by Bill Douglas
The white-coats were all showing signs of coming round, with grunts and moaning. Jimmy and Pat tore up a couple of their (patients’) shirts to truss and gag the three. John checked the gags to ensure the men could breathe properly.
So far, all was okay. Except that the three white-coats had taken a beating, which was something he hadn’t intended. He should have foreseen this; the pent-up rage exploding.
He glanced at the office clock. “It’s too early. Let’s wait till it’s nearer the shift change.”
An age passed. “Let’s go.”
Jimmy shot to the ward door, unlocked it and tiptoed out into the corridor. Pat and George followed, then Ginger shadowed by Kong. Last out, John locked the door.
There was no sign of anyone in the corridor. But they’d better not dally. The night shift weren’t due yet; and the possibility of somebody arriving early had been one of the hitches foreseen. Another had been someone going off early. But no, the corridor was empty. They moved silently, keeping the same order.
They reached the exit door. Here John went to the front, unlocked the door and stepped outside. Yes, the dark niche on the right was as Mac described. They could huddle there until it was right to go for the main gate. He motioned the others towards the niche as they appeared, then locked the door and joined them.
“Great place for hide-and-seek,” Jimmy whispered.
The air smelt good. Amidst the raised adrenalin and excitement, John was calm, clinical. So far, fine.
They’d agreed to go in pairs – Jimmy and Pat, then Ginger and Kong, then George and him. All must blend in with night-shift leavers. Timing could be critical.
Keeping an eye on the exit route, he whispered with George to outline how he planned to deal with handing in their keys. The group remained silent.
“Now – good luck.”
Jimmy and Pat set off, and a few paces after, Ginger and Kong. Then it was time for him, and he nudged George. By now other greatcoats and suits – some chattering – were making for the exit.
George and he filtered in. Their luck ran out. The great-coated giant immediately in front, looked round. Sarge. The audible gasp and “Chisholm!” told John he was rumbled.
Blast! But the others could still be okay. Yelling “Can’t catch me,” he ran towards the wall at the far side. He glanced backwards. Sarge and at least one other were pursuing. He’d give them a run – he could sprint fast. Taking up rugby league at uni, playing at Wakefield on the wing, had not only earned useful cash but toughened him up. He darted round Sarge and his mate, back towards the leavers. He wanted to draw more of them.
“Stop the bugger – he’s a patient,” he heard. Dark figures were leaving the queue and running his way. He turned and headed back in Sarge’s direction. He ran at Sarge and side-stepped round – delighting at the roar as he palmed the brute in the face – then jinxed away from another greatcoat and headed for the wall again. He heard puffing and swearing behind him, and risked a glance. Several were giving chase. He halted short of the wall, gasping. He was pretty unfit. They were circling round, to trap him. He dashed through a gap, then ducked and weaved to go another direction. But someone trip-tackled him, and, sprawling on the ground, he felt the impact of bodies pinioning him. Hopefully the others had escaped.
“Gotcha, Chisholm.” He recognised Sarge’s triumphant growl. The adrenalin rush over, he lay panting. He heard in the cacophony, “How the hell did he get off the ward?” He was done for. “Hold him steady,” the voice commanded. Strong hands obeyed. His bum stung. Everything faded.
38
Wednesday 17th October 1956 – in Springwell.
Dr James Braid Macdonald heard the door slam behind him and keys jangling as his escort locked up. He really wanted this job – a challenge at a backwoods place.
“Follow me please, Sir.”
He walked in solemn procession – one white-coated companion leading and another tagging at the rear – across the vast gloomy space towards a door in the far corner. A platoon formation. The plodding on the wooden floor sounded funereal. Fittingly atmospheric. The man in front unlocked a door and held it open.
Macdonald stepped into a dimly-lit passageway and waited while his companion locked the door behind them. This was like a gateway to Hell. Along the dreary corridor (with its stone-flagged floor and walls too dark a brown), they trudged in single file. How many sad tales could these walls tell? There was nothing remotely charming about the sinister pathways. So far, everything was reminiscent of that asylum where they’d imprisoned Auntie.
