‘You’re fine, Alex. You’re not going to need the collar. I’m going to raise you up a little and then get you that cup of tea.’ She looked at Fiona. ‘A couple of co-codamol wouldn’t do any harm.’
There was no doubt about it, Caroline Cowan was a master at keeping calm in a crisis, the pace and tone of her actions and voice just right for keeping hysteria at bay. She was giving Alex time to adjust to her situation, normalising everything as much as possible so that she would be better able to face the unpleasantness to come. Alex had always admired her, and never more so than now. She was making sure Alex was ready.
As the cubicle emptied of the other helpers, Caroline washed her hands at the sink. A spray of water splashed her green tunic and trousers, and she made light of it as she laughed and pulled paper towels from the dispenser on the wall. Even now, her small laugh was letting Alex know she was behaving naturally. It would be one step at a time. No rush. She was safe, and no one was going to get past Caroline.
‘So, sweetie, any questions?’
Alex bit hard on her bottom lip to stem the flood of tears waiting to fall. Afterwards, she promised herself. She would cry afterwards in the arms of Patrick and no one else.
‘The police. Have you called the police yet? They need to block all exits. And all theatres need to be checked first. I want the whole works: HIV check, syphilis, gonorrhoea, pregnancy – the lot. I don’t care if it takes all night. I need to know what he’s done to me.’
The reassuring expression had gone from Caroline’s face, replaced by a concerned frown.
‘Alex, what are you saying? Why do I need to call the police?’
A thumping sensation started beneath Alex’s breastbone. Her breathing came faster and louder, and her shaking limbs caused the sheet to slide off her.
Her voice, she later learned, was heard throughout the entire ward. Above all the other noises – the cries of pain and confusion and fear, the clatter of trolleys carrying treatments to the cubicles, the twenty-odd monitors beeping loudly at different times. Her voice, her words, carried over all of it.
‘Because he raped me.’
Chapter three
A rape case presented in the emergency department has a level of privacy all of its own. A protocol of silence and dignity wraps itself around the situation. The attending nurse, the doctor and the police go about their business without any other person in the department being aware of what has taken place.
In the case of Alex Taylor, there was not a person in the department that night who didn’t know what had happened, or who hadn’t heard what was alleged to have happened. Even before the examination was over there was speculation about what had really happened. The favoured opinion was that she had suffered a head injury; confusion and concussion perhaps.
In the examination room, the forensic medical examiner and the female detective constable didn’t disbelieve the distraught woman, or the rape, but they found it more than difficult to believe the rest of what she said. Only Maggie Fielding stayed neutral and objective, keeping to her professional duty of care as she completed the examination and listened to Alex Taylor’s lengthy story. She immediately answered every question put to her by Alex.
‘The coil’s in place, Alex. There’s no sign of it having been moved. I can see the strings, everything looks normal.’
Maggie Fielding waited for Alex’s next comment. She kept eye contact and seemed in no hurry. Maggie was a striking woman, tall, strong limbed and slim. She had magnificent chocolate-coloured hair that reached her waist when it was down.
The forensic medical examiner, who was also a GP, a New Zealander named Tom Collins, wore a permanent look of sympathy. He’d stepped out of the room while the examination took place.
Raising her bottom for the paper towel to be placed underneath, Alex’s pubic hair was combed for evidence. Then the towel, the comb and the hair were dropped in an evidence bag, sealed, signed, dated and handed to the police officer. Her fingernails were clipped and scraped into a separate bag. Hairs were taken from her head. She spat into a sputum pot, and internal swabs from her mouth, anus and vagina were obtained, and blood was drawn. Alex watched as Maggie rubbed a swab on a glass slide, knowing that it would be examined for sperm. Finally, every inch of her was examined for injury. Bruising. Tearing. Bites or teeth marks that could identify her attacker.
Maggie Fielding stepped away and Tom Collins was called back in. Only a few weeks ago, Alex had stood in the same spot as Maggie, beside the same man as he drew blood from a woman who had been attacked by her boyfriend. They had then shared the same status – both professionals, both doing their duty as they documented and photographed the multiple bruises. This time, as far as he was concerned, she was a victim and he was the professional doing his job and trying his hardest to hide the fact that he knew her personally.
‘Do you think we could go through this one more time?’ the female officer asked.
She had quietly identified herself as Laura Best and told Alex she was sorry this had happened and that it wasn’t necessary to address her formally, Laura would do. Except that now Laura didn’t look quite so sympathetic. Her freckled face was less open. She looked a bit impatient. All four of them had been in the private exam room for more than an hour, and the heat and stale air was closing in on them.
Laura flicked back several pages of her notebook and began reading. ‘You remember walking through the car park, feeling a blow on the back of your neck and then a gag at your mouth and possibly a smell of gas. You then woke up in an operating theatre, found yourself strapped down, your legs up in stirrups, and a pretend surgeon present.’
‘I don’t know if he was a pretend surgeon,’ Alex angrily snapped. ‘I said he was dressed as a surgeon.’
Laura briefly pursed her lips before continuing. ‘He then threatened to staple your lips together, showed you a tray of instruments, and said he’d removed your coil while he catheterised you and then went on to tell you he was going to do an operation on you, a vulvec— ’ She struggled to say the word.
‘A vulvectomy,’ Alex answered impatiently. ‘Yes and yes and yes to all of it.’
‘He then asked you a question, which made you think that he intended to rape you. After which you say he anaesthetised you.’
‘Yes.’
‘The next memory you have is of waking here in your own department.’
‘Yes.’
‘And you can’t describe him or recognise his voice.’
‘No. I told you the theatre lights were blinding me. I saw a surgical mask and I could see he was wearing a surgical gown. But his voice .?.?. it was like he spoke through a speaker system, like he wasn’t beside me. English, but then he also sounded a bit American.’
‘So this English and American doctor did all this to you? Hmm .?.?. forgive me, Dr Taylor, if I sound dense or perhaps insensitive, but you left here at 9.30 p.m. and you were found in the car park at 1.30 a.m.’