James White - Star Surgeon

Conway’s own instructions were general. He was to coordinate the work of data-gathering Corps medical officers on Etla and, because the sociological and medical aspects of the problem were so closely connected, he was advised to keep abreast of the developments outside his specialty. With the arrival of the latest reports the sociological problem seemed more confusing, and it was Lonvellin’s hope that a mind trained for the complexities of a multi-environment hospital would be able to establish a sensible pattern among this welter of contradictory facts. Dr. Conway would no doubt appreciate the urgency of the matter, and wish to begin work immediately …

… And I would like data on the Earth-human Clarke who is operating in District Thirty-five,” Lonvellin went on without a pause, so that I may properly evaluate the reports of this being …

As Captain Williamson was giving the required information Stillman tapped Conway’s arm and nodded for them to leave. Twenty minutes later they were in the back of a covered truck on the way to the perimeter. Conway’s head and one ear had been swathed in bandages, and he felt anxious and a little stupid.

“We’ll stay hidden until we’re clear of the port,” Stillman said reassuringly, “then we’ll sit with the driver. Lots of Etlans travel with our people these days, but it might arouse suspicion for us to be seen coming from the ship. And we’ll head straight for town instead of calling at ground headquarters. I think you should see some of your patients as soon as possible.”

Seriously, Conway said, “I know the symptoms are purely psychosomatic, but both my feet seem to be in an advanced stage of frostbite …

Stillman laughed. “Don’t worry, Doctor,” he said. “The translator bandaged to your ear will let you know everything that goes on, and you won’t have to speak because I’ll explain that your head injury has temporarily affected your speech centers. Later, however, when you begin to pick up a little of the language a good tip is to develop a stutter. An impediment of this kind disguises the fact that the sufferer does not have the local idiom or accent, the large fault concealing all the smaller ones.

“Not all our undercover people have advanced linguistic training,” he added, “and such ruses are necessary. But the main thing to remember is not to stay in any one place long enough for the more definite oddities of behavior to be noticed …

At that point the driver remarked that they were coming level with a blond whom he could cheerfully stay near for the rest of his life. Stillman went on, “Despite the coarse suggestions of Corpsman Briggs here, perhaps our best protection lies in our mental approach to the work, to the fact that our intentions toward these people are completely honorable. If we were hostile agents intent on sabotage, or gathering intelligence for a future act of war, we would be much more likely to be caught. We should be tensed up, trying too hard to be natural, too suspicious and are more inclined to make mistakes because of this.”

Conway said dryly, “You make it sound too easy.” But he felt reassured nevertheless.

The truck left them in the center of town and they began to walk around. The first thing Conway noticed was that there were very few large or new-looking buildings, but that even the oldest were very well kept, and that the Etlans had a very attractive way of decorating the outside of their houses with flowers. He saw the people, the men and women working, shopping or going about businesses which at the present moment he could not even guess at. He had to think of them as men and women, as being he and she rather than a collection of coldly alien its.

He saw the twisted limbs, the crutches, the disease scarred faces, his analytical eye detecting and isolating conditions which had been stamped out among the Federation citizenship over a century ago. And everywhere he saw a sight familiar to anyone who had ever been to or worked in a hospital, that of the less sick patient freely and unselfishly giving all the aid possible to those who were worse off than himself.

The sudden realization that he was not in a hospital ward where such sights were pleasantly normal but in a city street brought Conway physically and mentally to a halt.

“What gets me,” he said when he could speak again, “is that so many of these conditions are curable. Maybe all of them. We haven’t had epilepsy for one hundred and fifty years …”

“And you feel like running amuck with a hypo,” Stillman put in grimly, “injecting all and sundry with the indicated specifics. But you have to remember that the whole planet is like this, and that curing a few would not help at all. You are in charge of a very big ward, Doctor.”

“I’ve read the reports,” Conway said shortly. “It’s just that the printed figures did not prepare me for the actuality …”

He stopped with the sentence incomplete. They had paused at a busy intersection and Conway noticed that both pedestrian and vehicular traffic had either slowed or come to a halt. Then he saw the reason.

There was a large wagon coming along the street. Painted and draped completely in red it was, unlike the other vehicle around it, unpowered. Short handles projected at intervals along each side and at every handle an Etlan walked or limped or hobbled, pushing it along. Even before Stillman took his beret off and Conway followed suit he knew that he was seeing a funeral.

“We’ll visit the local hospital now,” Stillman said when it had gone past. “If asked, my story is that we are looking for a sick relative called Mennomer who was admitted last week. On Etla that is a name like Smith. But we’re not likely to be questioned, because practically everybody does a stint of hospital work and the staff are used to the part-time help coming and going all the time. And should we run into a Corps medical officer, as well we might, don’t recognize him.

“And in case you’re worried about your Etlan colleagues wanting to look under your bandages,” Stillman went on practically reading Conway’s mind, “they are far too busy to be curious about injuries which have already been treated …

They spent two hours in the hospital without once having to tell their story about the ailing Mennomer. It was obvious from the start that Stillman knew his way about the place, that he had probably worked there. But there were always too many Etlans about for Conway to ask if it had been as a Corpsman observer or an undercover part-time nurse. Once he caught a glimpse of a Corpsman medic watching an Etlan doctor draining a pleural cavity of its empyema, his expression showing how dearly he would have liked to roll up his dark green sleeves and wade in himself.

The surgeons wore bright yellow instead of white, some of the operative techniques verged on the barbaric and the concept of isolation wards or barrier nursing had never occurred to them-or perhaps it had occurred to them, Conway thought in an effort to be fair, but the utterly fantastic degree of overcrowding made it impracticable. Considering the facilities at their disposal and the gigantic problem it had to face, this was a very good hospital. Conway approved of it and, judging from what he had seen of its staff, he approved of them, too.

“These are nice people,” Conway said rather inadequately at one point. “I can’t understand them jumping Lonvellin the way they did, somehow they don’t seem to be the type.”

“But they did it,” Stillman replied grimly. “Anything which hasn’t two eyes, two ears, two arms and two legs, or which has these things but happens to have them in the wrong places, gets jumped. It’s something drummed into them at a very early age, with their ABCs, practically. I wish we knew why.”