‘David . . .’
The investigator immediately turned back to Delphine.
‘David,’ she repeated, smiling at the man, who had looked up from his copy of the Lancet, and who now turned his attention from her to Ash, his eyebrows raised but with a clear smile showing in his neatly trimmed goatee. ‘This is our senior surgeon, Dr Vernon Pritchard, who is in charge of the medical unit.’
Pritchard didn’t rise but extended a hand across the able. Ash shook it and noted its natural firmness.
The senior doctor was a smallish man, no more than five foot nine, Ash guessed, and stylishly dressed: fawn herringbone jacket, dark brown waistcoat, light blue shirt and natty blue-spotted bow tie. Ash put him in his early fifties, and although there was a casual air about him, his brown eyes were searching, almost questioning. One eyebrow was raised above his tortoiseshell bifocals, as if appraising the newcomer, and grey hair at his temples helped bestow upon him the necessary gravitas for someone of his status. That and the neat goatee he wore, which, suspiciously, hadn’t a single grey hair in it.
Before Delphine could introduce Ash, Pritchard said with a note of satisfaction, ‘Ah, you’re our parapsychologist, I take it.’ His grin was wolfish.
‘Ash,’ the investigator acknowledged.
‘Yes, David Ash. Correct?’
Ash nodded and returned the smile.
Delphine broke in. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you Dr Pritchard, but I felt David should know a little about our work here at Comraich.’
‘Oh, I’m sure you could have done just as well yourself.’ There was no criticism in the senior doctor’s remark. ‘But please, take a seat, won’t you both? My lunch is over and I was just about to order an Armagnac and a coffee to complete it. Have you eaten yet?’
‘No,’ replied Delphine. ‘I’m sure David is ravenous by now.’
‘Yes, I heard you had a rather harrowing ordeal on the plane. Strange how such an adrenaline rush can often leave you a bit peckish afterwards. And your body becomes unconsciously delighted to be alive, or so I’m told. Survival instinct kicks in, furtherance of the race and all that. As a psychologist, I’m sure Dr Wyatt can tell you more about that than I.’ He cast a mischievous grin at Delphine, whose cheeks reddened slightly.
Ash covered her embarrassment. ‘All I wanted afterwards was a stiff drink and a cigarette. Fact is, I had neither.’
‘Commendable,’ said Dr Pritchard as he leaned back in his seat. Although the doctor’s smile was relaxed, Ash couldn’t be sure if the older man was teasing. Still, he seemed amiable enough.
Pritchard barely waved a hand and a waitress, dressed in a creamy white blouse and a slim black skirt with dark tights, appeared before them.
‘Chloe, my darling,’ the doctor drawled smoothly, ‘the usual coffee for me with a Bas Armagnac. Domaine Boingnères, of course. And could you bring menus for my two colleagues?’
Ash felt the girl might curtsey, but she only smiled at Dr Pritchard before leaving the table.
‘You’ll find the cuisine here splendid, Mr Ash,’ the senior doctor remarked, indicating a chair opposite him across the spotlessly white tablecloth. He placed his copy of the Lancet to one side with a muttered ‘Only bloody magazine I can get here,’ while Delphine took the seat on his right. Ash’s back was to the room, but he was even more aware of the too-soft drone of conversation behind him. Something had been bothering him since he and Delphine had entered the room.
The general hum of voices, apart from when he and the psychologist had made their appearance and conversation had been momentarily suspended, was low, with no peaks of volume, no sudden laughter, and certainly no raised voices. He realized it was this that had caused his disquiet when entering the oval room. All the voices were low as if . . . as if the clients were sedated. He tried to shrug off the idea, yet the thought lingered that they had all been mildly tranquillized. He was trying to decide how he could diplomatically put the idea to Dr Pritchard and Delphine when the senior doctor spoke again.
‘Now, my darling Delphine,’ he said smoothly, ‘what is it I can tell Mr Ash that you feel unable to?’
Delphine smiled but Ash noticed her underlying discomfort. ‘I’m sorry, Vernon, I noticed you had almost finished your lunch and thought you wouldn’t mind my interruption.’
