Second Opinion (23 page)

‘I’ll grant you,’ he said handsomely, and sighed.

There was a little silence and then she said, ‘I think I’m going to talk to Prue. See what happened to her that night, and why she left Harry on his own when she was on call.’

He thought for a moment and then nodded. ‘I think that’s a good idea. We will interview her, as I said, but if you can get anything out of her now, on the old girls’ network, it’d be handy.’

She grimaced. The excitement of hunting down clues and unravelling mysteries was unalloyed pleasure for her, generally speaking, but it did make her uncomfortable to think she might be abusing the fellowship of her medical colleagues as part of her unravelling; and Gus caught her eye and seemed to read her mind.

‘It’s tough, ducks, but there it is. A murderer is a murderer, even if he or she turns out to be your best and dearest mate. If it’s too much for you …’

‘No,’ she said firmly, dismissing her qualms. ‘That’d be daft. It’ll do Prue no harm if she’s done nothing wrong. And if she has — well, better we find out. Listen, can you do
any
thing more about the Oberlander baby?’

‘We’re still trying, like I said, but I have to tell you it’s a cold trail. If no one reports a baby missing, and we can’t find any evidence of a missing child, then finding out who
he was, let alone who killed him or why, is almost impossible.’

‘As for why,’ George said. ‘Could it be because of the AIDS, I wonder?’

He looked puzzled. ‘Is that a motive for killing a child?’

‘Let’s think it through. You’re a parent and you’ve got this sick child. And you’re HIV positive. You know you are, but you don’t want anyone else to know. If the baby shows that he’s got the disease …’

‘Then that shows you’ve got it, because he must have got it from someone …’

‘Precisely.’ George leaned forwards eagerly. ‘And I’ll tell you something else. Children don’t get HIV infection from their fathers.’

‘Never?’ Gus said. ‘I think I know the answer, but —’

‘You do. The disease is spread by body fluids. The most likely cause for a baby to be HIV positive is via breastfeeding from an infected mother.’

‘Or from a blood transfusion, I suppose.’

‘Yes, of course. But if this baby got ill from blood transfusion it’s obvious the parents would have taken the child back to the doctor who gave him the transfusion, wouldn’t they? Or at least would have told Prue about it when it was brought in to Barrie Ward. And, anyway, in the UK transfusions are safe now. It seems to me to point straight to the parents — well, anyway, the mother. She has to be the one who’s HIV positive and who passed the virus on. I mean, look at what they did. They brought the child in under an assumed name because it was ill, took it away in panic when Prue talked about doing tests — maybe she even mentioned HIV? I’ll have to ask her — and then the baby turns up dead. Maybe they thought that was the simplest way out, since it was likely to die anyway, sooner or later. And looking at the poor little scrap when I did the PM I’d have said probably sooner. Maybe they just, well, cut their losses?’

‘And the mother’s secret about her HIV status is still safe.’ Gus shook his head. ‘There’s a catch in this. Hang on …’ He wrinkled his face and stared at her, his eyes glassy with concentration. ‘It’s got to do with film stars, I know it has. The catch …’

George stared back at him and then her own expression became gloomy.

‘I’ve just seen the catch,’ she said. ‘If the mother got her HIV infection from a blood transfusion a long time ago, before the baby was born —’

‘Before blood was safe in the transfusion service … and I’ve remembered the link. There was a Hollywood actor that happened to, wasn’t there? His wife got HIV from blood, she breastfed and so gave it to their baby. A dreadful business. Do you remember?’

