Death Before Time

by Andrew Puckett

  Carrie heard her out impatiently. “Yeah, so what is it with you and pneumonia, then? Jackie said you had a thing about it.”

  Gee, thanks Jackie … “It’s an interest of mine, always has – “

  “So why didn’t you ask me to my face about it?”

  “I am, now.”

  They eyeballed each other a bit longer, then Carrie backed down. “So what d’you want to know, then?” she asked sulkily.

  Yes, she agreed after Jo told her, both cases had developed very quickly and by the time anyone had thought of adding another antibiotic, it had been too late. “It does happen, you know,” she said defensively.

  Jo reported this to Tom. “The trouble is,” she said, “I can’t ask any of the others now if she was with them on the drug round - it’d be bound to get back to her.”

  Tom thought for a moment. “What’s your gut feeling?” he asked. “Is she involved?”

  “I disliked her intensely,” Jo said slowly. “But I don’t think she’d have been so in your face at me if she was.”

  “Then leave it,” said Tom. “In fact it might be an idea to keep your head down for while before anyone else starts wondering about you.”

  Bit late for that, she thought.

  So she and Fraser kept watching, like good shepherds both, but nothing happened. She had, she realised, begun to feel a bit like a shepherd in the responsibility and yes, the fondness she was feeling for these particularly vulnerable members of her flock. Especially Lily Stokes.

  On Friday, Mrs Bailey, whose bed was next to Lily’s, called Jo over.

  “Can’t you do something about them kids?” she demanded, pointing at Lily’s grandchildren.

  Payback time for Lily. However, the children were being rather noisy, so Jo asked them to calm down.

  They immediately looked mutinous and Jo was drawing breath to get heavy when Lily intervened.

  “Now look what you’ve done,” she said to them. “The nurse’ll have to make you go away, which means I won’t see you so often. If that happens, I won’t get better so quickly, and if that happens, you won’t be able to come and stay at my house, will you?”

  It wasn’t so much the words themselves, Jo realised, but the way she used them … Anyway, it worked, much to the annoyance of Mrs B.

  *

  “So now what do we do?” Marcus demanded irritably ...

  It was Saturday morning at the hotel, a beautiful day, which was maybe part of the reason they were all feeling so jaded. They’d held over the meeting from Friday evening so that they could see the results from the forensic lab, which had just been faxed through.

  There was nothing wrong with any of the ampicillin. The blood Fraser had taken from Rose Parker showed no sign of any poison or drug overdose, other than a high level of ampicillin, and the swabs he’d taken had grown virulent pneumococci that were completely resistant to it.

  “Can I see it, please?” Fraser said, and Tom passed it over.

  “With all due respect, Fraser,” Tom said, not sounding particularly respectful, “This does rather suggest to me that these patients are somehow being deliberately infected.”

  “Maybe it does - to you,” Fraser murmured, not taking his eyes from the report, “But I thought you’d taken me on for my medical expertise and I’m telling you – “ now he looked up – “That it can’t be done.”

  “Yes, you’ve told us that several times,” Marcus said, his voice acid smooth, “Do you think you might see your way to explaining why not?”

  Realising that Marcus was a tick away from ignition, Fraser concentrated his thoughts. “If this organism was somehow being used to give people pneumonia, it would have to be sub-cultured, and that would destroy its virulence.”

  “That doesn’t leave me any the wiser.”

  Fraser tried again: “To isolate the organism, you have to grow it on an agar plate from an infected patient, then keep it alive by passing it to further plates, sub-culturing it. And that’s the problem - sub-cultured pneumococci very quickly lose their virulence, their ability to cause pneumonia.”

  There was a brief silence, then Tom said, “How quickly is very?”

  “Very very. One, maybe two sub-cultures at the most.”

  “But exactly how does it lose its virulence?” Marcus asked. “I mean, it’s the same bug, isn’t it?”

  “Aye, but with one important difference. On agar, it loses its capsule, and its capsule is essential for it to remain virulent.”

  “All right, what’s its capsule?”

