The Swan Song of Doctor Malloy (13 page)

‘How's Irene?' I ask, glad, in the midst of everything else, to have remembered our recent phone conversation.

‘Oh, God, don't ask. I mean, thanks, but I'm just having too much of everything at the moment,' he replies, brushing my concern aside with the wave of a hand.

‘The bloody research assessment exercise is looming again, Anthony. Five years' work judged on your four best publications. What an absurd way to gauge anyone's worth. No way to run a sweetshop let alone an academic community.'

This, I know, is his hobbyhorse, something he feels strongly about. He waves the letter around to emphasise his point.

‘But this, this is very good news,' he says with genuine enthusiasm. ‘The very thing to resuscitate our international standing. Not to mention our cash flow. I've spoken to the Dean and there's no problem about your leave of absence. Take as long as you need. It's precisely the kind of thing he wants to see happening, especially with the backing you've secured.'

I force a smile. I should be ecstatic. This is all I have worked towards. But the circumstances are not quite as I anticipated. This forced march which should have been a trail of glory. A gun to my head, rather than the road to Nirvana. Then I think of Caitlin, imagine her terror, her isolation, her dependence on my actions. And I think of Warren and all the others with their hopes and fears.

‘Yes, it couldn't have worked out better,' I say, trying to sound convincing.

‘And they appear to be covering all the expenses. Is that your reading of the situation?' quizzes Blake, wishing in the front, the back and the middle of his mind he had never set eyes on Fiona's firm young body, had never set in motion the journey to his own very personal tragedy.

‘Yes, sure. My meeting in Brighton with Dr Foster, the rep I told you about, left me feeling confident all is in order.'

‘And a contract?'

‘Yes, they're sending it through early next week from their head of research in Geneva.'

‘And what's in it for them?'

I swallow. What indeed? The phone on Blake's desk rings. He ignores it. After the fourth ring it goes dead.

‘It's part of their public relations drive. To put them to the fore,' I say, repeating Dr Foster's mantra. ‘They need to establish a track record of promoting worthy scientific causes.'

‘No doubts?'

‘None really,' I say, doubt and worry seeping from every cell of my body.

The letter appended to my memo to Peter Blake was drafted by Mary Foster, and countersigned by her boss. It explains the company's interest and the intention of involving emerging scientists and laboratories from various continents. In this way the endeavour will be truly international and gain the support and backing of major worldwide donors. Design and production is to be a truly international venture. A model example of developed nations collaborating and working alongside the so-called ‘developing world'.

‘They know all the right people,' continues Blake, ‘solid links at all the proposed pilot test site regions. Dr Soytan in Bangkok, Professor Sanchez in Guadalajara, Dr Gomez in Bogotá. All world-class laboratories. They're well networked for such a new company.'

‘They certainly are,' I agree, remembering my last conversation with Mary Foster, when she told me they had bought, or could buy, anyone they chose, within reason. ‘They have a huge communications resource. The company portfolio lists some very influential people and they have all the backup from Doreale.'

‘I've read this letter over several times. There really don't seem to be any catches. They're really interested in you,' replies Blake, waving the paper before him like a backbencher in a Parliamentary debate. ‘You're to get your chance to make a real impression. To make a real contribution.'

What an irony. With Blake's words I see my immediate future. I am standing astride a globe holding my syringe: the scientist with the solution, the interventionist with the means to stifle the spread of disease and death. In this left hand I hold the technology, the means to promote change. In my right hand I hold a fistful of potent seeds that will flower innocently under a South American sun, reaching towards the warmth to grow strong and virile, yielding a powerful and encaging sap that will be powdered and processed to flow into the veins of drug users around the world. Heroin, as valuable as gold dust. Transported by any means imaginable and a few more. Swallowed in condoms by would-be tourists, moulded into chess pieces and packaged in wooden crates, stuffed into hollow pipes of industrial machinery. And there, at Heathrow airport in London, waiting in the queue for passport control, a mother cradles a baby in her arms. It is swaddled in a shawl knitted in a village near the Magdalena River. The shawl hides the stitching in the dead baby's side, where its innards have been scooped out and kilo after kilo of high-potency heroin is compacted against its ribs, like a turkey for Thanksgiving. Stay calm, young lady, the baby's not going to cry and there are ten thousand dollars waiting at the hotel in South Kensington. I shudder and look down at my hands. One to hold fruit, one to carry poison. The syringe to save lives; drugs to kill. Yin and yang, black and white, and all points between.

