Surgeon at Arms (22 page)

Alec was not sick into his soup, but he broke a wine glass, talked continuously and extremely loudly, and told obscene stories. Desmond recognized his invitation as a terrible mistake. He wondered for the first time if his cousin really were a psychopath, a manic-depressive, something like that. He certainly suffered the most alarming swings of mood. At other times he could be solitary, silent, gloomy, and savage. The only course was to get him safely to bed in the college’s guest-room. Further discussion about the money must wait until the morning.

But in the morning Alec had gone.

He woke in the dark, had no notion of the time, found his watch was stopped, and felt possessed with the idea of going down to London. The college porter let him out and he started his car. He hadn’t even shaved. It was fight when he reached Felicity’s house in Chelsea. There were few people about. He remembered it was Sunday. He rang the bell. Nothing happened. He stood back from the door and started to shout. A grizzled head appeared at an upstairs window. He recognized Air Marshal Sir Giles Perrins, K.C.B., D.S.O., D.F.C. and bar.

‘What the hell do you think you’re up to?’ demanded the householder.

‘I’ve come to see Felicity.’

‘Oh, it’s you. Well, clear off. Neither Felicity nor anyone here wants to set eyes on you again.’

‘I demand to see my future wife.’

‘For God’s sake, man! Get away, will you? You know perfectly well my daughter wishes to have nothing whatever to do with you.’

‘Felicity agreed to marry me.’

‘Please, please be reasonable. You’re just causing trouble for yourself and all of us. Felicity never said anything of the kind. You know that as well as I do.’

‘You’re deliberately keeping her from me.’

‘Do go away, there’s a good chap. You’re disturbing the neighbourhood. It’s terribly early.’

‘I demand admittance.’

‘Oh, clear off, you stupid little bastard.’

‘How dare you speak to me like that! I am a healer. I demand the respect to which I am entitled.’

There was a milk-bottle on the step. Alec picked it up and threw it into the closed downstairs window. He thought the crash sounded very satisfactory.

The rest of his morning was confused. There were policemen, the Air Marshal, even Felicity in the background, in her dressing-gown. People kept holding him down. They were persecuting him terribly. They wouldn’t listen, however much he tried to explain. There was another man, very worried. He was a doctor, he explained. ‘Now calm down, old man, calm down,’ he implored. ‘Look what a mess you’ve made of this sitting-room.’

‘I didn’t make the mess,’ Alec protested violently. ‘They made it, they’re trying to discredit me. It’s all a plot. What’s that?’ he demanded.

‘It’s only a syringe. I think you’d benefit from a sedative.’

‘You’re trying to poison me.’

‘No, I’m not. You’ll recognize the need for it yourself when you recover.’

‘Recover? I’m not ill. Everyone’s against me. Oh God, everyone’s always against me.’

Alec suddenly felt he couldn’t be bothered with these unpleasant persons any longer. Drowsiness overcame him. He’d had a tiring few hours, he had to agree. People seemed to be moving him. He let them have their way. He’d let them persecute him. He’d lost the will to resist. He was lying on his back, moving along. In something, a car. Surely not an ambulance, he wasn’t in the slightest ill. He was still on his back, in the fresh air again. His surroundings struck him as familiar. The flat dome, the smoke-belching minarets, the magnificent portico. Smithers Botham. They wheeled him to the block which had quartered the Emergency Squad, one of the first sections of the hospital returned to rightful use.

‘Hello, Alec.’

He looked up. It was Dr Dency, long fingers playing with the little gold bars of his watch-chain as usual.

‘Don’t worry, Alec. We’ll look after you. You’ll be all right here.’

‘Home again,’ said Alec simply. ‘Yes, I always liked this place.’

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

I’M SORRY I’M LATE,’ Graham apologized. ‘I had to go out to Smithers Botham. My nephew Alec was admitted there yesterday.’

‘I’m sorry to hear that,’ said Haileybury. ‘Nothing serious, I hope?’

