Surgeon at Arms

by Gordon, Richard

  After ten days of uncertainty, paralysing all his activities and most of his thoughts outside his professional ones, Graham ran into John Bickley in the Cavendish Clinic. He had just finished his last case of the afternoon, loosening a Dupuytren’s contracture in the palm of a stockbroker (the deformity interfered badly with his shooting). As he pushed open the door of the surgeon’s room to change, he found the anaesthetist in his long green theatre gown, packing away rubber masks, tubing, swabs, syringes, and other tools of oblivion into a square black-leather bag.

  ‘That was the best advice anyone’s given me in my life,’ Graham said at once.

  John looked up. ‘About not operating on that spiv fellow?’ He gave a smile. ‘You know, I hadn’t the slightest expectation that you’d take it.’

  ‘If I had, I’d be well and truly up the creek by now, wouldn’t I? With all this fuss, all these political people getting interested, trying to outdo each other scratching up the dirt. The ridiculous aspect of the whole affair is that I’d nothing to worry about from Cazalay. Nothing at all. He simply swindled me out of my money. He didn’t even buy those pernicious francs in the first place.’

  ‘How much did you lose?’

  ‘Five thousand quid.’

  John’s eyebrows shot up.

  ‘Yes, I’m a mug,’ Graham admitted. ‘Cazalay might as well have sold me a gold brick or the Eiffel Tower— didn’t some bright Frenchman flog it to the Germans for scrap during the war?’ He undid a length of bandage round his waist, and slipped the white linen operating trousers from his spindly legs. ‘But perhaps it was a reasonable fee to pay for the shock treatment. I’ve learnt my lesson. Henceforth Trevose sticks to the straight and narrow path.’

  ‘Oh, come, Graham! You’re making yourself sound like an old lag, not an ornament to one of our Orders of Chivalry.’

  Graham threw his trousers into the corner with an impatient gesture. ‘You know what I mean. Well, you ought to. You don’t imagine I’m unaware of your going about referring to me as “Flash Harry”?’ John laughed. ‘By the way, I’m giving up my private practice,’ Graham added.

  The anaesthetist paused in packing away his apparatus and stared at him. ‘You’re not serious?’

  ‘I’m perfectly serious. I’m abandoning the private racket for a full-time job. On the new unit Haileybury’s always talking about. I’m to be its first Director.’

  ‘But Graham—your whole life’s been built round your private work. Everyone in London is green with envy at your reputation. You already get patients sent to you from all over the country. Once things get really back to normal you’ll be getting them from all over the bloody world. Surely you can’t throw all that away?’

  ‘My life wasn’t built round private work during the war, and that was the only time I was happy.’ He pulled on his grey suit in silence. As John snapped the two catches of his leather case, Graham continued, ‘Perhaps the Government are right to set themselves against fee-paying medicine. It’s immoral really, if you look at it carefully. It didn’t matter so much even thirty years ago, when the doctor could generally do damn all whether you paid him or not. Besides, I want to think. Perhaps to write. Rushing round nursing homes chasing guineas, you haven’t a chance to do either. Perhaps I’ve an academic streak in me somewhere—don’t forget my father was a professor. He left a massive volume on the synovial membranes as his tombstone, which is more than I shall ever achieve.’

  ‘I still can’t take you seriously, Graham.’

  ‘Then wait and see. You won’t even have to wait long. The appointment’s being announced by the Ministry at the beginning of next month. I’ll have to resign from Blackfriars, of course, which will be a wrench, though mainly a sentimental one. There doesn’t seem the slightest prospect of the place being rebuilt in my lifetime. And the staff there will all be working for the Government anyway, whether they like it or not. I’m giving up my flat—I’ve got to economize and I want something smaller, nearer the site, to organize things.’ Graham’s voice suddenly lit up. ‘It’ll be like those early days at the annex, all over again. Except this time everyone will be on my side. I’ll only have to snap my fingers for equipment to arrive by the lorryload.’

