Death on the House (Edwin Scott Crime Trilogy Book 2)

  Death on the House

  Felix Bruckner

  Prologue – June 2014

  Like me, the old lap-top computer is getting a bit slow and rheumaticky. I ease the stiffness in my back and neck. I have been writing too long: the words on the computer screen blur, move in and out of focus. Outside the sky is dark and the light appears to be fading, although it is still only four-thirty in the afternoon. I become aware of the rain drumming on the roof.

  Files and sheets of paper litter the pine table which sits at right angles to my treasured Victorian writing-desk, with its faded green leather top. On the centre of the desk stands the word processor, on one side is the fax machine (hardly used since I retired from work), and on the other – neatly aligned – the Concise Oxford Dictionary and Roget's Thesaurus; beyond, on a low trolley lives the new printer – my pride and joy! Like the phoenix, my novel continues to renew itself from the ashes of successive revisions.

  Last night I dreamt about the hearse again ...

  In the back garden the huge holly hedge, the apple tree and the two silver birch trees blot out visual evidence of all other habitation, though occasionally I hear dogs barking behind the hedge. The pink Albertine rose on the brick pergola is in full bloom.

  When I rise from my seat, the twin ponds come into view in front of the rose walk, their surface shredded by the rain drops. I see a robin immobile on the lawn, its head cocked to one side, waiting patiently for a worm to emerge.

  Though well over seventy and retired from my medical work, I am still trim and reasonably fit. However, in the twenty-first century England is a far cry from the time when I first qualified, first started on the house. Then treatment was more primitive, more hazardous, less certain of success than now; yet expectations were lower, patients were more grateful; medicine was more exciting, and doctors were held in higher esteem; I had felt privileged to be a doctor in nineteen-sixty, as I have done ever since. Then the Beatles and the Rolling Stones had not even been dreamed of; the mini-skirt and the mini car were still in the future. James Bond and Elvis Presley ruled, men and women still danced together in pairs, and Love and Medicine dominated my life. In those days I had the sort of features – slight slim stature, fair hair and blue eyes – that girls found attractive.

  “Sometimes I wonder why I spend the lonely night / Dreaming of a song / The melody haunts my reverie / And I am once again with you ...”

  Visions of Jill, Paula, Lucky and faithful Fred flash before my eyes. Tragedy seemed to follow me in nineteen-sixty.

  Feeling a little faint, I sit down again abruptly on the padded swivel chair. I am almost overcome by the strong feeling of nostalgia for an age gone by – never to return. In my head, the gravelly voice of Hoagy Carmichael's “Stardust” mingles with the increasing hiss and rattle of the June downpour outside.

  “Though I dream in vain / In my heart it will remain / My Stardust Melody / The memory of love's refrain ...”

  Part One

  June 1960

  1

  Tuesday, 1st June: The rain hissed and rattled against the windows, while I gulped down my breakfast in the doctors' dining-room. Exultation mingled with apprehension. This was my first full day on the house: after five years as a medical student, I was finally a house physician! I paused for a moment to rally my courage, then braved the elements to cross the open car-park; I arrived on Ward Four at nine-twenty, damp, but in plenty of time for my first consultant ward round ...

  I had alighted from the train at Hitchin Station just after half-past two in the afternoon of the previous day, and climbed into the solitary taxi that waited outside.

  “St Peter's Hospital,” I instructed the driver. “I'm the new doctor.”

  As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I realized how stupid that must sound.

  “Oh yes?” he enquired without curiosity; he started the engine, and drove off briskly down the hill.

  The bright sunlight outside contrasted with the gloom of my thoughts. Through the window I surveyed the parochial yet faintly alien features of the small town: a shopping parade, a restaurant, a couple of nondescript cafés; we passed an Odeon Cinema that appeared to have seen happier days; then residential housing, a large green where the occasional mother pushed her pram or sat on a bench; finally we left the main road and made our way up a relatively modern side street until we reached a pair of open gates. The cab entered, slowed and deposited me in the car park of the hospital.

