Bob Gibson wrote an official report to the headmaster and recommended a review of Bella’s position in a month – with a copy to Agnes. Agnes told Bella. Bella thanked her over a long lunch where Agnes alluded to some concerns about Bob Gibson that she had garnered from a member of the school board, who suspected Gibson was inflating his monthly expense reimbursement submissions and perhaps even taking friends rather than donors out to lunch.
The next afternoon Bella dropped into Todd’s office, stating she would like to take him up on his standing offer of happy hour drinky poos and, over the next hour, was able to get – despite Todd’s tendency to bloviate – a few more snippets about Bob Gibson and even some about Jim Smith. She hinted that Gibson was being vindictive towards her and Todd offered his support while absentmindedly rubbing his groin.
The school’s development and fundraising office quickly became frost bitten.
Agnes now communicated only in writing to Bob. The secretary found herself in tears at times. When Jim Smith popped by – as was his wont – he left quickly. When she was there, Bella appeared indifferent, but would often drop into Agnes’s office. Bob reviewed the month’s data and knew he had to act. He was supposed to have Agnes with him when he met with Bella but Agnes had been tetchy and difficult in the last month, and she was overprotective of Bella. He just didn’t need any more of her crap. He called Bella to his office and moved quickly to the topic.
‘Bella, things are not working out. No donors in the last two months. When you are out of the office, people often have great difficulty in getting in contact with you. And there have been some other concerns.’
‘Exactly what, Mr Gibson?’
Bob hesitated. ‘I don’t think it would be particularly useful for me to go into details.’ His eyes dropped. ‘Bella, I’m not going to extend your appointment beyond the end of this month.’ He waited for her response. Anger? Bluster? Denial? Need for more details?
Bella stood up and left the room abruptly but did not slam the door.
Two days later Agnes received a letter from Bella with a medical certificate. No accompanying note. Just the medical certificate stating that Bella was under considerable stress and would be taking indefinite stress leave. She told Bob.
A week later the school received a letter from Bella’s lawyer indicating that Bella was initiating harassment claims: a worker’s compensation claim for general harassment and a civil claim for sexual harassment.
The school authorities moved into action. The headmaster convened an ad hoc committee comprising himself, the school’s honorary lawyer, James Hilton, and the school’s head counsellor, Peter Lawson, whom the headmaster considered wise and practical.
Hilton reported on his conversation with Bella’s lawyer. The sexual harassment claim involved the chairman of the interview committee – the chairman of the Old Boys Union, Jim Smith – who, Bella was asserting, had pointed his erect penis at her during her interview. The claim not only involved an outrageous act but a failure to act by many witnessing school officers. For example, Bella’s future line manager Mrs Agnes Dallwater had simply laughed rather than reporting Jim Smith. The claimant was therefore arguing that there had been a cover-up by the school.
The headmaster was ashen-faced. ‘This is extraordinary. I’d not heard a word about this. Why was I not informed?’
Hilton continued. ‘Heads we lose, tails we lose, headmaster. If you had known, she would accuse you of a failure to act responsibly. For you to claim you did not know will lead her to claim that the school sought to cover it up.’
‘Baseless! Disingenuous! I don’t and can’t accept those arguments.’
‘It gets worse. She will also claim that the bursar made degrading sexual remarks about her on multiple occasions – and she has witnesses. And that such offensive acts indicate that the school has a culture of sexual exploitation of junior staff.’
‘This has the potential to attract media attention.’
‘More than the potential. If it gets to court, it will make the front page.’
‘You are assuming that she hasn’t already gone to the media?’ asked Lawson quietly.
‘Her lawyer was vague when I asked. I read that as indicating she is holding off for now.’
‘The venom of the woman,’ observed the headmaster.
‘There are some other less substantive issues but which, in total, argue for a system failure,’ Hilton stated. ‘She claims that such behaviours led to other staff engaging in vindictive gossip and character assassination. That the D and F manager terminated her on non-specific grounds and that when she asked for exact details he refused to provide any.’
