An intricate yellow-gold bangle rattled against the lino.
Philippa Haven picked it up off the floor and bounced it on the palm of her perspiring hand. It was heavier than it looked. Two hearts, where the clips were hidden behind, stared back at her like the eyes of a hawk. Diamonds were evenly spaced along the item of jewellery – a row of glistening detached manors. She pocketed the item, knowing it could not have belonged to Eric.
She combed through the rest of the cabinet and the rugged bag left on the floor. Spare syringes, more cigarettes… how was Eric Pails fuelling his habit with such gluttony?
The curtains rattled behind her.
‘Is everything okay, doctor?’ a deep voice asked, startling Philippa.
She spun around.
A sizeable man wearing a baseball cap with girthy biceps stood there. They had crossed paths on several occasions tonight but she had yet to know his name – that was in part due to his lack of name badge.
‘Er – yes; everything’s fine,’ she replied quickly. She dunked the bracelet deep into her pocket, concealing it from the man.
‘What are you looking for?’
‘Nothing, these clothes belong to –’
‘Mr Pails – the man who nearly died outside. The man you managed to save.’
‘Yes, he’s gone to –’
‘ICU; they asked me to come and collect his things and take them up to the unit.’
‘Right… of course.’
The porter wore latex gloves. He had done so on every occasion she had seen him tonight. Was it to hide vital evidence? Being the porter meant he could ghost around the hospital without raising any suspicions. But she thought back to the man kneeling on one knee, offering Davina’s tearful niece a lollipop. He had seemed too gentle.
‘I’ll take that from you,’ he said to her. He had a strong African accent. Then it was his turn to freeze – a face of shock that made it improbable for him to be the killer. ‘That…’
‘The hoodie isn’t mine,’ Philippa told him. ‘But I don’t think it’s Eric’s either.’
‘I’ve seen that jacket tonight.’
‘Where?’
‘Someone was wearing it.’
‘What did you see? When?’
‘I was outside having a cigarette earlier. I think it was half-two or so.’
Philippa’s attention had been hooked.
‘I have portered here for ten years. Not once have I been inside that portacabin or known what it is… until tonight. I was having a cigarette when I saw someone – a man, I think, wearing that hoodie going up the stairs.’
‘Definitely this hoodie?’
‘That white tick on the sleeve. I recognise that.’
His words were making her intestines writhe.
‘Who was it?’
‘I cannot be sure. I didn’t see his face; the hood was up.’
‘What happened?’
‘Well I did not think too much of it. The man inside, he was the one we found dead on the floor. He let him in and they chatted for a while. They seemed to know each other.’
‘And then?’
‘He must have left the portacabin because he wasn’t there at the – what-do-you-call-it- arrest call. But I don’t know how long they were chatting for or what about.’
‘Was there anything else you noticed about this person?’
‘He was quite slim but that is all I can say.’ The porter frowned, then added, ‘Now that I come to think of it…’
‘What?’
‘The young man who died on Surgical Four. You remember that blood sample – the machine wasn’t working? There was someone at the machine wearing the same hoodie just before me.’
‘In A&E?’
‘Yes, but the person was wearing scrubs under the hoodie – you know, it’s normal for doctors to do that when it’s cold.’
‘Did you catch a clear glimpse of them?’
‘No, the hood was up again and they walked away before I got to the machine.’
‘Could you at least tell whether it was a man or woman?’
‘Man, for sure. Do you think –’
But Philippa Haven had heard enough. Who had been working in A&E? She checked her phone by habit before remembering it had run out of juice. She ran out of Medical Two and made a move back to the Ops Room, where this whole journey had begun.
She added the gold bracelet to the table embedded within patient names and numbers scribbled in all directions.
A repeated bleep from A&E did eventually force down her barriers. Philippa glanced at the time on the computer screen. After the final test, she would shut the shop from any further referrals. She had received enough for the night and she was both unsure and worried about how many patients she would be leaving for Alfred and his team to see in the morning. Hopefully, he would have a full team.
‘Hi, it’s Kristen… again.’
‘Hi,’ Philippa said, a little sympathetically given she had witnessed Dr Balsack’s attitude towards her earlier.
‘I’ve got a DKA here in the department.’
‘Oh… okay, known to us?’ Philippa could not hide her interest, but time was running away from her.
‘I believe so, but I can’t access any of her clinic letters.’
It was nearly half-six.
