Living Death

by Graham Masterton

  He opened the door of the woman’s room. It was completely dark in there, so he groped for the light-switch and turned on the overhead light. A young red-haired women was lying in bed at the side of the room. Her eyes were closed but she was honking and moaning and it was obvious that she wasn’t asleep. John approached her and touched her bare shoulder, and she flinched, but she kept on honking, and gave him no indication at all that she knew he was there.

  She was quite pretty, with a heart-shaped face and freckles across the bridge of her nose, and John guessed that she couldn’t have been older than fifteen or sixteen.

  ‘Can you hear me?’ he asked her.

  She didn’t answer, so he leaned over her and spoke clearly and loudly in her left ear. ‘Can you hear me at all?’

  He waited, but she still didn’t respond, so he assumed that she was either deaf or mentally impaired. He laid his hand on her shoulder again, trying to make her aware that he was here, and that he had come to help her. It was then that she lifted her left arm out from underneath the blanket, and he saw that her hand had been amputated, and she had nothing on the end of her arm but a smooth round wrist. He raised the blanket and saw that her right hand, too, had been amputated.

  He took a staggering step back. At the end of the bed the blanket was lying flat, so he lifted it up there. Both of the girl’s feet had been amputated, ending at the ankles.

  John didn’t have to see any more. He couldn’t guess how many disabled people Dr Fitzgerald was keeping in his clinic altogether, but it was enough for him to have seen two – especially since one of them had nodded his assent that it had been Dr Fitzgerald who had mutilated him.

  He left the girl’s room, closing the door as quietly as he could, and started to walk back towards the staircase. He had almost reached it when he heard the front door open, and voices in the hallway, a man and a woman’s. He couldn’t distinctly hear what they were saying at first, but he recognised Grainne’s voice.

  They came nearer to the bottom of the staircase. He slowly retreated, still holding on to the wall to keep his balance.

  ‘So who brought him here?’ asked the man.

  ‘He has a young female carer,’ said Grainne. ‘She works for Caremark, but I think she took it on herself to take care of him because he’s a good-looking feen and she felt fierce sorry for him. But now she’s finding him too much to cope with.’

  ‘It’s the same old story, isn’t it? People never realise how taxing it’s going to be, looking after a chronically disabled person day and night, week in and week out. And if they take good care of them, and don’t conveniently allow them to die of thirst, or malnutrition, or the bedsores – well, it can seem like they have to take care of them for ever.’

  ‘He’s here, in the reception room,’ said Grainne, opening the door. ‘John – Dr Fitzgerald is back! Give him a moment to take off his coat and he’ll be with you directly.’

  John backed further away, along the corridor. He was grinding his teeth, which he always did when he was stressed. Maybe there was another way out of here, a servants’ staircase, a fire escape, something like that, but even if there was, it would be almost impossible for him to get away on his stumps. It would be agonisingly painful, too.

  He heard Grainne say, ‘He’s not there. Gearoid! I left him waiting in the reception room.’

  ‘Maybe he went to water the horses.’

  ‘But his wheelchair’s still here. He’s lost his legs from the knees downwards. I didn’t think for a moment that he could walk.’

  Grainne walked to the end of the hallway, opened a door, closed it, and then came back again. ‘No, he’s not in there. Dermot!’

  ‘What is it now?’

  ‘Have you seen a feen with no legs walking around?’

  ‘No, but I once saw a feller with no fingers scratching his arse.’

  ‘Oh, for the love of Jesus, Dermot, this isn’t funny. He was supposed to be waiting in the reception room for Dr Fitzgerald to come back from town, but now he’s not there any more.’

  ‘Maybe he got tired of waiting and just decided he’d had enough.’

  ‘What, and walked out, without any legs? Head off, will you.’

  It was then that Dr Fitzgerald said, ‘Maybe he heard some of the patients calling out. You know what a Godawful racket they can make. Maybe he went upstairs to see what all the noise was about. If he’s thinking of being admitted here, after all, he’d want to find out what he was letting himself in for, wouldn’t he? I use earplugs myself, at night, especially when it’s a full moon and Dermot turns himself into a werewolf.’