  Just that, Fraser explained, a capsule made of a jelly-like substance which surrounded each individual bacterium and protected it from being engulfed by white cells. “You can squirt as many cultured, non-capsulated pneumococci into someone’s lungs as you like, but they won’t get pneumonia. The white cells get them first.”

  “And if they are capsulated?”

  “Then that person will probably get pneumonia and die. But as I said, you can only get capsulated pneumococci by taking them straight from someone who’s already infected.”

  “Could they be doing that?” asked Tom, “I mean, growing them up from the last infected person - like you’ve just done.”

  “You’d still have to sub culture it into a liquid medium to infect the next person.”

  Jo, who’d been quiet until now, said, “Isn’t there some way of stimulating cultured bugs to grow capsules?”

  “If there is, I hadn’t heard of it.”

  “Can you check on it?” Tom said, then turned back to Marcus. “In answer to your earlier question, I think the only thing we can do now is make sure we treat the next case with the cefataxin and hope they get better. As Jo said, there’s a good chance whoever’s doing it’ll give themselves away.”

  Marcus nodded his acceptance, then turned to Jo. “Were the patients all right this morning?”

  “They were fine – at least, mine were … “ She looked at Fraser -

  “Mine too,” he said. “I saw them last night and looked them up this morning on the computer.”

  “When are you on duty again?” Marcus asked Jo.

  “Midnight tomorrow.”

  “OK. Both of you do what you can to keep watching them. If it comes to it, phone the ward and say you’re just checking.”

  There wasn’t much else to talk about and shortly afterwards, Jo and Fraser were relieved to find themselves on the pavement outside.

  Fraser let out a sigh. “What’s got into Marcus?”

  She shrugged. “Bad hair day?”

  “Marcus?” he said, picturing the shiny bald head.

  They both laughed, then he said, “What are you doing now?”

  She looked up at the sky. “It’s a nice day, I think I’ll go for a walk.”

  “A walk?”

  She laughed at his surprise, then explained how she’d been doing an evening course in archaeology. “There’s a place near here called the Wansdyke I thought I’d go and see.”

  “Wansdyke as in Wansborough, I suppose … “ He looked at her a moment,“Can I come with you?”

  She looked almost as surprised as he had. “I suppose so … “

  “Ach, if you’re that keen, forget it.”

  “No, it’s not that - I was thinking about us not being seen together.”

  They arranged to meet outside the town an hour later after Fraser had checked the patients again.

  Chapter 20

  They met in a car park on the outskirts of town. She’d brought some lunch and a map, and showed him where she wanted to go.

  “I know that road,” he said, smiling … it was the narrow road over the downs that led to Fitzpatrick’s place and he gave her a censored account of the party as he drove away.

  Although it was only three weeks since he’d been there, the downs felt completely different; they’d filled out with greenery that still seemed to be growing as they floated through it. Sheep speckled the fields.

  They stopped in a small car park at the t
op, just before the scarp. He zipped up the tonneau and they set off along the Wansdyke, an earthen bank about four feet high with a ditch to one side that ran atop the ridge.

  He asked her who’d built it.

  “The theory I like best,” she said, “Is that the British warlord we call Arthur had seen Hadrian’s Wall and decided to build his own version down here, to keep the Saxons out.”

  “Ah, you’re a romantic,” he said. “Probably just a gang of dark age hoodies with nothing better to do.”

  She stuck her tongue out at him. Then: “Have you ever seen Hadrian’s Wall?”

  “Aye. And I have to say it’s more impressive than this.”

  “Oh, this would have been bigger when it was built. Imagine having to climb out of that” - she pointed down into the ditch – “And then up here with a row of angry Britons waiting to chuck spears at you.”

  “Certainly a deterrent,” agreed Fraser.

  They walked on. Larks hung in the blue above them, almost invisible, showering them with tinselled song. Insects hurried about their business.

  She was slightly ahead of him, dressed in jeans and patterned blouse and he watched as she walked with that swaying motion that is entirely the preserve of women, her free arm inclined away from her body. She wasn’t beautiful like Helen, he thought, but she was somehow more female.

