A Dublin Student Doctor (40 page)

Fingal saw Bob frown.

“We’ll make sure you get plenty of morphine to kill the pain, won’t we, Sister Daly?”

“We will, so,” she said. “I’m sure Mister Beresford only overlooked telling you because he took it for granted because it’s been part of his routine for months.”

Fingal saw Bob’s look of gratitude.

“T’ank you, sir,” the patient said, and turned his face away.

“Right,” said Mister Kinnear, “who’s next, Sister?” He led his entourage away from the bed.

“Bed 53, sir.”

Fingal followed. While they were in the middle of the ward Charlie appeared, red-faced, breathing heavily. He was clutching something. “Excuse me, sir,” he blurted, “something very important has come up. Could I speak to Fingal O’Reilly for a minute? Please?”

The consultant stopped and the little crowd with him. “If it’s that important, certainly.”

“Here, here.” Charlie thrust an envelope at Fingal, an envelope bearing a crest and the words
IRISH RUGBY FOOTBALL UNION
. “Open it. Open it.”

Fingal ripped the envelope open. The letter began,
Dear Mr. O’Reilly.
He had difficulty making out the words, but the gist of the first line was clear. He had been picked for the Irish trial. Fingal glanced to the bottom of the page. It was signed by Sir Samuel T. Irwin, President of the IRFU. Fingal lowered the letter and exhaled. “You too, Charlie?”

Charlie grabbed Fingal’s hand. “And we’re both Probables.”

Fingal gasped. The trial would be between two sides. The “Probables” would go on to make up the Irish team unless injury supervened or a player on the other team, the “Possibles,” massively outshone his opposite number. The cap was practically assured.

Charlie said, “Our letters say the trial’s at Ravenhill in Belfast on a Saturday, so we’ll have to go up the night before on the train. I’m sure Mister Kinnear’ll give us the go-ahead, won’t you, sir?”

“Of course you must go,” the consultant said. “It’s a great honour. I should know. I’ll never forget my first cap. I think getting it gave me a bigger thrill than becoming a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.” He shook hands with both lads. “Well done and good luck. I hope you’ll both succeed.”

“Thank you, sir,” Charlie said. “I know we’ll both try to.”

Fingal’s universe steadied. The shock had worn off. Lord, a trial. One last hurdle, and a low one at that, before the coveted cap. He glanced at his still not fully read letter. “Charlie,” he said quietly, “what’s the date of the trial?”

“Twelve days from now. Plenty of time for your nose to finish healing,” Charlie said. “Saturday, December fourteenth.”

“That’s what I thought.” Fingal’s shoulders sagged. “The fourteenth.” He sighed. “Do well for us, Charlie, but I’ll have to decline.”

“Surely not,” Mister Kinnear said. “Decline a chance to gain Ireland’s most coveted sporting honour? Don’t be daft, man.” He sounded angry.

“Why, for God’s sake?” Charlie said.

“Remember the night you broke my nose and I told you wild horses couldn’t stop me playing?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not horses, Charlie. Part One’s the week of the ninth. The fourteenth’s the day I’ll be doing orals in bacteriology and pathology.”

39

Success Is Counted Sweetest

Fingal paced up and down the corridor decorated with the portraits of previous academics. It was Saturday, December 14, and he was five minutes early for his microbiology oral. The two previous holders of the chair of pathology kept company with the first professor of bacteriology and preventive medicine, Professor Adrian Stokes. He had been succeeded in 1924 by Professor Joseph Warwick Bigger, the man who had been chosen to become dean of the faculty next year, and who, Fingal inhaled deeply, would be one of his examiners this afternoon. Not a man to be trifled with.

A door opened and a pale-faced candidate appeared. Fingal recognised Aidan Hewitt, a chronic who had started medical school even before Bob Beresford. “Prof Bigger’s in a foul mood,” he whispered as he passed Fingal. Hewitt had left the door open. Comfort ye my people, Fingal thought. Not long now until I’m in the lions’ den. At least it was the end.

Already Fingal had sat two written examinations. Last Wednesday he’d begun the pathology paper with Question 1,
Describe the macroscopic and microscopic findings in acute pancreatitis.
Fortunately, he’d had plenty of time to devote to the intricacies of pancreatitis on the Saturday after Charlie had broken Fingal’s nose. Questions two and three had both been gifts. And this morning’s pathology oral hadn’t been too bad at all. “Mister O’Reilly, please,” a man said, and disappeared back behind the door.

Fingal used a hand to smooth down his thatch, straightened his tie, and wiped his sweating palms along the sides of his trousers. He took a deep breath and strode ahead.

