In the week preceding the party Paul spent a great deal of time brooding on tactics. What he needed with Marianne, he felt, was a chance to make mellow conversation in relaxed surroundings – a little wine to take the edge off his nerves, a little background music to fill in any awkward gaps, a little spot of prolonged eye contact. Instead, thanks to Crispin, he would be wearing a stupid outfit, screaming above the biggest sound system that he had ever seen outside of a club and drinking cocktails made largely of blue curaçao, a two-litre bottle of which had been discovered in the back of a wardrobe at the nurses’ home; there would be no margin of error between total sobriety and extreme drunkenness, no subtle gap between effortful small talk and sozzled blabber. And while it was true that most of Paul’s previous relationships had begun with a booze-fuelled snog, it was also true that most of them had ended not all that long after both parties had sobered up.
It was time, he decided, for a more considered approach and the solution occurred to him one night as he was holding yet another retractor at yet another four a.m. appendectomy: he could be on call! It was perfect – he’d become an occasional visitor to the Bacchanalia, rueful yet dignified, a white-coated beacon of maturity who, while enjoying the antics of his friends, had yet a higher, finer, more sober purpose for the evening. (‘I’ve hardly seen you all night, Paul.’ ‘I know, I’m sorry, but we had a cardiac arrest on Ward 4.’ ‘Did you – did you manage to save him?’ ‘Yes, but… you don’t want to hear about serious stuff do you?’ ‘No, I do. Let’s get away from here, let’s find somewhere where we can really talk.’)
All the plan needed was a minor rearrangement of the rota and a reason for the rearrangement that wouldn’t attract Crispin’s derision; a fictitious ear infection requiring antibiotics did the trick rather well (‘Christ, Pud, you sad bastard, what a fucking catastrophe not to be able to drink at your own party!’), and the only crease in the plan was Armand’s slight reluctance to swap shifts (‘I don’t see, Paul, why you can’t attend this social get-together and simply stick to soda. Why is it necessary to drink alcohol at all?’), but Paul offered to spend their next shared free evening working on a flat-tidying rota and a deal was struck. Since the night of the sink Armand had thawed just a little and had become friendly in a slightly mechanical way, as if schooled through an earpiece. In return for the largesse of letting Paul use the shower for five minutes in the morning he had begun expecting a sort of simultaneous translation of British cultural mores, and would also jot down odd questions that occurred to him during the day.
‘So, what is a clanger?’
‘A clanger? Well, it means a big mistake. People say, “Oh I’ve dropped a clanger,” when they’ve said something they shouldn’t.’
‘So when I overheard Gwyn Parry say that I sounded exactly like an outraged Clanger, that means …?’
‘Oh right, that sort of Clanger.’ Sometimes the explanations were difficult; sometimes Paul lied.
His flatmate had been surprisingly accommodating about the party, and Paul wondered whether he had actually grasped the full extend of the squalor that might result. ‘You know there’ll be loads and loads of people here,’ he’d said tentatively.
‘Paul, I appreciate your concern, I can see how you might think it wouldn’t be my kind of thing, but I enjoy social occasions and I’m more than able to deal with them as long as my own personal space is out of bounds. Which of course it will be.’ The muscles around his jawline had flickered ominously.
‘Right… and, er, who’s your hero?’
‘You mean, what costume am I going to wear?’
‘Yup.’
‘Well, I’ve had what I think is quite a clever idea. And amusing. You see, my personal hero is my maternal grandfather who emigrated from Caithness in 1927 when he was only fourteen and took a job in a bakery in Montreal, and I look a lot like him. Really a lot, I’ll have to show you a photo. So I thought I could wear a name badge with his name. And maybe some sort of neckerchief, so that I look kind of dated.’
