Survival of Thomas Ford, The (6 page)

Thomas Ford woke up suddenly, surprised that he had been asleep. He looked to his right and saw the face of Dr Radthammon, who was sitting in the chair by the bed.

“Hello again, Mr Ford. Well, I have good news for you. There is nothing organically wrong with your thoracic area. Your heart and lungs are in admirable condition. Therefore, and very understandably Mr Ford, given your personal circumstances, I am sure that the pains you experienced were phantom in nature. Pains of the mind, as it were. How do you feel just now?”

Thomas swallowed.

“Alright I think.”

“No pain?”

Thomas shook his head.

“No.”

“Good, good. Well, Mr Ford, your friend, Mr Johnson, is still here. He is waiting to drive you home, for the second time today!”

Dr Radthammon laughed. He wanted to get away quickly from ITU, to go to have a look at the house site. Radthammon wanted to see whether McCallum was personally on site, or was he leaving all the responsibility to his foreman. Radthammon looked at his Rolex Yachtmaster watch.

“Now, Mr Ford, just before I go, I have contacted a colleague, Dr Nissen. I would like you to see Dr Nissen in a few days, especially if you have any recurrence of these pains. Alright? Good day Mr Ford! The nurse will give you Dr Nissen’s contact details.”

Dr Radthammon jogged away from Thomas Ford’s bed.

Five floors above Thomas and the Intensive Therapy Unit, Jimmy woke slowly to find himself in a bed with thin, starched white sheets. He had never woken so slowly in his life. There was something very wrong. All the wild cells in Jimmy’s body were screaming out. This was capture of some kind, his instinct knew it. Jimmy tried to blink, but his eyes were gummed up. He couldn’t open the right eye.

“Christ eh?” he shouted. “Eh? Christ! Who the
fuck!
”

Jimmy coughed, sniffed. He heard the clipping of a woman’s short heels on a hard floor.

“Now just stay calm, Mr McCallum!” he heard a female voice say.

Jimmy moved to get up. His arms and thighs were strapped tight to the bed.

“Whooooaaa! Hey to
fuck!
” Jimmy screamed. “Do you cunts know who I
am
?”

A large, round, girl’s face appeared above him.

“Calm down, Mr McCallum! Now, you were acting like this in A&E and you had to be sedated. Do you remember that, Mr McCallum? Do you understand what I’m saying Mr McCallum?”

Jimmy raised his head as far as he could. His neck flexed and strained. Veins bulged above his eyebrows and all the way up to his thick black hair. Black bird eyes blazed beneath the hospital’s fluorescent lighting.

“
Woo woo woo!”
he said. “You’d better untie me. I’m just telling you a fact. You’d best untie me right now. If you’re no going to untie me you better kill me eh? Just don’t ever let me up off this bed unless you do it right now eh? Make sure you can keep me down here forever eh? Otherwise make sure you’re no on planet Earth when I do ever get up eh? Understand?”

Jimmy said the last words very quietly. Some of them went into the young girl’s brain. She retreated from the bed and went to get Dr Nissen.

Jimmy’s dad, Jack McCallum, was in the double garage at the side of his house, in the Subaru, in the back seat, where Jimmy’s mum, Cathy, would never come to look for him. He was masturbating and looking at the crumpled colour photograph of Farrah Fawcett Majors that he had kept loyally in his wallet for the past thirty-one years. He breathed out steadily, watching her blue eyes and the flick of her famous hair.

The phone went.

“Fuck,” said Jack.

He kept stroking, but the phone kept ringing.

Eventually he sighed and took the call.

“Hello.”

“Dad! Fuck’s sake eh! They’ve got me up at the hospital man. They’ve drugged me! I’m tied in a bed. There’s a nurse holding the phone for me eh!”

“Jimmy?”

“Aye! Dad! Going to talk to them eh, get me out of here!”

Jack heard shuffling sounds and deduced that the phone was being taken by someone new.

A deep voice came on the line.

“Hello. Mr McCallum?”

Jack placed the photo of Farrah face down on the top edge of the driver’s seat in front of himself.

“Yes. Who is this?”

“I’m Dr Nissen, Mr McCallum. I’m afraid your son was admitted to the psychiatric ward here this afternoon, after having some kind of episode. The situation is, Mr McCallum, that I would very much like to keep him here for evaluation and observation. I have to be honest with you and let you know that I am currently in the process of obtaining a second signature from the doctor in A&E who was very disturbed by your son’s behaviour, so that we can hold him under the terms of the Mental Health Act
Scotland
.”

Jack heard Jimmy’s voice in the background.

