The God Squad (22 page)

‘What happened?’ she asked.

‘I don’t know, I was just walking and I couldn’t walk any more.’

Then I asked them if I could take off my shoe because it was hurting me.

‘My toe just keeps bending inside it and it’s sore.’

‘Well stop bending it then,’ she said.

‘I can’t, it just keeps doing it.’

They both looked concerned and agreed to mention it to Professor Casey when he arrived to collect me.

When he came into the ward I watched him speaking to the nurses on duty. He looked concerned as one of them demonstrated with the use of her hand and forearm what was happening to my back. Before coming to my bed he was handed a brown bottle of tablets by the nurse.

‘I hear you’re in some difficulty?’ he said to me.

‘Just my toe,’ I replied.

He took the chart from the end of my bed and said he
was increasing the dose of my ‘new tablet’. That would help ensure that my back didn’t arch and prevent my toe giving me trouble. He asked if I would be able to walk from the ward to the car.

‘Yes,’ I said confidently.

I had only gone a short distance when I was forced to stop. Professor Casey urged me to take my time, to relax, everything would be fine. When I resumed walking, I was determined to keep going and not allow my body to be taken over by strange movements over which I had no control. Within the space of a minute, it happened again and I became terrified that this time I would not emerge from the tight grip of the spasm.

‘Has this happened to you before?’ he asked.

‘Once or twice in Kilkenny hospital when I had the splint on my leg.’

‘When did you notice it first, since you came to this hospital?’ he asked.

‘I don’t really know,’ I replied.

‘Would you say it is just since you started on the new tablets?’ he asked.

I thought for a moment and told him that I didn’t really know.

‘We won’t worry about that for the moment,’ he said as we walked down the hospital steps to his car and introduced me to his three children who were sitting quietly in the back. They were older than me, with probably as much as five years between his youngest child, a boy, and myself. The two girls looked about sixteen and seventeen. I sat in the front seat for the ten-minute journey from the hospital, looking at the various types of houses we drove past on the way. Despite the urgings of their father, none of the children spoke to me and I said nothing to them.

I was desperately uncomfortable in the car. My toe
twitched violently inside my shoe causing me to squirm. I didn’t want anyone to notice, but knew they could see me sweating heavily. Professor Casey shifted his gaze from the road to me many times during the journey and each time I tried to give the impression that I was all right.

‘Have we far to go?’ I asked.

‘Another couple of minutes.’

The car pulled up outside a Georgian house with an elegant oak hall door, its brass fittings looking like they had just been polished. A neatly groomed woman opened the door and descended the three steps to the car. She opened the passenger door and embraced me, welcoming me to her home and hoping that I would enjoy the day. The rest of the family got out and, at their father’s request, went into the house while his wife and himself enquired whether I could manage the steps.

‘I think so,’ I said.

I got out of the car with difficulty and waited as the Professor locked it. He walked towards the house and invited me to follow. I couldn’t move. His wife offered to help, but he suggested that I be left alone and given time to relax. As I urged my body to move, I noticed the children watching from a front window. This made the situation worse. My body was refusing to do what my brain was demanding. Then Mrs Casey held my hand which had a soothing effect and I relaxed sufficiently to be able to walk up the steps, through the hallway and into a large brightly lit sitting room, decorated with Christmas lights and cards hanging from string over a magnificent white marble fireplace where a fire blazed. The Professor offered me something to drink and I accepted a large cool glass of lemonade. He and his wife had a glass of sherry and before drinking they toasted each other, their own children, and me. Whenever I looked at him he diverted his gaze. I felt
uneasy, conscious of being watched, and worried that what he was observing would give him a reason to operate on me again.

The children were curious about what I did in the orphanage at Christmas. Did Santa come? Did we have a party?

There was no Santa, I said, but I did have to serve three Masses and I added that all of us used to get jelly and custard. The boy, who had been silent up until now, said, ‘That wasn’t much of a Christmas.’

Then I told them about how Santa came in the hospital and they laughed at me pretending to be asleep while the nurses and patients stuffed my locker and the big pair of socks. Mrs Casey said I was right, and laughed too.

‘But,’ she added, ‘I’m certain the real Santa did come once you were asleep.’

During the day I became increasingly uncomfortable as my toe flexed wildly inside my shoe and became sore. When I could no longer tolerate it I asked Professor Casey if I could remove my shoe.

‘Certainly,’ he said, asking if my toe was still giving me trouble. He reached into his pocket and took out the bottle of tablets he had taken from the hospital, then looked at his watch and remarked that it was a bit soon to take any more. Later in the afternoon when he gave me two I was embarrassed swallowing them while his children watched.

At six o’clock dinner was served. The table was covered in a white, finely embroidered table cloth and at every place there was a cracker, laid out along with an assortment of knives, forks, and spoons. The golden-coloured turkey was placed on a silver tray in the centre of the table, its basted body glistening in the candlelight surrounding it. Professor Casey sat at one end of the table, his wife sat opposite him. I was seated at his right, opposite his son, who offered me a
cracker to pull. It broke with a sharp crack which instinctively caused me to duck as paper hats and tiny plastic toys flew into the air. I had never pulled one before and had no idea that the pieces of coloured paper wrapped tightly in elastic bands were paper hats.

The doctor and his family rose to say grace before meals and as I attempted to stand, he indicated that I could remain seated. When grace was finished he reminded his family to remember children like me who didn’t have parents or a home for Christmas. I could feel my face redden but kept my head bowed so that no-one would notice.

