‘That is untrue and unjust.’
‘Oh, really? Well, I’ll try to believe that. But in just a couple of hours Kit could be receiving the best surgery available. Why should you deny him that?’
‘I don’t accept it will necessarily be the best. It’s available, yes, wonderfully available, but why the best? The finest surgeons in the land work for the NHS –’
‘Could I just remind you,’ said Ned, mild still, but with an underlying threat in his voice, ‘that those surgeons include me? For many, many hours a week. At a very fine teaching hospital. Whose theatres and support staff just happen not to be available to me this afternoon. And who, should I turn up there now, with a request to use their facilities for Kit, would almost certainly turn me away.’
Tom was silent for a moment, then he said to Alice, ‘If you go ahead with this, totally against my wishes, then clearly there’s nothing I can do to stop you. I would hope you would see how unhappy that makes me, and that it would trouble you. Please, Alice, please, for my sake consider that at least. And could I remind you that – that –’ He paused, clearly struggling with a mass of painful emotions. ‘When Laura died, and I asked you if it still would have happened, if her care would have been what some would call better, had she been under Jillie’s uncle at St Thomas’, you and she both assured me she would not. Surely that must mean something to you.’
They faced one another across the room, gladiators in a life-and-death struggle: Jillie watched them, half fascinated, half fearful. And then Alice spoke, her eyes brilliant, her voice low with rage and fear, but quite strong.
‘Tom, we lied,’ she said.
‘I think,’ Jillie had said, after Alice had made her poisonous confession, ‘I think I’ll wait outside.’
‘I’ll come with you,’ said Ned. ‘In any case, I have other patients to see. Please tell Jennifer when you have come to a decision, Alice – and can I just remind you that time is passing and Kit is in danger. Whatever you decide.’
‘But I thought – I thought you said you could save him?’ Alice’s voice was thick with fear.
‘Alice, Jillie was right, there are no certainties in medicine. You know that, of course you do. He is a very sick little boy and it’s a difficult operation. Of course I can’t guarantee anything although I do feel confident. But I do repeat, time is of the essence. You must make your minds up very soon, if he is to have the best possible chance.’
‘My mind is made up, obviously,’ said Alice, giving Tom a look of such implacable hatred that Jillie winced. ‘And since that is sufficient for Ned to go ahead, there is no need for any delay.’
‘And the form?’
‘I’ll sign the form,’ said Tom, very quietly.
Chapter 57
The operation was delicate, and took longer than anyone had expected. To Alice, waiting in the parents’ room, and to Tom, banished to the general reception area two floors below, the afternoon seemed endless and terrifying.
Once Tom ventured upstairs: ‘I was afraid I would miss Ned if I was down there, when he had finished, you know.’
‘I’ll see you are informed, of course,’ said Alice.
‘Alice – Alice, please will you let me just try and explain—’
‘You couldn’t,’ she said.
‘But—’
‘Tom, please, just go away. I shall never forgive you as long as I live. I think the best thing you can do is go back to Purbridge. You’ve got really important things to do there.’
He left; she went back to her chair and sat hugging a cushion. How had she let this happen? How could she have put Kit’s life in danger, accepting what the GP said, not taking him somewhere she trusted immediately? Was she mad? Or just feeble? She thought of Kit as she had last seen him, dressed in his tiny hospital gown, lying like a doll on the trolley as they wheeled him down to theatre. He had been so brave, hadn’t cried or made a fuss, just lain there, his fair hair neatly combed back; only his blue eyes, wide with apprehension, to hint at what he must be going through.
As they stood in the lift, a little hand came from under the blanket groping for his mother’s; Alice took it, kissed it, tears blinding her.
Silence; then a sudden wail: ‘Teddy. Want teddy.’
‘Darling, I can’t—’
‘Teddeee.’ The small face crumpled, the chest heaved with the beginning of a sob: losing Teddy was breaking Kit, as the pain and the fear had not.
‘Kit –’
‘It’s all right, Mrs Knelston,’ said the nurse who was accompanying them to theatre. ‘You can go and get his teddy. We’ll wait. Mr Welles likes the children to have anything they want at this stage, to feel as comfortable and happy as possible.’
What an amazing man he was, Alice thought, running upstairs and searching frantically for Teddy, finding him finally under the cot where Kit would sleep. No wonder Jillie had loved him so much.
Reunited with Teddy, Kit smiled a seraphic smile.
‘Teddy brave,’ he announced.
‘Teddy is very brave.’
‘Stay now, Mummy.’
‘I will.’
And stay she did, holding Kit’s hand up to the moment when he lost consciousness, lying limp and still, even Teddy no longer required.
And Alice, terrified beyond anything, went to the parents’ room and sat there, willing Kit to be strong, strong enough for his small body to withstand all that was required of it.
She looked out of the window, thinking about Kit, the astonishment and wonder of her first sight of him, his first smile, his first laugh – a slightly hoarse, deep chuckle, nothing like his light dancing voice – his first steps – tottering determinedly across the sitting room from one chair to the next, a long and perilous journey for his sturdy little legs. Kit lying sweetly and peacefully asleep in his pram in the garden, under the apple tree. He always smiled in his sleep; as if to show that his dreams, like his life, were sweet and happy. Please God, it would continue and safely, that short, precious, happy little life. That short, fragile little life.
A clearly exhausted Ned came smiling into the room two hours later, assuring her that all was well. ‘The bowel hadn’t necrosed. He’s still unconscious and quite poorly, but absolutely not in danger. Although – another twelve hours even, and it could have been a very different story.’
‘Can I see him?’ said Alice, tears of relief streaming down her face.
‘Not yet. But when he comes round he’ll need you to be with him. In this hospital, mothers are welcome to stay with their children round the clock.’
‘That’s amazing,’ said Alice. ‘Thank you.’
‘Now I must get back to theatre. I’ve several more operations to do yet, one almost as difficult as that one. Kit will be in his room in an hour or so.’
‘Oh, Ned,’ said Alice, ‘how can I ever thank you?’