  Home sister showed me to my room in the doctors' quarters, where a bed had been made up for me. From my suitcase I extracted my stethoscope and patella-hammer; I put on the clean starched white coat, which lay ready for me on top of the bed cover, grabbed my instruments, and made my way to the ward-block, leaving the further unpacking of my case for later. In Ward Four I met the current house physician. He had been in the year above me at medical school, and was a rather colourless character by the name of Robin Spanswick-Colonne, universally known as “Spastic Colon”. He had come to the end of his house jobs, and informed me with a smirk that he had been offered a post in general practice, to commence next week. He refused the staff-nurse's offer of tea, on my behalf.

  “We're far too busy, Staff ... I need to show Scott all the Middleton patients, and I want to be out of here by five o'clock ...”

  He had escaped at four-thirty, leaving me on call, though I was not due to start until the next day ...

  Now the ward sister was waiting with the notes trolley; she gave me an encouraging smile, but remained silent, whilst I tried to collect my thoughts. Anxiously, I again leafed through the huge pile of notes – I would never remember all the details!

  Dr Middleton arrived with Brian Root, the registrar, at precisely half-past nine. The consultant greeted Sister, and then paused to appraise me.

  “Good morning, Dr Scott. Welcome to St Peter's Hospital,” and we shook hands formally. He was tall and slightly stooped, with a balding head and a faint thread of spittle between his lips as he spoke, causing him to lisp occasionally. His crisp white coat fitted his narrow frame poorly, giving him a vaguely scarecrow appearance. (I was mildly surprised at the coat, because at the London Hospital consultants had always worn suits on the wards.) However, his grip was firm and warm, and his eyes were friendly.

  “Lets start – we have a lot of patients to see before lunch.”

  The trolley, pushed by Sister Milton, squeaked softly as we proceeded from bed to bed, Dr Middleton in the lead, I following at his shoulder, Dr Root two or three paces behind me, and level with Sister. Most of the beds had at their head a printed notice in large capital letters: DR PETER MIDDLETON.

  “This patient is, er, Mrs Joyce Hobart ...” I fumbled with the notes, “... aged thirty-seven, with thyrotoxicosis ... She presented with ... er ...” I floundered, and my mind went blank.

  “You'll remember, sir, she presented last week with weight loss, tremor and exophthalmos ...” the registrar put in smoothly.

  “Oh yes ... large rather vascular goitre with atrial fibrillation ...How're you getting on, Mrs Hobart?”

  He turned, gave her a charming smile, and she brightened visibly...

  Dr Middleton treated me with forbearance and surprising consideration; my nervousness gradually evaporated. One patient I had admitted personally yesterday evening, so I knew her well, presented her accurately. Dr Root helped me with the rest, and by a quarter to eleven we had completed our circuit of the ward.

  We sat down in sister's office, and a staff nurse brought in tea on a tray. Sister Milton poured and passed around the cups with slices of cake. She was trim, in her early thirties, and
possessed hazel eyes, a pleasant smile and the hint of an accent I couldn't place – Hertfordshire, I hazarded. We discussed the patients, while she made notes in a small book.

  The business part of the round over, the conversation lightened. While we tucked in to our cake, Dr Middleton treated us to an amusing anecdote involving the local undertaker, and another about a recent golf match organised by the Rotary Club. Sister laughed merrily, while Root and I permitted ourselves rueful smiles. The consultant paused for thought, then turned rather doleful.

  “My garage has been giving me an inordinate amount of trouble recently. They're the main Austin dealers, yet they seem to take for ever to correct a simple oil leak ... I've had my car in three times in the last six weeks,” he complained.

  “Have you tried the garage in the Bedford Road, sir. The owner, Mackie Patterson, is married to our Gynaecology Sister on Ward Three ...”

  Sister Milton's interruption took him aback; a frown briefly crossed his face, but he quickly recovered his poise and good nature.

  “Perhaps I will, one of these days ...”

  The registrar had ambled behind me throughout the ward round; now I was finally at leisure to examine him – over my tea cup – while the boss was holding forth. Dr Root was slim, with handsome regular features, cyan-blue eyes and pupils constricted as though looking into a bright light. His fair hair was rather long, and his fore-lock tended to droop across his right eye. He had a faintly arrogant – maybe reckless – air which he tried to conceal from his superior. His speech was clipped and concise.