On the evening of the day before the party, therefore, it was Armand and not Paul who was on call when Mrs Dimoglou returned to hospital as an emergency with an inflamed and perforated gall bladder. She was taken straight to surgery, and from there to intensive care where – much to everyone’s surprise – she survived the night and was transferred to a side room on the ward. ‘Ah yes,’ as Mr Gorman said acidly on the round the next morning, ‘and now we come to a patient who should have had her gall bladder removed under, controlled conditions three weeks ago, instead of as a desperate measure involving the midnight summoning of a senior surgeon who was hoping, for just once in his life, that the competence of his junior staff would enable him to have a full night’s sleep. Dr Gooding, would you like to define the meaning of the word “elective” for the benefit of our medical students?’
After the round Paul returned furtively to the room and looked through the porthole window at the tiny figure in the bed. He was used to feeling inadequate in the face of patient suffering, but feeling directly responsible was a new and unpleasant sensation. There was no way around it: if Mrs Dimoglou had had her routine operation as planned, then she would not now be fighting peritonitis with the aid of four separate tubes and a heart monitor. Fat Trevios was sitting beside her, holding her hand; Paul watched impotently for a while and then slunk away.
Trevios stayed, but other relatives came and went throughout the day; Paul peered into the room whenever he was passing – and sometimes made a detour even when he wasn’t – and witnessed across the hours a tiny and gradual improvement in Mrs Dimoglou’s condition. By early evening her blood pressure and temperature checks were down from half-hourly to hourly, and she was beginning to take the odd sip of water.
‘Still with us, is she?’ asked Gwyn, coming on shift at seven and catching Paul on one of his sorties.
‘Just about,’ said Paul, subdued.
‘Oh, don’t give up on Mrs Dimoglou, she’s tougher than she looks – stringy, you see, that’s the build you need if you want to get old; all the ones who end up getting their telegrams are head-to-toe gristle.’ He nodded encouragingly. ‘Any admissions expected?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Well, thank God for that, you know how many staff I’ve got on with me this shift?’
‘No.’
‘One. Student. Guess how much ward experience she’s had – go on, guess.’
‘A week?’
‘Two days.’ He gave a mirthless bark of laughter. ‘Bloody marvellous, isn’t it, I’m surrounded by toddlers. No offence, Paul.’ He took off his coat and yawned and then halted, mid-stretch. ‘Hey now,’ he said, ‘I’ve just remembered something. It’s your party tonight, isn’t it – cocktails and hip-swivelling debauchery until the small hours?’
‘Yup.’
‘So why are you taking the bleep?’
‘I can’t drink – I’m on antibiotics for an ear infection.’
‘Oh God, bad luck. Still, if it stays quiet you should be able to pop upstairs every now and again. You ought to make a point of viewing Lexie – she spent most of yesterday night making her costume. Mind you, that’s about an hour per square inch of material so be prepared to shield your eyes from the glories of the flesh.’
‘What’s she going as?’ asked Paul, stirred in spite of himself.
‘Princess Leia in that scene where she’s rolling round in front of the big slug – you know, the tin bikini. Doesn’t do anything for me but I gather it sends you straight boys into a frenzy of lust. Or maybe you’ve got someone special of your own arriving? Little bit of a private consultation, maybe? Just step into my room, madam, and I’ll demonstrate the use of my stethoscope?’
Paul shrugged with an attempt at nonchalance. ‘You never know,’ he said.
When, ten minutes later, he climbed the stairs from the ward to the accommodation floor he could feel the bass line pulsing through the soles of his feet, and he pushed open the door to the corridor expecting to be slapped back by a wall of music. Instead there was merely a slightly muffled version of the same beat, filtering up through the carpet tiles. Outside the open door of the flat Armand was sellotaping a row of bunting around the frame. He was wearing the neckerchief, together with a check shirt and a pair of jeans, both of which were covered in white dust.
‘Flour,’ he said, in answer to Paul’s query. ‘If you remember, my grandfather worked in a bakery. But I’ve actually used non-perfumed talcum powder.’ His name badge, written in copperplate, read ‘Archie McClaren’.