George nodded, eagerly. ‘That’s right. I do remember. And, if this mother, like the Hollywood one, had a transfusion and got the infection, there’d be no need for all the secrecy, would there? No one would be able to point a finger and accuse her of some sort of sexual fling where she picked up the virus.’ She shook her head in sudden anger. ‘Not that anyone should ever have to be ashamed of being ill. It’s a tragedy that happens to some people, and it’s got nothing to do with morality any more than — than heart disease. But there’s a lot of ignorance about and maybe this mother —’

‘Maybe this mother
didn’t
have a transfusion and wants to keep from her husband the fact that she’s infected, and maybe she killed the baby to stop him finding out?’ Gus stopped, irritable. ‘Too many maybes. Look, I’ll spread my own boys about further. It’s facts we need, not guesses. We’ll do some checking on sexually transmitted disease clinics and with HIV consultants. See if that way we can find a mother who fits the bill. Meanwhile …’

‘Meanwhile, I’ll talk to Prue and see what happened there.’ George got to her feet and stretched. ‘I’d better get home. Um — see you soon, then.’

Gus seemed abstracted, already reaching for his phone, and she thought a little bleakly: He doesn’t mind me going.

‘Mmm. You do, ducks. And yeah, see you soon. Call me with the news, if any. I’ll be here late tonight, and most other nights, I think. There’s a lot of routine stuff you have to get through with these murder cases. Like checking the car that ran over Harry. ‘Night, Dr B.’

‘Night,’ she said and went. There was no elation left now.

At home, she found her mother and Bridget busy in the kitchen.

‘We’re making supper, darling!’ Vanny called. ‘We found this country market where they had all sorts of nice things. I’m making you the sort of things you used to like a lot.’

George, her lips curling delightedly at the thought of the sort of country market they might have found in Shadwell, put her head round the kitchen door. Doubt filled her. The smells that were wreathing the place were indeed familiar and her heart sank.

‘Ma! Not, I beg you, candied yams!’

‘Why not? You always adored them the way I did them, with the toasted marshmallows on top and all. We got some ham steaks too, and some spinach. No collard greens but spinach comes close.’

‘It’s all a bit Southern style for a Yankee,’ George said, knowing when she was licked. The dish of yams with marshmallows on top was already in the oven; she could see the topping bubbling and browning through the glass door. ‘You must have found Watney Street. Lots of Afro-Caribbean stalls there. They have yams and sweet potatoes.’

‘Indeed we did.’ Bridget lifted a flushed face from the minute kitchen table where, George now realized, she was putting the last trimmings on a pumpkin pie. ‘I saw they had pumpkin and I said to Vanny, we’ll give her the Thanksgiving dinner she never did have. Just to get her all set up for Christmas. We’re making it, you know, honey.
All of it. There, doesn’t it look good?’ She held the pie up on one hand, making the fingers into a sort of five legged stand for it. ‘Just like the pie Snow White made for the dwarves!’

‘It’s been a long time since I ate Disney food, Bridget,’ George said. ‘And as for Christmas, for heaven’s sake, you don’t have to —’

‘It’s all arranged,’ Bridget said seriously. ‘We talked to the butcher in the market there and made an order for a dear little turkey, and we’ve organized to get all the vegetables and everything else. Even the cranberries. One of the stores had them in jars, just like home, would you believe. It’s going to be great. Better than a hotel any day.’

‘I’m sure,’ George said, surrendering, knowing it would be a waste of energy to argue. ‘I hope you haven’t ordered too much. There’ll only be the three of us, after all.’

‘Not three, darling,’ Bridget trilled. ‘Four!’

‘Oh?’ George lifted her head from the little pile of mail that had been waiting for her, her finger halted in mid-slit of an envelope that looked horribly like one from the taxman. ‘How d’you reckon that?’

‘Well, he was so kind to us, taking us out and all, I just had to do something. I said to Vanny, shall we take him out too, and she said she thought that would be a bit — well, too much, you know? And then she said she knew he had no family, since she’d asked him all about his folks, and there you are!’

‘Bridget,’ George said, her heart sliding down her ribs. ‘What have you done?’

‘Why, I sent a nice invitation to Gus today, to spend Christmas Day with us. I handed it in to the police station — the address was in the phone book — and I’m sure he’ll get it safe and sound. If not, well, we can call him. You have the number, I imagine? I do so hope he’ll come. I have a feeling he will, though.’

‘Do you know, Bridget,’ George said after thinking for a
little while, trying to decide what she should do about this, if anything, and failing to reach a conclusion. ‘Do you know, I rather think so too.’