  “All my house physicians come from The London,” continued Dr Middleton in a more reflective tone. “I trained there myself, many years ago, and was senior registrar there, before I came to St Peter's Hospital as a consultant,” he confided, his eyes slightly misty.

  After twenty minutes, he cleared his throat, rose from his low armchair, thanked Sister for tea, and made his way to Ward Ten to continue the ward-round, Brian Root and I following two steps behind.

  2

  Wednesday, 2nd June: The table lamp cast a warm glow over the small room. The gramophone was playing Chris Barber's Petite Fleur. I sat comfortably on the solitary arm-chair with a tumbler of whisky in my hand. Across the room, on the bed, sat Adam Fenchurch, my opposite number. He was into his last month as house physician to Dr Thomas Cottar, the junior of the two consultant physicians. I had met him two evenings before, when he had given me much-needed help and moral support with my very first emergency admission.

  Yesterday's rain had passed, and now, through the open curtains, I could see a bright, almost full, moon and the sky frosted with stars. His room was in the overflow doctors' quarters at the north-east corner of the hospital, backing onto Ward Four; it had its own entrance down a path behind the main residents' quarters where I lived. Fenchurch shared this annexe with the paediatric senior house officer (when he was on call), the gynaecology SHO, the surgical registrar and one of the surgical SHO's.

  “It's a piece of cake, Edwin. We rarely have more than four admissions in twenty-four hours, and we get good back-up from our registrars; but if you're ever really worried, you can always give me a buzz, and I'll help out again ... You'll enjoy it here, I'm sure. Like I said, it's not too busy, the GP's are good, and there's a very high standard of medicine at St Peter's. You should get a car, though; it'll be a bit boring in Hitchin without transport.”

  He was slim and fair, with a quiet yet confident manner; he had twinkling grey eyes and an infectious smile – instantly likeable. Like all Dr Cottar's housemen he had trained at St Thomas' Hospital.

  “I only knew your Jill by sight,” he regretted. “She was a year below me ... But didn't she share a flat with a rugby player for a time, and mix with the rugger crowd?”

  This was a reminder of a faintly disagreeable episode in my life: I quickly changed the subject.

  “What's my registrar like?”

  “Brian Root? A bit rum, really, but comes in if asked and seems to know his stuff ... He was born with a silver spoon in his mouth ... Father's a barrister, a silk. ... Brian was Eton, Cambridge and the London Hospital. Made a promising start; then seems to have fallen by the wayside. He's been here about a year ...”

  I sipped my drink, listened to the music and gazed through the window at the silver landscape.

  “I say, Edwin, you must read Casino Royal; its the first of the Ian Fleming James Bond books. It's less sophisticated than the others, but I'm finding it enthralling.” He indicated an open book on his bedside table.

  We discussed Dr No, From Russia with Love, and Goldfinger, all of which I had read. (The Bond books had become a cult at the London Hospital Medical College, before I had left.) Petite Fleur was replaced by Cleo Laine's verbal gymnastics with Johnny Dankworth's band, and then George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue.

  “What about Dr Middleton?”

  “Oh, Uncle Peter. The hospital's not named after him, by the way ... Well, under that rather forbidding exterior there beats a heart of gold. You'll get on just fine with him.”

  “And the charge nurse on Ward Ten – Stanley Pollett – what about him?”

  “Another rum sort of a cove ... Big fellow, probably quite useful in a fight. Was a cook in the merchant navy. Very efficient; runs a tight ship: 'All ship-shape and Bristol fashion'. In spite of his frowns and gruff voice, the nurses twist him around their little fingers ...”

  He got up, went to the gramophone and put on another record – Louis Armstrong and Jack Teagarden playing Hoagy Carmichael's Rockin' Chair. The mournful blues melody with its loud trumpet accompaniment echoed in the room, and I wondered if we were disturbing anyone.

  “I've got the whole portacabin to myself this evening; no need to worry ...” he reassured me. “But how did you find your first forty-eight hours at St Peter's? How was Monday's lady with the stroke?”