  His words may have sounded like banter, but even from up here on the landing John could tell by his tone of voice that Dr Fitzgerald was irritated, and very serious. He had no doubt at all that he would be coming upstairs in a moment, just to make sure that John hadn’t been poking around. If he was running a major drugs-smuggling racket, as Katie suspected, he wouldn’t be the kind of man who left anything to chance.

  John retreated further down the corridor, opening one door after another. In each gloomy room, there was a hospital bed, and somebody lying in it, either asleep and snoring or awake and moaning. At the end of the corridor there was a green stained-glass window with a wistful-looking merrow on it, sitting on a rock. Next to that, a door led into Dr Fitzgerald’s operating room, with its stainless-steel sink and its stainless-steel side-table and its cases of surgical instruments. John could hear footsteps coming up the stairs, so he hobbled into this room and closed the door. If he stood close to the wall behind the door, and somebody opened it to take a quick sconce inside, maybe they wouldn’t see him, especially since there were so many surgical gowns hanging on the back of it.

  His stumps were hurting badly now, and he had to take a few seconds to squeeze his eyes tight shut and try to suppress the pain. When it had eased a little, he took his mobile phone out of his pocket and dialled Katie’s number.

  He could see that her phone was ringing, but she didn’t answer. Please let her not be driving, or in a meeting, or interrogating somebody. I need her now.

  He dialled her number a second time. Now he could hear footsteps coming along the corridor, and doors opening and closing. Dr Fitzgerald must be looking into each patient’s room to see if he was there.

  ‘John?’ said Katie. ‘What is it? I’m at CUH. We’re just about to start filming our video.’

  ‘I’m at St Giles’ Clinic,’ John whispered.

  ‘What? Could you speak up, please? There’s an awful lot of people talking at once and I can’t hear you.’

  ‘I’m at St Giles’ Clinic,’ he repeated, but only a little louder.

  ‘What in the name of God are you doing there? Where’s Bridie?’

  ‘Bridie’s gone shopping.’

  ‘What? She’s left you at St Giles’ Clinic and gone shopping? Are you codding me, John?’

  ‘No, darling. I’m stone-cold serious. I persuaded Bridie to fetch me here. I thought it would save you having to raid the place.’

  ‘John, I can’t believe what you’re telling me. Please say that this is a joke.’

  ‘I’ve seen them for myself, Katie. There’s a fellow here who can’t speak and it looks like he might have been blinded, and there’s a young girl with no hands and no feet. I haven’t had time to check them all, but you can hear them screaming and crying and wailing. I tell you, it sounds like Purgatory.’

  ‘You have to get out of there now, John. I mean it. Get out of there now and ring Bridie and tell her to come back and pick you up, urgent. I’ll call her myself, too.’

  ‘I can’t get out. Dr Fitzgerald’s come back and he’s looking for me.’

  ‘So where are you?’

  ‘I’m hiding myself in some kind of an operating room, upstairs.’

  ‘Then stay there. I have two surveillance officers directly outside and they’ll come in to get you right now. Stay there and don’t move but if Dr Fitzgerald finds you and wants to know what you’re d
oing there, don’t say a word. Act like you can’t speak. For God’s sake don’t tell him that you were looking around for evidence.’

  John said, ‘I’ve fucked this up, haven’t I?’

  ‘Don’t worry about that,’ said Katie. ‘Just stay where you are and keep this phone open. I’m having Pádraigin call the surveillance officers right this second.’

  John was about to describe to Katie exactly where he was, in the room next to the stained-glass window, when the door opened and Dr Fitzgerald came in. He was still wearing his long black raincoat and from John’s point of view he appeared so tall and attenuated with his hawklike nose and his swept-back hair that he could have been a vampire.

  John pressed himself back against the wall but Dr Fitzgerald turned around and saw him immediately.

  ‘Who are you and who are you talking to?’ he snapped, in his dry, schoolmasterly voice.

  John said nothing, so Dr Fitzgerald came up to him and twisted his mobile phone out of his hand. His fingers were long and very strong and John was too weakened by his medication to resist him.

  Dr Fitzgerald peered at the screen with his lips tightly pursed and then he held the phone up to his ear.

