Clinical Judgements

by Claire Rayner

  There wasn’t a lot left on the menu. Only cheese on toast or beans on toast and she had a brainwave and asked if she could have both — the cheese cooked on the toast and then beans on top. And the woman behind the counter looked flustered and worried and she said she wouldn’t know what to charge, really. So Audrey settled for beans on their own and a piece of rather tired-looking chocolate cake and took them over to the corner table she favoured where she could watch people without feeling as though everyone could see her doing it. Not a bad supper, really, but the prices these days! Over a pound for just these bits of nothing. When she and Joe had married, her whole week’s housekeeping hadn’t been as much as four quid and she’d cared for them both and the house and later on the first couple of kids on that. Over a pound for these few bits … And she pondered that as she ate her meal and then sat back to take her time over her cup of tea.

  That was when she saw them sitting there and she frowned. She knew that woman sitting with her back to her, she was sure she did. The way she was leaning over and chattering at the man in the wheelchair beside her was very familiar and then Audrey remembered and shrank back into her corner. That was Mrs Holliday, the one who talked so much. That was who it was. The way she was feeling right now, the last person she wanted to get involved with was her.

  But it was too late. The mere fact that she had looked at the woman seemed to have alerted her to her presence for she glanced over her shoulder and her painted little face split into a great eager grin.

  ‘Well, there you are, Reg, who’d have thought it, here’s someone from the ward that you know, now isn’t that nice, she’ll tell you it’s all right, I’m sure she will, now do come over here and sit with us, Mrs — don’t be shy now — I wish I could remember your name but I was always like that, never could remember names, aren’t I a silly? But it’s lovely to see you, so do drink up and come over here and I’ll go and get us all some more tea —’

  Audrey was swept up in a tide of chatter and was deposited, breathless, on the shores of their table and sat between Mrs Holliday and her silent husband while Mrs Holliday went on pouring out words as she searched in her bag for her purse and then went up to the counter to engage the flustered woman in conversation as she laboriously prepared their cups of tea. Audrey thought about telling her she’d pay for her own, not wanting to be beholden, but knew it would be no use. She’d just run over her in her verbal juggernaut and she’d still get the tea. Might as well save her breath.

  She looked at Mr Holliday then, and found him staring at her with his rather watery pale eyes. He had a ring of milkiness around the faded blue of the iris and she remembered her own old dad suddenly. He’d had eyes like that and the memory made her smile.

  ‘How are you, Mr Holliday? You’re looking quite bobbish, I must say. Did your operation help, then?’

  He stared back at her and for a moment she thought he was about to weep, for the eyes suddenly seemed much more glistening. But he blinked and the moment passed and she said again encouragingly, ‘Well, you certainly look well. Your wife must take very good care of you.’ And she looked over her shoulder to where Mrs Holliday was leaning on the counter chattering busily as the three cups of tea cooled in front of her and the flustered woman listened with an expression of slight panic on her face.

  ‘She’s lovely,’ Mr Holliday said unexpectedly. His voice was thin and low but Audrey could hear him easily enough in spite of the sound of his wife’s voice behind them. ‘Ever so good to me. But she’s not someone I can talk to, you know?’

  Audrey smiled. ‘I know. I’ve got a sister-in-law like your missus. Heart of gold she’s got. Do anything for anyone.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Mr Holliday said. Still Mrs Holliday went on with her chatter and Audrey looked at Mr Holliday now sitting staring down at his hands clasped over his blanketed knees and tried again.

  ‘Just dropping in for old times’ sake, are you?’ she said brightly. ‘It’s a nice little café this. Useful —’

  ‘Yes,’ Mr Holliday said. ‘And it’s a nice walk. We live only a bit away and we take this walk in the evening, my exercise she calls it, and we come here for a little bit of a cuppa and then walk back. It’s an outing, see.’

  ‘Yes,’ Audrey said and smiled again. ‘An outing.’ There seemed little else she could say.

  Still Mrs Holliday chattered on at the counter and now the flustered woman was leaning forward and listening, clearly entranced. It would be some time before she got her tea, Audrey thought, and wished she hadn’t gulped down the first one so quickly at Mrs Holliday’s insistence.