  To their left, the scarp fell away to the valley below, while in the distance, a dark blue plateau underlined the lighter blue of the sky.

  “What are those hills over there?” he asked for something to say.

  “Salisbury Plain.”

  “You know your geography round here, don’t you?”

  She said, “I have reason to remember Salisbury Plain.”

  “Not altogether a pleasant memory, from your tone?”

  “Not altogether, no,” she agreed. After a pause, she related how she and Tom had infiltrated a dodgy fertility clinic there, posing as a childless couple.

  Fraser looked at her anew – he’d wondered about her past relationship with Tom, but hadn’t realised it had been so dangerous.

  “I’m surprised you came back for more,” he said.

  “So am I, to tell you the truth,” she said with a grin. “This isn’t anything like so bad, of course, and I had my reasons.” She told him about her mother, the Safety Committee and David Petterman.

  By now, they’d walked two or three miles and she suggested they stop for lunch. They sat atop the ridge. Everything was balanced just right, he thought, the hot sun on his face tempered by the breeze flowing up the scarp.

  She’d bought some mature cheddar that crumbled and fizzed on the tongue, crusty bread, tomatoes and a can of beer.

  “Best meal I’ve had for months,” he mumbled as he finished.

  She smiled, but didn’t reply; returned to gazing down at the section of hill they’d just passed. After a few moments, she said, “Look down there, it’s so perfect, it’s almost as though it were manmade …”

  The scarp dropped away in regular terraces to the plain below, where it ended abruptly. “And down there, it’s like a sea,” she said.

  She was right, he thought. The fields below were dead flat and the corn planted there came right up to the base of the hill. The wind caught the tops of the stalks, moulded them into waves that marched across the plain and broke on the shore of the scarp – he half closed his eyes and the illusion was complete – he was looking at a green sea breaking on a lee shore …

  It occurred to him that for perhaps the first time since Frances died, he felt happy.

  He finished his beer, savouring the sharp taste of the hops, the warm muzziness in his head. He turned to Jo.

  “D’you know something? I’m happy.”

  “I’m glad,” she said.

  On impulse, he leaned towards her and kissed the side of her mouth. She smiled but didn’t move and he put an arm round her to draw her to him -

  “Uh, uh,” she said, shaking her head and pulling away.

  “Why not?”

  “Because I don’t want to. Anyway, what d’you think I am? You’re already involved with someone.”

  “Ach, that doesn’t count for anything …”

  “Maybe not for you, but have you thought about her? Maybe it does for her. It certainly does for me.”

  She took her cigarettes from her bag, lit one and it seemed to him as if she was deliberately raising a barrier between them. A voice told him to stop digging, but he couldn’t –

  “It can’t end soon enough for me.”

  She blew smoke, said, “You can say that now, but nobody forced you into her bed in the first place, did they?”

  “No,” he admitted, “I suppose not.”

  Anyway, who wants to kiss an ashtray, he thought?

  You do, a voice inside him answered.

  He swallowed. “You’re right,” he said, “I apologise.”

  “No need,” she said. “Forget it.”

  They set off again. He felt conscious of his hot face, of every part of his body, like a schoolboy caught playing with himself. Forget it, he thought, but he knew it would be a while before he did.

  She stopped and opened the map. “If we go down there…” she pointed to a path that led down the shallow dip slope – “there’s another path that should take us back to the car.”

  “Fine,” said Fraser, trying not to sulk.

  The shrubs thickened as they descended. The wind died and the sun homed in. They walked quickly, brushing away flies. After a while, the hedge was replaced with barbed wire; sheep dotted the fields and tufts of their wool clung to the barbs.

  Jo stopped to look at her map again. “It should be here somewhere …”

  Fraser slapped at a horsefly. “Maybe it’s beyond those trees.”

  They hurried on into the belt of trees, and as they emerged, they found themselves confronted by a strange sight - a man bent over a sheep, which was on its back waving its legs in the air. A dog lolled beside him.