  ‘John?’ said Katie. ‘John, what’s happening? The surveillance officers won’t be more than a couple of minutes.’

  Dr Fitzgerald prodded the phone to end the call and then slung it sideways across the room.

  ‘So who are you?’ he said. ‘Don’t tell me you’re a guard. I know the Garda recruit men with no brains but I didn’t realise they’re taking on men with no legs.’

  John still didn’t answer, so Dr Fitzgerald took hold of his sleeve and dragged him, stumbling, out of the corner.

  ‘Get back downstairs,’ he ordered him. ‘Get back downstairs and if any guards come knocking at the door, tell them that you’re fine and that there’s nothing wrong.’

  It took all of his self-control for John not to shout back at Dr Fitzgerald, but he had to recognise that without his legs he was physically powerless, and that anything he said would only cause Katie more horrendous complications. Slowly and painfully, and trailing his hand along the wall, he hobbled his way back towards the staircase. Grainne was waiting for him there, with her arms folded, and a disgusted expression on her face, as if he were a child and she couldn’t believe how badly he had let her down.

  Meanwhile, Dr Fitzgerald opened up one of his cases of surgical instruments and selected a number 12 blade, which was curved like a hook. He fitted it on to a scalpel handle and then he left the operating room without closing the door behind him, and walked swiftly along the corridor with his raincoat rustling.

  John heard him coming up behind him but didn’t turn around. He was concentrating too hard on reaching the staircase, and his stumps were now giving him so much pain that he was biting his tongue.

  Dr Fitzgerald came close up behind him and without saying a word he reached around in front of him and cut his throat. He sliced so deeply into his neck muscles that John’s head dropped backwards and almost fell off, and a huge spout of blood gushed out of his carotid artery and soaked his jacket, as well as splattering on to the parquet floor.

  ‘Holy Jesus!’ Grainne cried out.

  Dr Fitzgerald gave John a kick in the small of his back so that he fell against the skirting-board. John shuddered violently and his right hand reached out as if he were trying to save himself from sliding into death, but then he lay still. Dr Fitzgerald tossed his scalpel on top of him.

  ‘God in Heaven, what did you do that for?’ said Grainne.

  ‘We’re found out, Grainne. He was phoning the guards when I caught him. They’re on their way now.’

  Dermot had heard Grainne crying out, and he came stamping up the stairs to see what was going on. When he caught sight of John’s half-decapitated body he said, ‘Holy Saint Joseph.’

  Dr Fitzgerald was behaving with ice-cold hysteria. He turned away from John’s body and then he turned back again, holding up his bloodstained right hand.

  ‘I’ll wash my hands,’ he said. ‘I’ll have to wash my hands and then we’ll get out of here as quick as we can.’

  ‘What about him?’ said Dermot, pointing at John’s body. ‘You can’t just leave him lying there, can you?’

  ‘We can dispose of him,’ said Dr Fitzgerald. ‘Where are Ger and Milo?’

  ‘You know where they are,’ Dermot told him. ‘You sent them out to see if they could pick up another patient, to replace Siobhán. They’re probably sitting in a layby on the Western Road, smoking their heads off and looking out for some student they can run over.’

  ‘Well, call them,’ said Dr Fitzgerald. ‘No – on the other hand, don’t call them. They’ll only complicate things. Is that ambulance repaired yet?’

  ‘I think so. I heard Sonny revving the engine outside, so I reckon he must have fixed it.’

  ‘Right. Okay. Dermot – you go and check that it’s up and running. Then we can take this fool away and get rid of him. Grainne, there’s a blue plastic sheet in the operating theatre, under the table at the side. Bring it out, will you, so that we can wrap him up? We don’t want any more blood on the floor than we have already. Once we’ve taken him outside, Dermot, if you can get out the bucket and the mop.’

  Grainne said, ‘Gearoid, what about all the patients? If the guards are coming, they’re going to find all the patients, aren’t they?’

  ‘I’m not worried about the patients. They’re all alive, aren’t they, even if they’re not kicking. There’s no way that the guards can prove that we disabled them. We’re taking care of them, aren’t we? We’re giving them better care than they could ever expect anywhere else.’