‘No, not too alarming. He’s in the psychiatric block as a voluntary patient. Dency’s looking after him. Alec’s landed himself in a bit of trouble. He’s been behaving rather oddly recently, I must say. I expect they’ll get him straightened out. I gather they’ve some new drugs coming in for this manic-depressive business, which should help the poor fellow.’

‘Nevertheless, it must be very disturbing for you.’

‘It is.’ Graham sat down. ‘I thought we had enough mental illness in the family with my wife. God knows where Alec inherited it from. Though his father could be peculiar enough when he liked. Missionary or not, there were one or two stories about him I shouldn’t care to repeat.’

‘No, no, of course not,’ said Haileybury hastily. ‘Anyway, every family’s got one or two mad ones in it, if you look closely enough. Not that Alec’s certifiable, anything like that. He just needs watching for a while. He’s grown into a peculiar young man all round. And I’m more or less responsible for him, with his mother in America. At least, I promised her as much. She’s a pleasant woman. You’ve never met her?’

Haileybury gave a faint smile. ‘Indeed I have, Graham. You seem to forget she was our secretary at the plastic hospital near Ramsgate in 1918.’

Graham laughed. ‘I could be forgiven for the lapse, surely? Water had poured over the dam with frightening speed since then. Then you’ll also remember I was having a violent love affair with her at the time?’

‘I don’t think we need go into that now,’ said Haileybury amiably.

He’s mellowing pleasantly with the years, Graham thought. In those days of far-off passion, he tried to lose me my first chance of a decent job over it. He isn’t a bad fellow, really. At least he isn’t a hypocrite. As most doctors are obliged to be—half the time for the good of their patients, and the other half for the good of themselves.

‘What can I do for you, Eric?’ he asked.

They were sitting in Haileybury’s club, in the same corner of the morning-room as at the beginning of the war. Haileybury was wearing his usual plain blue suit. Graham could never remember him in anything else. It was early evening, and Haileybury signalled the club waiter to buy Graham a drink for the second time in his life.

‘I gather you met Butcher the other evening?’ Haileybury asked.

‘I bumped into him at a party.’

‘I also gather he said something to you about my scheme for a national burns unit?’ Graham nodded. ‘Would you like to hear more about it? If you don’t, if you think it might bore you, if it’s a notion you couldn’t feel interested in, do please say so. We'll just drop the subject, have a gossip instead. I shan’t be in the slightest offended. I’ve talked about it to so many people, I can’t expect all of them to share my enthusiasm.’

‘I should be very Interested indeed. I suppose I must by now have handled more burns than most people.’ Haileybury nodded slowly. To Graham’s surprise he produced a briefcase and laid it on the table. A man like Haileybury would not encumber himself with a showy accessory unless he felt most strongly about its contents. Haileybury extracted some papers.

‘These are my ideas reduced to writing. You may like to take them and study them at leisure.’ Graham found himself with a thick bundle of closely typed foolscap. ‘Since I first talked to Butcher I have raised my sights somewhat. With the Government, the more you ask for the more you get. I see it as a centre devoted to the surgery of accidents in its widest sense. Motor accidents, accidents in the home, industrial accidents. This last, I think, gives me the most confidence of success. It strongly appeals to the trade-union element in the Government. Nobody’s really bothered to specialize in the surgery of industry before. To my mind, the need is just as pressing as specializing in the surgery of war.’

‘I’m sure you’re right.’

‘I understand that Bevan himself is very keen on the idea.’

‘But when’s it all going to materialize?’ Graham asked. ‘After all, the Government’s already committed to taking the profession by the ears and shaking it out of all recognition in the next few months. It’s supposed to be building health centres everywhere like luxury cinemas. It’s got half the hospitals in the country damaged by air-raids, and the other half falling to bits anyway. When are they going to create your shining new palace? I’m sure the idea will come to something one fine day, Eric, but I’m afraid you and Nye Bevan and I shan’t be here to attend the opening ceremony.’

‘It already exists,’ said Haileybury quietly.