They reached another solid-looking door. The nurse leading the way unlocked it and held it open for him and his other, much older, escort to pass through. This corridor was a lot brighter, the walls painted cream and the floor carpeted (in institutional brown, predictably, but at least it was carpet). He heard the door shut behind him, and keys jangling, as the door was re-locked. He glanced backward. His ‘lead’ escort had gone.
“This is a bit brighter,” he said to his remaining escort, now alongside him.
“Yes, Sir. It needs to be because this is our administrative block.”
Shocking, but not unexpected. “Ah.”
“I’ll take you to the waiting-room, Sir.”
“Thank you, Mr Porter. You’re Assistant Chief Male Nurse?”
“Yes, Sir, but I retires next month. Near forty years, I been here – ten of these Assistant Chief to Mr Hallman. He runs a tight ship, but he’ll not be here much longer neither. Don’t know what’ll happen then.”
What indeed? Change? “Well, all the best for your retirement, Mr Porter.”
“Thank you, Sir.” Porter stopped outside a door in the corridor. “If you’ll wait in here please, with the other gentlemen. It’s the ante-room to our boardroom.”
*
Inside the room, Macdonald stood for a moment, looking around. Bigger than he’d have expected for an ante-room. Along the opposite wall, three grey-suited men sat in a row of armchairs, which were spaced well apart – two on each side of another door.
“Good day,” he said, glancing along the row. One man – white-haired with a weather-beaten wrinkled face – looked up at him; the other two sat with their heads bowed. He heard grunting, presumably in response. “Jamie Macdonald. I’m afraid my train from up north was very delayed.” More grunting ensued and the weather-beaten one gave a cough, maybe clearing his throat. The other two carried on staring at the floor. All three looked old – a good ten to twenty years older than he.
“Dr Macdonald, I’m Liam Kenney.” The weather-beaten face now crinkled into a half smile.
He sank into the armchair next to Kenney.
This guy at least seemed human. “Where are you from, Dr Kenney?”
“I’m Deputy here. I’m near retirement age, but I was persuaded to throw my hat in the ring.”
“Well, you must feel you’ve earned the job.”
Kenney leaned over to whisper. “I don’t want it. Too much time on admin, not enough on clinical. But I’ll feel obliged to take it if I’m offered.”
“I’m sorry to have missed the tour round.” True. The two-hour delay had been a damn nuisance.
“You didn’t miss anything. The boss planned to show everyone round, but cried off sick and cancelled. Normally I’d stand in – but well, I’m a candidate.”
No wonder the others looked grumpy – assuming they arrived on time. “How long –” He started as the door beside him opened and an elderly woman appeared.
“Gentlemen, I am Miss Bewlay, Secretary to the Medical Superintendent.” She paused, then resumed in her shrill commanding voice. “Dr Kenney, you will be interviewed first.” She held the door open while Kenney sprang to his feet and walked through.
The door shut, he was closeted with two morose companions and his own thoughts. He recalled Auntie’s tormented look in that asylum, and the vow he took over her lifeless body. The six-year medical slog at Edinburgh had been okay, except for pathology in year four, when
he had to re-sit. He hated corpses.
The reason he didn’t stay in Edinburgh? Simply Gill, the only woman on his course. “I have to go home, Jamie.” He saw her anguish as she chose between her madly-in-love boyfriend and her widowed terminally ill mother. No contest. And he didn’t regret following her to Manchester for his three-year psychiatry training. Life was good. He was set on the field he’d dedicated to and courting the girl he loved.
It was sad that Gill’s mum died a few weeks before the wedding. And the other cloud was Adolf Hitler, with his gang of Nazis.
He leaned forward and glanced again at his two fellow candidates. Each was greying, hunched forward, and staring at the floor. They were almost statuesque. He curbed an impulse to laugh. Could they have fought in the War? Surely they’d been too old for active service – and could even have fought in the Great War.