‘And right you are,’ Pritchard said with a small laugh. ‘It’s always interesting to meet someone new in Comraich. Mr Ash, then, what can I do?’ He’d turned his attention to Ash opposite him.
‘Well,’ said the investigator, unfazed by Pritchard’s seniority or grandiloquent manner, ‘I was curious about the medical practices here. I mean are you really geared up for surgery? Do you have a cardiac unit, for example?’ he added, remembering Moira Glennon.
‘Oh, we manage much more than just that, Mr Ash. We also maintain a research department of a very high standard. In fact, we pioneer many treatments.’
He paused as the waitress put a balloon glass of amber liquid before him and a small cafetière to one side. Chloe produced two menus from under her elbow.
‘Might I suggest,’ interposed the senior doctor, ‘that you order now.’ He lifted his wrist to check his watch. ‘Yes, Chloe will bring it in ten minutes’ time. By then I shall have finished my discourse on Comraich Castle’s medical facilities as well as having imbibed my after-lunch Armagnac and coffee.’
He’d noticed Ash’s admiring interest in the ornate timepiece he wore and lifted his wrist again to give the investigator another sight of it. All Ash really knew was that the wristwatch looked old and very expensive. ‘Vintage Rolex, 1936,’ he told Ash proudly. ‘Worth about sixteen K on today’s market. Had it several years, a little guilt-gift to myself.’ He shot his shirt cuff with practised ease, concealing the small treasure again.
While Delphine and Ash turned their attention to their menus, Dr Pritchard withdrew a metal cigar tube from his inside breast pocket, unscrewed its flat end and slid its content into his open palm. Ash reflected wryly that, despite its plethora of rules for outsiders, Comraich was probably the only institution in the country not to have imposed a smoking ban.
‘Hope neither of you minds,’ he said, smiling first at Delphine, then at Ash. Without waiting for a response, he told them, ‘This is a rather fine cigar, which I’m very partial to. Cohiba, from Cuba.’ He struck a match and puffed the cigar into life, drawing in deeply before exhaling a dense stream of smoke across the table towards Ash. With a grin, in a mock theatrical whisper, he confided, ‘As a doctor, I know I’m a bad example to some of our guests, and that’s why I always lunch alone in this deserted corner of the room.’
At first Ash had thought Pritchard had directed the smoke at him purposely as a sign of disguised contempt, or at least disdain for his kind of trespasser, but when he breathed in the rich scent of tobacco, he changed his mind: the other man had wanted him to appreciate the cigar’s quality. The senior doctor was obviously a man who enjoyed the rewards of his elevated profession.
He regarded Ash and his inflection was a little more brisk, although unequivocally genial. ‘Actually, as a psychic researcher, I would’ve thought you were more interested in the dead than how we preserve the living.’
He stared into Ash’s eyes, humour – or mockery – still evident in his expression. The investigator was confused: he didn’t know whether to like the man or not. Whatever, he didn’t like the soft-voiced teasing.
‘I thought we were going to order lunch first, Vernon,’ Delphine cut in, sensing the investigator’s uncertainty.
‘Of course, my dear,’ Pritchard said, as if surprised. ‘You go ahead and order while I brew myself a coffee.’
The smell of the coffee complemented the cigar’s aroma perfectly and Dr Pritchard couldn’t help but boast as he poured the steaming liquid into his cup, ‘Above all, my favourite. Jamaican Blue Mountain, considered one of the rarest and most expensive of all coffees.’
Like I would know, thought Ash as he studied his menu. What next
– the glorious merits of the bloody Armagnac? Ash was surprised at the wide choice offered. Food had never been a priority in his life – he ate to live, not vice versa – but when he read the selections, his mouth began to salivate.
‘Oh, just the Arran smoked salmon for me,’ Delphine told the waitress who hovered between her and Ash. Chloe scribbled the order on her pad and said, ‘And the main course?’
‘Nothing more, thank you. Just the starter.’
The waitress addressed Ash. ‘And for you, sir?’ Her Scottish accent had a pleasant lilt to it.
Despite himself, for the menu had certainly looked appetizing, Ash showed restraint. ‘Uh, just a main course for me, then. I’ll have the fillet steak, medium rare, with the hollandaise sauce rather than the peppercorn.’