  ‘Did you —’ Mr Holliday swallowed. His speech had been blurred before, but that hadn’t worried Audrey. Her dad had been like that, couldn’t speak clearly at all, and she had long since got used to it. Now though, Mr Holliday sounded more blurred than ever, the way her dad would get when he had to say something that worried him and Audrey leaned forwards and said encouragingly, ‘Yes?’ as the rusty voice stopped.

  ‘See the news?’ Mr Holliday managed and stared at her. His face showed little expression but all the same Audrey felt the anxiety in him.

  ‘On the telly?’ she said. ‘I wasn’t really listening, I mean, it was on in the day room but that’s right the other end of the ward, you see, so — Was it something bad? Another bombing in Ireland and that?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘No bombs.’

  ‘Well, that’s small mercy these days,’ Audrey said heartily and smiled at him again. Maybe if she went to help Mrs Holliday with the teas that would make her stop her chattering to the woman at the counter?

  ‘It said, doctor here and the police,’ Mr Holliday said, and now his voice was almost incomprehensible. ‘I saw it. Said the police —’

  ‘A doctor here?’ Audrey frowned and tilted her head at him. ‘A doctor here in trouble? I never heard that.’

  ‘It said on the news — Dr Buckland — do you know?’

  Audrey shook her head regretfully. ‘I don’t, I’m sorry. It’s not a thing I’d — I mean, I’ve been busy with my Joe, you see. And really I must get back up to him, I’ve been down here ever such a long time already —’ And she got to her feet.

  It was that that drew Mrs Holliday’s attention at last and with much exclaiming and clucking she came rushing over to the table bearing two cups of tea and then rushed back for the other.

  ‘Imagine me, gassing on and not fetching it, well there it is, I’m a terror once I get going, you ask my Reg, he’ll tell you, isn’t he looking well now, Mrs — er — isn’t he? I keep telling him he’s better every day, gets tired you know if he talks a lot, but getting better all the time.’ And she beamed fondly at her husband and with swift and birdy little movements of her small hands set the tea in front of him, fixed a handkerchief over his chest to catch any drops and put the cup in his hand. ‘Can manage nicely himself now he can, after his operation, a real miracle I call it, wonderful it was, a real miracle, and I tell him he shouldn’t be worrying himself over it, and him doing so well, they don’t do these operations if they don’t know what they’re doing, even if they have a new sort and so I keep on saying it but there, he’s a deep man is my Reg, thinks a lot you know, very deep, and he will go on about it especially tonight after the news about this awful business here. But like I said she wasn’t nothing to do with him, a baby doctor and all!’ And she laughed merrily and began to drink her own tea. ‘I mean a doctor who looks after maternity wouldn’t hardly be on his case would she, so I tell him not to worry. But there, he’s deep, is Reg, and I tell him he’d worry about the sun getting up in the East if there wasn’t anything else he could fret over! Oh, are you going then? Well, lovely to see you, give the other patients our regards won’t you, and to Sister, lovely to us Sister was, Reg’ll be up to see her soon, got to have a check-up he has, next week, Mr Bulpitt said so, I hope to see you too, and I do hope your good husband gets on well soon, Mrs — er —’

  Audrey escaped, smiling vaguely at Mr Holliday w
ho stared hopelessly back at her, and went back up to the ward. It hadn’t been much of a break she’d had really. But it had been different. At least there wouldn’t be Mrs Holliday chattering at her up there, whatever else there was. And she’d watch the news later, just to see what it was Mrs Holliday was on about.

  If she remembered.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The programme had been a pig. He couldn’t remember when he’d last had such a lousy collection of callers or when the debate had been so lacklustre, and he said as much to his engineer as he came out of the studio and found the man dispiritedly rewinding the tape.

  ‘Well, we all have our off days,’ the engineer said, not looking at him, and Oliver was out of the control room and halfway upstairs into the newsroom before he realised the chap had thought he was apologising for his own input rather than complaining about the outside factors, and nearly went back to explain to him, needing to exculpate himself. But he didn’t, of course, and went on to his desk in the far corner of the big clattering newsroom, where he had the privilege of a screen of tired plants in elderly pots to mark out his territory, in a sour mood.