The headmaster appeared puzzled. ‘But Bob would always give an employee a formal list of issues. What does Agnes say?’
‘Regrettably, Bob proceeded without Agnes or any other witness. And Bella claims that Bob yelled at her and continued to humiliate her even when he could see that she was distressed and in tears. As a consequence she is submitting a formal claim for workers compensation. Humiliation and bullying, failure to justify termination of employment, jeopardising her future employment, blah, blah, blah.’
Hilton and Dawson required Jim Smith to meet with them the next evening.
‘I really don’t know how to respond,’ was his first response. ‘I’m happy to step down from my position if that would help.’ He was somewhat chastened by their failure to reject that option.
The two interviewed Agnes next. She was supportive of Bella, saying that Bella was a conduit for a sexism element that she had long observed in the school administration and hierarchy. She judged Bob Gibson’s over-reaction as central but observed that he was known to be headstrong and relatively insensitive to staff when they had personal stress.
Todd Green, when asked at interview about his observations of Bella over the years, was quick to deny any previous knowledge about her and suggested that Bob Gibson must have imagined Todd giving any such personal reference, and that Bob had a history of scapegoating.
The ad hoc committee convened at the end of the week in the headmaster’s study. ‘At least,’ said the headmaster, ‘we are talking to each other, gentlemen. For our two senior D and F people, Agnes and Bob, are not communicating with each other, Bob and Todd make contact only by memos, Jim Smith is uncontactable and I’ve received two letters from Bella’s lawyer. We have had to pay out a lot of money to quieten the group who had the less than idyllic Bordeaux trip. Throw in the First Fifteen losing last weekend against the competition loser and my head gardener resigning this morning, and I think we have a system problem.’
Lawson drawled in a reasonable Paul Newman imitation, ‘What we have here folks is a failure to communicate.’ And he smiled drolly.
‘Peter. This is not a situation worthy of humour. This school risks being brought to its knees by a very junior employee who has been here for a very brief period of time.’
Lawson spoke gently. ‘Splitting. I’ve actually seen larger organisations put at serious threat by such a strategy. It’s pretty evident to me that we are dealing with someone who has a very marked borderline personality…’
Hilton interrupted. ‘Borderline? OK. I suggest we don’t record that word, headmaster.’
The headmaster had thought Lawson had said ‘bodyline’ and had been unable to follow the context. ‘Borderline’ was also unclear to him. ‘I’m not keeping any record of our meetings, gentlemen. Borderline, Peter?’
‘She finds weaknesses in people, uses her skills to divide them and exploits them for her own ends, and then goes back to her coven unfussed.’
Hilton smiled. ‘Coven? I like that!’
Lawson also smiled. ‘And we need a border protection strategy. I also think that she’s sociopathic, lacking a moral compass…’
The headmaster was struck by Lawson’s misogynism, when he was usually so rational. But he was going through an apparently messy divorce. He elected to cut across Lawson to focus on Hilton. ‘Let’s ignore any cou
rt action for the moment and let me ask you, James. What’s the end game? Formal apology? Withdrawal of her termination notice? Mediation? How do we stop further escalation?’
‘It’s not an easy one. She’s poisoned the water…’
Lawson interrupted. ‘Absolutely. And we therefore need her out of here. Tout de suite. But, equally importantly, we need to be aware that the next risk is of further splitting. Right to the top, including us. A classic borderline strategy. We need a response that we all support and then we must all work together in actioning it.’
‘I recommend that we fight the court action,’ the headmaster said, looking at the window.
‘The immediate priority is to restore the working relationships between our senior staff. And we need Bella out of the school at any cost.’ Lawson said, looking at the door.
‘I suggest that we pay out Bella’s contract, limited to one year,’ said Hilton, looking at his fingernails.