‘Has anybody else arrived?’
‘No, not yet. Oh, Crispin wanted a word with –’
‘Pud! Is that you? Get in here.’
The sitting room had been cleared of most of its furniture and a bar constructed out of the kitchen table and a length of yellow crepe paper. A purloined whiteboard sported a list of available cocktails.
‘What’s a Shadley Oak Shafter?’ asked Paul.
‘Curaçao and Coke. I think the stereo’s fucked.’ Crispin gave the top an irritated smack. ‘Know anything about them?’
‘Not much.’ Paul crouched beside it. ‘What’s an Abbey Arseholer?’
‘Curaçao and Guinness. One of the speakers isn’t working – listen.’ He swivelled the volume dial, and Paul’s entire body became one vast, thrumming bass note.
‘See what I mean,’ said Crispin, turning it down again. ‘No treble.’
‘That could be really dangerous, doing that,’ said Paul. He felt as if his bowels were still sounding a low C. ‘That’s a biological weapon. I read about someone once who was killed by a low-frequency noise. At the post-mortem they found that his organs had disintegrated into a homogeneous jelly.’
‘Curaçao and homogeneous jelly,’ said Crispin. ‘I could sell that. Here, Pud, you know I found a bunch of old party photos from our student days. How about I staple them to the front of the bar?’
‘I’d prefer it if you didn’t. Where did you get the stereo from?’
‘Card in a shop window, dead cheap. So, can you mend it?’
‘No,’ said Paul, straightening up. ‘At least, I can’t see any loose wires and that’s about my limit.’
‘Bugger. I’ll have to see what I can borrow – hey, while I’m gone can you stop that loon sticking labels on everything. Real atmosphere killer.’ He caught sight of himself in the mirror over the gas fire and gave his bow tie a tweak before striking a brief pose, forefingers forming an upward-pointing gun. ‘Mishter Bond,’ he said, in a rough approximation of Sean Connery, ‘you’re looking sho fucking shexy.’
The notice outside the bathroom read ‘Please leave this room as you found it’, and just beside the toilet the cleaning materials had been corralled into one easy-to-find group labelled ‘USE ME’. The kitchen sink had a slightly pointed ‘Drinking Fluids Only Down Here’ sticker, and on Armand’s bedroom door was taped a sheet of A3 on which was written ‘PRIVATE, THIS MEANS YOU!!’ in large black letters. Paul rubbed the back of his neck thoughtfully and decided to leave any intervention to Crispin. He could hear Armand talking to someone outside the flat, and from the pink-knitted timbre of his voice he was feeling outraged again.
‘Paul,’ he said, when Paul had stuck his head round the door to see what was going on, ‘did you know there’s an empty apartment just up the corridor?’
‘It’s not empty any more,’ said a woman standing nearby, a laden bin bag in her arms and a holdall over one shoulder. ‘It’s got me in it, for three weeks anyway.’ She glanced at Paul and then did a distinct double take. ‘Hello there.’
He looked at her blankly. She was, what – thirty-five, forty, more? He found it difficult to estimate women’s ages once they stopped being obviously young. She had curly hair and very blue eyes and quite a big bust.
‘You don’t remember me?’
He shook his head, made slightly uneasy by the knowing slant of her mouth. Had she been a patient to whom he had done something especially incompetent? ‘Sorry,’ he added.
‘That’s OK,’ she said, ‘you were pretty busy when we met. You having a party?’
‘Yes, we –’
‘I’m sorry to butt in here,’ said Armand, in a determined voice, ‘but I just need to … to establish something. You are moving into a hospital apartment?’
‘Yes, temporarily. It’s one they save for married doctors, but there aren’t any at the moment so it was offered to me …’
‘You’re a doctor?’
‘No, I’m a dietitian.’
‘So we’re talking about a – a –’ Armand seemed almost unable to articulate the next word, ‘single-bedroom apartment? A single-bedroom doctor’s apartment with bathroom?’