The waiter brought their drinks. As he retired, Haileybury added, ‘It exists less than twenty miles from where we are sitting. To be precise, near Iver, in Buckinghamshire. Extremely convenient for London.’ Graham frowned. He couldn’t recall such a place. ‘Has some genie waved the magic wand?’

‘No, but the Americans have. They built a hospital there during the war. It took them, I believe, a matter of some weeks. They are not a people for procrastination. Now the Americans are going home, the building stands there stripped and empty. There seems no obstacle to our taking it over. It is a perfectly adequate structure, single-storey wards, room for five hundred beds. The design of the operating theatres is quite remarkable. There are one or two peculiar features—a soda-fountain, for instance—which can easily be removed. I gather the price will be nominal, particularly if we call it the “Franklin D. Roosevelt Hospital”, something of that nature.’

‘That sounds a pleasant windfall,’- said Graham thoughtfully. What would you want me to do? Serve on some committee to raise funds for the equipment?’

‘I would want you to head the staff.’

Graham looked up. He had imagined that Haileybury’s interest in the hospital came at least partly from the glory of running it himself. ‘But what about you?’ Haileybury shrugged his shoulders. ‘You would be the better man.’

‘Aren’t you rather carrying modesty to extremes?’ Graham found himself faintly irritated by Haileybury’s honesty. It was something of an affront. ‘You’re the one who’s preached for years that plastic surgery was essentially the surgery of repair. As for rue, I’m a beauty-doctor, a face-faker?’

‘And that, if I may say so, is a rather over-modest view of your work during the war.’

‘I thought you imagined my work during the war was grabbing publicity?’

‘I did imagine it at the time,’ Haileybury told him frankly, ‘but I was wrong. I didn’t understand the importance of the cosmetic work you were doing. I make all the apologies you feel you deserve. It was difficult, confined to administrative tasks. I was too far from individual patients. I came to appreciate only late in the war how much you did for morale.’ He tapped the table with his long forefinger. ‘And that is what we need in this new place of mine. Someone to make plain that those mutilated by the hazards of peace can be treated as effectively as those mutilated by the hazards of war.’

‘But Eric! This is an enormous job you’re asking me to take on. There’re all manner of questions for me to decide first.’

‘At least the financial question will decide itself. As director, you would draw the appropriate consultant’s salary in the new health service. Plus a merit award» doubtless, if that part of the scheme goes through.’

‘But what time have I for such responsibilities? Don’t forget I’ve a busy private practice.’

‘I regret that private practice would not enter into it. The post would be full-time. You know how strongly the Government feels on such points.’

‘Then I’m afraid it’s out of the question.’

‘Do you know, Graham, it’s the second time you have used that expression to me sitting exactly in this spot?’

Graham smiled. ‘I’m sorry. I much appreciate the honour you’ve paid me, but I must look to my own interests. I’ve landed myself with a hell of a lot of debts, to be paid off somehow before I’m too old to work at all. I’d love to accept, Eric, the idea’s got tremendous attraction, it would be like the annex all over again. But I’m afraid it’s just not on.’

‘Last time, I made the mistake of pressing you for a decision. I shall not repeat it. There is plenty of time— months, perhaps a year, perhaps two. Any moment you feel inclined to discuss the matter further, lift a telephone. Will you promise?’

‘Very well,’ Graham told him amicably. ‘I’ll keep it constantly before me. Should I undergo a change of heart you’ll hear at once.’

‘Excellent. Now let us drop the subject and talk about something else. Very sad, don’t you think, Graham, the prospects for the coming county cricket season?’

Graham quickly put the offer out of his mind. A salaried post, he decided, would be far more suitable for a man of modest tastes like Haileybury himself. But even Haileybury indulged in a little private practice. He did operations every Saturday morning in a small hospital near the Crystal Palace, which during the war had somehow fallen under the domination of his own in London, King Alfred’s, and afterwards never escaped. It had few private beds, the theatres were antiquated, but the nursing was sound and the general atmosphere Haileybury found agreeably modest. John Bickley was a consultant to the hospital and generally gave Haileybury’s anaesthetics, though regretting that Haileybury didn’t take the same wide view of operating fees as Graham.