  ‘They were a bunch of wankers this morning, weren’t they?’ Ronnie Carter said as he passed his desk, and Oliver stopped gratefully. Usually he and this man — who called himself showbiz editor and who, it seemed to Oliver, did nothing more than swan around at boozy receptions and thereafter broadcast limp PR handouts — were on distant terms, but this morning he needed the reassurance of another broadcaster that it hadn’t been his fault his programme had been so bad.

  ‘Weren’t they just?’ he said. ‘That lunatic from — where was it? — Bromley. I could have cut his throat, the damned fascist that he is —’

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Ronnie said with a fine judicious air. ‘I thought he was one of the more interesting ones. You could have made a bit more of that woman from Ealing or wherever it was, mind you — the one who went on about the EEC. She had some good points to make, though you did cut her off rather —’

  ‘Yes, well, not everybody has the wit to string together half a dozen intelligent words,’ Oliver said with sudden savagery. ‘It’s a rare gift after all,’ and he slammed away to his desk feeling worse than ever. If even Ronnie Carter could pick holes in his handling of his show he really was in a mess. He’d have to see her today, get the whole damned thing sorted out somehow. He couldn’t go on like this, torn into shreds first by Sonia, now by Kate; he’d end up with even worse than no home life — he’d have no career either. And he could have wept at his situation, and threw himself into his chair, needing to make some sort of physical statement of the way he felt. The chair rocked and he almost toppled and that helped a little. By the time he’d rescued his balance and settled himself, he was a little calmer.

  His desk was piled high with letters, mostly banal invitations, but a good many from irate listeners who hated his style and even more from those who adored it and wanted him to open fetes, become patron of their charities, or read their novels with a view to advising them on publication. Usually he found some mild pleasure in the inanities in the postbag, but this morning it was the last thing he needed, and he pushed it all aside and reached for the big scribble pad on which he was planning The Unkindest Cuts, part three. He still needed material for part two of course but he had to think ahead and block out where he was going, or he’d find himself painted into a helluva corner. And he felt another surge of anger as the words slid into his head: Christ, if he was even thinking in such dismal old clichés, what sort of stuff was he broadcasting? Maybe they were right, the engineer and Ronnie, maybe he was finished, useless, dreary —

  He dropped the scribble pad and reached for the phone. Talk to her right away, apologise, explain he had meant no harm, wanted only to protect her. Until he did there was no hope of doing any decent work and he punched the nine and began to key in Old East’s number.

  Radlett appeared from behind the plants and stared at him gloomily. ‘What are you doing here? Why haven’t you gone over to the hospital? With all that’s going on there this morning, you’ll have enough to finish your whole bloody series, if you ask me. Or have you done it already?’

  Oliver jumped a little at the suddenness of his appearance, miskeyed and swore and hung up.

  ‘What are you on about?’ he said. ‘I’m going over there later this afternoon. There’s —’

  ‘Thought as much. Didn’t listen to the news, did you, before you went on air? So you don’t know —’

  ‘Know what?’ Once more Oliver was on the defensive. Usually he listened to every news bulletin religiously, making notes, needing to be ready for whatever the punters threw at him, but this morning he’d been too abstracted, too wrapped up in his own doings to be bothered; and even in the middle of the programme when they’d gone over to ITN for the half-hour bulletin he’d pulled off his cans and stopped listening, preferring to sit there and think of last night and the things they’d both said.

  ‘The demo there. It’s getting nasty. They’ve seen today’s Globe — it really got up their noses, it seems. There are a lot more people there than there were and there’ve been some scuffles. Trying to rush the barriers the hospital’s put up. And the security people looking after Saffron got stroppy too — you’d really better get over there. And — er —’ Radlett reached over and flicked his forefinger and thumb at the pile of virgin newspapers on the corner of Oliver’s desk. ‘Better take a look at the Globe on the way. It’s relevant stuff, if a bit on the unnecessary side for my taste. Still, they know their readers, I suppose. Scum, that’s what they are — By the way, the show was a bit under par this morning, wasn’t it? We’ll have to get some better controls on the callers you’re getting — see you —’ And he went padding away to leave Oliver staring after him in a state of barely suppressed fury. And it didn’t help that there was no one at all he could blame but himself.