‘Gratin of vegetables, the garlic barley risotto?’
‘Some new potatoes and that’ll be it.’
Chloe dipped her head and made her way back to the kitchen.
Ash spoke. ‘You were wondering why I was interested in your medical department.’
‘Yes, so I was. But it isn’t just a department, you know. It’s rather grander then that. I suppose you could say it’s the size of a small cottage hospital in square footage but with hi-tech equipment and state-of-the-art laboratory apparatus, pioneering research, and the best proven drugs to date. We treat conditions as varied as heart dysfunction and cancer. And from, say, motor neurone disease to food allergies. We’ve made inroads with manic depression, which Dr Wyatt and Dr Singh would, I’m sure, be only too happy to explain to you.’ He leaned towards Delphine, rather leerily, Ash thought. ‘By the way, my pet, you look a mite fretful. Has your migraine come back to torment you again?’
‘It’s just a headache.’
‘Perhaps it is now, but I wouldn’t like it to develop into a migraine cluster; you know how they bring you down.’ His voice was syrupy with concern. ‘Now why don’t you follow the advice I gave you last time? Botox will clear it up in no time at all.’
Ash was surprised by the information and he stared at Pritchard incredulously. Botox? For migraine?
‘I told you before, Vernon,’ said Delphine, mock-scoldingly, ‘I’m too young for that kind of procedure and not yet vain enough.’
‘Well, it’s up to you, precious, but you should give it some serious thought.’
‘That would give me a headache.’
Both of them laughed and Dr Pritchard dropped the subject.
‘Well, then, Mr Ash,’ he went on, ‘other treatments here are for disorders as diverse as hypertension, Alzheimer’s, strokes and meningitis. We have extremely efficient screening equipment that will show early signs of any number of diseases.’
He tilted his chair back, drawing deeply on the exalted cigar as he reflected.
‘Let’s take cancer, for instance,’ the doctor said after a moment’s further thought. ‘You see, there are new drugs not yet on the market simply because in England NICE – the preposterous acronym for the National Institution for Health and Clinical Excellence – was reluctant to fund treatments for various cancers before it was satisfied beyond all possibility of doubt that they were safe and their efficacy proven. It is, of course, limited by financial restraints from the government.
‘The trustees of Comraich have neither NICE’s timidity, nor its monetary constraints. We are happy to use these so-called “unapproved” drugs to the benefit of our guests. We began to use Revlimid, for instance, long before its approval by NICE in 2009 because it is particularly useful in the treatment of bone marrow cancer, and its effect provides an insight into other forms of the disease. As well as Revlimid, NICE also rejected the use of various drugs for advanced kidney cancer because it found interferon is as effective – though studies suggest otherwise – and far cheaper to use. In fact, interferon is of such limited use that only one in ten sufferers are treated with it.’
Pritchard gently swirled the Armagnac in its balloon, creases between the inner corners of his eyebrows forming vertical ridges on his forehead. It seemed that poor government funding for the health of British citizens roused his ire. He further underlined this by exclaiming, but quietly, ‘God, we’re so far behind Western European countries and the United States that they’re beginning to regard us as medical primitives. British oncologists were up in arms when they weren’t able to use Sutent to treat advanced kidney and liver cancers until 2009, because the health service in Britain declared the cost is too great to bear!
‘You know,’ Pritchard continued with a faux-hopeless sigh, ‘NICE even vetoed marvellous drugs such as the anti-TNF for rheumatoid arthritis and Aricept for Alzheimer’s because it talks in terms of “evaluation according to their excellence”, but no, it’s a lie! What it means is drugs are not truly assessed by their excellence, but by their cost-effectiveness! The government does not think in terms of life extension and reductive pain, but believes in palliative care, using drugs that only make patients drowsy and so less complaining. I tell you, it’s all down to budgetary restraint and therefore, politics.’
‘Isn’t it always?’ Ash put in, mostly because he felt it was expected of him.
The sympathetic agreement seemed to raise the senior doctor’s spirits again. He sipped his Armagnac, then his coffee, and finally drew on the cigar which was rapidly decreasing in length.