  “Oh, she's quite well now, weakness already improving ... Dr Middleton seemed quite pleased on the ward round, yesterday.”

  There was a long pause, while he topped up our drinks; then Adam continued with his briefing.

  “At week-ends you will be on take with my boss and my registrar, Steve Bolton, and admit cases into our beds. You'll like Steve, a very bright lad. He was at Cambridge (Trinity College) and St Mary's Hospital ... Rugby blue, excellent doctor, always willing to come in. Just passed his MRCP. He's married with a small child – both delightful ... Rents a small house on the way to Letchworth. Anyway, you couldn't meet a nicer fellow ... Tom Cottar, my consultant, had been a high flier; was senior medical registrar at Tommy's with an interest in cardiology ... Apparently he became deaf, and had to lower his sights ... Now has a big private practice in Hitchin, large house with swimming pool, souped-up Bentley saloon, wife and two teenage daughters. Seems content.”

  I was digesting all this, feeling relaxed, the second glass of whisky half empty in my hand, when the phone rang. I had given switchboard my whereabouts, in case of emergency. My contentment evaporated instantly, and I felt the pounding of my heart. Adam answered the phone, but immediately passed the receiver over to me.

  “Sorry to trouble you, Dr Scott. I've got Dr Cumberbatch on the line for you about an admission ... Putting you through, sir.” There was a brief pause, a click and then a rich plummy voice came on the line:

  “Hello, Dr Scott, I hear you're the new HP. I'm Michael Cumberbatch, one of the Hitchin general practitioners. I have a lady who I think should come in: a case of pneumonia ...”

  When I had finished with the GP, I rang Brian Root:

  “I've just had a Dr Cumberbatch on the phone, Dr Root. He's sending in a lady with pneumonia to Ward Four. It's almost ten o'clock, and I wondered if you wanted to come in, or if I should ...”

  He cut across me in mid flow:

  “No need for that yet. You admit her, make a diagnosis, then ring me again ... I'll come in if there are any problems. Otherwise, you can start her on antibiotics, and get her X-rayed in the morning.”

&nbs
p; Before I could reply, the line went dead ...

  “Don't go yet,” Adam advised softly, as I went to rise, his voice reassuring and calming.

  “Ring the ward to let them know. Then there'll be at least another half-hour before the patient has been safely admitted into a bed by the nursing staff, so you'll have plenty of time to finish your drink. There's a back door to these quarters, which opens out opposite Ward Four.”

  Louis Armstrong's trumpet faded away. I phoned Ward Four, and asked the night staff-nurse to contact me when the patient had been admitted.

  “I'll be in Dr Fenchurch's room.”

  Then I returned to my whisky.

  “Have a peppermint, Edwin, when you've finished. Can't have you smelling like a public bar when you see only your second emergency patient ...”

  The phone rang. My pulse started to accelerate again. The patient had arrived and was ready for me. I put on my white coat. Adam unlocked the back door to the doctors' annexe; as I crossed the covered corridor to Ward Four, I heard him lock it again.

  It was half-past ten. The main lights were off, and the patients were composing themselves to sleep. A few soft snores were already audible. Staff-Nurse showed me to the side-room, still brightly lit in contrast to the main ward, and handed me the slim hospital folder.

  “Mrs Agnes Baker, Dr Scott, aged fifty-six ...”

  She remained at the bedside to chaperone me. My pulse had settled. Almost calmly, I embarked on the history.

  “Good evening, Mrs Baker. Can you tell me about your condition, please?”

  “Dr Michael sent me ...He's absolutely marvellous, doctor. He took one look at me from the bedroom door, as soon as he arrived at my home. 'Aggie,' he said, 'I must send you into hospital immediately ...' and here I am!”

  Eventually, I was able to elicit a history: she had been well until two days before, when she developed a dry hacking cough and felt feverish. It got worse, and she took to her bed shortly after breakfast, today. She had no appetite, and had eaten virtually nothing since then ... There was no cough in the family. She was a housewife with two grown-up daughters who had both left home. She smoked nil, and was teetotal.