Surgeon at Arms

with plenty of them. We mustn’t give them the smallest stick to beat us with.’
    Graham replied by holding his hands before his face. ‘So that is why these must be lost to the country like a torpedoed munition ship?’
    ‘You’re taking too dramatic a view, as usual,’ said Haileybury shortly. ‘Your unit will continue as before. That Canadian Tudor Beverley is a perfectly sound man. You should be the first to admit that none of us are indispensable. If I may say so, in peacetime you had rather a procession of assistants. Anyway, you remain on the staff of Blackfriars. Some beds will be found for you, either at Smithers Botham or elsewhere. Perhaps the Ministry of Pensions would have something to offer. You might like to know that I have made a point of assuring myself you wouldn’t be left in the cold.’
    ‘I am not going to treat a single casualty outside the unit that I have built up.’
    ‘Then I fear you will find little else to do. Women are not given much to having their faces remodelled these days.’
    ‘You’re wrong.’ Graham got up. ‘Once released from my contract, I’m allowed to take on as much private practice as I can handle. Right? Well, women are continuing to give a great deal of thought to the new area I’m treating. I’ve been working with O’Rory at Smithers Botham on a reconstruction procedure for congenital absence of the vagina. It isn’t a particularly unusual condition, you know. The operation’s extremely interesting. You dissect the pelvic tissues from below, then put in a skin-graft on a mould. Sometimes it takes, sometimes it doesn’t. You have to cut the graft extra thin or you’ll get a crop of hair, which would be highly uncomfortable for all concerned. So, Haileybury. You don’t want me. Nobody does. I shall therefore spend the rest of the war making new pussies.’
    Without another word he clattered down the oak staircase and out to his Morris. The sergeant stared after him anxiously. Whatever had happened, it seemed likely to put the brigadier in one of his moods.
    Graham wanted to leave the annex as soon as possible. Tudor Beverley and his staff offered to resign en block, but Graham wouldn’t hear of it. Desmond, who seemed more shocked by his father’s dismissal than by his second stab at paternity, suggested he withdraw from the Blackfriars medical school—the ridicule was liable to break out afresh, he suspected inwardly. Graham told him not to be stupid. His patients suggested getting up a petition, but Graham knew that official minds couldn’t be swayed by even a snowstorm of paper. Anyway, he was suddenly weary of battling with authority. He’d lost, and he wanted to leave the field, just as soon as he could tidy up his work.
    Clare was wonderful. Her practical mind stood rocklike amid their sea of troubles. She decided they would move somewhere for the span of her pregnancy, perhaps up to Scotland. They could enjoy a wonderful holiday until the baby was born—Graham had no need to start work, they’d saved a bit, and she’d a little money of her own. The divorce could surely be left in the hands of the solicitors. Graham agreed with everything. He felt he wanted the child desperately. It would be an achievement, a symbol of defiance, something to show for his existence. Without a regular achievement of some sort, he doubted if he could live at all.
    Then they killed Bluey.
    It was stupid, unnecessary, almost criminal. A couple of years of Graham’s surgery had the Australian looking more or less like a human being. Better still, his hands were mending splendidly. He had a pair of new thumbs made from chips of his hip-bone, he could light cigarettes, hold a tankard, even fondle a girl. A small operation was still needed to trim the inside of his lip. John Bickley again gave an injection, and slipped the rubber tube into his windpipe. To stop the blood from Graham’s incision trickling into his patient’s lungs, John packed the back of Bluey’s throat with a length of oiled bandage. It was common practice, performed on patients every operating day. Afterwards, John drew out the tube and forgot the bandage. They wheeled Bluey back to bed. The nurse who found him dusky and straining to breathe wasted away his life trying artificial respiration. John was summoned, and instantly ripped out the bandage which was suffocating him. But it was too late. Two years in hospital had so enfeebled Bluey that the survior of a blazing Hurricane