Felix Francis - Crisis

‘I’m here about Zoe Robertson, Zoe Chadwick as she was then. She had an abortion here in August 2002.’

‘What about her?’ the doctor asked.

‘She’s dead,’ I said. ‘You may have heard recently of a fire in some stables in Newmarket that killed several horses.’

She nodded.

‘Zoe was the human victim of that fire. She’d been murdered.’

‘Oh dear,’ Dr Sylvester said. ‘But what has that to do with us?’

‘I think that having had an abortion may have a bearing on her death.’

‘Are you from the police?’

She made it sound like a concern.

‘No,’ I replied. I gave her one of my business cards. ‘I’m a solicitor and I represent Mr Declan Chadwick. He’s been arrested on suspicion of killing his sister but he categorically denies any knowledge of the crime. I am trying to establish his innocence.’

‘And why do you think that her former treatment here is relevant?’

‘I consider that the victim’s previous sexual abuse is germane to who might have committed this crime. Zoe Chadwick was just thirteen when she had the abortion, and I believe the pregnancy was a result of that abuse.’

‘Are you quite sure she was treated here?’

I removed my smartphone from my pocket and showed her the photo I had taken of the letter to Dr Benaud from Dr Andrews. ‘I found this in her medical records.’

Dr Sylvester took a close look at the letter.

She nodded. ‘Gavin Andrews was my predecessor here as director.’

‘Do you still have Zoe’s notes?’ I asked.

‘Oh yes,’ she said. ‘I’m sure we do. We are required by law to keep records of all our procedures. They will be in our storage area in the basement.’

‘Can I see them?’ I asked.

‘The 1967 Abortion Act specifically prohibits, without the patient’s express permission, the notification of a termination to anyone other than the Chief Medical Officer of the Department of Health. I take it that’s not you.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘But why, then, did Dr Andrews write to Zoe’s GP informing him ?’

She looked again at the letter.

‘It does not inform him that an abortion has occurred, merely a gynaecological intervention .’

‘But all you do here is abortions. It therefore doesn’t take a rocket scientist to work out what the intervention was.’

‘Maybe Miss Chadwick had given her permission for her doctor to be contacted, or maybe she had been referred here by him in the first place. I don’t know. Either way, unless a patient specifically forbids it, we are customarily in touch with her GP to ensure there are no underlying medical conditions that might put the patient at risk. I tend to use email but I know that Dr Andrews liked to telephone, and clearly he must have done so in this case.’

She paused briefly and folded her arms. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Foster, but you can’t see the records without the patient’s permission and that’s final. I have to adhere to the absolute requirements of the Act, otherwise I would be putting our very existence in jeopardy.’

‘But the patient is dead,’ I said.

‘I’m afraid that her being dead makes no difference. I am still unable to give you notification of a termination.’

‘But I’m not asking you to give me notification. I already know that the termination occurred. I’m asking for any other aspects of the circumstances that might have a bearing on her murder. Surely you would want to see her killer brought to justice?’

‘Of course.’

‘Then will you look through her records and tell me if there is anything contained within them that might be useful. For example, the letter refers to a sample being sent for analysis. Is that common? What sort of analysis would that be? And do you still have the results?’

She hesitated.

‘I could ask the detective chief inspector who is investigating the murder,’ I said. ‘I’m sure he could get a search warrant.’

Mention of potential police involvement seemed to sway the argument. Visits by the police were clearly not good for business.

‘All right,’ she said. ‘I’ll go and look through the records for you. Please wait here.’

While I was waiting for her to return, I wasted some time using my phone to look up the trains between Ipswich and Cambridge. As the driver had said, one ran every hour with alternate trains stopping at Dullingham.

Then Kate called me.

‘You were right,’ she said. ‘Julie confirmed it. Ryan asked her to sort it on the Friday before the fire and she made the call. But it seems that nothing was set in stone and, by Monday, it didn’t matter any more.’

‘Thanks,’ I said.

Dr Sylvester returned with a buff folder in her hand.

‘You’re not the first person to ask to see these,’ she said. ‘There’s a note on the front to say that photocopies of all the enclosed papers were made and sent out at the request of the patient.’

‘When?’ I asked.

She looked again at the note.

‘Six years ago. Just before I arrived.’

She opened the folder and studied the top couple of sheets, being careful to hold them up so I couldn’t read them too.

‘All perfectly standard,’ she said, closing the folder again and placing it down flat on the table. ‘Nothing out of the ordinary at all. Sorry, Mr Foster, I can’t help you.’

‘How about the sample sent for analysis?’ I asked. ‘Are there any results from that?’

She reopened the folder and briefly shuffled through the papers.

‘As I said, there’s nothing in here that’s out of the ordinary.’ She was clearly determined that there shouldn’t be.

I thought back to what Janie had told me about the flaming row she’d overheard between Zoe and Oliver:

Zoe was shouting that she’d now obtained the DNA evidence to prove it.

Was that the evidence to prove that she actually was his daughter or to prove something else entirely?

‘Is there anything to indicate who the father was? And, in particular, was a DNA profile made of the aborted child?’

‘That wouldn’t be standard practice,’ the doctor said. ‘Blood and urine samples from the patient maybe, and only then to determine if there were any sexually transmitted infections present.’

‘Can you please check again?’ I said. ‘This is most important and I will apply to the police to obtain a search warrant if necessary.’

She wasn’t to know that I’d probably not get one.

Reluctantly, she opened the folder for a third time and studied the papers, this time taking much longer to go through absolutely everything.

‘How very strange,’ she said eventually, holding up one piece of paper.

‘What’s strange?’ I asked.

‘It seems there was indeed a sample taken from the foetus. That is highly irregular. Highly irregular indeed.’ She shook her head. ‘Maybe not even legal.’

‘Who took it?’ I asked.

‘It must have been Dr Andrews. No one else would have had the authority.’

‘What happened to the sample?’ I asked.

She looked again at the paper.

‘It was sent to a lab in London.’

‘Which lab?’ I asked.

I could tell that she didn’t want to tell me but I just waited, resisting a temptation to tap my fingers impatiently on the table.

‘Somewhere called the Chancery Lane Medical Laboratory,’ she said eventually, reading from the paper.

‘Do you use them often?’ I asked.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I’ve never heard of them before.’

I typed their name into my smartphone and pulled up their website.

‘Specialising in forensic testing for the legal profession’ was their strapline.

‘Do you have the results?’

‘There is nothing in here,’ Dr Sylvester said holding up the folder. ‘I’ve been through it all.’