  Jo looked uncertainly at Fraser, then called out, “Excuse me.”

  “Ahh!” The man straightened and turned in one movement. “Cor,” he said, “You made I jump.” Button brown eyes peered at them from beneath a cloth cap.

  “Sorry. We’re a bit lost. There’s a path here somewhere …”

  “Ah. Well. Yers …” He rubbed furtively at his chin … He was dressed in shapeless brown trousers belted at the waist, a shirt that could’ve been any colour and a jacket whose pockets bulged as though they were full of apples. He could have been any age between fifty and seventy.

  He said, “Lemme just finish ‘ere an’ I’ll be with ‘ee.”

  He grabbed the sheep’s fleece and hauled it upright. It bleated plaintively.

  “Ged on, ban’t be nothin’ wrong with ‘ee,” he said, giving it a shove. It tottered a few paces before reaching down to crop some grass. He picked up an old fashioned shepherd’s crook and came over to them. The dog followed.

  “What’s wrong with it?” Jo asked.

  “Nothin’. They’re stupid buggers, sheep – beggin’ yer pardon, miss. They falls over on their backs an’ can’t get up again.”

  He looked round to where it was still cropping grass. “She’ll be all right now.”

  Jo had her map out again. “Can you tell us where this path is?”

  He peered myopically and Fraser guessed he knew perfectly well which path they meant.

  “Ah,” he said. “That one. It ain’t used much now.”

  “Can we use it?” said Jo. “Otherwise we’ve got to walk back to the top of the hill.” She smiled at him winningly.

  He sniffed. “Or right,” he said at last. “I’ll show ‘ee.”

  He put his foot on the lower strand of wire and lifted the upper.

  Jo bent and wriggled through. Fraser watched the shepherd’s eyes as they were drawn to her bum – he looked up suddenly, caught Fraser watching him and winked. Fraser tried to restrain a grin as Jo straightened and looked f
rom one to the other of them with a puzzled expression. Fraser ducked under the wire.

  They followed him along the side of the copse. Sheep ran away from them, bleating to their lambs, which were almost as big as their mothers.

  “They’re yours?” Fraser asked.

  “Ah. I’ll be sellin’ ‘em on soon, not that I’ll get much, bloody supermarkets – beggin’ yer pardon, Miss.”

  “That’s all right,” said Jo. “Can’t you sell them to a farmer’s market or something?”

  “I suppose, but I still gotta go through an approved slaughter ‘ouse an’ the nearest one’s sixty mile ... ”

  He regaled them with an account of the iniquities of the Common Agricultural Policy (“Beggin’ yer pardon, Miss”) as the path curved into the trees. Ahead of them lay a clearing and in the middle stood a caravan propped up on breezeblocks. Beside it were a shed and a pickup truck.

  “My place,” said the shepherd. Then, to Fraser’s surprise: “Will ‘ee stop an’ have a cuppa?”

  “That’d be nice,” said Jo, to Fraser’s even greater surprise, “Thank you.”

  The shepherd fished a key from his pocket and opened the door. They followed him inside. The small kitchen wasn’t tidy, but nor was it sordid. Close to, he emitted a slight earthy smell, not unpleasant. He put a kettle on the gas range.

  “How long have you been here?” Fraser asked.

  “Twenty year.” He grinned at them. “Council bin tryin’ to get rid o’ me ever since, but me landlord sticks up for me.” He paused, then said, “You won’t tell about the path, will ‘ee? I know ‘tis a right of way, but I’m fed up wi’ people’s dogs chasin’ me sheep.”

  The kettle boiled and he made the tea. After he’d handed them theirs, he extracted a half smoked roll up from behind his ear.

  “Have one of these,” said Jo, holding out her pack.

  As she lit up for both of them, his eyes flicked to Fraser.

  “He’s a doctor,” she said, “Doesn’t believe in it.”

  Fraser smiled and took a sip of his tea. It wasn’t as foul as it looked.

  A few minutes later, the shepherd showed them which way to go.