‘Yes,’ said the woman. ‘At least I think so, I haven’t actually seen it yet.’ She waggled a key at them. ‘I’m just on my way in.’
‘But I was very clearly informed by administration that there are no en suite doctor’s rooms.’
‘Well I doubt it’s en suite,’ said the woman, ‘but as I say –’
‘It’s the equivalent of en suite.’ He took a deep and quivering breath. ‘I shall have to speak to someone in authority about this. Excuse me.’
‘Can I ask,’ said the woman, after Armand had darted back into the flat, ‘why your friend’s dressed as an extra from Seven Brides for Seven Brothers?’
‘He’s not. He’s his own grandfather. It’s a heroes party.’
She blinked a couple of times. ‘And who are you dressed as?’
‘I’m not. I mean, I’m working.’
‘You could be Sir Alexander Fleming.’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’
‘Or Dr Strangelove.’
‘Yes, maybe.’
‘Or Dr Finlay. Or Dr Who. Or Dr No. Or –’
For once he was grateful for the interruption of the bleep; she looked capable of suggesting doctors all evening. ‘I’d better answer that,’ he said, patting his pocket.
‘And I’d better unpack. Is your party going on late?’
‘Er … probably.’ It hadn’t occurred to him to warn the neighbours. ‘I mean, if you want to … you know …’ The invitation died on his lips, strangled by insincerity.
‘Thanks,’ she said drily. ‘That sounds lovely.’
As he criss-crossed the hospital over the next ninety minutes, listening to a chest here, taking a blood sugar there, pulled by his bleep from one task to another, he caught occasional glimpses of other party-goers on their way to flat 5K: Elvis holding the lift door open so that Superman and Superwoman could support an already rat-arsed Gandhi across the threshold; a pointy-titted Madonna and two Florence Nightingales, one of them male, sharing a joint in the staff car park; Mr Spock snogging Margaret Thatcher outside the coronary care unit. ‘Hi Pud,’ Margaret had said perkily just as he’d passed, and he’d been startled to see Wai’s face under the blonde wig. Her giggle had followed him around the corner and as far as the stairwell, and it seemed to keep ringing in his head as he climbed, a feverish little refrain.
During his absence the flat had filled and then overflowed into the corridor, and he pushed his way to the door through a steamy press of bodies; the interior was a roaring crush, every mouth open in simultaneous yelled conversation, every hand clutching a bluish cocktail; the kitchen floor was sticky with spilled drink and plastic glasses cracked underfoot as he edged around the room, scanning the crowd for a glimpse of Marianne. Over the din he could just hear Crispin bellowing, ‘Wrong! Wrong!’ and a woman’s voice shouting something that was greeted with a scattering of applause.
‘Hi Paul,’ said a red-eyed girl wearing a sheet and a plastic Roman helmet. She looked vaguely familiar and he groped for a name.
‘It’s Carrie,’ she said. ‘I’m wearing contact lenses.’
‘Oh sorry. And who are you dressed as? A ghost?’
‘The goddess Minerva.’ She pointed at the furry toy owl fastened to her shoulder.
‘Oh.’
‘I know, it’s a bit esoteric, isn’t it? Maybe I should have worn a name badge.’ She blinked, rather painfully. ‘And my lenses feel like dustbin lids. Still, it’s nice not to wear glasses sometimes.’
‘Yeah,’ he said, momentarily distracted; he had just caught sight of Lexie sitting on the draining board. She was dressed in a tinfoil-covered bra and tiny tinfoil-covered knickers, and his balls seemed to wither at the sight. He realized after a moment that Carrie was telling him something.
‘Sorry?’
‘I said, Crispin’s doing a Gorman quiz. He couldn’t get the stereo to work properly so he’s providing entertainment.’
‘A what quiz?’ Behind Carrie there was a sudden influx of guests into the kitchen.