PROFESSIONAL AND FAMILY LIFE
Martin drove home from his medical school reunion – his twentieth since graduation. He was intrigued by his colleagues’ wide interests and that several had completely given up medicine. Many had misgivings about their career, some highly critical about the long hours and poor remuneration, while only a few, like Martin, were content with their career choice.
He recognised that being a general practitioner was a more demanding career option than if he had specialised, although Dave Bradbury suggested that it was merely different.
Different perhaps because of the need to know something about everything. Patients would present with problems emerging out of multiple fields – dermatological, ear and nose, gynaecological, endocrinological, neurological, whatever – and they would expect their doctor to be competent to deal with it. Throw in the capacity to reduce a dislocated hip in an emergency, deliver a baby and suture a laceration, and it was difficult to organise the day.
The doctors entered the surgery at various times in the morning – Martin usually first – and move out of their zone of peace (the last minutes of the drive to work) as they entered the practice. The receptionist handed the doctor his or her list of calls to return, tasks to complete and questions to answer even before the first appointment began. In the background was the relentless sound of phones ringing, and despite it being so early, a sea of expectant faces, the chairs and couches fully occupied. Some of the doctors ran late, and if they were late at the beginning they rarely caught up. Their day would be marked by their constant apologies, especially when their patients in the waiting room fixed them by eye as soon as they left their room, indicating that it must be my turn, doc. There would be a mother holding a baby who had kept her awake the previous night, looking drained if not exhausted, perhaps trying to amuse her other small children who might be playing chaotically, frustrated at not being able to get to school and needing to express their cooped-up energy. It was a personality test for the adults around them – some smiling benignly, others clearly irritated and vexed.
Martin sought always to be on time and run to time. His appointment book was structured with fifteen-minute slots (at variance with most of the others who ran ten-minute appointments) and with every fourth slot free for catch ups or emergencies. Excluding the house calls, up to thirty people per day. Babies with fever. Toddlers with gastroenteritis, ear infection or tonsillitis. Adolescent girls wanting the pill. Young adults with abdominal pain and concerned about an acute appendicitis. Women with breast lumps. Elderly people with knee or back problems or nebulous neurological symptoms. Skin disorders were strikingly common, with suspicious lesions needing cryotherapy, excision or referral. Repeat prescriptions for asthma or hypertension medication. In winter, the sweeping appearance of respiratory infections. And each day there would be one or more patients who left him unsettled. Might that child’s headache be meningitis? Was the chest pain definitely reflux? Was the child hydrated enough to get through the night? You couldn’t refer everyone you were worried about off to the local hospital or to specialists. You just couldn’t practise that way. But driving home or in bed at night Martin might worry, and at times have difficulty sleeping. He would only ease his anxieties by ringing the patient the next day or having them return for a review. The relief would be transient as new concerns would emerge about someone else. Some days could stretch into the night, days of lunch on the run or being so busy he could not even get to the bathroom.
The rewards came less from getting it right, although that was important to Martin, and more from being able to help people whom he often got to know more closely than did any of their relatives. Martin was an excellent diagnostician but, as had been evident from his earliest days, was most distinguished by his empathy. Patients often commented on how he greeted them in the waiting room with a beaming face and a distinct chuckle. There was no stimulus for his chuckle and, on reflection, it almost seemed inappropriate. But it was so welcoming, a signal that he was really pleased to see that patient again. One of his pleasures was undertaking yearly reviews of his patients, which he called his ‘ten thousand kilometre service’. He would allocate an hour for the assessment and steadfastly work through a computerised program with the patient. As the patient progressively nominated positive symptoms Martin would maintain a steady conversation. ‘Right…that’s excellent…nothing there then, that’s great…oh that’s fine, nothing to worry about there.’ And after the review Martin would undertake a full physical examination, while ever courteous and respectful of the patient’s private world. ‘I’ll get you to take off your watch just in case there’s a melanoma hiding there…Great! All clear…Now we’re going to have to give the prostate a check, sorry about that but it’ll only be a brief moment. Excellent.’ Then the paperwork, the computer sending pathology request and specialist referral forms to the printer while Martin gave the patient any shots required for the next year or for any overseas trip. To wind up with a brief chat and then finish on the positive note of reassuring the patient – whether in full health or dealing with major medical problems – and stating that he looked forward to their next review. Always having the patient thinking to the future.