  John stood looking at him, his bony long-fingered hands resting on the top of his case. ‘It must have been a sacrifice. Or at least a horribly difficult decision.’

  ‘Not really. Like most of the big steps in my life, I didn’t think twice about it.’ As John slipped the green gown from his shirt, Graham added as off-handedly as possible, ‘You know, I really would rather like to see Clare again.’

  ‘That’s the best news you’ve given me today.’ Graham felt this sounded vaguely condescending, but asked, ‘Do you think she’d respond to some sort of social invitation? To a dinner, a show, something like that?’

  ‘Why don’t you come and find out? I’m just off to Kenworth to do a case. I know for a fact she’s on duty. Are you free?’

  Graham hesitated. Then his natural impulsiveness made him say, ‘All right. You can give me a lift.’ As John picked up his instrument-case he added, ‘After all, I’ve nothing to lose, have I? If I admit to you now that I treated Clare quite disgustingly, it’s something which I have only just come to admit to myself.’

  ‘Quite so,’ said John.

  It suddenly struck him how much Graham was starting to sound like Haileybury.

  It was fortunate for the reputation of Sister Mills at the Kenworth Hospital that she had charge of a children’s ward. Unlike the adult patients, who had little to do except listen to Workers’ Playtime through the headphones and intensely observe the personal behaviour of the staff, the youngsters saw nothing remarkable—only some welcome entertainment—in a wide-eyed little man bursting among them, a startled cry from Sister, a whispered conversation, glances between bewildered nurses, a brisk retreat to Sister’s office, a slamming of the door. Graham reflected afterwards he could as well have telephoned, but his unexpected appearance was much more dramatic and much more satisfying. In the office, they were far too confused and embarrassed to say very much, nor even to approach within arm’s length of each other. Graham told her he must see her, it was desperate—couldn’t he even take her to dinner? She demurred, trying to adjust her mind to the situation. But he was never a man to lose the advantage of a woman’s hesitation.

  ‘All right,’ Clare agreed doubtfully. ‘All right, Graham. For old times’ sake.’

  ‘That’s wonderful! We’ll have so much to talk about. It’s only three whole years since we—’ He wondered how to put it. ‘Went our separate ways.’

  She couldn’t prevent herself asking, ‘Did you miss me?’

  ‘Like an amputated limb. You know how the patients get pain in them, don’t you? “A phantom limb.” It hurts worse than ever, even if it isn’t there.’

  She gave a nervous smile and said, ‘You mustn’t forget the limb’s always amputated for the patient’s own good.’

  There was a pause. Neither of them felt entirely sure where the conversation was leading. Both were relieved for it to be frustrated by a knock on the door and the news that a child due for release, overcome by excitement, had vomited copiously over the newly cleaned floor.

  Two evenings later they met. Graham had chosen a restaurant in Soho, whispered among a small and knowing circle as providing with its generous portions not only butter but crisp, white, mysteriously unrationed bread. By then both he and Clare had found time to adjust themselves, and were perfectly charming to each other. They sat in the corner of the small, rose-lighted room, chatting gaily of pointedly inconsequentoal generalities. Graham had really no precise idea what he was going to propose to her, and hoped he could rely on her delicacy to raise nothing that would make him feel too uncomfortable. He picked up the wine-list and suggested champagne, adding half-humorously, ‘This place is terribly black market.’

  ‘Oh, everyone these days knows someone who can get them something.’ Clare smiled. ‘Our theatre porte
r finds us the most lovely nylons—“They dropped off a lorry” is the story. It must have been an extremely large pantechnicon.’

  ‘I’m growing rather tired of all that, you know. I’ve had some sort of moral conversion. And, like most converts, I was scared into it.’ He picked up the evening paper, beside them on the table. Lord Cazalay and Arthur had been charged that morning with a number of offences from bribery of Government officials to possessing unauthorized sweet coupons. To Graham’s relief, there was still no mention of currency transactions. ‘You’ve read all about this, I suppose?’

  ‘Is there anyone who hasn’t?’

  ‘But I think I can entertain you with some unpublished details.’