  He read the paper in the taxi, propping it up against the Uher on his knees and had to admit that Jimmy had done a good job, according to his lights. It wasn’t what Oliver would have done, but then Oliver wouldn’t have worked for that sort of tabloid. It wasn’t as bad as some of the scandal sheets that masqueraded these days as newspapers, even if it was a long way from the broadsheets, and he settled to read carefully as the taxi bucketed its way down Fleet Street and on towards the City, with a scowl on his face.

  ‘The Magic Wand Waved at Old East’, read one of the cross heads, and under it gushed a torrent of inflated prose about the tragic life of Kim Hynes, the brave honest patient in the kidney ward who had submitted to such painful surgery which was to change a life that had been hitherto such a burden — and on and on. The only notable thing about the writing was the way Jimmy had managed to avoid using personal pronouns: not a he or she, him or her, appeared anywhere and Oliver had to grin a little at that. So Jimmy hadn’t been able to persuade his subs to regard Kim Hynes as a woman? Interesting, that. How would the readers of the Globe regard her? Would they be able to say she? Or would they think of her as a mutilated he, or possibly, worse still, as an it?

  He lifted his head and stared blindly out of the window of the taxi as it pushed its way through the heavy midday traffic. How did he regard Kim himself, come to that? Somewhere deep inside he had to admit that Kate had made a sharp dig when she had said what she had about his attitude. He did find it difficult to contemplate the inner life of the sort of person who would submit to having his genitals removed as part of an attempt to be something he was never born to be. And he felt an actual frisson of sensation through his groin as the image of the operation rose in his mind and his Uher rocked on his lap as his thigh muscles tensed.

  He got out of the taxi at Old East and, as he was paying the driver, the man said conversationally, ‘Nasty business here, mate, eh? You press, then?’

  ‘Radio,’ Oliver said briefly, and dug in his pocket for change.

  ‘Yeah, thought so. You’re that Merrall, aren’t you? Saw
your picture in the colour supps once — “A Room of My Own” or something. I got a memory for faces.’

  ‘Yes,’ Oliver reddened. He still found it embarrassing to be cast as any sort of celebrity, however minor; he agreed to the sort of interviews that led to this kind of recognition, flattered and amused at the time, and then hated himself afterwards for the effects publication had. Every time he did it he swore he never would again, and every time he said yes. It would really have to stop.

  He was about to go and then stopped. After all, taxi drivers were famous for having opinions on everything, a useful vox pop insert if he had anything worthwhile to say. ‘What do you think of this then?’ he said and lifted his copy of the Globe. ‘Read it?’

  ‘What, the fellow what had the sex change? Sooner him than me,’ the driver said, and made a face. ‘Must be barmy.’

  ‘You think it’s right for him to have an operation like that on the NHS?’

  ‘If that’s what the stupid bugger wants and what some crazy doctor wants to do to him, what’s it to do with me?’ the driver said and put the cab into gear. ‘No skin off my nose. I belong to Private patients’ Insurance, anyway. Wouldn’t get me into a place like this and no error. It’s all a lot of socialist rubbish anyway, all this NHS stuff —’ And he nodded affably and drove off and Oliver stared after him and thought — Why do I bother? Why do any of us bother? Who gives a damn anyway?

  A lot of people, he realised then as he turned round to look at the Medical School entrance of the hospital. The little knot of demonstrators who had been there every day he had come had now thickened considerably. There were at least a hundred of them, he assessed, looking at the mob with an expert’s eye, and a great many more bystanders were just watching and waiting to see what would happen. They had been herded behind roped-off areas by the police who were heavily in evidence, and several of them seemed settled in for a good day. There were old women and several very young ones with children in prams who bawled a good deal, and not a few youths who had clearly drifted over from the Job Centre on the next corner.