Val McDermid - Beneath the Bleeding

Elinor raised her hand to knock then paused. Was she about to commit career suicide? You could argue that, if she was right, it didn’t matter whether she spoke up or not. Because if she was right, Robbie Bishop was going to die anyway. Nothing could alter that. But if she was right and she didn’t speak up, someone else could die. Whether accident or intent lay behind whatever had happened to him, it could happen to someone else.

The thought of having another death on her conscience swung it for Elinor. Better to make an arse of herself in a good cause than have to deal with that. She rapped on the door and waited for Denby’s distracted, ‘Yes, yes, come in.’ He looked up impatiently from a stack of case notes. ‘Dr Blessing,’ he said. ‘Any change?’

‘In Robbie Bishop?’

Denby pulled a half-smile. ‘Who else? We claim to treat all our patients equally, but it’s not exactly easy when we have to run the gauntlet of football fans whenever we enter or leave the hospital.’ He swung round in his chair and looked through the window to the car park below. ‘Even more of them now than when I came back in after lunch.’ He turned back as Elinor began to speak. ‘Do you suppose they think being there can influence the outcome?’ He sounded more bemused than cynical.

‘I expect it depends whether they believe in the power of prayer. I did see a pair of them huddled in a doorway saying the rosary.’ She shrugged. ‘It doesn’t appear to be helping Mr Bishop – he seems to be deteriorating steadily. The fluid on his lungs is building up. I’d say respiratory distress is getting worse. There’s no question of him coming off the ventilator.’

Denby bit his lip. ‘No response to the AZT, then?’

Elinor shook her head. ‘Nothing discernible so far.’

Denby sighed and nodded. ‘Damned if I know what’s going on here. Oh, well. So it goes sometimes. Thanks for keeping me posted, Dr Blessing.’ His eyes returned to the files on his desk in dismissal.

‘There was one thing?’

He looked up, eyebrows raised. He appeared to be genuinely interested in what she had to say. ‘To do with Mr Bishop?’

She nodded. ‘I know it sounds crazy, but have you considered ricin poisoning?’

‘Ricin?’ Denby looked almost offended. ‘How on earth would a premiership footballer be exposed to ricin?’

Elinor battled on. ‘I’ve no idea. But you’re a terrific diagnostician and when you couldn’t come up with anything, I thought it must be something a bit off the wall. And I thought, maybe poisoning. So I checked it out on the online database and all his symptoms match ricin poisoning – weakness, fever, nausea, dyspnea, cough, pulmonary oedema and arthralgia. Add to that the fact that he’s not responding to any of the medications we’ve tried him with … I don’t know, it fits the way nothing else does.’

Denby looked bemused. ‘I think you’ve been watching too many episodes of Spooks , Dr Blessing. Robbie Bishop is a footballer, not a KGB defector.’

Elinor stared at the floor. This was what she’d been afraid of. But the reason that had driven her through the door in the first place still existed. ‘I know it sounds ridiculous,’ she said. ‘But none of us has been able to come up with an alternative diagnosis that makes sense of the symptoms and the fact that the patient is not responding to any of the drug regimes we’ve tried.’ She looked up. His head was cocked to one side and although his mouth was a tight line, his eyes expressed interest in what she had to say. ‘And I’m not saying this to flatter you into taking me seriously. But if you can’t work out what is clinically wrong with Robbie Bishop, I don’t think there can be a straightforward explanation in terms of a viral or bacterial illness. Which only leaves poison. And the only poison that makes sense is ricin.’

Denby jumped to his feet. ‘This is crazy. Terrorists use ricin. Spies use ricin. How the hell does a premiership footballer get ricin into his system?’

‘With respect, I think that’s somebody else’s problem,’ Elinor said.

Denby rubbed the palms of his hands over his face. She had never seen him flustered, never mind this agitated. ‘First things first. We need to check whether or not you’re right.’ He looked expectantly at her.

‘You can do an ELISA test for ricin. But even if they’ve got the right antigen in stock and they fast-track it, we still won’t get the results of a sandwich ELISA till tomorrow.’

He took a deep breath and visibly pulled himself together. ‘Set the wheels in motion. Take the bloods yourself, take them straight to the lab. I’ll call ahead, make sure they know what’s coming down the line. We can start treatment –’ He stopped dead, his mouth hanging open. ‘Oh fuck.’ He squeezed his eyes shut momentarily. ‘There is no bloody treatment, is there?’

Elinor shook her head. ‘No. If I’m right, Robbie Bishop’s a condemned man.’

Denby slumped back into his chair. ‘Yes. Well, I don’t think we need to share this possibility with anyone just yet. Not until we know for sure. Don’t tell anyone else what you suspect.’

‘But …’ Elinor frowned.

‘But what?’

‘Shouldn’t we tell the police?’

‘The police? You were the one who said it was someone else’s problem, determining how the ricin got into his system. We can’t call the police in on a hunch.’

‘But he’s still having lucid spells. He can still communicate. If we wait till tomorrow, he could have lapsed into a coma and he won’t be able to tell anyone how this happened. If it happened,’ she added, seeing the ominous expression on Denby’s face.

‘And if you’re wrong? If it turns out to be something quite other? This department will have lost all credibility within the hospital and the wider community. Let’s face it, Dr Blessing, two minutes after we call the police in, the media will be screaming from the rooftops. I’m not prepared to put my reputation and that of my team on the line like that. I’m sorry. We don’t tell anyone – not another living soul – until we get the ELISA results and we know for certain. Are you clear on that?’

Elinor sighed. ‘I’m clear.’ Then her face brightened. ‘What if I was to ask him? When we’re alone?’

Denby shook his head. ‘Absolutely not,’ he said firmly. ‘I will not have you interrogate a patient like that.’

‘It’s kind of like taking a history.’

‘It’s nothing like taking a history. It’s playing at Miss bloody Marple. Now please, let’s not waste any more time. Get started on the ELISA protocol.’ He managed a faint bloodless smile. ‘Good thinking, Doctor Blessing. Let’s just hope for once you’re wrong. Apart from anything else, Bradfield Victoria have no chance of making it into Europe next season without Robbie Bishop.’ Elinor’s face must have revealed her shock for he rolled his eyes and said, ‘I’m joking, for Christ’s sake. I’m as worried about this as you are.’

Somehow, Elinor doubted that.

Tony started awake, eyes wide, mouth stretched back in a silent scream. The power of morphine dreams to recreate the gleam of the axe, the battle cry of his attacker, the smell of sweat and the taste of blood was terrifying. His breathing was fast and shallow and he could feel sweat curdling on his top lip. Only a dream . He deliberately controlled his breathing and gradually the panic subsided.

Once he’d calmed down, he tried to raise his wounded leg from the hip. He clenched his hands into tight fists, the nails biting into his palms. The veins on his neck corded up as he strained to move a limb that seemed to have been transmuted into lead. The futile seconds stretched out, then with a grunt of frustration, he gave up. It felt as if he’d never move his left leg again.