Everyone at the table wore a paper hat during dinner, and as the adults poured themselves wine, their eldest daughter asked if she could have some. Her father refused, saying she had taken the pledge and couldn’t take alcohol until she was twenty-one.

Throughout the meal I felt uneasy and uncomfortable. I was an intruder in a family unit, expected to fit but unable to do so. Everything that went on was alien to me, the food was unlike anything I had ever tasted before. I was confused by the variety of knives, forks and spoons around my plate, never sure which one to use. I was reluctant to try the various sauces which the children spread so liberally over their food. I was afraid to ask for anything and, as they all chatted, wondered if I would always feel so out of place in a family situation as I did that day.

My bare foot was now involuntarily either kicking one of the family or banging hard against the wooden frame of the chair. My paper hat became soggy from perspiration and its dye ran down my face. I wanted to get away from the table and to sit on the floor, where I knew I would be most comfortable.

The room lights were switched off and the candles on the table cast eerie shadows on the walls. Those members of
the family still at the table whispered to each other as though some secret ritual was about to begin. I wondered what was happening. From the kitchen I heard Mrs Casey singing ‘Silent Night, Holy Night,’ her voice becoming clearer as she re-entered the room carrying the Christmas pudding on a plate. On top of the pudding a blue flame danced lightly and the air was filled with the rich smell of brandy. The family joined in the singing as I watched the flame flicker and begin to die away in a stream of blue rivulets running down the sides. There was silence as the flame on the pudding wavered between life and death and when it finally died, they cheered. This was obviously a family tradition to which they attached great importance.

After dinner Professor Casey and his wife sat on the big settee near the fire, drinking from magnificent bulbous glasses. I sat on the floor with their son playing a dice game. They spoke quietly to each other, not realizing I could hear parts of their conversation. She asked her husband had he any idea what I was suffering from, adding that I looked desperately uncomfortable most of the time.

‘No,’ he sighed, ‘but it appears to be progressive.’

‘What will happen to him?’ she asked.

Again he sighed and said he didn’t know. He stood up and reminded me it was time to go. I put away the various pieces of the game and was about to put my shoe on when he said there was no point in wearing a shoe that hurt. Asking his children to remain with their mother and assuring them he would be back soon, he lifted me into his arms and held me as I said goodbye to everyone. It felt very strange to be carried to his car. He settled me into the front seat.

‘We’ll go for a quick spin into town to see the lights,’ he said. It was not a long journey and we didn’t speak until we reached the city centre. There were few people about,
mostly young couples, hand in hand, or with an arm wrapped tightly around their partner’s body. They were dressed to keep out the chill of the December evening with heavy coats, gloves and scarves, yet despite these barriers, there was a sense of real intimacy between them.

O’Connell Street and Henry Street were a mass of brightly coloured lights which were reflected on the windscreen of the car. Whenever we came to a shop window with toys the doctor pulled up close to enable me to have as good a view as possible of the display.

Driving back to the hospital he chatted to me about the hospital. Did I like it? Were the nurses nice to me? What were the other hospitals like and would I like to be able to go back to the school?

‘I don’t really ever want to go back to that school,’ I said.

‘Why?’ he asked inquisitively.

Without really intending to I found myself telling him about everything that had happened to me there, the beatings by the nuns, the locking up in dark rooms, even how I had fallen down the altar steps while carrying the missal during Mass. He laughed loudly at that, saying it could have happened to a Bishop.

Suddenly I was tempted to ask if he knew anything about my parents. I wanted to tell him about the recurring fears I had of hanging men and of death. I was certain he would believe me. But though I felt very much at ease with this man now, I stopped short of telling him anything about my secret fears. I wanted him to know, not to gain his sympathy, but because I was certain he would understand and believe me. Sometimes I still wonder if he too knew the facts that were hidden from me.

He carried me from the lift into the ward and when one of the nurses offered to help he would not allow her to, saying that I was no weight at all.

Before he left he looked at my chart and told the nurse he wanted the dosage of the new tablet increased immediately and the Phenobarbitone continued with one extra tablet any time I showed signs of distress.

Perhaps it was because I had been with him over Christmas that I felt much more relaxed with him afterwards. One morning early in the new year he checked my foot and noticed the position of my toe.

‘Is that the way your toe stays all the time?’ he asked.

‘Most of the time,’ I answered.

‘And when is it not like that?’

‘When I’m busy doing something, like playing a game or reading.’

He asked the nurse if I was sleeping all right and if there was any movement of my foot while I was asleep. She said there was not.

‘Patrick,’ he said, ‘I am going to have to send you to another doctor.’

I froze with fear and disbelief. This was the man who was so kind and gentle to me, who had introduced me to a family for the first time I could remember. Now he was sending me to another doctor, which to me meant a change of hospital. I didn’t want him to see me cry as I told him that I didn’t want to go away.

‘Who said anything about going away?’ he asked. ‘You won’t have to move hospitals, just wards. That’s not so bad. Is it?’

‘No.’

‘And I’ll be able to keep an eye on you, and no doubt some of your nurse girlfriends will come and visit you for the time you are there.’

He pressed his hand firmly down on my head and remarked on the length of my hair. ‘We’ll have to get that cut for you one of these days, maybe you’ll come to
the barber with me when I’m not too busy.’

‘Where is the other doctor?’ I asked nervously.

‘Mother of Mercy Ward.’

‘Will I have to stay there?’

‘That depends on what he says,’ he said, adding that he was certain I would be back in his ward sometime.

‘Is the other doctor going to be able to make me better?’

‘I hope so, after all that’s why we are sending you to him, and if he doesn’t he will have to deal with me,’ he laughed.