‘A Mr Gorman quiz. It seems to be a mixture of not very good puns and questions about the history of Shadley Oak. And if you get an answer right you have to drink a shot glass in one go. Who are you looking for?’
‘Just er …’ he dragged his eyes away from the group, ‘a friend who said she might come. Actually I might go and see if she’s in the living room, because she won’t know anyone else here.’
‘OK,’ said Carrie, equably. ‘Well I’m going to check if the loo’s free. See you later.’ Her helmet bobbed away through the crowd, and Paul revived long defunct scrummaging skills and forced his way in the opposite direction.
‘I’m looking–’ Crispin was shouting, standing on the windowsill with the lights of Shadley Oak behind him ‘– I’m looking for a two-word title here. A Surgical Snakebite awaits the correct answer.’ On the floor next to him stood Armand, holding a tray of filled glasses; he was smiling in a fixed way but his eyes were desperate. ‘I’m looking for a two-word title. Which pop song of the sixties, or maybe it was the seventies, answers on a postcard, anyway, which pop song – two-word title – did Gorman quote when our Canadian friend here accidentally tripped over a catheter stand? This is totally guessable even for those people not lucky enough to have been present at the aforementioned incident. Two words.’
‘Sealed with a Piss,’ shouted someone.
‘Two words,’ reiterated Crispin, over laughter, ‘and neither of them are piss.’ Paul stood on tiptoe and surveyed the room, his gaze darting between the few visible blonde heads; Marianne was not among them. His first feeling was of disappointment. His second, rapidly succeeding it and surprising him by its strength, was of relief – once again, he realized with a cowardly lift of the spirits, he could postpone the encounter, could keep it safely within the billowy realms of imagination; once again he could defer the need for witty aperçus and sophisticated charm. He was free, instead, to droop around the party feeling a bit sorry for himself – and also slightly unwell, now he came to think of it. The back of his neck was quite sore and he wondered if he might be getting a cold.
‘Two words,’ shouted Crispin again. ‘Just imagine the scene, ladies and gentleman, our colonial pal here, a tube full of urine wrapped tightly around one ankle –’
‘Yellow River,’ answered Paul, to put Armand out of his misery.
‘Correct.’ There was a burst of applause, and Crispin lifted up a glass of violet liquid. ‘And seeing as our mighty friend in the white coat is on the wagon this evening so as to keep his skills honed for the usual bunch of creaking timewasters –’ Paul gave a modest wave of acknowledgment ‘– and also because he’s got an earhole full of pus, I will drink this on his behalf. To Pud!’ He threw the glassful neatly down his throat, turned scarlet and sat down rather suddenly, clutching at the bar as he did so and tearing off a section of photo-adorned crepe paper.
‘Religion,’ shouted Crispin, using one of Armand’s shoulders as a crutch to haul himself upright. ‘That’s the next question. Your starter for ten. It’s about what you can see from Ward 12. One of Gorman’s harder questions. Religion. Quite hard. Starter for ten.’
‘Get on with it,’ shouted someone.
‘OK. It’s quite hard. Which two saints are the patron saints of Shadley Oak Abb–’
‘St Joan and St Catherine,’ said a loud, clear, female voice with a trace of the local accent.
‘Very good,’ said Crispin. ‘Do I know you, or are you here with someone?’
‘Neither,’ said the woman. ‘Do I get a drink?’ As she reached forward for her prize Paul recognized her as the new neighbour. She took a delicate sip, grimaced and then took another.
‘Right,’ said Crispin. ‘History. When – I’m looking for a year here and it’s a geography question. I mean history. When – a year, remember, when was this building built? This building, I mean, here.’ He waved an uncoordinated hand at the room.
‘1964,’ called the woman.
‘No,’ said Crispin. ‘Close but no banana. Any advance on the lady?’
‘It was 1964,’ repeated the woman. ‘I was there. My father was one of the builders. I can give you the exact date if you want.’ She plucked another glass from Armand’s tray. ‘You are Kolly Kibber and I claim my five pounds. Cheers. I deserve this, I’ve had a hell of a day.’