Jack rolled his eyes to the beige roof of the four-by-four. He noticed a greasy spot there and wondered what had caused it. He reached up with his finger and shoved at the area but it was dry.

“Dr Nissen, did you say? Well, Dr Nissen, do you mind if I call back in ten minutes? Sorry, but I have to take care of some business. Please delay your plans until I call you back in ten minutes, alright Dr Nissen? Thank you.”

Jack terminated the call without waiting for the doctor’s reply.

He sniffed and reached for the photo of Farrah. He looked at her blue eyes again, longingly. He leaned forward, his gut getting in the way as he tried to reach the dashboard. He pulsed his weight forward twice, then gripped his wallet, put the photo away safe.

Jack entered the house by the door from the garage, walked through the hall, turned right into his study/office.

On the desk, he grabbed the array of contact cards in their plastic green case.

He flipped through, looking for R.

When he saw Radthammon’s address and number, he dialled.

The phone rang four times then Dr Radthammon answered.

“It’s McCallum here. Listen…”

“No, Mr McCallum, you listen! Do you know where I am? This is a great coincidence sir, because I am at the site of my house you are building for me. But you, sir, you are not here evidently. You are never here when I come, are you Mr McCallum?”

Jack sighed.

“Don’t worry about the build, Doctor. It’s perfectly under control. My foreman, Lanski, has it fully in hand, and I’m there very regularly, I assure you.”

“Well…”

“Anyway, Dr Radthammon, I called because I need you to do me a favour, at the hospital.”

“The hospital?”

“Yes. There’s been some sort of scene there with my boy, Jimmy. Do you know a Dr Nissen?”

“Yes. He is a psychiatrist.”

“Well, Dr Radthammon, that silly wee bugger Jimmy must have gotten up to something there today. I just had a call from Nissen and he is all set on getting Jimmy Sectioned right now. I told him I’d call back in ten minutes. He said he won’t proceed until then.”

“Well, Mr McCallum, I cannot interfere with the clinical findings of a man like Dr Nissen. In fact…”

“Radthammon, I’m going to build you a good house. You’ll be able to rely on the work being done well and on schedule.”

“I appreciate that, Mr McCallum.”

“No, I don’t think you do, Dr Radthammon. I’ve got your deposit. My boys have laid the foundations for a fine house. I know what you earn and what the plot already cost you, doctor. Even on your salary, I know you’re stretched now. You can’t afford any big problems with this house, Dr Radthammon.”

“Mr McCallum, are you threatening me?”

Jack didn’t answer. He let the silence build up on the line. When the doctor spoke again, it was in a new tone.

“McCallum, in my country Radthammon is a name to be feared. My family are not spoken to in this way, not anywhere, not by anyone. I will take you to Court for my deposit and I will transfer the work to another building firm by noon on Friday of this week. Good-day…”

Jack licked his lips.

“Radthammon, you don’t understand the position you’re in. You don’t know who I am and you don’t know how this city works. I can have you blacklisted in this city. No builder, no labourer, no architect will touch your house. Now, get my boy home for his supper, before his mum knows where he’s been, or I’ll have those Poles pour fucking battery acid, toxic waste, atomic fuel rod leftovers, oil, piss, paraffin, all over the foundations of your beautiful house, doctor, and the land around it. Then no-one will be able to build a house there for a hundred years, Radthammon, whether your name is to be feared or not, ok doc? Cheers.”

Jack cut the call off and sat down in the big leather chair. He tapped his fingers against his forehead, rhythmically. Cathy appeared in the doorway.

“Who was that on the phone?” she said.

“That Dr Radthammon. He’s worried about his house.”

“That’s a beautiful spot he got for it, Jack. That view.”

“Aye.”

“I’m worried about Jimmy,” said Cathy.

“He’ll be alright,” said Jack.

The ten minutes had elapsed and Mr McCallum had not phoned back. Dr Nissen tilted his neck to one side. It wasn’t often that he felt such urgency about a case. He did not often make snap decisions. But he had to admit, when he first encountered Jimmy, the bird-like face, the black eyes, the things the boy was shouting, only moments had passed before Dr Nissen was going through a mental list of possible colleagues to bring in for the second signature needed. Dr Nissen had lied to McCallum on the phone. Jimmy’s admitting A&E doctor had gone off duty so it was too late to use him now.

Dr Nissen sat in his small office, bit his lip, then decided on Ray Mellor. Ray was a sensitive man. He would pick up on the Satanic vibe coming off this lad right away and be happy to sign off on it.

Dr Nissen couldn’t see the bed where Jimmy was restrained, not from his chair in the office. The boy would keep there for a while longer though. He wasn’t going anywhere, and Karen had an eye on him.