‘Well,' says Blake. ‘This all looks extremely promising. For you and for us, the lab. We can all benefit. We can all grow. Time for a drink.'

‘Thank you for your support, Peter. In everything. The recent business with the treatment centre. I really appreciate how you dealt with it. I know you've got your own problems, so I'm doubly grateful.'

I look at the old professor, worn down by marital mayhem, remorse, guilt and failure, yet still genuinely pleased for me and my success. He lifts the whiskey bottle from the shelf and takes two tumblers from his desk drawer.

‘Ah,' he says smiling, small lines creasing in the corners of his eyes, ‘mineral water for you, young man. We can't have you wrecking the place.'

And we both laugh as he turns back to the shelf for a bottle of sparkling water. Peter pours me a water and then fills his tumbler with a generous measure of spirit. We clink glasses as the phone rings again. I notice a large vein ebb and flow at his temple as he picks up the receiver.

‘Tell her … tell my wife … no, Jean … it's okay. I'll speak to her.'

I finish my drink, raise my hand in salutation and stand to leave. Blake presses the phone so close to his ear it might snap.

‘I'll see you soon,' I mouth silently, as I turn and head for the door.

As I leave the room I hear a long sigh and the thud of his fist on the table.

‘What oil? What oil?'

Caitlin lies on her left side, facing the wall. This is how she stays. ‘In the wall is the world. In the world is the wall,' she thinks. She hears the footsteps of one of the guards about to open the door. There are two guards. Both men. She has seen their faces, but now she chooses not to. Neither the One with Eyebrows, nor the One without Eyebrows. Over the days, one comes, one goes. The One with Eyebrows says words, smells of tobacco. The One without Eyebrows says nothing, smells of sweat. The One with Eyebrows brings milk to show it is morning; the One without Eyebrows brings pizza to show it is night. Above are footsteps. Then no footsteps. Voices. Then no voices.

I can't see the rain because the curtains are drawn – even though it's still before noon – but I hear it lashing against the window. I stare at the familiar painting on the wall. Not the pastel one with the huge flowers that makes me think of triffids. That is on the other wall. To see that one I have to turn my head. And I try to avoid turning my head in case she reads something into it. Instead I listen to the rain and stare at the grey painting of an open door and a dark-green uninviting garden beyond. I think about the Aftercare Meeting due to start at lunch time and my resolve to get there today.

‘I wonder why,' continues the voice I know so well, in this book-lined room with the clock ticking the seconds away, ‘you so often finish a sentence by stating
it doesn't matter?'

‘What do you mean?' I reply from the couch, my stare now fixed on the reflection made on the ceiling by the curtain rail, painfully aware the rumpled curtains look like nipples.

‘Well,' she says, ‘just now when you told me you felt responsible for everyone – your daughter, your sister, your ex-wife – and that you could never tell where the boundaries should be, you ended by saying that
it doesn't matter.
And before, when you have described the way you never expect your relationships with women to last, you often say things like: I
would have liked to have accepted their love, but it doesn't matter;
or else,
I felt alone and sad, but it doesn't matter.
So, just now when you said
it doesn't matter
I wondered what you were feeling?'

I like this analyst. She often says more in one session than my previous analyst, a mean little man who grimaced as if in constant pain, would say in a month. I also like the fact her eyes seem to change colour on different occasions and she has a wise smile. I am convinced she is a highly evolved soul who has travelled many lives in many guises, with an understanding and wisdom I want to attain: by osmosis, by default, by cheque.

