me. They have.’ Haileybury put his finger-tips together and blew on them, rather noisily.

‘You’re perfectly aware of that, of course,’ Graham added accusingly.

‘It has come to my ears.’

‘Why did you do it? Why did you throw me out?’ Haileybury looked shocked. ‘I?’

‘I’ve a certain right to know, you must admit.’

‘But, my dear fellow, I couldn’t possibly be responsible for your dismissal. That would be a civilian matter, quite outside my province.’

‘In all the years we’ve been squabbling, Haileybury, you’ve invariably done two things that I often enough have not. Told the truth and been honest.’

There was a silence. ‘I see,’ said Haileybury.

He got up, crossed silently to a filing cabinet, and still without speaking removed a folder.

‘Your suspicions are correct, Trevose, I must agree,’ he admitted, sitting down. ‘Though only partly correct. I certainly made representations to the proper authorities. And I can hardly pretend otherwise than that my views were bound to carry some weight.’

He opened the file. My God! thought Graham, he’s more of my cuttings than I’ve collected myself. He imagined Haileybury painstakingly snipping each one out, muttering to himself and shaking his head sorrowfully.

‘Very well, the annex has been getting some publicity,’ said Graham. ‘And what of it? It’s cheered the patients up. It’s encouraged my staff to keep working flat out. It’s given the civilian population something to feel proud of. Hasn’t it put up the morale of your own men? At least they know there’s a unit to look after them efficiently, if they get their faces smashed up. It’s made a hell of a difference in the R.A.F., I happen to know for a fact.’

‘That isn’t the point,’ said Haileybury.

‘You don’t imagine it’s done me any personal good, do you?’ demanded Graham irritably. ‘I’ve neither the desire nor the need to push my own interests. I’m only concerned with those of my patients.’

‘I think we know each other’s views on these matters too well for the need of repetition. I will only emphasize that mine have remained quite unchanged by the war.’

‘Oh, you’re stupid, ridiculous, blind, smug. Of course I can’t help getting into the papers. I’m part of the scene. Nobody objects if General Montgomery or Vera Lynn or whoever you like gets photographed for the front pages, do they?’

‘I think you’re putting it rather extravagantly, Trevose.’

‘Then tell me why you’re getting me kicked out? No, don’t bother. I know. Through spite, that’s all.’ Haileybury drew a deep breath. ‘You must be perfectly aware,’ he said calmly, ‘that there has been a great weight of complaint. However understandable your enthusiasm—perhaps even commendable—you have rather created the impression... well, the impression that nobody else in our profession is doing anything for the war at all. It has been brought very sharply to the notice of the Ministry and the Service departments. And to myself personally.’

‘By whom? Twelvetrees at Smithers Botham, Graham thought, perhaps even Crampers.

‘You might prefer me not to name names. The last time I unwittingly did so, I understand it led to a good deal of remorse on your part.’

The reference to Tom Raleigh made Graham shift uneasily in the chair. He continued in a more subdued voice, ‘You might at least tell me why the Ministry should have chosen this particular moment to pounce. It couldn’t have come at a more awkward time for me personally.’

Haileybury reflected that most times were awkward for Trevose personally. ‘I fancy people had to decide when matters had gone a little too far,’ he declared. He paused and added, ‘As I have been frank, will you perhaps let me make my motives clear?’

Graham nodded curtly.

‘I assure you there was no suggestion of spite on my part. Surely you don’t really think that of me? Not in your heart? There was no spite on anybody’s part. But medicine is entering upon difficult times. You must know that, if only from the newspapers. When we raise our eyes from the war, what do we see? The future of our profession is in the balance. The politicos are concocting a large number of recipes for cooking our goose, believe you me. There’s talk of forcing us into some sort of State health scheme—pure socialism.’ Haileybury seemed to shudder. ‘That would never do. We should lose our professional freedom. We should become mere civil serants, with the Government our taskmaster. The doctor-patient relationship, as we have known it for centuries, would be lost for ever.’

