come up with something. Like fucking her to death. That would be natural. And this Piper guy had a hard-on for old women. Could be there was something there.
In the emergency theatre at the Roosevelt Hospital doctors and surgeons struggled to save Piper's life. The fact that appearances led them to suppose he had bled to death from a head wound while his symptoms were those of suffocation made their task more complicated than it might otherwise have been. The hysterical nurse was no help at all.
'He said he was a bleeder,' she told the chief surgeon who could see that already, 'he said he had to have a transfusion. I didn't want to do it and he said he didn't want one and she told him not to and he got at the blood bank and then he passed out and then they put him on resuscitation and '
'Put her on sedation,' shouted the surgeon as the nurse was dragged out still screaming. On the operating table Piper was bald. In a desperate attempt to find the site of the wound his hair had been clipped.
'So where the fuck's the haemorrhage?' said the surgeon, shining a light down Piper's left ear in the hope of finding some source for this terrible loss of blood. By the time Piper revived they were none the wiser. The scratch on his hand had been cleansed and covered with a Band-Aid and through a needle in his right wrist he was getting the transfusion he had dreaded. Finally they cut off the supply and Piper got off the table.
'You've had a lucky escape,' said the surgeon. 'I don't know what you're suffering from but you want to take it easy for a while. Maybe the Mayo could come up with an answer. We sure as hell can't.'
Piper wobbled out into the corridor bald as a coot. Sonia burst into tears.
'Oh my God what have they done to you, my darling?' she wailed. MacMordie studied Piper's bald head thoughtfully.
'That doesn't look so good,' he said finally and went into the theatre. 'We've got ourselves a problem,' he told the surgeon.
'No need to tell me. Diagnostically I wouldn't know.'
'Yeah,' said MacMordie, 'it's like that. Now what he needs is bandages round his head. I mean he's famous and there's all those TV guys out there and he's going to come out looking like Kojak and he's an author. That isn't going to improve his image.'
'His image is your problem,' said the surgeon, 'mine just happens to be his illness.'
'You cut his hair all off,' said MacMordie. 'Now how about a whole heap of bandages? Like right across his face and all. This guy needs his anonymity till his hair grows back.'
'No way,' said the surgeon, true to his medical principles.
'A thousand dollars,' said MacMordie and went to fetch Piper. He came reluctantly and clutching Sonia's arm pathetically. By the time he emerged and went outside with Sonia on one side and a nurse on the other only two frightened eyes and his nostrils were visible.
'Mr Piper has nothing to say,' said MacMordie quite unnecessarily. Several million viewers could see that. Piper's bandaged face had no mouth. For them he could have been the invisible man. The cameras zoomed in for close-ups and MacMordie spoke.
'Mr Piper has authorized me to say that he had no idea his great novel Pause O Men for the Virgin would arouse the degree of public controversy that has marked the start of his lecture tour of this country...'
'His what?' demanded a reporter.
'Mr Piper is Britain's greatest novelist. His novel Pause O Men for the Virgin published by Hutchmeyer Press and available at seven dollars ninety '
'You mean his novel caused all this?' said an interviewer.
MacMordie nodded. 'Pause O Men for the Virgin is the most controversial novel of this century. Read it and see what has caused this terrible sacrifice on Mr Piper's part...'
Beside him Piper swayed groggily and had to be helped down the steps to the waiting car.