“Close the door and sit,” said a small man from behind a desk upon which was perched a brass-barrelled microscope. He wore a wing collar and a black tie. Fingal recognised Doctor William Jessop, assistant in the department of bacteriology. Beside him sat the redoubtable Professor Bigger. “That must have hurt,” he remarked, nodding at Fingal’s face. “Rugby?”

The swelling of his nose had pretty well gone and the trainer had been right, it did have a distinct list to port. There were dirty-yellow bruises fading beneath both of Fingal’s eyes.

“Boxing, sir.”

Professor Bigger grunted.

“I don’t suppose it will stop you looking at slides,” said Doctor Jessop. He pushed the microscope across the desk. “Take a look and tell us what you see.”

Fingal sat, bent to the eyepiece, and spun the focussing wheels. In his mind he heard Bob Beresford saying, “Microscope: A cunningly designed optical instrument for making out-of-focus multicoloured blobs bigger.” Fingal focussed and clumps of maroon rods became more defined. So the organism was “gram positive” because of its reaction to a standard colour stain and, because it was rod-shaped, a bacillus. That narrowed the search. Now. He moved the slide and noted small spheres. Those were spores. This microorganism, when threatened, protected itself by becoming encapsulated. To his knowledge there were only three spore-forming gram-positive bacilli. Two needed oxygen to develop, the aerobes. One family thrived without oxygen, the anaerobes. He looked up. “May I ask, sir, were these cultured aerobically or anaerobically?”

“Anaerobically,” said Doctor Jessop.

“In that case those are
Clostridia
.” Fingal thought back to his having messed up a question about the organisms on the paper in June. He’d made bloody well sure to read up about them this time. “But I’m not sure which exact one of the types.” Fingal hesitated and hoped his inability to do so wasn’t fatal.

“Differentiating is tricky.” A faint smile played on Doctor Jessop’s lips. “It’s
welchii,
” he said.

“It causes gas gangrene, sir.” Fingal began to feel a little more at home. “
Tetani
causes tetanus, lockjaw,
botulinum
botulism, a vicious food poisoning.”

He was grilled by each examiner in turn, until Professor Bigger said, “Last questions. Who first described the organism of tuberculosis?”

“Robert Koch, sir, in 1887.”

“And how is it recognised microscopically?”

“The organism,
Mycobacterium tuberculosis,
is acid fast. It holds a stain even when treated with acid. Slides are prepared with carbofuchsin, acid alcohol, and methylene blue, the Ziehl-Neelsen stain, sir, and the
Mycobacteria
will appear under the microscope as red rods.”

“I don’t think,” the great man said with a grin, “we’ll be seeing you back for these exams in the warmer weather, O’Reilly. Well done.”

The not-so-subtle hint that he had passed wasn’t going to make waiting for the results any easier, and they would not be posted until Monday at five.

*   *   *

“I’ll read the results again,” Charlie said. “Final Part One. O’Reilly. Pathology. Pass. Seventy-eight percent. Microbiology. Pass eighty-one percent.” He whistled. “Eighty-one, and the pass mark is forty.” He made a low sweeping bow to Fingal. “Gentlemen,” he said to Bob and Cromie, “we should be humbled in the presence of genius.”

Fingal laughed at Charlie, but said, “I’m bloody relieved.”

“So are we, mate,” Cromie said. “Maybe we’ll get a bit more of the pleasure of your company now.”

“You will tonight, Cromie,” Fingal said, but he wasn’t going to slack off. He would like to have felt triumphant or been able to cheer, dance a jig, hurl his duncher in the air, but this was a resit. Getting the subjects he should have passed in June out of the way, that was all. He would have felt the same way after a long-nagging aching tooth had been pulled.

Bob Beresford slapped Fingal’s back, Cromie pumped his hand. Hilda and Fitzpatrick were on ward duty so the lads had all been able to come to the Trinity Library.

“There you are, Fingal,” Cromie said. “You’ve got your Christmas present nine days early and I reckon we should celebrate.”

“The Bailey or Davy Byrnes?” Bob asked.

“Byrnes,” Charlie said, “and it’s my shout.”

Fingal walked beside Charlie behind Bob and Cromie, who charged ahead through the traffic and the crowds.

The shaggy-haired man in the battered trilby who usually sat on the corner of Nassau and Dawson Streets selling newspapers and magazines was at his post and calling his wares. “
Independent, Irish Times, Pall Mall, Illustrated London News,
yer honour?” The man stank of damp underwear.

Fingal slowed, tossed a couple of coppers into the man’s money satchel. “I don’t want a paper,” he said, “not tonight.” Damn it, he had passed and he was going to celebrate.