  Over dinner he gave a frank account of his life since she had walked out of Cosy Cot, with the exception of Liz. In his penitent mood he was half-inclined to throw her in too, but consoled himself that Clare would certainly suspect he had been mixed up with a woman or two, and through natural female pride and vanity imagine them goddesses. If she became increasingly serious and sympathetic, Graham had been smugly confident of as much. His moral weakness had always been of as much concern to her as his physical ones, he reflected, and she accepted both with the same resignation. She hadn’t changed, he told himself. Though if she had changed towards him was a separate question. When he finished the tale she held his hand under the table, and said, ‘Poor Graham! You did get yourself in a mess, didn’t you?’

  ‘I didn’t have you to keep me out of it.’

  He started to talk about his new job, a conversation which drifted naturally back to the annex and Smithers Botham. Her eyes began to sparkle, she gripped his hand tighter than ever, and he felt a sudden glow of relief. It was going to be all right. She had forgiven him, they could pick up neatly where they had left off, except this time he really would marry her, just as soon as the little formality could be arranged. He was starting to believe she would go that very night with him to the flat, when she said, ‘Graham, it’s been simply lovely meeting you. We must have another reunion one day, mustn’t we? Perhaps when all this black-market and rationing nonsense is over.’

  He looked blank. ‘But Clare. Aren’t you coming back to me?’

  ‘Don’t be silly, Graham.’

  ‘But this time, I mean... we’d be married, it would be different.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be different in the slightest. As I told you once before, it wouldn’t work.’

  ‘You’re being ridiculous.’ He sounded quite cross. ‘Everything was abnormal in those days.’

  ‘Yes, there was a war on.’

  ‘I mean everything about me. I was selfish then, foolish, chasing all the wrong things. I’ve changed. I know I’ve changed. I’ve got my sense of values straight.

  I don’t give a damn for the fripperies of life any more.’

  ‘You sound like Sir Stafford Cripps,’ she told him.

  By the time he reached home Graham was furious. It was beyond him why Clare had refused to fall gratefully into his arms. All this effort to turn himself into a decent human being, he reflected petulantly, would be absolutely wasted if nobody was going to take it seriously. He poured himself a whisky and sat in the armchair. For the first time there stole upon him the black realization that he had lost Clare for good. A solitary fife stretched ahead, as bleakly as the concrete corridors at Smithers Botham. And at fifty-one you needed someone beside you, much more desperately than at twenty-one. But there was nobody who cared a damn about him. Only his son Desmond. At least, he presumed so. The young man had more or less given up speaking to him.

  The next morning Graham had a letter from Haileybury, confirming the new appointment and inviting him to lunch with some political figures who were enthusiastic over the new hospital. Mr. Bevan himself, he added, might possibly be joining them for coffee. Graham wrote resigning his post as consultant surgeon to Blackfriars. He would devote himself wholly to his new interest. He would have the best part of fifteen years in the place before he retired, and he would leave it as a splendid monument to himself. He would meanwhile live alone and put up with it. After all, he was a widower, not some crabby never-loved bachelor like old Crampers. He wondered vaguely if Crampers were still alive. He doubted it. The Welfare State seemed to have been the death of him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  THE POLITICIANS’ LUNCH was held in the House of Commons, a fair proportion Of which, like a fair proportion of the place, though confessing as he was escorted Graham was interested to see for the first time the inside of the place, though confessing as he was escorted rapidly through the corridors and stairways a feeling of disappointment. The marble floors, the vulgar murals, the pillared corners and vaulted ceilings, the solemn dress-suited attendants, reminded him of somewhere— yes, it was the casino at Monte Carlo. He supposed that both structures had been raised about the same time, and had much in common in their function.

  The party gathered in a smallish upstairs room with mullioned leaded windows and an over-abundance of carved pale oak, overlooking the river. Graham at once realized the importance of the affair. Of the thirty-odd men in the room, about half he recognized as top medical people, including Haileybury. Clearly, the Government had taken the new hospital to its heart.

