‘Brilliant man,’ said Trool.
Gordon locked up the car again and walked back to the hospital with Trool where they met up with Thomas in a small dining room on the same floor as Trool’s office. There were perhaps eight tables, each seating four people and spaced at a discreet distance from each other. Gordon counted ten people in the room; their clothes and confident manner suggested consultant medical staff.
Trool led the way over to a table by the window where a small man with a swept-back mane of white hair rose to meet them.
‘Carwyn, I’d like you to meet Tom Gordon, one of our local GPs. Tom, may I present Professor Carwyn Thomas, director of the IVF unit here at Caernarvon General.’
Gordon shook hands with Thomas, noting that he’d become ‘Tom’ on the way up from the car park. ‘A great pleasure, Professor, he said, ‘I’m familiar with your work of course. In fact, I’ve referred patients to you in the past.’
‘With some success I hope,’ smiled Thomas.
Gordon thought it prudent not to mention the Palmers at that particular moment.
‘Where about are you a GP?’ asked Thomas.
‘Felinbach and surrounding area.’
Thomas nodded. ‘It can’t be easy being a GP at a time when medicine is advancing on all fronts; there must be so much for you to keep up with?’
‘A constant struggle,’ agreed Gordon who joked, ‘I’m never short of bedtime reading.’
Gordon found the food passable and the conversation agreeable, if a little strained. He thought he detected a slight atmosphere between Trool and Thomas but wasn’t sure. Their politeness to each other seemed to suggest a lack of warmth. He got the impression that the conversation was being deliberately steered to topics outside the hospital and medicine in a search for neutral ground. They ended up discussing the relative merits of the home nations rugby teams in the current international season. As Trool was English, they already had three of the nations at the table.
Half way through the main course, Trool’s phone went off and he had to excuse himself from the table. Before he left, he apologised profusely to Gordon about having to go and said again how grateful he was for the understanding he had shown. He would be in touch soon.
‘That man lives on his nerves,’ said Thomas as Trool left.
‘He seems to care a great deal about the hospital. I suppose it must be a pretty stressful job,’ said Gordon.
‘Try “marriage”,’ said Thomas. ‘He should have listened to what Chaucer said about January and June.’ He didn’t volunteer any more and Gordon thought it impolite to ask.
As he finished his coffee, Gordon was pleased when Thomas offered to show him around the IVF unit. ‘I really feel we should interact more with our colleagues outside the hospital,’ said Thomas as they made their way through busy corridors. ‘It can only be in the patients’ interest in the long run, don’t you agree?’
The tour started in Thomas’s own office where Gordon was amused by the walls being covered with photographs of young children.
‘My other family,’ said Thomas proudly. ‘These are all children who resulted from their parents receiving treatment here.’
‘Wonderful,’ said Gordon, full of admiration. ‘Not many doctors can point to such tangible proof of their impact on people’s lives.’
‘I get Christmas cards from nearly all of them,’ said Thomas.
‘Is this where you meet patients for the first time?’ asked Gordon.
Thomas replied that it was. ‘I think it puts them at their ease. Breaks the ice, so to speak. You know I’m still constantly surprised at the strength of feeling involved in wanting to become parents. It’s such a powerful force and they are very vulnerable people. We constantly have to be on our guard about offering false hope.’
‘I know what you mean,’ said Gordon, thinking of the Palmers and their long quest to become parents.
There was something about the way he said it that Thomas caught on to. ‘You said you’d referred patients to me in the past?’ he said.
‘John and Lucy Palmer were my patients,’ said Gordon.
‘Oh, I see,’ said Thomas thoughtfully. ‘Felinbach and surrounding area, I should have realised. Such a sad case, an absolute tragedy and at a time when I felt so sure they’d both come to terms with their baby’s problems and were doing so well.’
‘They had and they were,’ said Gordon firmly.
‘How can you say that after what happened?’ asked Thomas, looking puzzled.
‘I think John Palmer admitted to the crime because he mistakenly thought that Lucy might have done it after having some kind of relapse. If you remember, she suffered quite badly from post-natal depression?’
‘I do. Have you mentioned this to the police?’
‘I’ve been telling anyone who will listen,’ said Gordon ruefully. ‘No one wants to know, least of all the police.’
‘But the baby was found in the Palmers’ own garden,’ said Thomas ruefully.
‘I know,’ sighed Gordon. ‘But I’m still convinced he didn’t do it.’
‘I can see that,’ said Thomas, leaning back in his chair, ‘I didn’t realise there was more to this than met the eye. It needs thinking about. In the meantime, if there’s anything I can do to help, you must let me know.’
‘I’m hoping they’ll at least let me visit John; he’s not been speaking to anyone,’ said Gordon.
Thomas nodded and said, ‘It was a blow to all of us here when their baby was born the way it was. They’d been one of our most difficult cases and we were all prepared to celebrate our success when suddenly it all went terribly wrong.’
‘Have you had many cases of babies being born with deformities?’ asked Gordon.
‘It never used to be the case,’ said Thomas. ‘Our problem in the past, apart from complete failure of course, was usually concerned with multiple births but, since we started using ICSI for the more difficult cases, we’ve had quite a few serious problems. Mercifully, most of them haven’t gone to term; they’ve spontaneously aborted. The Palmers’ baby was an exception, a badly deformed foetus that did go to term and survived post-natal surgery.’
‘ICSI is where you inject the sperm directly into the ovum, isn’t it?’ asked Gordon.
Thomas nodded. ‘That’s right. Intra-Cytoplasmic Sperm Injection, more usually called, “icksee” for obvious reasons. Our chief embryologist is quite expert at it but the technique still seems to carry quite a high risk of foetal abnormality. It’ll be interesting to hear the experience of others at next week’s symposium. Why don’t you come along?’
‘To the symposium?’ exclaimed Gordon, taken by surprise, ‘I’m a simple GP. Most of it will go over my head.’
‘There’s no such thing as a simple GP,’ said Thomas. ‘Think about it; you’d be most welcome.’
‘You know, I’d like that,’ said Gordon after a moment’s thought. ‘Maybe I will come along to a couple of talks if I can find the time. Thanks for asking.’
‘Come on, I’ll show you around the rest of the unit.
Ten
Gordon was taken on a tour of state-of-the-art lab facilities that occupied most of the east wing of the hospital on the third floor. He found that the unit also had its own surgical facilities. This was true even for women requiring Caesarean section, the theatres being equipped to handle all likely obstetric emergencies. He asked about the incidence of such problems before moving on to a long narrow room without windows and with only minimal background lighting where two very sophisticated looking microscopes sat side by side on a single long bench. A tall man wearing surgical smock and trousers sat working at one of them, his fingers deftly moving the complicated micro-manipulation apparatus attached to the microscope stage.