Ken McClure - Pandora's Helix

The tears stopped and hope replaced pain in the Downys’ eyes. “Of course, Doctor.”

“I must just stress again,” said Neef. “It’s all right to hope for the best but I think it would be wise to prepare yourself for the worst.”

“Yes Doctor. Thank you Doctor.”

Ann Miles had been holding a call from Eve Sayers. Neef put a hand to his forehead and made a face when she told him; he had forgotten that the journalist was due to call back today. He nodded to Ann and picked up the receiver.

“Well, do I get to come and visit him?” asked Eve. She sounded anxious.

“To be quite honest, Eve,” confessed Neef. “I haven’t had time to think about it. We’re about to start out on a trial of the new therapy I mentioned. We just got final permission this afternoon.”

“Sounds exciting. So, what do you think?” asked Eve, returning to her original question.

“There would be certain conditions.”

“Like what?”

“I’d need your assurance that you were coming here as a private individual, not a journalist.”

“You have it.”

“And if you start visiting Neil, you don’t stop.”

“I don’t understand. What do you mean?”

“It’s not unusual for people to want to visit sick children, especially the terminally ill but they want to do it on their own terms; they want to come when it suits them and not when it doesn’t.”

“I’m not one of them,” said Eve.

“I didn’t imagine you were but if Neil forms an attachment to you, as well he might considering how well you two got on the first time, you would have to respect it, even when his condition starts to worsen. You will have to be around for him, however distressing you personally might find it.”

This time there was a long pause.

Neef said, “I’m glad you’re taking time to consider.”

“I suppose I hadn’t thought that one right through,” said Eve.

“Think about it on your own for a bit,” said Neef. “Call me back tomorrow. Better still... come to lunch with me on Sunday?”

“Lunch?”

Neef had voiced the invitation on the spur of the moment and was suddenly filled with doubts. He felt slightly embarrassed and more than a little vulnerable. It was however, too late to change his mind. He explained, “One of my colleagues, Frank MacSween and his wife have asked me to lunch on Sunday. They said I should bring a friend if I had any left after you and your paper had finished with me. They’ll be most impressed if I turn up with the assassinating journalist in question.”

“I see,” said Eve. “Tangled web and all that. All right, I’ll come.”

Neef wrote down her address and said he would pick her up at twelve thirty.

“What does your colleague do?” asked Eve as an afterthought.

“He’s a pathologist,” replied Neef.

Neef put down the phone and wondered for a moment what he had done. He couldn’t remember the last time he had turned up at a function other than on his own. Certainly not since Elaine’s death. Four years was a long time. Depending on who else was at the MacSweens on Sunday, tongues might start wagging. Did it matter? He supposed not. Apart from anything else he had only asked Eve along as a sort of riposte to Frank’s joke about having no friends, he reassured himself.

On Friday morning Neef held his weekly meeting with his unit medical and senior nursing staff. He was able to give them the good news that his application for the latest American anti-cancer drug, Antivulon, had been approved after further consideration by the Pharmacy sub-committee. Tim Heaton had kept his word; the unspoken quid pro quo had been honoured. The news had come by way of an internal memo from Heaton’s office; it had arrived just before the meeting.

“The question now, of course, is who do we treat?” said Neef. “Our problem is compounded by the fact that Menogen will be starting their trial on Monday and I’d like your views on candidates for Gene Therapy as well.”

“I suggest that John Martin be changed to Antivulon as soon as possible,” said Tony Samuels.

“He hasn’t settled on standard chemotherapy then?” asked Neef.

“No sir, he’s had a pretty unpleasant week all round. Things just aren’t getting any better for him.”

“And we’ve still not been able to start him on radiotherapy,” added Lawrence Fielding.

“Then he sounds like our first Antivulon patient,” agreed Neef. “I called the Pharmacy department as soon as I got the go-ahead. There’s no local agency handling the drug so they’ll have to order it directly from the States. They’re FAXing the request.”

“What about Thomas Downy, sir?” asked John Duncan. “Now that Mr Beavis has decided against surgical intervention.”

“I’m marking Thomas down for Gene Therapy,” said Neef. “Dr Pereira thinks he’s a good candidate, always providing we can reach the tumour with a needle. I think we can. I’ve already had a word with his parents so we have their permission but I’ve still to arrange a surgical team.”

“I see sir.”

“Some of our kids are doing really well on the regimen they’re on at the moment,” said Lawrence Fielding. “I suggest we leave them out of the reckoning and concentrate on the ones that aren’t doing so well.”

“That’s imperative in the case of Gene Therapy candidates,” said Neef. “Our open license dictates we confine therapy to those with very poor prognoses. So let’s eliminate our success stories from the list of potential candidates.”

Fielding read out a list of names he thought should be excluded from consideration, asking for occasional confirmation from Kate Morse.

After a further half hour’s discussion and with eight children assigned to either Gene Therapy or Antivulon treatment, the group reached a stage where there were just two patients left for consideration, Jane Lees and Neil Benson.

“I hate saying this about any child,” said Neef, “but I fear Jane may be a lost cause. The tumours are just so wide spread in her lungs.”

“She’s been fading fast since she was admitted,” said Kate Morse. “I think maybe her pneumonia left her debilitated but she has very little in the way of fighting spirit and that’s working against her.”

“She would be totally unsuitable for Gene Therapy according to Max Pereira but I think I would be in favour of giving her Antivulon,” said Neef.

“Nothing to lose,” said John Duncan.

“Maybe everything to gain,” added Tony Samuels.

“Then we’re agreed?”

There were nods all round.

“That just leaves Neil,” said Neef. “The bravest of hearts in the smallest of bodies. Is he still in remission?”

“No increase in tumour size,” replied Fielding. “He’s still on the plateau.”

“Then we let well alone for the moment,” said Neef with an air of finality.

“And when it starts to grow again?”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

Frank MacSween had gone off to a pathologists’ meeting up in University College Hospital leaving Chief Medical Laboratory Scientific Officer, Charlie Morse in charge of the path lab. Knowing that the PM suite would not be in use for the next few hours, Morse decided that this would be a good time to get the faulty extractor fan above table four fixed. He called Hospital Maintenance and asked for the electrical foreman, Doug Cooper.

“Any chance of one of your lads fixing a faulty fan in the PM room?” Morse asked.

“Not occupied is it?”

“No, nor liable to be for some time. There’s some kind of meeting on up at Uni College.”

“In that case and seeing it’s you asking, Charlie, I’ll come myself,” said Cooper.