  Never a martyr to the self-inflicted tortures of modesty, Graham was flattered to notice the stir his arrival made among the politicos. They would have heard enough of him during the war, he supposed. Or perhaps, he reflected wryly, they were aware of his having married the daughter of the first Lord Cazalay, and his kinship to the rogue at the seat of their present troubles. Graham was coming to detach himself from the man in Brixton prison with more assurance every day. He decided his brother-in-law had enough on his hands without dragging him into the mess—though with a man like that you never could tell. But if anything about himself was exposed by the promised radical surgery of the tribunal, he fancied even the memory of the present feast would induce in his hosts an attack of acute dyspepsia.

  Graham found himself sitting next to a young Member of Parliament with junior rank in the Government, though he was vague what, and felt it would be discourteous to reveal such ignorance. Graham was far too self-centred to have much interest in politics, a quality which, combined with his exhibitionism, might have made him a successful politician. He had troubled neither to vote in the recent election, nor even to hear Churchill’s broadcast speeches during the war. Like most medical people, he saw mankind less as noble sufferers in adversity than as sadly muddle-headed ignoramuses, to be saved from themselves by well-educated ladies and gentlemen as kindly as possible. With a lazy if reasonable over-simplification, Graham wrote off the Tories as appealing to the populace’s natural greed, and the Socialists to its natural envy. If the Government were now trying to organize everyone’s life from the cradle to the grave he felt it probably a sound idea, most inhabitants of a growingly complicated world being incapable of even crossing the road with impunity. Long ago in the days of the first Lord Cazalay, he had grasped that politicians ran to their own rules, as detached from those of everyday life as the rules of some game of cards. You had to let them get up to whatever they wished, running your life as best you could and allowing for their existence like the bacteria contaminating every article you touched.

  The young M.P. revealed himself over the soup as a strong enthusiast for the coming National Health Service.

  ‘My father,’ he explained forcefully to Graham, ‘suffered from bad eyes. He couldn’t afford to attend a doctor, or an optician, or anyone qualified for the job. Do you know what he was obliged to do? Go to one of the cheap sixpenny stores, where they had a card affair, with those different-sized letters on it. Right on the counter, among all the tubes of toothpaste. He’d pick up lenses and try them till he found the right ones. Thousands of sufferers from bad eyesight had to do exactly the same. Those cheap stores were providing a valuable social service on behalf of their shareholders, if they but knew it. But it’s disgraceful, isn’t it, Si
r Graham. In future, every citizen will be entitled to a properly fitted pair of spectacles as a right. Just as he’s entitled to clean water or the protection of the law.’

  ‘It’ll probably be equally expensive,’ Graham demurred mildly.

  The politician’s gesture brushed this aside impatiently. ‘Naturally, there’ll be a pent-up demand, but the whole point of a proper health service is that it gets progressively cheaper. When people are given the proper treatment they’ve been denied through poverty—not to mention given better working conditions, better houses, and a higher standard of living from decent wages—the need for medicines and doctors will simply diminish. We’ll all live healthier and longer. Eh, Sir Graham?’ He grinned. ‘As a medical man, mustn’t you agree?’

  ‘But if we all live longer we’ll simply suffer more intractable ailments and need even more doctors.’

  ‘Sir Graham! You’re belittling your profession. What about the inevitable great advances in curative medicine?’

  ‘And the inevitable increases in expensive drugs? Penicillin’s a dreadful price as it is.’ Graham felt uneasy entering in an argument with a professional debater, but to his relief the waiter interrupted by serving the main course. ‘What on earth’s this?’ he exclaimed in surprise.

  ‘Whale steak,’ the M.P. told him proudly. ‘We’re importing tons of it to eke out the meat ration. I assure you it’s absolutely delicious.’

  Then the young man began talking equally energetically about India, a subject which bored Graham even more than cricket.

  It was clear that Haileybury was enjoying the occasion immensely. He rose to make a short if wholly un-memorable speech, and as they prepared to break up Graham noticed with amusement he was noticeably flushed with official port.