‘All that’s nothing to do with me.’

‘But it is.’ Haileybury leaned forward earnestly, his eyes shining. ‘We shall have to fight these people. Fight them at every turn. And what shall be our weapons? We shall need every scrap of dignity, of integrity, of professional correctitude that we can muster. We must make it plain to the public that we stand above the ordinary commercial motives of life, that we seek no vainglory for ourselves, that we have no thought but for the welfare of our patients. None of us must falter—or appear to falter—from the rigorous discipline we have imposed on ourselves. None of us! We must fight not as individuals, but as a profession. Oh, politicians are slippery people, Trevose. I know. I’ve had dealings with plenty of them. We mustn’t give them the smallest stick to beat us with.’

Graham replied by holding his hands before his face. ‘So that is why these must be lost to the country like a torpedoed munition ship?’

‘You’re taking too dramatic a view, as usual,’ said Haileybury shortly. ‘Your unit will continue as before. That Canadian Tudor Beverley is a perfectly sound man. You should be the first to admit that none of us are indispensable. If I may say so, in peacetime you had rather a procession of assistants. Anyway, you remain on the staff of Blackfriars. Some beds will be found for you, either at Smithers Botham or elsewhere. Perhaps the Ministry of Pensions would have something to offer. You might like to know that I have made a point of assuring myself you wouldn’t be left in the cold.’

‘I am not going to treat a single casualty outside the unit that I have built up.’

‘Then I fear you will find little else to do. Women are not given much to having their faces remodelled these days.’

‘You’re wrong.’ Graham got up. ‘Once released from my contract, I’m allowed to take on as much private practice as I can handle. Right? Well, women are continuing to give a great deal of thought to the new area I’m treating. I’ve been working with O’Rory at Smithers Botham on a reconstruction procedure for congenital absence of the vagina. It isn’t a particularly unusual condition, you know. The operation’s extremely interesting. You dissect the pelvic tissues from below, then put in a skin-graft on a mould. Sometimes it takes, sometimes it doesn’t. You have to cut the graft extra thin or you’ll get a crop of hair, which would be highly uncomfortable for all concerned. So, Haileybury. You don’t want me. Nobody does. I shall therefore spend the rest of the war making new pussies.’

Without another word he clattered down the oak staircase and out to his Morris. The sergeant stared after him anxiously. Whatever had happened, it seemed likely to put the brigadier in one of his moods.

Graham wanted to leave the annex as soon as possible. Tudor Beverley and his staff offered to resign
en block,
but Graham wouldn’t hear of it. Desmond, who seemed more shocked by his father’s dismissal than by his second stab at paternity, suggested he withdraw from the Blackfriars medical school—the ridicule was liable to break out afresh, he suspected inwardly. Graham told him not to be stupid. His patients suggested getting up a petition, but Graham knew that official minds couldn’t be swayed by even a snowstorm of paper. Anyway, he was suddenly weary of battling with authority. He’d lost, and he wanted to leave the field, just as soon as he could tidy up his work.

Clare was wonderful. Her practical mind stood rocklike amid their sea of troubles. She decided they would move somewhere for the span of her pregnancy, perhaps up to Scotland. They could enjoy a wonderful holiday until the baby was born—Graham had no need to start work, they’d saved a bit, and she’d a little money of her own. The divorce could surely be left in the hands of the solicitors. Graham agreed with everything. He felt he wanted the child desperately. It would be an achievement, a symbol of defiance, something to show for his existence. Without a regular achievement of some sort, he doubted if he could live at all.

Then they killed Bluey.