Maybe it was being an only child and having a vivid imagination. Reminiscing was for him a relaxation, a winding down from busy high-stress times. Happy or sad, memories served as affirmation and reinforced his learning from experience.
A year into the War he’d completed his Diploma in Psychological Medicine, married Gill, and joined the Royal Army Medical Corps. In France, he worked long hours, seeing folk with conflict-related breakdowns – not only shellshock, but also other hellish inner torments triggered by the war and separation from loved ones.
Sometimes he was sure he’d helped; sometimes he knew he hadn’t – as with those two soldiers who committed suicide. He resisted army pressures to speed getting soldiers back to the front line. Where the soldiers wanted to get back, and he thought they were up to it psychologically – fine. But otherwise he ensured they got not only treatment, but the time they needed for rehabilitation.
A tough induction to psychiatric practice. The haunted faces, the harrowing tales, were still there in flashbacks. Sometimes he’d felt on the verge of sanity, and turned to a nightly whisky to help him sleep. But he survived, kept afloat by letters from Gill and those too-rare leaves with her, by his memories of Auntie – and by the whisky. He raged at God often. Sessions with the chaplains brought him back to worship and prayer. But through France and beyond, the nightly whisky got larger.
The door beside him opened. Liam Kenney emerged, looking unflustered, and, bending over, said in a whisper, “I’ve blown it, Macdonald. Good luck.” Kenney straightened, and exited by the door back to the corridor.
Kenney seemed a nice guy. At a guess, conscientious.
“Doctor Hastings, will you come with me please.” Miss Bewlay spoke as one expecting to be obeyed, and held the door open. As though electrified, the man in the furthest armchair leapt up and, with military bearing and searching eyes that stared angrily, marched past Miss Bewlay to the boardroom.
Left alone in monastic silence, with a companion who wasn’t one (the man sat with eyes fixed on the floor), Macdonald continued reflecting.
He’d craved going back to civvy street, but that wasn’t all roses. Early on the nightmares were so bad that he slept downstairs to let Gill have an undisturbed night. He got a clinical/teaching registrar post in Manchester University’s Psychiatry Department.
It was not where he wanted to end up. But the quieter life of academia suited him for a time, and allowed him to address his growing alcohol problem. With support from Gill and the local Alcoholics Anonymous, he’d tackled this head-on and gone teetotal. It was years since he’d felt an inclination for a nightly soporific.
Then at a conference came a big moment – meeting Macdonald Bell, the boss at Dingleton Hospital in Melrose. What a guy, enthused by the idea of unlocking the wards – and branded crazy by the old guard, who predicted chaos and carnage.
When the consultant post came up there, he’d gone for it, with Gill’s 100% support. She wound down with the practice in Hyde, stayed till the house was sold, and got part-time work in Melrose.
The door opened and Miss Bewlay entered. Hastings couldn’t have been in for long. “Doctor Macdonald, please come with me.”
He rose and stopped. “Excuse me. Dr Hastings?”
“His interview is over. He was escorted out by another exit.”
He straightened his tie, insisted that Miss Bewlay precede him, and took a deep breath. Yes, he did want this job.
39
Tuesday 23rd – Wednesday 24th October 1956 – in Springwell.
Waking up in a padded cell wasn’t a shock for John. Trying to escape, and slugging three white-coats on the way, wouldn’t have charmed the regime. He was a villain, surely to be punished and detained. The only question was what other sanctions or punishments might follow. The gallows? Beheading?
The hatch grated, letting in a shaft of light. A face?
“Chisholm!”
Even in his semi-drugged state, the sound struck a chill. Sarge? He lay looking up at the face. “Who’s asking?”
“Who do you bloody think? I’m the boss here on Refractory, and I’m keeping you locked in this cell all day.”
Bad news. Nothing he could do about it.
“You’ve been a right fucker. I’ll see you gets your comeuppance tomorrow.”
