"I know. All this doesn't influence me, Edwardes."
"Wait a moment. We had a system in the operating-room as perfect as I
could devise it. I never finished an operation without having my first
assistant verify the clip and sponge count. But that first case died
because a sponge had been left in the operating field. You know how those
things go; you can't always see them, and one goes by the count, after
reasonable caution. Then I lost another case in the same way--a free case.
"As well as I could tell, the precautions had not been relaxed. I was doing
from four to six cases a day. After the second one I almost went crazy. I
made up my mind, if there was ever another, I'd give up and go away."
"There was another?"
"Not for several months. When the last case died, a free case again, I
performed my own autopsy. I allowed only my first assistant in the room.
He was almost as frenzied as I was. It was the same thing again. When I
told him I was going away, he offered to take the blame himself, to say he
had closed the incision. He tried to make me think he was responsible. I
knew--better."
"It's incredible."
"Exactly; but it's true. The last patient was a laborer. He left a
family. I've sent them money from time to time. I used to sit and think
about the children he left, and what would become of them. The ironic part
of it was that, for all that had happened, I was busier all the time. Men
were sending me cases from all over the country. It was either stay and
keep on working, with that chance, or--quit. I quit." "But if you had
stayed, and taken extra precautions--"
"We'd taken every precaution we knew."
Neither of the men spoke for a time. K. stood, his tall figure outlined
against the window. Far off, in the children's ward, children were
laughing; from near by a very young baby wailed a thin cry of protest
against life; a bell rang constantly. K.'s mind was busy with the
past--with the day he decided to give up and go away, with the months of
wandering and homelessness, with the night he had come upon the Street and
had seen Sidney on the doorstep of the little house.
"That's the worst, is it?" Max Wilson demanded at last.
"That's enough."
"It's extremely significant. You had an enemy somewhere--on your staff,
probably. This profession of ours is a big one, but you know its
jealousies. Let a man get his shoulders above the crowd, and the pack is
after him." He laughed a little. "Mixed figure, but you know what I
mean."