In another room of the Medical Centre, in those hours, an elderly truck driver-later to be known in scientific papers as Henry M.-had been rushed to the hospital, suffering a severe coronary occlusion. In emergency surgery, his heart began to fail, and there was no hope of his survival. In those dark minutes, through the influence of the resident surgeon (an admirer of Garrett’s) upon the patient’s weeping family, John Garrett was encouraged to attempt his transplantation of the calf’s heart into this suddenly available human chest, instead of the waiting canine.
The responsibility was staggering. Garrett had never before introduced Anti-reactive Substance S into a fellow human, let alone attempt a heterograft. But by now, he possessed a fanatic’s belief in his as yet only partially proved findings. The nervous impetus that had geared him for the experiment on a canine was now automatically transferred to the unconscious truck driver. The mass of tissues on the table before him might be man or beast, for all Garrett knew. His conscience was in his fingers. Henry M., who hovered on the far edge of death, was injected with Anti-reactive Substance S. He was hooked to the cardiopulmonary bypass machine. Surgery proceeded. The heterograft, with all its complexity, was made surely and swiftly. And then, the question. Would the patient live?
When the clamps and catheters were being removed, Garrett’s mind went to an old paper he had once read. In 1934, the Russian physiologist, Dr. S. S. Briukhonenko, had applied a mechanical heart and lung to a suicide victim, a man who had hanged himself, and the machine had brought the man back to life. The patient had opened his eyes, been aware of the physician and staff surrounding him, and had then closed his eyes forever. Even though this was different, the all-important serum, a mammalian heart, Garrett feared the same pattern when the truck driver, Henry M., opened his eyes at daybreak and blinked his bewilderment and then his gratefulness.
But Henry M.’s eyes stayed open, then and since, and he lived on with his sturdy calf’s heart, unaffected by the rejection mechanism, and in medical circles and soon in the press Garrett became the Jesus who raised Lazarus from the dead.
In short months, Garrett would learn that only one cardiac patient in twenty possessed the proper blood and tissue qualifications compatible to accepting the sensational serum that would neutralize the rejection mechanism and allow the body to accept the radical transplantation. Nevertheless, encouraged and supercharged by the case of Henry M., Garrett succeeded in grafting his substitute hearts into seventeen more human beings, whose blood and tissue had been screened beforehand. Every one survived. The implications were fantastic.
When Garrett read his definitive paper on his work at the Western Surgical Association in Denver, he was hailed by scientists throughout the world. Despite the limitations of his discovery, everyone seemed to sense that the first giant step towards longevity, even immortality, had been made. It was as if, in his day, Ponce de Leon had actually found the Fountain of Youth and bottled its waters. From a nonentity with a wild dream, John Garrett had become a saviour unique. He held his rarefied position exactly ten days. On the tenth day, he was asked to move over. There was another to share the occupancy of the spotlight with him.
The wire services of America carried the long and dramatic story from Rome, and the newspapers of America paraded it across their front pages. It appeared that Dr. Carlo Farelli, the eminent Italian physician, had just published a brilliant paper claiming and proving the very same discovery that Garrett had made. Farelli had also found a serum that, like Anti-reactive Substance S, made a heterograft acceptable, and had successfully transplanted resurrecting mammalian hearts into twenty-one persons from Italy, Switzerland, and Austria.
Overnight, Lazarus was multiplied, and Jesus was not one but two.
The world rejoiced. John Garrett was confused. His fame, while no less secure, seemed dimmed because his glory was shared. Colleagues abroad made inquiries not only of Garrett, for further work in the field, but of Farelli. The press quoted not only Garrett but also Farelli, and the Italian was quoted more frequently because he was a colourful showman as well as a great scientist, and better equipped than the reticent John Garrett to communicate his ideas to laymen.
Several months after the advent of Farelli, John Garrett’s headaches began.
And here I am, he told himself, conscious once more of his surroundings and that Mrs. Zane’s interminable recital of her libidinous history was coming to an end.
‘-until at last he fell asleep,’ Mrs. Zane was saying in a voice become hoarse. ‘But can you imagine two times in one night? I mean, I wouldn’t mind, I’m not that old, but when you’re tending five children all day, well, enough is enough. Anyway, I got dressed and took a taxi, but it must’ve been after midnight when I finally had the dishes cleared away and changed Joanie’s bed-she’s still wetting-and got to sleep. I’m at my wit’s end, is what I want to say. I think I’m the most depraved person in the world.’
Her voice trailed off on the last, and she settled back in her chair, the sordid saga of infidelity again exorcised, and her features now relaxed as if her tensions had been relieved.
‘You’ll find your way, Mrs. Zane,’ Dr. Keller murmured, as he studiously jotted some notes on the pad before him. ‘You’re further advanced than you think.’
He peered up from beneath his bushy eyebrows, his enormous chest heaving as he inhaled and exhaled, and he studied his group. No one spoke. It was as if the smash main attraction had been on, and no one wished to follow it with a lesser act.
John Garrett saw that it was now or never. He lifted his right hand, partially, like an uncertain schoolboy. Dr. Keller noticed the gesture, and nodded.
‘Well, I guess I have a pressing little matter,’ said Garrett. He made a deferential bow at Mrs. Zane beside him. ‘Perhaps it is not as-as emotional-as involving as what we have just listened to, but it is important to me.’ His eyes met the psychiatrist’s again. ‘As you know, I’m to deliver an address tonight. At the United Forum. I’m told there will be a full house, and that the press will attend. It’s a singular opportunity for me to be heard and to express my views on my-my problem. Now, I’ve written my new speech, as I told you I would. The question remains-should I deliver my new speech-say what I want to say? Or should I settle for the usual one I’ve been giving-you know-“Hippocrates and the Human Heart”? What do you think?’
‘I don’t think the decision should be in my hands,’ said Dr. Keller instantly. ‘You are acquainted with the analytic process. If I make your decision, you will not gain by it. You must learn to make up your own mind, come to your own conclusions.’
Garrett frowned at what he considered a reprimand, although he knew better. The psychiatrist was always saying that people must come to the understanding of themselves, by themselves. He was only a guide, a catalytic agent, sometimes an interpreter. Often, he had once said, he could advise a patient what was wrong with him after two or three visits. But the knowledge would be of no value to the patient, unless the patient found out the same information by himself. This frequently made the route tortuous, but in the end, the repair was more effective and permanent.
‘I guess I have made up my mind,’ said Garrett. ‘I think it was made up before I came here today. I suppose I wanted to hear what you would say first.’ He paused. ‘I’ve decided to give the new speech. I’m going to blast the hell out of Farelli.’