She enjoyed the yams with marshmallow more than she had thought she would. Maybe Christmas wouldn’t be so bad after all.

17
  
  

Mixing detection with running a busy Path. Department, George told herself at ten to one the following Monday, was the perfect way to drive yourself crazy.

All the morning she’d been working at full throttle, dealing with the routine jobs and a prolonged series of complicated telephone discussions with Harold Constant at the coroner’s office about a case over which she would have to be in court early in the New Year, as well as fitting in a PM on an old man who’d keeled over dead in the middle of Leman Street, and all the time she’d been itching to get over to Barrie Ward to talk to Prudence Jennings. She could have talked to her on the phone, it was true, but she was unwilling to do that. There was so much more to be learned from people than just the words they used; their behaviour when they were asked questions, the expressions on their faces as they did it, the way they moved, all of it was relevant. And that wasn’t available on a phone.

As the morning had worn on however, it had got easier. Sheila was in a particularly co-operative mood and Jerry and the rest of the senior staff followed her lead.

‘Christmas,’ Jerry said virtuously when George murmured something oblique about how surprisingly agreeable everyone was being this morning. ‘Season of goodwill and all that crap to all men.’ He’d snickered then. ‘And pressies.
I’m expecting something really smashing from you, Dr B., after the way I’ve worked so hard all this year. If you let me down, who knows what sort of mood I’ll be in come the New Year?’

‘You’ll be lucky,’ George said. ‘When do I get the time to go shopping?’

‘Try the off licence,’ Sheila said acidly. ‘Give him a bottle or two of whisky, and he’ll follow you anywhere.’

George, who had already decided to present her staff with bottles of good port and small Stilton cheeses from Marks and Sparks as Christmas presents, pretended not to have heard that and decided to make the best of her opportunities.

‘Well, since you’re all feeling so benevolent,’ she said, ‘I’ll disappear for a while. I have things to do, and if I make an effort I can be back here by three in time for that PM. If I’m a few minutes late, make nice noises at whoever comes from the coroner’s office, Sheila, will you? I’ve already asked Danny to see to it he gives them tea and biscuits.’

‘Yuk,’ Sheila said. ‘How anyone can sit down there in among all those corpses and slurp tea is beyond me. OK, Dr B. We’ll hold the fort.’ And she put on her long-suffering look as George headed for the door.

She went straight to the Paediatric Department. There were other places she wanted to visit to do some questioning, but it was important to get Prudence Jennings sorted out first. She rehearsed inside her head the questions she would ask as she went scurrying through the Disney corridor and on into the main play area of Barrie, threading her way through clusters of mothers and children who were everywhere. Outpatient Clinic morning, she decided, and hoped that Prue wouldn’t be too bogged down in work to spare her some time.

Sister Collinson was in the middle of the room and the tangle of toys and floor cushions, arguing passionately with a small bony woman who had four small children, all of
whom looked to be well under six, clustered round her. The two women were almost nose to nose as they hissed and spat their rage at each other and the children watched wide-eyed, as indeed did several other mothers who clearly found the whole exchange highly entertaining.

Philip Goss was standing alongside them with a pile of notes under his arm and it was he who sorted the matter out. He moved smoothly in beside Sister Collinson and said something to the woman which made her jerk her head back and look at him, and then down at one of the children.

He was the smallest, a snotty-nosed child of about two, and he had both hands held to his mouth, chewing something with great concentration. His mother yelped and pulled it away from him. The child began to wail at the top of his voice; the mother shrieked and hurled the thing she’d grabbed from him at Sister Collinson — it was a large plastic syringe — who received it in her eye, and then scooped up the child to slap him hard and bawl that he was a dirty little tyke what ought to know better. The child immediately screamed like a steam engine and Sister Collinson fled, clearly intending to do something about her eye. Philip Goss said something else to the mother who, now thoroughly flustered, headed for the door with her other three children running behind her like demented ducklings and, pushing George out of the way, went. Much to everyone’s relief.