Surgeon at Arms

case?’
    ‘I’ve no alternative, have I? I was a fool having anything to do with that Cazalay bastard. He tried to bring me down once before. This time he’s going to make a proper job of it.’
    ‘But if you do it, and the fact comes out in the papers, it’s going to look pretty nasty for you.’
    ‘Perhaps nothing will come out.’
    ‘These things generally do.’
    Graham looked more uneasy, and said, ‘It isn’t the first time, you know. Before the war I did a couple of patients like this. I had my doubts about them, but didn’t delve very deeply. I just blinded myself to the fact they were a pair of crooks. I was disgusted at myself afterwards. I don’t want to repeat the experience, quite apart from risking my neck. But if I don’t... why the hell did I buy that villa, anyway? I’ve never had a chance to use it.’
    ‘I don’t think I can really give the anaesthetic for you, Graham.’
    ‘No, I didn’t expect you would. It was selfish of me to ask. I wanted the moral support, I think, that’s all. I’ll see what I can do under local. Probably I can manage more than I expect. We get spoiled, with good general anaesthetics always available from experts like you. Some of our more unfortunate brethren manage to run a flourishing practice in cosmetic work under locals. The ones who get themselves struck off for advertising.’
    ‘Won’t you take my advice and not touch this case, Graham?’
    ‘You mean to substitute the certainty of trouble with the law for the possibility?’
    ‘It’s two sorts of trouble. The operation would spoil everything you gained for yourself during the war.’
    ‘What did I gain? A knighthood. For services to publicity.’
    ‘You know that’s not true.’
    ‘Not completely so, perhaps. But it’s near enough to the mark.’
    ‘I was speaking to Clare about you two or three weeks ago,’ John remarked unexpectedly.
    Graham looked at him sharply. ‘I thought she’d disappeared off the face of the earth?’
    ‘She’s at the Kenworth. Children’s ward sister. I do a list there once a week.’
    Graham made a wry expression. ‘How is she?’
    ‘Very well. She likes her job.’ John paused and added, ‘Do you want to see her again?’
    ‘She’d hardly want to set eyes on me,’ Graham told him impatiently.
    ‘I’m certain she would.’
    ‘No, that’s ridiculous. Not after the way I treated her.’
    ‘Is it ridiculous? You’d know. You’ve had more experience of women than me.’
    Graham stuck his hands in his trousers pocket and started pacing the room. ‘Everything’s wrong, isn’t it? You see things differently as you go through life, and often enough you realize all the time you’ve been seeing them wrong. When I was young I could see the way ahead, and I tramped up it not caring overmuch how I muddied my boots. Things didn’t go all that smoothly —Maria, all that fuss. But I got where I wanted. In the war I didn’t really want anything for myself and I was happy. Now I’m trying to worship my old gods, but they don’t represent anything any more. They’re like native idols discovered in some jungle. Incomprehensible, frightening to look at, make you wonder at the simplicity of the people who venerated them. I’d got no proper sense of values. The war imposed one on me.’
    ‘Graham, you’re making yourself sound a horrible type,’ smiled John.
    ‘Well, I am. Though let’s hope it not because I can’t help it, but because I try to be.’
    ‘Because you think it’s smart?’
    Graham shrugged. ‘I can’t even contemplate meeting Clare again. Not at this particular crisis in my life.’
    ‘She might be glad to help you. She did during several others.’
    ‘I suppose she loved me.’
    ‘You loved her, surely?’
    ‘Deep down, I told myself I didn’t. It was the same with every woman I’ve got mixed up with. I never wanted to give myself to them completely. At the age when you can face these things, it’s too late to rectify them.’
    Denise appeared with the coffee.
    ‘Graham wanted to discuss a case he’s doing tomorrow, darling,’ John explained.
    ‘I’m not doing it,’ said Graham briefly. ‘I’ve decided it’s inoperable.’
    He’d forgotten about Denise and her coffee. He then had to sit down and make conversation of some sort while he drank it, and she always made dreadful coffee, anyway.
     

TWENTY-FOUR
     
    HAILEYBURY HAD HARDLY SHAVED when Graham arrived the next morning at his house in Richmond. His