Donor by Ken McClure

friends!’
    ‘Apart from that, their friends will be pretending there’s nothing wrong with them anyway!’ said Dunbar with an extravagant shrug that made Ingrid smile.
    ‘Dr Ross mentioned an NHS patient getting plastic surgery here tomorrow?’ he went on.
    ‘That’s right,’ replied Ingrid. ‘It’s a face reconstruction, a young girl. She was born with a protruding jaw that disfigured her whole appearance. The surgeons are going to fix it so that she can lead a normal life.’
    ‘I take it the hospital has put out a press release?’
    ‘Oh yes,’ replied Ingrid. ‘I’m told the results will be quite dramatic, so the before and after pictures should be spectacular.’
    Dunbar nodded. ‘Especially as there’s no scarring with that particular operation. They do all the cutting from inside the mouth, even removing portions of jawbone from either side. It should be very good publicity for the hospital.’
    Ingrid said quietly, ‘I don’t think that’s the only reason the surgeons are doing it.’
    ‘Of course not,’ he conceded. ‘I’m sorry if I sounded cynical. The hospital needs as much good publicity as it can get.’
    ‘You seemed very interested in Dr Ross’s unit this morning. Is transplant technology a particular interest of yours?’
    ‘Not really,’ he said, immediately on his guard.
    ‘You seemed very interested in the logistics of transplants and what happened to the donor organs when they arrived,’ she persisted.
    Alarm bells rang in Dunbar’s head. If Ingrid thought that, the chances were that Ross and Hatfull must have thought the same. Damn it! Had he overplayed his hand on his very first day? ‘I was just curious,’ he lied.

SIX
     
     
    Dunbar spent the afternoon looking through the computerized staff and accounting files provided by Leo Giordano’s office. He found it all extremely boring but felt obliged to identify some questions to ask in the next few days, in order to make his role in the hospital seem genuine. As for the real purpose of his visit, he was just looking and learning. So far, everything about the hospital, and the transplant unit in particular, seemed impressive. Its record in terms of successful transplants was second to none, it was staffed by people of the highest calibre, the equipment was state-of-the-art, it was led by one of the finest transplant surgeons in the country, if not the world, and the unit was not under pressure – the usual cause of things going wrong in a hospital. If first impressions were anything to go by, Ross’s unit was the last place on earth he was going to find evidence of mix-ups or sloppiness.
    The thing that still bothered him, of course, was the same thing that had bothered the Sci-Med computer, the fact that the same allegation had been made not once but twice, by two trained nurses, who didn’t know each other. At least, he had assumed they didn’t know each other. Was it possible that they did? He took the Sci-Med personnel files from his briefcase and checked the dates. Sheila Barnes had left Médic Ecosse almost two years before Lisa Fairfax started work there.
    He would have to talk to them, he decided. If he ruled out sloppiness or bad management as possibilities, he would have to consider alternative explanations for the women’s allegations. Those would include malice and hysteria. He would have a word with Staff Nurse Fairfax first, find out what made her tick. You could usually tell more from a two-minute conversation with someone than from reading a fifty-page personnel file.
    Sci-Med had supplied Lisa Fairfax’s address and telephone number. He picked up the phone and then thought again. He stared at the receiver for a moment, wondering if the hospital operated a call-logging system. He wouldn’t like anyone to know he was calling a dismissed member of staff, particularly as Ingrid had noted his interest in how donor organs were handled when they arrived. Any suspicion that the authorities were giving