It was stupid, unnecessary, almost criminal. A couple of years of Graham’s surgery had the Australian looking more or less like a human being. Better still, his hands were mending splendidly. He had a pair of new thumbs made from chips of his hip-bone, he could light cigarettes, hold a tankard, even fondle a girl. A small operation was still needed to trim the inside of his lip. John Bickley again gave an injection, and slipped the rubber tube into his windpipe. To stop the blood from Graham’s incision trickling into his patient’s lungs, John packed the back of Bluey’s throat with a length of oiled bandage. It was common practice, performed on patients every operating day. Afterwards, John drew out the tube and forgot the bandage. They wheeled Bluey back to bed. The nurse who found him dusky and straining to breathe wasted away his life trying artificial respiration. John was summoned, and instantly ripped out the bandage which was suffocating him. But it was too late. Two years in hospital had so enfeebled Bluey that the survior of a blazing Hurricane succumbed to lack of oxygen as readily as a baby.

John went back to the theatre and told Graham. The surgeon dropped his instruments, left the operation to Tudor Beverley, and strode out to sit alone in his office. John hesitated. He had better face him. At the end of the case he followed Graham to the hut, and found him in tears.

‘It was a terrible mistake,’ John admitted at once. ‘I just don’t know how it happened.’

Graham said nothing. .

‘I’m always so careful about the throat-packs, Graham —you know I am. I’ve had nightmares about leaving one in. I’ve been half afraid something like this might come about, ever since the unit started.’

Graham wearily moved the glass bottle containing the soldier’s tattoo. ‘And after all the poor devil went through,’ he muttered.

‘I can’t begin to say how sorry I am.’ Graham again made no response. ‘But it’s awfully difficult, you know, with two tables in the theatre. Without any proper assistants. I’ve told the nurses time and time again to feel for the throat-pack at the first sign of trouble afterwards. The nurse in charge of Bluey was new. She let us down.’

‘If you’re going to make excuses, don’t shift the blame on to some poor girl who at the moment is too frightened to speak.’

‘I’m not making excuses,’ said John patiently. ‘I’m only putting the facts.’

‘Whose responsibility is it?’

John shrugged. ‘Of course, mine. Ultimately, as the anaesthetist in charge of the case. I’m not denying that.’

‘Of course you’re making excuses,’ Graham told him angrily. ‘You’re always making excuses, whenever you make a mess of it with a patient. If you give a perivenal injection, the vein was abnormal. If you break a needle, it was a faulty one. If your oxygen cylinder runs out, you told the orderly to change it. I only hope you’ll find the coroner a more sympathetic listener.’

‘I’m perfectly prepared to answer whatever the coroner feels like asking me,’ John retaliated. ‘I've nothing to hide.’

Graham made an impatient gesture. ‘Oh, you’ll come out of the inquest with your skin. Unavoidable mistake, pressure of work, patient’s difficult airway. You’ll continue with your job here as though nothing had happened.
I
shan’t even be here to inconvenience you. You and Denise can go on putting out poisonous gossip about me, as much as you care. That probably helped to get me sacked, if you looked into it.’

‘It’s not fair to say that, Graham,’ John told him patiently.

‘It may not be, but it’s the truth and you know it Denise doesn’t like me. She never has.’

‘If Denise has sometimes been... well, indiscreet,’ John admitted, ‘she’s been careful nothing could go further. Not outside the hospital. But now you’re talking as if we were sworn enemies. Of course we’re not. You’re imagining things. Haven’t we been friends, you and I, close friends, for years? Ever since the E.N.T. days? We’ve been through enough together, God knows. We’ve lost patients before.’ He hesitated. ‘We’ve even covered up for each other before. I wouldn’t like to think that, however tragic, this incident meant the end of our personal relationship.’

‘Be that as it may, but never in your life will you give another anaesthetic for me,’ Graham told him angrily. ‘At this particular moment, I doubt if that strikes you as much of a penalty. I’m down, I know it. But I won’t stay down. When the war’s over there’ll be fifty anaesthetists in London breaking their necks chasing after my work. I’m going to make my fortune again. And this time you won’t get ten per cent of it. Now please leave me in peace.’