  ‘We didn’t disable them, Gearoid,’ said Grainne. ‘You did.’

  ‘Don’t give me that, Grainne. You aided and abetted. Who handed me the spoon when I was taking out Gerry Mulvaney’s eyeballs?’

  At that moment, the doorbell rang, and rang again, and again, and there was a loud hammering on the front door.

  ‘That’ll be the guards,’ said Dr Fitzgerald. He held up his bloody hand again. ‘I must wash my hands. Grainne – you go and answer the door. Stall them. Tell them that everything’s grand and deny that this fellow ever came here. No, don’t do that. The woman on the phone said surveillance officers. That probably means that they’ve been watching us, and so they will have seen him arrive here.’

  The doorbell was now rung continuously, and the hammering was even louder.

  ‘Jesus wept,’ said Dermot. ‘Any second now they’ll be knocking it down with one of them battery rams.’

  ‘Go on, Grainne, go and open the door for them,’ said Dr Fitzgerald. ‘Tell them that he’s upstairs, right in the middle of a medical assessment, and that we’ll be bringing him down in just a few minutes. Then take them into the reception room and lock them in. That should give us enough time to get away.’

  ‘Gearoid, this is madness,’ said Grainne. ‘We’re never going to get away with this. Not in a million years.’

  ‘Will you answer the door and do what I tell you!’ Dr Fitzgerald screamed at her. ‘If they can’t find his body they can’t prove anything!’

  Grainne shrugged, and looked at John lying up against the wall, with his head tilted away from his neck and his hair matted with blood. ‘If that’s what you want, Gearoid. But it wasn’t me who cut that feen’s throat, no matter what you say about aiding and abetting.’

  She went downstairs. As she walked along the hallway she called out, ‘All right! All right! I’m coming for the love of God! Hold your whisht awhile will you!’

  Dr Fitzgerald turned to Dermot and said, ‘Go out the kitchen way and see if the ambulance is ready. If it is, come back up and we’ll carry this fool outside.’

  ‘And where are you thinking of taking him?’ asked Dermot. ‘We can’t just turn up at St Finbarr’s Cemetery and politely ask them to bury him for us, can we?’

  ‘If you bury bodies they can be found, can’t the
y?’ said Dr Fitzgerald, still holding up his hand. ‘But if they’ve been eaten, they can never be found, can they?’

  ‘You’re joking, aren’t you? What are you going to do, cut him up and put him on the barbecue?’

  ‘Of course not. We’ll take him up to Ballyknock. Lorcan’s up there already. We can give him to Bartley Doran’s dogs as bait.’

  ‘Now I know you’re joking.’

  ‘Dermot, I was never more serious in my life. Now get down there, will you, and make sure the ambulance is ready.’

  44

  Katie was speeding back into the city on the South Link road when Detective Sergeant Begley called her.

  ‘One of the surveillance officers who was watching St Giles’ has just been in touch. He says that they were let into the clinic, but asked to wait for a few minutes, because your John was right in the middle of a medical assessment. Next thing they knew they looked out of the window and saw an ambulance shooting off. They were going to go after it but found that they’d been locked in.’

  ‘Oh, this gets better by the minute,’ said Katie. ‘I’m guessing that it was one of the clinic’s own ambulances – the white St Giles’ ones, with the picture of St Giles on it?’

  ‘That’s right. We haven’t clocked it yet but they can’t get far. They might as well have tried to get away in an ice-cream van.’

  ‘What about John? Is he still there?’

  ‘No sign of him, ma’am, but there’s a whole mess of blood in the first-floor corridor.’

  ‘Mother of God,’ said Katie, and felt a deep sickening sensation in her stomach. As soon as John had rung her and told her that he was inside St Giles’ Clinic, she had known that this would end badly.

  ‘There’s five patients there altogether, four male and one female,’ said Detective Sergeant Begley. ‘They’re all blind and all severely disabled. I’ve contacted the Mercy and they’ll be sending a couple of ambulances to pick them up. O’Donovan and Markey are on their way up to Montenotte now, along with eight uniforms. I’ve informed Bill Phinner, too, and he’s sending up a technical team.’