Despite agreed upon medical practices of the hospital, Dr. MacCallan proceeded to his own advantages and ensured his reputation
for aggressive and malignant theories which prove detrimental to the sacred oath of caretaking
They now thought him an arrogant butcher with no care of destroying those entrusted to his care, as if his Hippocratic oath meant nothing. As if he didn’t mourn every life that couldn’t be saved. Did they truly think his arrogance stripped him of human decency in the delicate balance of life and death?
He dragged his hands through his hair as his mind railed against the accusations. Harkin had shown no signs of post-op complications, although many could lay dormant for months. Wynn yanked open the desk’s bottom drawer where he kept correspondences and pulled out the third envelope down. A letter from Harkin dating two weeks before his death stating that the physicians at St. Matthew’s Hospital in London had cleared him with a full bill of health. Surely if a complication had lain dormant, they would have discovered and diagnosed it.
Despite the letter’s false claim, Wynn had made sure to gain Harkin’s permission before the operation. He had been scared, as most patients were, but never once had he voiced disagreement.
A thick absence of feeling coated him from scalp to foot, blocking sound from his ears and sight from his eyes. All sight
except the black words. Their tyranny could not be hidden from the cold light streaming in through the window nor the slamming
closed of his eyelids. They taunted him in the darkness, searing into his brain. If only Hugh were here.
“Wynn?”
Wynn’s eyes shot open. Svetlana stood in the doorway.
“I am sorry to disturb. I did knock.” Head tilted to the side, eyes softened, corners of the mouth slightly pulled down, hesitation in the stance. She was worried. About him. “Is everything all right?”
He wanted his ice princess with her haughty expression and raised eyebrows. The glacial slant of her nose where woes dared not fall lest they slip off to their deserved doom. The arctic chill in her eyes that frosted demeaning circumstances and stamped them beneath the ice where they belonged. That beguiling creature would at least challenge him to exert all his willpower to thaw her with a smirk here and a teasing comment there.
Instead, his willpower was nearly crippled by her look of near pity. He would not be that to her. Whatever it took, she would not witness him crippled by his own arrogance and failures.
“The coroner sent his final report on Harkin. A formality.” The words slipped out before he could stop them. He grabbed the letter and shoved it into the bottom drawer.
Sadness and relief flitted across her face. Wynn’s stomach twisted. What did it cost the soul to lie? Mere fragments breaking off until its existence was nothing more than a hollow shell? Could he learn to live on the meagerness that remained? Could his future with Svetlana exist on it? Would he be able to survive the guilt?
But so much had been taken from his wife; he could not bear to see her suffer further because of him. One day he would tell her the whole truth, but to do so now would only cause her unnecessary pain. He believed she would understand the reason for his concealment when the time came. She had not agreed to become his wife in exchange for a life of disgrace. He had wanted only to save her from that in promise of a good life. He would salvage whatever remained of his reputation and force his feet to tread the path demanded of him. He would give Svetlana the life of happiness she deserved.
“Will you come and have tea with me?” she asked.
“Nothing I’d like more.” Coercing a smile, Wynn stood and shut the drawer, but not quick enough to erase the letter’s final lines burning him with shame.
Edwynn MacCallan is thereby stripped of his medical services and doctoral titles pending a formal investigation of actions.
Chapter 22