The Skinner's Revenge. Chris Karsten

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СКАЧАТЬ I’m glad that you’re so positive about this unfortunate incident. That you understand the risks of infection. It’s hard to believe, but I’ve had patients who have been beside themselves with rage when the bandages were removed.”

      “So I can be discharged now?”

      “Perhaps tomorrow morning. Spend tonight here, just to be on the safe side. I’m very proud of your ears – they came out beautifully. Flat against your head. Michelangelo couldn’t have done it better.”

      Pixie ears, the nurse had remarked.

      “Why Burundi?” the patient asked. “Wouldn’t Europe be better, where there’s less danger of infection? Wouldn’t your wife prefer to live in Europe instead of Africa?”

      “I’ll be going now,” Dr Lippens said. “I have a few more patients to visit before I can go home, and it’s almost ten o’clock. On a Saturday night! No time for myself. I’ll take another look tomorrow morning. If everything seems in order, I’ll sign your discharge papers. All right, Mr Lomas?”

      “He’s not married,” the nurse volunteered as soon as the doctor had left the ward.

      “Oh,” said the patient. “I don’t want to be disturbed. I want to sleep. Draw the curtains around the bed.”

      As soon as she’d left, he pulled the IV needle from his arm and put on his dressing gown, tying the cord around his bulging stomach. He searched for his shoes in the rusty metal nightstand. There, along with his clothes and shoes, were his wallet, his watch and the keys to his 4X4 bakkie and the door to the back room he was renting from the widow Demarcène. There was also a stainless-steel knife, made by J. Russell & Co. of Turner’s Falls, Massachusetts – ideal for severing tough sinews and cartilage while slaughtering animals.

      He pushed the knife into his dressing-gown pocket and slunk to the window. The sharp lights in the ward had been dimmed and the silence was almost complete except for an occasional sigh or groan from a bed in which sleeping tablets and sedatives had not yet taken effect.

      He undid the catch, pushed up the sash and felt the sultry subtropical night air on his injured face. He clambered out and pulled the window back down. With its large grounds, the clinic lay at an intersection. His window faced the car park used by the hospital staff, out of sight of the main gate and visitors’ parking lot. He waited under an acacia tree beside the wall, a motionless figure in his dressing gown. His eyes searched the dark shadows, then glanced up through the branches at the night sky, where the stars were obscured by dark clouds that had begun to gather over Lake Tanganyika.

      Someone came out through the side entrance, got into a car and drove away. He focused his attention on the cars belonging to the night staff, on the door and on the large green metal dumpsters for medical waste.

      Half an hour went by before the door – illuminated by a dim light and displaying a sign that read NO UNAUTHORISED ENTRY: HOSPITAL STAFF ONLY – opened again and Dr Lippens stepped out, his white doctor’s coat folded over his arm.

      The patient came out from under the acacia and moved towards the car that the surgeon was heading for. The doctor must have heard his footsteps because he turned.

      “Mr Lomas!” he exclaimed.

      “There was something I wanted to tell you, Doctor … ”

      “What are you doing here? You should be in bed.”

      “I wanted to tell you: I lied.”

      “What?”

      “About being back in a month’s time to have my nose and chin fixed. I’ve given it some thought: I like the sharp, crooked nose. And I like the chin. It’s a strong chin. It says something about my personality.”

      “I’m surprised. Are you sure?”

      “The only thing I don’t like is the pockmarks on my chin.”

      “Yes, that is a pity. It’s the result of the sepsis.”

      “My skin was always smooth, like a baby’s. I like smooth skin without scars. Babyface, they used to call me.”

      “Skin grafts … we can try. But we’ll discuss it tomorrow, during my last consultation before I sign your discharge forms.”

      Dr Lippens unlocked his car door and put his medical bag inside.

      The patient stepped closer to the open door, took off his dressing gown, placed it on the seat and took the coat from Dr Lippens’s hand.

      “What are you doing?”

      The patient said nothing, just held the blade of the Russell knife to the soft hollow at the base of the startled Dr Lippens’s throat.

      “Mr Lomas … I … ”

      “Be quiet. Close the door.”

      “I … ”

      The patient pierced the skin, drawing a little blood. “Let’s walk to the garden at the back of the building. Perhaps we can sit and talk somewhere. And quietly, Doctor. You lead the way.”

      As they walked, the patient managed to shrug on the doctor’s coat. He gave Lippens a shove in the back, steering him into the dark, park-like grounds, to a spot out of sight of the side entrance and parking area. In a pocket of the coat, next to a stethoscope, he found a pair of latex gloves, standard equipment for doctors and paramedics in a time when Aids was rife.

      He saw wild asparagus shrubs and frangipani in the glow of a distant streetlight and, closer, more dense shrubbery. He sniffed and smelt rain in the dark overcast air.

      “Right, we can talk here.”

      Dr Lippens turned. The hilt of the Russell knife struck his temple with so much force that he stumbled, lost his balance, and pitched into the undergrowth.

      The patient sat down on the surgeon’s stomach, pinning his back to the ground, and pulled on the gloves. His fingers locked around Lippens’s neck, strong thumbs on the arteries, all the strength and weight of his upper body and arms concentrated on his victim’s throat and neck.

      “Thank you for the new face, Doctor. It’s not exactly what I wanted, but it’s unrecognisable, and that’s the main thing. I’m sorry I lied to you. Twice. I won’t return in a month’s time and my real name isn’t Lomas.”

      He felt the pulse under his fingers falter, like the fluttering of a bird, then die. To make certain he took out the stethoscope and pressed it against the doctor’s chest. Nothing.

      He got up, put the stethoscope back into the pocket, buttoned the coat and set to work with the Russell knife. The first incision was in the hairline on the doctor’s forehead, the exact location where a skilful cosmetic surgeon would insert his scalpel to execute a traditional facelift. Not the three fine incisions that allowed an endoscope entry to perform a “weekend” facelift.

       6. 1991-1993: Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina СКАЧАТЬ