Crispin swayed on the windowsill, temporarily at a loss for words. ‘OK,’ he said after a moment, ‘I’ll check that answer tomorrow. Almond, check that answer tomorrow.’
‘Excuse me, everyone.’ Armand cleared his throat, nervously. ‘Excuse me. Could I just ask people to be careful about where they put their glasses, because I’m seeing a great many –’
‘OK, next question, and you’re banned,’ said Crispin pugnaciously, pointing at the woman.
‘Why?’
‘Because there’s an upper age limit.’
‘Are you a bouncer?’
‘I’m Bond,’ said Crispin. ‘James Bond.’
‘With an IQ of double-oh-seven, apparently.’
Crispin flushed darkly. ‘Who are you dressed as then?’ he asked. ‘Widow Twankey?’
There was a tiny moment of relative silence followed by a collective, excited ‘Oooooh’ from the audience and the woman looked slowly down at her faded green-and-yellow sundress and then back up at Crispin.
‘Better Twankey than wanky,’ she said.
Crispin looked at her, open-mouthed. ‘Who invited you?’
‘That doctor over there.’ All heads turned towards Paul.
‘She’s a neighbour,’ he said, feebly. ‘In the next flat…’
‘He goes for blondes normally,’ shouted Crispin, ‘don’t you, Pud?’
With magnificent timing Paul’s bleep went off. ‘Gotta make a call,’ he said, ducking away through the crowd. The phone in the kitchen was unreachable and he fought his way along the corridor towards his bedroom, hesitating a moment at the sight of the door, which was slightly ajar. You never knew what you might find in a bedroom at a party. He pushed it open quietly and saw Marianne and a man with a beard. He closed it again and went and leaned against a free patch of wall and began a frantic analysis of what he’d just witnessed.
Had they been actually doing anything? No, they’d been sitting next to each other on the far side of the bed, and Marianne had been talking. Had any part of them been touching? No, no part of their bodies had been touching because in the gap between them he could clearly remember seeing his own boxer shorts, hanging over the back of a chair. Had they been smiling? No, the impression had been one of serious conversation. Had it actually been Marianne? Well, he’d only seen the curve of her cheek, and the pale skin of her neck, and her blonde hair pushed carelessly – yes, yes, all right, it had definitely been Marianne, of course it had been Marianne and the trespassing bastard next to her had been that repulsive beardy git from the newspaper office. Well, he could just fight him for – Paul’s bleep went off again and simultaneously Marianne and Beardy left the room, passing within feet of him. ‘… that’s why it’s so interesting to talk about it,’ Marianne was saying. ‘Yeah,’ replied Beardy, ‘do you know where we can get a drink?’
Paul slammed into the room and dialled switchboard and then Ward 12. ‘Can you come over, Dr Gooding,’ said a faltering voice. ‘Nurse Parry’s had to run down to Ward 6 to help with an emergency and I think Mrs Dimoglou might be having a stroke.’
The student nurse met him at the door of the ward. ‘She says her arm’s feeling all funny,’ she said, huge-eyed. She was young enough to make Paul feel like an authority figure.
‘What sort of funny?’ he asked, walking alongside her.
‘Just … funny really. She didn’t say. But her pulse on that side feels …’
‘What?’
‘I don’t know, really. A bit funny, I think. Not normal anyway.’
‘And how’s her speech?’
‘Well it’s …’ There was a long, unhappy pause, ‘it’s always a bit, you know … funny.’
Trevios had gone and Mrs Dimoglou was alone in the room; she lifted one of her hands from the coverlet when she saw Paul, and caught his wrist with a grip so weak that it was almost imperceptible. She looked weightless, a figure of wire and parchment.
‘Hello Mrs Dimoglou,’ said Paul. ‘How are you feeling?’
