Except …
That houseman, Fletcher, then Dougherty, it hadn’t seemed anything that concerned him, that might impinge on his life, touch him at all. And then that young girl, the one who’d been an ODA. He had never wanted to admit to himself that there might be a connection.
Then he turned back towards the hospital and saw the two men standing close to the entrance, neither of them men that he recognized as such, but the way they stood and waited, you didn’t need to know their name.
“Superintendent Skelton,” said the taller man, showing his card. “This is Detective Constable Patel. We appreciate that you have a busy schedule, but we were wondering if you could find time to talk to us. It may not take very long.”
Salt made a brief nodding motion, almost imperceptible. “I have a cholecystectomy scheduled, which I should imagine, barring complications, will take an hour to an hour and a half. After that …”
“Will be fine,” said Skelton. “There are other matters we can be checking into while we’re here.”
Salt didn’t ask what these might be; some of them he thought he might guess.
“Cholecystectomy,” said Patel, “an operation to remove the gallbladder, is that right?”
“Yes,” said Salt, “it is. Absolutely.”
“What did you get your degree in?” Skelton asked as they were walking into the hospital.
“Mechanical engineering, sir,” Patel said, holding the door to let the superintendent step through.
“Rightly or wrongly,” Bernard Salt was saying, “the impulse is always to calm the patient down, give something to deal with the residue of the pain, basically ensure as little agitation as possible. Last thing you want them to do, dwell upon what happened. Difficult enough to forget, I should have thought, without willingly reliving it all the time. No, you can apologize, you can try to explain.”
“Smooth it over,” suggested Skelton.
“Absolutely.”
They were in the consultant’s office, Skelton and Salt facing one another from the two comfortable chairs, Patel off to one side on a straight-backed chair with a leather seat. Among the questions he wanted to ask, why wait until someone else gave us this information, why not come forward with it yourself? The sister who did point them in this direction, what were her motives? Another of a different kind, what was Skelton’s degree in? But he remembered somebody saying, the superintendent was not a graduate at all. When Skelton had entered the Force, relatively few recruits had been graduates; even fewer had been Asian, black.
“There is always, I suppose,” Skelton was saying, “the danger of legal action in cases such as this?”
Salt tapped his fingers together, brought his heavy head forward once.
“And so to do anything which might seem to be accepting liability …”
“Quite.”
Skelton let his glance stray towards the window. After the brave showing of sunshine, today’s skies had reverted to an all-over anonymous gray. “I believe there was an instance, four years ago. An … er … laparotomy, if I have the term correctly.”
“An exploratory examination of the abdomen,” said Patel.
Salt glared at him with something close to hatred.
“The patient claimed to have been awake throughout the operation,” Skelton continued. “Damages were sought from the health authority, who settled out of court for an undisclosed sum. You were the surgeon in charge of that operation.”
“The patient,” Patel said, less than comfortable with both of the older men staring at him, “was in a ward on which Karl Dougherty was working as a nurse.”
Salt shook his head. “I can only take your word for that.”
“It is true,” said Patel. “Dougherty himself remembers the incident and, as far as we have been able, we have checked the records.”
“I’m sure you have,” said Salt, a tone neither quite accusation nor patronization. “And I am sure you have discovered that in November of last year, during an appendicectomy, the anesthetic was found not to be functioning correctly and the operation was abandoned.”
Skelton looked across at Patel and Patel, who had come across no such information, nodded wisely.
“Only a few months before the operation to remove the gallbladder,” Skelton said, “there was considerable adverse publicity around a woman who claimed to have been conscious while giving birth by Caesarian section.”
“Certain newspapers,” Salt said, “I am sure sold a great many extra copies.”
“Not only were the health authority sued, but also the surgeon in charge and the anesthetist. I think that is correct?”
“In the light of that,” Skelton went on, “it’s reasonable to imagine the authority, the hospital managers, would be very loath to attract similar publicity so soon again. Quite apart from the financial loss, what might seem to the general public like a falling away of professional standards, that would be something to be avoided at all costs.”
“Not at all costs, Superintendent. There is no sense of anything having been covered up. And as for this hospital, I can assure you that, cheek by jowl, our record in these cases compares very favorably with others of a similar size.”
“I’m sure it does.”
“The number of operations that are carried out …”
“Please”-Skelton spread his hands-“Mr. Salt, even if such issues were my concern, you would not have to convince me that what you say is true.”
Salt cleared his throat and stretched out his legs, drawing them back up again towards his chair.
Skelton glanced over at Patel and nodded.
“The operation to remove Mr. Ridgemount’s gallbladder, sir, the anesthetist was Alan Imrie and his assistant was Amanda Hooson.”
“Correct.”
“At the time of the operation, Tim Fletcher was attached to you as a junior houseman?”
“I believe … I should need to check to be … Yes, yes. I suppose it’s possible.”
“The surgical ward in which Mr. Ridgemount was a patient, Karl Dougherty was a staff nurse on that ward.”
“He may have been. I’m sure you know that better than I.”
“Dougherty, Fletcher, Hooson-after the last of these, at least, why didn’t you come forward?” Skelton asked.
“I had never drawn the connection you are suggesting.”
“Never?”
“Superintendent, Dougherty may have been one of the nurses who cared for Mr. Ridgemount. During his time at the hospital, so would a good many others. And as for Fletcher, I can’t imagine that his contact would have been more than peripheral.”
“So you never thought it might be relevant-what happened to Ridgemount?”
“What he alleges happened.”
Skelton looked at the consultant keenly. “He made it up?”
“An operation, Superintendent, it’s a traumatic thing. It has been known for patients to hallucinate, for their imaginations to distort what actually happened under the anesthetic.”
“And you’re saying that’s what happened in Ridgemount’s case?”
“I’m saying it’s a possibility.”
“It’s also a possibility that he was telling the truth.”
“Yes.”
“Ridgemount,” said Patel, “he was threatening legal action also.”
Bernard Salt nodded. “At one time.”
“Against yourself, the senior anesthetist, and the health authority?”
“So I believe.”
“You’ve no idea, sir,” asked Patel, “why the action was dropped?”
“None. Although, my supposition at the time was that whoever had been advising him didn’t consider his case strong enough to take to court. Either that, or he changed his own mind about what actually happened.” Salt made a point of looking at his watch. “Gentlemen,” he said, rising to his feet, “I am in danger of being late for theater.”
“The anesthetist in charge that day,” Patel said as they were passing through the door, “Imrie, wasn’t he also involved in the cesarean section? The case that was settled out of court?”
“I believe he was.”