‘Well let me tell you this,’ he said, happily jabbing the remaining half of the cigar at Ash. ‘We at Comraich buy in the best drugs available rather than wait for the results of some long drawn-out assessment policy. Reolysin, for instance, probably won’t be approved for another five years, but we’re curing people with it today. It works where chemotherapy doesn’t. It’s a kind of magic bullet that shrinks tumours and in some cases has made them vanish.’
Dr Pritchard leaned back in his chair and regarded Ash, deep satisfaction broadening his smile. ‘We’re very proud of our work at Comraich,’ he said smugly.
The investigator nodded sagely, not knowing what else to do. But he was beginning to wonder if Comraich was actually just a research institute working in an unholy alliance with big pharmaceutical companies and the ‘guests’ acting as guinea pigs.
‘Are you as advanced in areas of health care other than cancer?’ he asked, genuinely curious.
‘Oh, yes, we certainly are.’ The senior doctor looked up and saw the waitress approaching with Delphine’s and the investigator’s lunch. ‘But look, I’ve taken up enough of your time – your fault for getting me on to my old hobby horse. Here’s Chloe with your lunch, so I’ll leave you in peace. I expect you’re tired of the diatribe by now, in any case.’
He drained the last of his Armagnac with relish, then the rest of his coffee. He pushed back his chair, the stub of his cigar still burning between his fingers, stood and reached across the table to shake the investigator’s hand.
‘There’s plenty more to know about our various treatments and cures for our guests here at the castle, but I’ll let Delphine fill you in with more details. Much more pleasurable for you, wouldn’t you say?’
Also standing, Ash smiled at the brashly elegant (if such a description were possible) senior doctor.
‘Thank you for taking the time,’ Ash said appreciatively, but not too humbly.
‘Been a pleasure, old boy. Now, if there’s anything I can help you with, just let me know, all right? And I’d like to have a chat to you sometime, about your business and what crazy things you’ve witnessed. I think you might call me a sceptic, but I am, nevertheless, interested in the sort of thing you get up to.’
With a touch on Delphine’s shoulder, Pritchard moved around the table and eased himself past Chloe.
Ash caught the senior doctor before he could go on his way. It was the investigator who moved closer to him, realizing he’d been wrong about the physician’s height – Pritchard barely scratched five foot six. The girl laid both full plates at their settings on the table, her hands shaking a little.
‘Tell me, Dr Pritchard,??
? Ash said quietly, leaning down towards the other man’s ear. ‘D’you keep your, uh, your guests . . .’ he emphasized the word ‘. . . under sedation all the time?’
The dandified doctor pulled his head away from Ash to regard him quizzically. Then, his voice also low, he replied, ‘Is it that obvious?’
Ash nodded with a bland smile, but caught the brief exchange as Pritchard looked past his shoulder at Delphine, who had remained seated.
‘Well you see, old boy,’ said Pritchard confidentially, ‘we like to keep them happy – and peaceable,’ he added. ‘Oh, they’re not under any “chemical cosh”, if that’s what you’re driving at. Absolutely not. No, we use a group of drugs called benzodiazepines – Valium and the like. And, of course, our old friend Prozac. Perhaps something a little stronger for those who require it most. But our guests are kept healthy and happy. That’s our agreement with them, or with whoever is footing their bill. It’s why we’re so anxious to clear up this present nonsense about ghosts – it isn’t good for their well-being!’ He managed a quiet chuckle as he placed a manicured hand on the investigator’s shoulder. ‘It’s nothing for you to worry about, old boy. They aren’t aware of the mysterious crucifixion of Douglas Hoyle’ – He’s making it sound like a TV drama, thought Ash – ‘but rumours do tend to abound and become exaggerated in a confined location such as this. You just solve our temporary problem as quickly as possible, then all will be as it should – a peaceful, benign inner sanctum.’
He patted Ash’s shoulder, then smoothly made his way out of the restaurant, stopping only occasionally to charm a guest or two before moving on.
The investigator came back to the table from where Delphine had been watching him, her brown eyes anxious.
He grinned at her and took the seat just vacated by the senior doctor. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘that was informative.’