Thirty minutes later, armed with a new ID which looked suspiciously like a credit card, Cassi returned to admitting. There she was confronted with another seemingly insurmountable problem. Since she used her maiden name, Cassidy, in the hospital because it was the name on her medical degree, and since Thomas had taken out her health insurance under Kingsley, the secretary claimed they needed her marriage certificate. Cassi said she didn’t have it. It wasn’t something she’d imagined she’d need to be admitted to the hospital, and surely they could just call Thomas’s office and get it straightened out. The clerk insisted the computer had to have the certificate. She was only the machine’s handmaiden, or so she said. This impasse was finally solved by the admitting supervisor who somehow got the computer to accept the information. Finally Cassi was assigned a room on the seventeenth floor, and a pleasant woman in a green smock, with a badge that said MEMORIAL VOLUNTEER, escorted Cassi upstairs.
But not to seventeen. First Cassi was taken to the second floor for a chest X ray. She said she had just had one six weeks ago during a routine physical and did not want another. X ray claimed anesthesia would not anesthetize anyone who was not X-rayed, and it took Cassi another hour to get the chief of anesthesia to call Obermeyer, who in turn called Jackson, the chief of radiology. After Jackson checked Cassi’s old film, he called Obermeyer back, who called back the chief of anesthesia, who called back the radiology clerk to say that Cassi didn’t need another chest film.
The rest of Cassi’s admission went more smoothly, including the visit to the lab for standard blood and urine analysis. Finally Cassi was deposited in a nondescript light blue hospital room with two beds. Her roommate was sixty-one and had a bandage over her left eye.
“Mary Sullivan’s the name,” said the woman after Cassi had introduced herself. She looked older than her sixty-one years because she wasn’t wearing her dentures.
Cassi wondered what kind of surgery the woman had had on her eye.
“Retina fell off,” said Mary, as if noting Cassi’s interest. “They had to take the eye out and glue it back on with a laser beam.”
Cassi laughed in spite of herself. “I don’t think they took your eye out,” she said.
“Sure did. In fact, when they first took my bandage off I saw double and thought they’d put it back in crooked.”
Cassi wasn’t about to argue. She unpacked her things, carefully storing her insulin and syringes in the drawer of her nightstand. She would take her normal injection that evening, but after that she was not to medicate herself until she was cleared to do so by her internist, Dr. Mclnery.
Cassi changed into pajamas. It seemed a silly thing to do at that time of day, but she knew why it was a hospital rule. Putting the patients into bedclothes psychologically encouraged them to submit to the hospital routine. Cassi could feel the change herself. She was now a patient.
After all her years at the hospital, she was amazed at how uncomfortable she felt without the status of her white coat. Just leaving her assigned room made her feel uneasy, as if she were possibly doing something wrong. And when she emerged on the eighteenth floor to visit Robert, she felt as if she were an intruder.
There was no answer when she knocked on 1847. Quietly she pushed open the door. Robert was flat on his back, snoring gently. At the corner of his mouth was a single drop of partially dried blood. Cassi went alongside the bed and gazed at him for a few moments. It was obvious he was still sleeping off his anesthesia. Like a true professional, Cassi checked the IV. It was dripping smoothly. Cassi kissed the end of her finger and touched it to his forehead. On her way to the door, she noticed a pile of computer printouts. She went over and glanced at the first page. As she expected it was the data from the SSD study. For a moment she considered taking it with her, but the thought of Thomas’s finding it in her room made her hesitate. She’d read it with Robert later.
Besides, it she were to take her friend’s new theory seriously, it was not the sort of evidence she cared to have in her room the night before an operation.
Thomas opened the door to his waiting room and crossed to the inner office. He nodded a greeting to the patients and mentally cursed the architect for not providing a separate entrance. He’d prefer to be able to get to his office unseen. Doris smiled as he approached but didn’t leave her seat. After the episode the day before, she felt a little gun-shy. She handed him his messages.
Inside his office, Thomas changed to the white coat he liked to wear when he saw his patients. He felt it encouraged not just respect but obedience. Sitting at his desk, he ran quickly through the multitude of phone calls until he got to Cassi’s. He stopped and stared at the pink slip. Room 1740. Thomas frowned; it was a semiprivate directly opposite the nurses’ station.
Snatching the phone off the hook, Thomas put in a call to the director of admissions, Grace Peabody.
“Miss Peabody,” said Thomas with irritation. “I’ve just learned that my wife has been admitted to a semiprivate. I really wanted her to have her own room.”
“I understand, but we are a little crowded right now, and she was classified as a semi-emergency.”
“Well, I’m sure you can find her a private room since I feel it’s important. If not, I’ll be happy to call the hospital director.”
“I’ll do the best I can, Dr. Kingsley,” said Miss Peabody with irritation.
“You do that,” said Thomas and slammed the phone down.
“Damn!” He hated the pea-brained bureaucrats who were running the hospital these days. They seemed intent on creating maximum inconvenience. He had trouble imagining how anyone could be so shortsighted not to give the wife of Memorial’s most famous surgeon a private room.
Glancing at the schedule that Doris had placed on his desk, Thomas massaged his temples. His head had begun to pound.
Hesitating only briefly, he yanked open the second drawer. After three bypasses and with twelve office patients on the agenda, he deserved a little help. He got out one of his peach-colored tablets and gulped it down. Then he pressed the intercom button and told Doris to send in the first appointment.
Office hours went better than Thomas had anticipated. Out of the twelve patients there were two postop visits that required no more than ten minutes each. Of the other ten, Thomas signed up five bypass cases and one valve replacement. The other four patients weren’t operative and should not have been sent to Thomas in the first place. He got rid of them quickly.
After signing several letters, Thomas called Miss Peabody back.
“How does room 1752 sound?” asked Miss Peabody haughtily.
Room 1752 was a private corner room at the end of the corridor. Its windows faced west and north with a fine view of the Charles River. It was perfect, and Thomas said so. Miss Peabody hung up without saying good-bye.
Thomas changed back to his suit coat and, after telling Doris he’d see her later, left for the Scherington Building. He made a brief stop in X ray to see some films before going to visit Cassi.
When he reached seventeen, he was surprised to find his wife still in 1740. He pushed in without knocking.
“Why haven’t you moved?” he demanded.
“Moved?” asked Cassi, confused. She’d been talking with Mary Sullivan about having children.
“I made arrangements for you to have a private room,” said Thomas irritably.
“I don’t need a private room, Thomas. I’ve been enjoying Mary’s company.”
Cassi tried to introduce Thomas, but he was already pressing the call button.
“My wife is going to be treated properly,” said Thomas, glancing down the hall to see where the nursing staff was hiding out. “If any of these supposedly indispensable hospital administrators have a member of their family in this hospital, they always make sure they have a private room.”