Gauloises cigarettes, rank and stinking in the confined room. David's
eyes felt raw and gravelly for he slept little during the night, and the
smoke irritated them. He kept looking at his watch, and imagining what
was happening to Debra during these last minutes, the undignified
purging and cleansing of her body, the robin& and the needles of
sedation and antisepsis.
The slow drag of minutes ended at last when the screen began to glow and
hum, the image shimmered and strobed then settled down into a high view
of the theatre. The set was in colour, and the green theatre gowns of
the figures moving around the operating-table blended with the subdued
theatre green walls. Height had foreshortened the robed members of the
operating team and the muttered and disjointed conversation between the
surgeon and his anaesthetist was picked up by the microphones.
Are we ready there yet, Mike? David felt the sick sensation in the pit
of his stomach, and he wished he had eaten breakfast. It might have
filled the hollow place below his ribs.
Right, the surgeon's voice sharpened as he turned towards the
microphone. Are we on telly? l Yes, doctor, the theatre sister
answered him, and there was a note of resignation in the surgeon's
voice, as he spoke for his unseen audience.
Very well, then. The patient is a twenty-six-year-old female. The
symptoms are total loss of sight in both eyes, and the cause is
suspected damage or constriction of the optic nerve in or near the optic
chiasma. This is a surgical investigation of the site. The surgeon is
Dr. William Cooper, assisted by Dr. Reuben Friedman. As he spoke, the
camera moved in on the table and with a start of surprise David realized
that he had been looking at Debra without knowing it. Her face and the
lower part of her head were obscurred by the sterile drapes that covered
all but the shaven round ball of her skull. It was inhuman-looking,
egglike, painted with Savlon antiseptic that glistened in the bright,
overhead lights.
Scalpel please, sister. David leaned forward tensely in his seat, and
his hands tightened on the armrests, so the knuckles turned white, as
Cooper made the first incision drawing the blade across the smooth skin.
The flesh opened and immediately the tiny blood vessels began to dribble
and spurt. Hands moved in the screen of the television, clad in rubber
so that they were yellow and impersonal, but quick and sure.
An oval flap of skin and flesh was dissected free and was drawn back,
exposing the gleaming bone beneath, and again David's flesh crawled as
though with living things, as the surgeon took up a drill that resembled
exactly a carpenter's brace and bit. His voice continued its impersonal
commentary, as he began to drill through the skull, cranking away at the
handle as the gleaming steel bit swiftly through the bone. He pierced
the skull with four round drill holes, each set at the corners of a
square. Peri-osteal elevator, please, sister. Again David's stomach
clenched as the surgeon slid the gleaming steel introducer into one of
the drill holes and manoeuvred it gently until its tip reappeared
through the next hole in line. Using the introducer, a length of sharp
steel wire saw was threaded through the two holes and lay along the