Karen, the young nurse, was standing at the side of Jimmy’s bed, an expression of suppressed fascination on her face and in her eyes. Jimmy was raising his head high off the pillow now, to stare at her. He was grinning.

“Come on now eh?” he was saying, very quietly. “What’s your name? Hey, don’t worry about me, I’m cool. My girlfriend’s a cleaner in this hospital eh? Working a shift right now. We came up on the bus together. I had sore guts, that’s all, and she says I had to go to A&E. Then I wake up here! Go and ask her. Do you know her? Lorna Stewart. She says she’s cleaning the theatre today, getting ready for some big inspection you’re having here.”

“Lorna the cleaner?”

“Aye. Young lassie like you. Bonnie like you. You know her? Go and tell her what’s happened eh?”

The wide double doors of the ward slammed open. Karen looked over, startled, to see Dr Radthammon running in. He was sweating and wheezing. His eyes glared.

“Where is Dr Nissen?” he shouted at Karen.

“He’s in the office, Dr Radthammon.”

Radthammon’s eyes swivelled, almost involuntarily, toward Jimmy on the bed. Radthammon saw the same bird-like features as McCallum the builder. The same black eyes. Instead of thick white hair, there was thick black hair. Radthammon turned away and headed for Nissen’s office.

“This place is mental eh?” said Jimmy from the bed. “What’s your name?”

She looked at the black eyes.

“Karen.”

“Karen. Do you go out much in the city Karen?”

“Aye. A bit.”

She felt herself smiling.

“Going to scratch my neck, Karen? I’m awful itchy there.”

The girl sighed. She swallowed. She walked to the bedside, glancing back at Nissen’s office door. Loud voices could be heard from the office, muffled emissions, like baby elephants senselessly trumpeting. Karen felt herself blush as she reached toward Jimmy’s neck. At the last moment she looked up at the hungry black eyes and pulled her hand back.

“How about going out tomorrow night eh Karen? You off then?”

“No, I’m working tomorrow night.”

“Night after then?”

“I’m working then too.”

“Just one wee scratch eh Karen?”

She reached toward his neck again. Before her hand could touch his skin he darted forward with his head and enveloped her index finger in his mouth, the whole finger. He sucked like a greedy calf. She pulled her finger away and stepped back from the bed. Jimmy grinned at her.

Dr Nissen’s office door opened. Dr Nissen and Dr Radthammon walked jerkily across the hard floor, their expensive shoe heels clipping.

“We’re very sorry about this misunderstanding, Mr McCallum. We’ll arrange for a taxi to take you home right away. Karen, please undo Mr McCallum’s restraints,” said Nissen.

Karen looked strangely at the doctors. Both their faces were red, their eyes bloodshot. Karen had never seen them like that. She turned towards Jimmy. He was grinning hard now, at all of them.

“Doctors eh?” said Jimmy. “You’ll be educated men eh? I’m an educated man too, like, self-educated, at the library and on the internet and BBC4 and that. An autodidact, in the Scottish tradition eh? But my old man wouldn’t let me stay on at school like. He wanted me on the building sites.”

Jimmy stared at Dr Radthammon.

“Aye aye, Dr Radthammon, how’s your house coming on? I was there yesterday, man, carrying bricks for you, helping those Poles!”

Dr Nissen stared at Dr Radthammon sharply. Karen was undoing the strap on Jimmy’s left ankle.

“Oh, Karen, give a wee scratch there eh? I think I’m getting some skin condition or something, itchy everywhere. Funny thing though, my guts feel better. Hey docs, what do you think of all that physics eh? Atoms and particles eh? Hey, what do you think about those quarks? Those up and down quarks, and charm quarks? It’s great eh? Fucking chaos eh? Man, I should have stayed in school. Karen! No go on, a wee scratch eh?”

When Jimmy and Dr Radthammon were gone from his ward, Dr Nissen walked into his small office, sat in his chair, and held his head in his hands. There was a strange feeling in him. It took him fifteen minutes to recognise it from the summer holiday the year before, with Anna, to
Florida
. They’d chartered a boat and gone out into the deep fishing waters. It had all gone well until Dr Nissen got something heavy on the line. After what seemed hours, with raw hands despite the hide gloves, Dr Nissen had eventually pulled a long silver-finned shark half out of the water. The boat’s captain had come running over and cut the line. He had explained to Dr Nissen and Anna that the law protected this rare shark in those waters, even though the shark could be a decimation machine, consuming and disturbing the rest of the fish population there. But the law was the law.