extended -up across the nape of his neck and over his scalp. The
meshing of the skin grafts gave them a patterned effect, regular as the
scales of a fish, and the new grafts were hard-looking and raised. We
can move the pedicel up now. 'This afternoon's theatre, doctor? 'Yes,
please, sister. David came to know that they operated every Thursday in
the burns unit. He came to dread the Thursday morning rounds when the
consultant and his staff crowded around his cot and touched and prodded
and discussed the restructuring of his flesh with an impersonal candour
that chilled him.
They freed the fat sausage of flesh from his belly and it dangled from
his arm like some grotesque white leech, seeming to have a life of its
own, drawing blood and sustenance from its grip upon his forearm.
They lifted his arm and strapped it across his chest, and the raw end of
the pedicel they split and stitched to his jaw and to the stump of his
nose.
It's taken very nicely. We will begin shaping it this afternoon. We'll
have him at the head of the theatre list.
Will you see to that please, sister? With the living flesh that they
had stolen from his belly they fashioned a crude lump of a nose, taut,
narrow lips and a new covering for his jawbone.
The oedema has settled. This afternoon I will go for the bone-graft on
the jaw.
They opened his chest and split his fourth rib laterally, robbing it of
a long sliver of bone and they grafted this to the damaged jaw-bone,
then they spread the flesh of the pedicel over it and stitched it all
into place.
On Thursdays it was the knife and the stink of anaesthetic, and for the
days in between it was the ache and pain of abused and healing flesh.
They fined down the new nose, piercing it with nostrils, they finished
the reconstruction of his eyelids.
They laid the last grafts behind his ears, they cut a double zigzag
incision around the base of his jaw where the contracting scar tissue
was trying to draw his chin down on to his chest. The new lips took
firm hold on the existing muscles and David gained control of them so he
could form his words again and speak clearly.
The last area of raw flesh was closed beneath the patchwork of skin
grafts, flesh grafts and stitches. David was no longer a high-infection
risk and he was moved from a sterile environment. Once again he saw
human faces, not merely eyes peering over white surgical masks. The
faces were friendly, cheerful faces. Men and women proud of their
achievement in saving him from death and refreshing his ravaged head.
You'll be allowed visitors now, and I expect you'll welcome that, said
the consultant. He was a distinguished-looking young surgeon who had
left a highly paid post at a Swiss Clinic to head this burns and plastic
surgery unit.
I don't think I will be having any visitors, David had lost contact with
the reality of the outside world during the nine months in the burns
unit.
Oh, yes, you will, the surgeon told him. We've had regular inquiries on
your progress from a number of people. Isn't that correct, sister?
"That's right, doctor. You can let them know that he is allowed
visitors now. The consultant and his group began to move on.
Doctor, David called him back. I want a look at a mirror, and they were
all silent, immediately embarrassed. This request of his had been
denied many times over the last months.
Damn it, David became angry. You can't protect me from it for ever. The
consultant gestured for the others to leave and they filed out of the
ward, while he came back to David's bed.
All right, David, he agreed gently. We'll find you a mirror, though we
don't have much use for them around here! For the first time in the
many months he had known him, David glimpsed the depths of his
compassion, and he wondered at it. That a man who lived constantly
amongst great pain and terrible disfigurement could still be moved by
it.
You must understand that how you are now is not how you will always be.
All I have been able to do, so far, is heal your exposed flesh and make
you functional again. You are once more a viable human being. You have
not experienced the loss of any of your faculties but I will not pretend
that you are beautiful. However, there remains much that I can still do
to change that.
Your ears, for example, can be reconstructed with the material I have
reserved for that purpose, He indicated the stump of the pedicel that
still hung from David's forearm - There is much fine work stiH to be
done about the nose and mouth and eyes. He paced slowly the length of
the ward and looked out into the sunlight for a moment before turning
back again and coming forward to face David.
But let me be truthful with you. There are limitations to what I can
do. The muscles of expression, those delicate little muscles around the
eyes and mouth have been destroyed. I cannot replace those. The hair
follicles of your lashes and brows and scalp have been burned away.
You will be able to wear a wig, but David turned to his bedside locker
and took from the drawer his wallet. He opened it and drew out a
photograph. it was the one which Hannah had taken so long ago of Debra
and David sitting at the rock-pool in the oasis of Em Gedi and smiling
at each other. He handed it to the surgeon.
Is that what you looked like, David? I never knew. The regret showed
like a quick shadow in his eyes. Can you make me look like that again?
The surgeon studied the photograph a moment longer, the young god's face
with the dark mop of hair and the clean pure lines of the profile. No,
he said. I could not even come close That's all I wanted to know. David
took the photograph back from him.
You say I'm functional now. Let's leave it at that, shall we? You
don't want further cosmetic surgery?
We can still do a lot Doctor, I've lived under the knife for nine
months.
I've had the taste of antibiotics and anaesthetic in my mouth, and the
stink of it in my nostrils for all that time. Now all I want is a
little escape from pain, a little peace and the taste of clean air.
Very well, the surgeon agreed readily. It is not important that we do
it now. You could come back at any time in the future. He walked to
the door of the ward. Come on. Let's go find a mirror. There was one
in the nurses room beyond the double doors at the end of the passage.
The room itself was empty and the mirror was set into the wall above the
wash basin.
The surgeon stood in the doorway and leaned against the jamb. He lit a
cigarette and watched as David crossed towards the mirror and then
halted abruptly as he saw his own image.
He wore the blue hospital dressing-gown over his pyjamas. He was tall
and finely proportioned. His shoulders were wide, his hips narrow, and
he had the same lithe and beautiful man's body.
However, the head that topped it was something from a nightmare.
Involuntarily he gasped out aloud and the gash of a mouth parted in
sympathy. It was a tight lipless mouth, like that of a cobra,
white-rimmed and harsh.
Drawn by the awful fascination of the horror, David drew closer to the
mirror. The thick mane of his dark hair had concealed the peculiar
elongation of his skull.
He had never realized that it jutted out behind like that, for now the
hair was gone and the bald curve was covered with meshed skin, thickened
and raised.
The skin and flesh of his face was a patchwork, joined by seams of scar