‘My arm is bad,’ she said in a sticky whisper, moving her head slightly towards her other hand. Paul studied the even set of her mouth and the symmetrical web of wrinkles across cheeks and forehead. It didn’t look like a stroke. Gently he disengaged his wrist, and moved to the other side of the bed. Mrs Dimoglou’s right arm seemed a little darker than the other.
‘Is it numb?’ he asked, carefully turning it palm upwards.
‘It feels … squash. And my fingers are pins and needles.’
‘And did it start suddenly or slowly?’
‘Slowly.’
Paul took her pulse; it did feel funny, indefinably so, the blood butting against his fingertips with peculiar vigour. He asked her to hold his wrist and she did so with a grip no stronger or weaker than that of the other hand; he tested her reflexes on both sides and found them identical.
‘What do you think it is?’ asked the student nurse, and Paul shook his head. His mind was a frightening blank and he had the impression that the small, hot room was getting perceptibly smaller and hotter. Mrs Dimoglou’s eyes were fixed upon his and he could feel the weight of her gaze.
‘I’ll just, er …’ He tried to think of something, anything, that might aid diagnosis. ‘I’ll just do your blood pressure.’
‘I did it fifteen minutes ago,’ said the nurse as Paul pushed up the loose sleeve of Mrs Dimoglou’s gown. ‘It was a hundred and forty over ninety. I kept the …’ Her voice wavered as Paul exposed the black cuff wrapped around Mrs Dimoglou’s upper arm; it was still partially inflated, still tightly embracing the flesh above the elbow. He reached for the rubber bulb and twisted the little silver cog at its base. With a hiss the cuff released its air and Mrs Dimoglou’s arm returned to its normal colour. She rubbed her fingers across the sheet.
‘Oh,’ she said softly. ‘It’s better. Thank you, it’s wonderful.’
No residual neurological signs/symptoms wrote Paul in Mrs Dimoglou’s notes, and then added a full stop before placing the biro on the desk. It was even hotter in the office than it had been in the side room, and he wiped his forehead with a sleeve and cautiously slid a hand across the back of his neck. There was a small, tender swelling on either side.
‘Oh, tonight’s just getting better and better,’ said Gwyn, hurrying through the door with an empty box of tissues. ‘She says she won’t come out of the sluice until her eyes have gone down. I’ve tried to tell her there’s far worse done every day in every hospital in the land, and it’s my fault for not being here and that she’s learned her lesson and there’s no lasting damage to the patient, but she’s in absolute floods. There isn’t any lasting damage, is there?’ he asked, suddenly anxious.
‘No,’ said Paul, ‘and I’m going to put that in Mrs Dimoglou’s notes.’ He picked up a biro and wrote No residual neurological signs/symptoms and then noticed that he’d already written exactly the same thing on the line above. ‘Oh,’ he said blankly, and crossed it out again.
‘Are you all right?’ asked Gwyn, leaning over and peering at him.
‘No, not really. I’m feeling a bit hot and I’ve got a couple of nodes up on the back of my neck.’
‘Oh marvellous.’
‘But I can’t really remember what it signifies when you get occipital nodes. Can you?’
Gwyn shrugged. ‘Is it something to do with the ear infection?’
‘No,’ said Paul, with certainty.
‘Well, why don’t you look it up?’ Gwyn nodded at the books on the office windowsill. ‘Look it up, take your temperature and then go to Casualty and get a couple of paracetamol. I’ve got to get on, sorry, I’ve got a million things to do.’