“Don’t blame you,” Charlie said. “The international news is dire.”

“I’ve not been keeping up,” Fingal said. “I used to, but the last few months?” He shrugged.

Charlie said, “It’s been all gloom and bloody despondency. Mussolini’s forces have ripped into Abyssinia, aeroplanes and tanks against bows and spears. Last month, Japanese troops marched into Peking. I’m bloody glad we’re not Germans. Hitler’s declared every man from eighteeen to forty-five a Wehrmacht reservist. If he calls them up it’s going to be one hell of a big army. He wants thirty-six divisions. That’s 550,000 men. I’d not like to be a French
poilu
sitting in this Maginot Line they’re building, and wondering when Adolf is going to come looking for revenge for ’14 to 18.”

“I’m glad I’m not German for more reasons than that,” Fingal said. “Have you ever tried sauerkraut? And the silly buggers don’t play rugby.” Fingal lengthened his stride. “Bugger the Germans,” he said. “I’m looking forward to my pint, and to toasting you, old friend. We’re all coming out to to watch Ireland wallop England when you play the first home game in Dublin.” In the stadium on Lansdowne Road, he thought, not far from home. He wondered how Father was this evening. He and Ma were on the Continent.

Charlie stopped. “I’m disappointed for you,” he said. “You should be coming with me to play Wales.”

Fingal shrugged. “Wasn’t to be, Charlie. Not this year, unless the lad who got my place messes up, or gets hurt, and for his sake I hope he doesn’t. You just play your best game ever, help Ireland win, and be sure to get a second cap for the England game.” He started to walk and turned onto Duke Street. “Come on,” he said. “I’m ready for that pint.”

They swung into the familiar pub where Cromie was already seated and Bob leant on the long bar talking to Diarmud the barman. “Fingal O’Reilly, me oul’ segotia,” Diarmud called, “and Charlie Greer. Bob says the form’s ninety tonight.”

Fingal was pleased to be called Diarmud’s old friend. And, yes, the mood was exceptional.

“We’ve got things to celebrate,” Bob said.

“So are yiz four on the lash tonight?”

“No,” Bob said, “it won’t be a heavy session, but Fingal’s passed his exams and Charlie’s got an Irish cap.”

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Stop the lights. I don’t feckin’ believe it. Dat’s gas. Bloody marvellous. Right. T’ree pints and a Jemmy.”

Diarmud knew their order. A good barman should, and a good pub, and Byrnes was one, should be an extension of your living room. A place to feel at home.

“Please,” Bob said. He turned to Charlie. “I know you said you’d get first shout, but it’s my pleasure. Really.”

“Your money’s no good, Bob Beresford. Dem’s on the house,” Diarmud said, giving Bob his Jameson. “And when the pints are ready horse them into you for I’ll have your second round on the pour. Congratulations, Fingal, and to you, Charlie.” He offered a hand that was twice shaken.

“Thanks, Diarmud,” Fingal said. “And I will get the first pint down in a couple of swallows.” He strolled across to where Charlie and Bob had joined Cromie.

“Plant your arse, Fingal,” Cromie said, and sprawled back in his chair. “And again, well done.”

Fingal sat. “Before the evening gets out of hand I want to be serious for a minute.”

“You, Fingal? Serious? Mother of God will wonders never cease? Can we believe that, lads?” Bob Beresford shook his head.

“He’s been bugger all but serious since he failed it first time around,” Charlie said.

“All right, Charlie.
Touché,
so bear with me a bit longer. I just want to thank you three for,” Fingal hesitated, “for all your—”

“It’s all right,” Cromie said, “we understand. My father says if you can count your real friends on the fingers of one hand you’re a lucky man.” He grinned at them.

“True,” Bob said.

“Hear him,” Charlie said as Diarmud arrived with the drinks.

“Here’s yer gargles,” he said. “On Davy Byrnes.”

“Thanks, Diarmud.”

Four glasses were raised. The roared-in-unison
Sláinte
s made the other patrons stare, then, presumably because they were used to rowdy Trinity students, return to their own conversations.

After Fingal’s first swallow, there was a white ring one-third of the way down his pint glass. “Your da’s right, Cromie,” Fingal said, and thought, Charlie, Cromie, and Bob, that was three. Fingal had become close to HMS
Tiger
’s young navagating officer, Tom Laverty, in ’30, but it seemed unlikely their paths would cross again. Then there was Lars. He’d get a call later tonight to be told the exam results. “Do you reckon brothers could count as good friends?” Fingal asked.