Ken McClure: Hypocrite's Isle

Caroline nodded.

‘If I use up the Valdevan on her, there will be none left to complete the experiments, if and when lab space should ever become available.’

Another nod.

‘There probably isn’t enough to treat your mother anyway.’

‘Gavin, you don’t have to explain...’

‘But we’re going to give it a try if you’re up for it.’

Caroline’s mouth fell open. ‘You’re serious?’

‘The sooner we get started the better,’ said Gavin. ‘But where will your father fit into all this?’

‘I can’t possibly tell him. I’ll have to give Mum the drug when he’s not around.’

‘Will you tell her what you’re doing?’

‘I think I have to. It’s important that we have her permission...’

In case things go wrong , thought Gavin, filling in the blank. But even with that proviso, he could imagine a hostile barrister mouthing the words: You preyed on the hopes of a desperate woman in order to carry out a wholly unlicensed experiment...

‘Getting her to agree won’t be a problem,’ said Caroline. ‘But...’

‘But what?’

‘The minute I tell her about this, her whole demeanour is going to change. No matter how much I warn her that it might not work — probably won’t work — she is going to cling to it like a life-jacket, because it’s the only hope she’s got, and that’s what people do in her situation. She’ll want to tell Dad. She’ll want him to share that hope.’

‘Presumably he’ll go apeshit if he finds out?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘Your mother wasn’t going to tell him about her assisted suicide request.’

‘She could hide despair from him. I’m not so sure about hope.’

‘Sounds like we’re falling at the first fence.’

‘I could strike a bargain with her... I could tell her that if your idea fails... I’ll give her the help she wants, providing she doesn’t say anything to Dad about Valdevan.’

‘The stakes are getting really high.’

‘For all of us. When do we start? How do we do this?’

Gavin confessed that it was going to be guesswork all the way, but he could calculate the dose of Valdevan if he knew Caroline’s mother’s body weight. Caroline was able to tell him exactly, adding, ‘She was weighed at the hospital last Thursday.’

‘Then the only big unknown is the growth rate of the tumour,’ said Gavin. ‘Tumours grow at vastly different rates. Cell doubling time can vary from about twenty-five days to over a thousand, with an average of about a hundred. I’m assuming that, because she’s gone downhill so fast, your mother’s is at the fast end — bad for the patient but good for us — the faster the better. The sooner the cells take up the drug the sooner they’ll develop membrane damage and become susceptible to polymyxin. We’re only going to get one chance, so I think we have to give her as long as possible on the Valdevan and then give her the polymyxin. We’ve got enough Valdevan for fourteen days, maybe a bit longer.’

‘Whatever you say.’

‘When do you plan on going home?’

‘I’ll tell the university I’m going to have to drop out of my course for a few weeks and hope they’ll understand. All things being equal, I could go down tomorrow morning.’

‘I’ll prepare what you need tonight and write out instructions. I’ll meet you at the station in the morning?’

‘I don’t want to be alone tonight.’

Caroline returned to the flat with Gavin and together they prepared a pack for Caroline to take with her in the morning. Luckily, Gavin had held on to the polystyrene box he’d brought the drugs home from the lab in, so it could be restocked with ice and would keep drugs cool until Caroline got home. They talked a bit about the injection schedule and possible side-effects to look out for but, as no lab monitoring would be possible, this would all be subjective.

They went out for a meal to Bar Napoli, an Italian restaurant known for its easy-going Mediterranean atmosphere, in the hope that it might afford them some escape from the growing strain they were under, but to no avail.

‘I can’t believe I’m going to do this,’ said Caroline, playing with the food on her fork more than eating it.

‘ We’ re doing it,’ corrected Gavin.

‘I’m to blame. You’re only doing it because of me.’

‘It’s not a question of blame. It’s the right thing to do... when all’s said and done.’

‘What will you do while I’m away?’

‘I’ll write up the paper, adding in all the data I’ve gathered since Frank did the first draft, and then I’ll talk to him and get him to do the covering letter.’

‘It’s not going to be easy, meeting him after what he’s done. You won’t lose your temper, will you?’

Gavin shook his head. ‘Like you say, there’s probably much more to it than we’re seeing.’

Gavin had a pint of lager in the Abbotsford after seeing Caroline off at the station. It took the edge off the feeling that their lives would never be the same again, but despite the temptation to go on drinking, he stopped at one. It wasn’t oblivion he needed to embrace right now, it was a sense of purpose. He decided to go home and start typing the paper into his laptop.

Before he could start, he had to decide on which journal the paper should be sent to, because this would determine the format of the text and tables. Frank had mentioned several possibilities at the outset but had not, as far as he knew, come to any firm decision. It didn’t take Gavin long to decide to go for broke and write it up for Nature — one of the most prestigious scientific journals in the world. If Frank disagreed, the text and data would at least be in the computer. It would be easy enough to re-format it for another journal.

He had a couple of copies of Nature among his books and papers, so he looked up the ‘Instructions to Authors’ section in one of them.

Entering the text of the paper was straightforward, but when it came to inserting tables, his progress slowed to a crawl as he struggled to present data in the way the journal stipulated. He was still wrestling with the software when the first of his flatmates, Tim Anderson, arrived home and offered to help. ‘Microsoft Excel is my middle name, Gav.’

Fifteen minutes later, Gavin was biting back the urge to point out to Tim that his first name should be ‘Unable to Use’, as skills learned in the world of life insurance did not translate well to Gavin’s needs. ‘Sorry, mate, I’m stumped.’

It took Gavin another hour back in his own room before things became clear, and the tables could be aligned in the stipulated way.

‘How’s it going?’ asked his flatmate, when he went through to the kitchen to make himself a coffee.

‘Sorted.’

Caroline phoned just after 8 p.m. ‘Mum’s had her first injection. I gave her it while Dad was doing evening surgery.’

‘Does she know exactly what you’re doing?’

‘I told her everything,’ said Caroline. ‘She reacted just like I thought she would: her outlook changed in an instant. Now I understand how easy it is for charlatans to prey on the afflicted. I warned her that there was only the slimmest of chances it would work, and that it had never been tried on anyone before, but she saw the one thing missing from her life — hope — and snatched at it. She’s been like a different woman.’

‘Your dad will wonder what’s going on.’

‘She’s promised to keep it secret. We came to an agreement.’

Gavin was pleased to hear Caroline sounding positive, even optimistic, but this was an unreal situation. He suspected that she hadn’t looked ahead to what might happen if the treatment should fail. The plunge from hope into despair, and possibly bitterness, might well be even more dramatic. He tried broaching the subject.