It took Paul a long time to find the right page. Common aetiologies of occipital lymphadenopathy, he read, running a finger beneath the line, include tinea capitis, seborrhoeic dermatitis, insect bites, orbital cellulitis and pediculosis. Pediculosis was nits, wasn’t it? He scratched his head absently and thought about the mad stuff he’d said to Mrs Dimoglou when he’d first talked to her – wallets and purses and handbags – all rubbish, of course. He should have said, ‘Bish bosh, couldn’t be easier.’ Viral aetiologies include rubella, varicella and roseola infantum. He’d never even heard of roseola infantum. Lucky it hadn’t come up in finals, wasn’t it? He closed Radcliffe’s Clinical Signs and thought, with a sudden flush of indignation, about what an insensitive clod Beardy was. Marianne had obviously been trying to talk about something interesting and all Newspaper Man had wanted was a drink. What a hairy, booze-obsessed idiot. Paul should have knocked him to one side and called out, ‘Marianne, tell me about the interesting thing.’ He should have –
‘You still here?’ said Gwyn, appearing in the office door with an armful of sheets. ‘What’s your temperature, then?’
Paul removed the thermometer from his mouth and scrutinized it. ‘Thirty-eight point five.’
‘God almighty. Go to Casualty or go and lie down. I’ll call you if I need you.’
The corridor outside the flat smelled as if someone had mistaken curaçao for carpet cleaner, and a scattering of pulverized tortilla chips formed a pathway to the door. Paul stepped over one of the Florence Nightingales and followed a dribble of chatter through the front door and into the kitchen. The few remaining guests were ranged around the walls, as if incapable of standing unsupported. ‘Hey Pud,’ said another Nightingale, noticing him very slowly, ‘where d’you hide the drink?’; Paul shook his head and carried on towards the bedroom. He opened the door, gazed for a long moment at the bouncing blue jacket and pale chunky thighs of a knickerless Thatcher astride a trouserless Spock, and then closed it again. ‘They’re using my bed,’ he said. ‘Well they’re not using my bathroom,’ echoed Armand, throatily. He was seated on a chair that blocked the toilet door, and his arms were folded; he looked like John Wayne defending a pass against the Apaches.
‘Armand, I’m feeling like shit, can I go and lie down in your room?’
‘I’m sorry, Paul, but I’m expecting an urgent phone call. No,’ he said, half rising as a stumbling party-goer approached. ‘This portion of the flat is not for public use.’ There was a new strength to his voice, as if he knew the cavalry was just over the horizon. Paul turned away and headed for the darkened living room.
‘I love my husband,’ said the woman from the next-door flat. She was seated on one end of the sofa, with her head hanging over the back, and it was hard to see who, if anyone, she was talking to. Paul, at the other end, closed his eyes. The thudding bass was quite soporific in a way, and Crispin’s snore provided an hypnotic treble line. ‘My husband’s lovely. He’s so strong and lovely, he can pick me up and put me over his shoulder. Look, you can see how lovely he is. Look.’ There was a rattling noise directly in front of Paul’s face and he opened his eyes to see a dangling keyring bearing a picture of a bald bloke. ‘And he’s gone away,’ said the woman, with a lacrimose quaver to her voice. ‘All the way to America.’ There was a pause and then she started, very softly, to sing the words of the Joan Armatrading song; Paul shifted further along the sofa and sat on something that crackled. It was a piece of yellow crepe paper to which was stapled a trio of creased photos. One was a blurred group shot, all red faces and waving cans, one was of Crispin pretending to shag a statue of Queen Victoria and one was of himself.
‘My dad built this building,’ said the woman. ‘I loved my dad. He asked me and I picked cerulean blue.’
The photo had been taken outside the Birmingham art gallery five years previously, and showed Paul in a John Travolta pose, in a fountain, in the nude. It had, presumably, been seen by most of the people at the party. His gaze slid away from the terrible image and drifted along the shallows of the wrecked room, taking in the jetsam of dropped glasses and trampled paper plates, and resting, finally, on the glinting knickers of Lexie who was curled like a seashell on the floor with her head on Crispin’s stomach.
‘I saw my dad today,’ said the woman. ‘I saw my dad for the first time in twenty-nine years. No, twenty-eight years, twenty-eight years and four –’
‘Please,’ said Paul, ‘please, will you just shut up.’