Martin introduced three types of peer review groups into the practice and gently encouraged the others to remain up to date. He set a standard of excellence in the practice but never declared it. He deflected any compliments or praise and, once, when asked about his high standards, observed that his most distinctive contribution to the practice was ensuring that no magazine in the waiting room was more than three months old.
Once, after attending a neurophysiology lecture, Dave Bradbury fronted Martin.
‘I now know why you are so different,’ he stated abruptly in the tea room when the two were alone.
‘Pray tell,’ responded Martin somewhat quizzically.
‘You’ve got too many mirror neurons, Sunny.’
‘Never heard of them.’
‘Bill Jeeves was telling me about them the other day. Neurons that fire when an animal observes the same action in another person, and are thought to explain empathy. They mirror behaviours in others. If you are interacting, say, with someone who is in distress, then your mirror neurons allow you to actually feel that distress.’
‘Intriguing,’ Martin mused. ‘Mirror, mirror on the ball…’
‘So I thought you were simply a nice bloke. But now we know you’re more simply the product of your neurons.’
‘But of course,’ Martin smiled. ‘How could it be otherwise?’
Martin and Sarah had adapted slowly over the decade to the realisation that they would never have children. For Martin there was the diversion of being a doctor. But he sought other distractions, ones that developed and tested his academic interests. He pursued his love of literature by undertaking a part-time English literature night course but suspended it after a year as he found it did not excite much pleasure in him at this stage of his life. He turned to medical research, and completed an MD (Doctor of Medicine) research degree. His thesis
discussion was lengthy but inconclusive. Edina congratulated him at another graduation day, older but ever proud.
‘Martin Homer, MD. A real MD! I am so pleased for you.’
Sarah viewed Martin’s pursuit of an MD as his baby. In recent years neither had discussed their inability to have a child. It remained an ache in Sarah. She had worked as an occupational therapist for a decade and then, in response to an invitation, had accepted a locum administrative position. Against her expectations she progressively became absorbed in health administration, completing a night course in minimal time and was then appointed to a full-time position at the New South Wales Government Department of Health’s North Sydney office.
The end of the day was still seen as special by Sarah and Martin. A time, seven at the earliest but often ten o’clock at night, when the two would have a drink, a meal and discuss their day. Martin would bring his humour and positivity to reporting events, Sarah loving his empathic way of describing people. And then, a little before midnight, they would go to bed, hold each other briefly and, at times when one, usually Sarah, had the urge, they would whisper their signal to each other and engage in gentle and respectful sex. On weekends they would have Edina over for dinner.
One evening Edina winced as she was standing up from the table. Sarah asked if she was all right. Still grimacing, Edina said it was just a backache, a recurrence of the pain she had had five years ago and which had put her to bed for a week, but nothing like as bad. Sarah offered to get her an analgesic tablet but Edina resisted, although she did ask if she could be driven home.
Later, Sarah observed to Martin how flat she had been. Martin suggested the pain had made it hard for her to interact.
Edina was unable to come to dinner for the next two weeks, as she was going to a bridge weekend at Gosford and a Jane Austen weekend at Katoomba.
The next weekend she appeared brighter, noting how unusual it was for her to have two weekends in a row away from them. In answer to their questions, she said the back pain was a little better. She left some of her food at the side of the plate, and said her friend Margie wanted her to go on a cruise to New Zealand the following week. Martin and Sarah were enthusiastic in their support. As he was driving her home, Martin offered to pay her fare.
In Two Minds Page 5