Predictable from Sarge. His punishment couldn’t be any worse than before. Or could it? When three of Sarge’s henchmen came in to give him the expected chemical knockout, he offered no resistance.
Thursday 25th October 1956 – Night-time.
John was in bed at last after his first full day in the Factory. It was hard to sleep. The dormitory lighting was brighter than on Admissions. At either end of the dormitory were white-coats, in pairs. At least Sarge wasn’t around. Another white-coat sat in the office.
He’d survived, unscathed. But the atmosphere was menacing. And Sarge’s presence daytime ensured he would be a prime target for bullying.
There was another dimension. Some of the patients here were the proverbial hard men, the tough guys. Micky, a scowling massive middle-aged man who’d sat jostling him at breakfast, claimed to be from Broadmoor. “I’m not the only Broadie here – there’s three other lads.”
He’d heard that Broadmoor housed the violent criminally insane. Micky and his fellow ex-inmates there had obviously been deemed fit for an ordinary asylum – but the guys must have had form. Micky reckoned he’d been in Broadmoor over twenty years. “Strangled me girlfriend. The bitch took over my mind and the voice told me to kill her. I’m from these parts, and they moved me to this dump so’s me old mam could come and see me.”
And so many white-coats! Their ratio to patients must be double anything he’d seen on Admissions. Apart from Sarge, he didn’t recognise any of them. Some looked tough and mean. Could be contextual – violence breeding violence.
Again, looks could be deceptive. Clark, who’d looked a bully, was quite a caring guy, with a sense of humour. In contrast, Niven and Sarge, as well as looking the part, vied with each other in bullying credentials.
Shouting and heavy footsteps indicated a scuffle opposite the end of his bed. He sat up to look. A man, struggling and yelling, was being frogmarched by two white-coats. “Shut the fuck up,” he heard somebody bawl. And indeed the yelling stopped after two more white-coats arrived. A limp body was carried by two white-coats into a padded cell. “A right bugger that,” one of the white-coats said loudly.
“Shut up,” came from the next bed. The two white-coats carried on talking as they went down the dormitory; one went into the Charge’s office. There was silence, apart from muttering in the next bed and bronchitic coughing further along.
He slid down into the bed and sank into reflection.
So far, Sarge hadn’t singled him out for the dire punishment promised, or even for humiliation. That could be to do with the large number of patients on the ward – or maybe the fights had kept him off the radar. In three incidents, violence had flared, and one escalated into a brawl, with several patients and white-coats getting stuck in. The scrapping patients were knocked out and put into cells. He’d managed to stay clear of troubl
e each time.
There were seven cells. And, soon before lunch, he’d seen patients being escorted – one-by-one – into each of these. There was no discernible reason for this.
“Screws’ lunchtime,” Micky growled loudly. And indeed the cell occupants were released when the white-coats got back to strength.
Friday 26th October 1956
After breakfast, John spied George. He’d willed the others to escape while he drew the hunters. But he felt bucked at seeing a fellow non-escaper.
George conveyed in whispers what had happened. “When they recognised you, I surrendered. A fiend twisted my arm up my back.” George peered around. “They must know I’m a famous author and it would be bad to let me escape. Kong fought the white-coats and Ginger yelled ‘Unhand me.’ I didn’t see Pat or Jimmy.”
Maybe they’d escaped. But Ginger must be captive somewhere in this dump.
And as John lined up to go outside, he heard the ward door being unlocked. In came a party of white-coats bearing a stretcher with a body on it. Sarge emerged from his office and inspected the still figure.
Another victim. This was presumably how he himself entered Springwell.
“Caught the bugger,” bawled Sarge, turning to address the patients. “A lesson. You try to escape, we’ll catch you – and we’ll cut your balls off.”
Not literally. But with Sarge…? Must be either Paranoid Pat or Jimmy.
“Like Moloney here,” Sarge continued, then said to the white-coats holding the stretcher, “Throw the bugger into cell one, till I’m ready to deal with him.”