Ever since things started to go really badly with Matilda, I have come to this room for my hour (well, fifty minutes) of psychotherapy. I had read a book where an eminent psychoanalyst recounted his ten favourite cases, or most successful analyses, or some such thing. Anyway, in one of these, the therapist was approached by a seventy-year-old man who had been unhappy for the past fifteen years since the death of his wife. He wanted the therapist to get to the bottom of his inability to accept the loss, and he gave him six months to do the job. Inspired by this, I decided to embark on a similar mission. It was the quick fix I was after. Dorothy had smiled (knowingly, as it transpired), and said she would take me on and see how it went. So, here I am, over a year later, still hauling myself onto the couch, still trying not to see nipples in the curtains.

I wonder how to tell her I might have to go away. I know once I do that the rest of the session will be filled with discussion on how I feel about the break. It is not what I want to talk about just now. I want to come clean about lying to her about my recent absence, where I told her the same story about the ‘retreat' that I used with my work colleagues. I want to tell her how I still sometimes feel lost and bereft without my drink and drugs: my very best friends. Especially now I am so raw about the Caitlin thing. And I want to tell her about Caitlin and Lottie and how my heart is breaking. But there's not time. Not just now. Not for me. I look at the clock without moving my head, so as not to attract her attention. Only ten minutes left. Better get on with it and take the medicine.

‘Actually,' I say quietly, ‘I may have to go away for work for a couple of months or so. So I might not be coming to see you for a while.'

There is a short pause. She shifts in her chair and asks in a soft and soothing voice, ‘I wonder …'

In the road next to the therapist is an organic fruit shop. I've promised to bring desert for tonight's dinner with Lottie and Matilda, so I choose some blueberries, strawberries and Greek yoghurt. For good measure I buy a big bunch of tulips. As I leave the shop I notice my bus has just left the stop on the corner. I watch it disappear down the hill to the high road, realising the next one isn't due for half an hour. Walking towards the bus shelter I pass by the pub that I've noticed many times, but never entered. The doors are wide open. The pub looks so inviting, what with the sunlight streaming in, lighting up the rows of bottles behind the bar. A red-haired woman is the only person in the lounge. The smoke from the woman's cigarette floats along the sunbeam, like a genie beckoning me to come inside. As she puts a coin in the slot and I hear the record drop onto the turntable, I make a decision. I step into the bar, all the wisdom of my therapist, all thoughts of sobriety and Aftercare Meetings, left firmly on the pavement outside.

The bartender is in the corner, reading a newspaper. He puts his paper down and walks over to where I stand. All I learned at the Friary dissipates into the ether. All my resolve melts away and I find myself defenceless against that first drink that will send me to God knows where. The barman stands before me.

‘Pint of Guinness,' I say, putting the bags down, leaning against the bar, listening to Elvis and the Hound Dog, a slight sweat breaking out on the palms of my hands.

Time has passed by. I know, because it is dark. The pub is full and noisy. The tulips are wilting in the cigarette smoke, and the fruit is fermenting in the plastic shopping bags. I drift in and out of blackout. The red-haired woman is resting on my shoulder. She tries to light her cigarette, but cannot get the flame from her lighter to connect. She nods her head forward and nearly sets fire to her eyebrows. I look around through bleary eyes. The table in front of us is full of empty beer and whiskey glasses; the ashtray overflows with cigarette butts. This woman, who I barely recognize, puts her hand on my thigh and asks me if the flowers are for her.

‘Did you buy them for me?' she slurs, her mouth wide open, her eyelids barely parted.

I look down at the orange petals, drooping and dull. Then I notice her shoes. The leather uppers are torn and scuffed. On one shoe the sole has come away. Around us people are talking and laughing, but I see them only as blurred photographs, snapshots, as if a strobe light is circling the room, picking out a face here, a smile there. I lift my hand in front of my eyes. The index and middle finger are stained by nicotine. I do not know this hand, this place, this woman with dyed-red hair who leans on my shoulder and says words I cannot decipher.

‘Do you want to then?' I finally hear her say.

Her face is older than I remember, and I know nothing about her.