But this was her forte. DKA or diabetic ketoacidosis was a diabetic emergency where the absence of insulin led to the formation of chemicals called ketones which in abundance made people feel extremely sick.
Her fingers drummed the table. She clicked her tongue against her palate.
‘I can’t…’
It was too close to the final test. In usual circumstances, she would be able to clerk this patient and come up with a management plan in twenty minutes, but this was time she did not have.
‘I know you’re busy,’ Kristen added, ‘But if you could give some verbal advice until you get the chance to see her, that would be really helpful.’
‘What are her details? You’ll have to bear with me though; it’s my first shift so I’m not as fluent with all the systems as I’d like to be.’ If I can stop this killer in time, I might just be able to see the patient before Dr Steer gets in at eight, she thought optimistically, and it would mean one less patient for Alfred to deal with.
Kristen relayed the seven-digit hospital number, which Philippa typed into the search box.
The patient’s admission details popped up onto the screen.
She clicked on the Documents tab and scrolled through to her most recent clinic letter.
‘Katherine Blandy?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Okay, so I can see she was on levemir insulin, twenty units twice daily. Did she have any of her levemir last night?’
‘I don’t think so.’
‘Why don’t we give her the morning dose of levemir now? Keep her on the DKA protocol and I’ll see her as soon as I can,’ Philippa advised. ‘Oh, and can you make sure a pregnancy test has been done?’
‘Sure, thanks.’
‘Oh, Kristen?’
‘Yes?’
‘How many male doctors are working in A&E tonight?’
‘Er – male? I think three – four if you include Dr Balsack. How comes?’
‘What are the names – of the three?’
‘There’s Louis, David and Naz.’
‘Has any of them been wearing a black hoodie tonight?’
‘Now you’re asking. I think Naz was wearing a hoodie but don’t think it was a black one. That’s a strange question?’
‘If one of them were to sneak off and take a longer break would –’
‘Longer break? We hardly get to chance to have a usual break. Dr Balsack’s pretty militant about our breaks. He keeps a firm watch on all of us.’
‘Thanks.’ Philippa replaced the receiver.
It was a fair point.
She returned straight away to her table of clues but maintaining her concentration was becoming exceedingly onerous, now that she had toiled relentlessly for the last ten hours. By the end of the morning ward round, she will have worked for over half a day.
She rubbed her face several times. Her stomach rumbled, adding to the only other noise of a whistling breeze between the loosely fitted window and its frame. The air was prickly. She smelt tea from the trolley. How she would have loved to help herself to one.
Philippa went to the window, opened it wide and rested her elbows upon the sill. The moment’s peace was invaluable.
Think, Philippa.
The winds had settled somewhat. The temperature was warming just a little. She heard the faintest tweets from above.
What evidence did she have so far? Every test had yielded clues about the next…
That was when it clicked – the meaning of the second riddle!
She opened her emails and immediately felt a deep sorrow for Shinji Nyarko. They had read and watched these clues together.
Dearest Dr Haven,
Looks like you’ve failed the first ‘un
So, here’s a clue
That might help with two
And beyond,
from here on
Just click on the link,
then think!
The link was referring to Fibonacci, as they had fathomed. His mathematical sequence involved using the previous number to help determine the next. The killer was stating that to help with the second test and beyond, she had to utilise the information from the previous death to solve the answer to the next each time, just as she had inadvertently done, to save Eric Pails’ life.
If that was the case, then what was the method the killer was planning to use for the final test? And what about the location? If only she could work out the answers to those key questions, then she would be able to wait for the killer before they struck with the correct antidote to hand. The solutions would help her be ahead of the game and outsmart the killer at last.
Philippa slid the mouse cursor over the cross sign in the top right corner of the Patient Records programme. Something about the patient’s details made her stop.
Katherine Blandy, DOB: 18th April 1998
Hospital number: C180976
NHS number: 425-513-8179
There had been a third riddle.
She withdrew the sheet of paper – the note that the killer had tauntingly pretended to have been written by Rob.
Her bleep went off.
First time only.
You will find them helpful;
The digits complete, at your disposal,
Though it’s not one you’re more used to.’
‘You will find them helpful, the digits complete, at your disposal,’ she read loudly, ‘Though it’s not one you’re more used to.’
Could it be possible?
Kristen had relayed a seven-digit code, known as a patient’s hospital number. That was how all staff referred to patients for ease of bringing up information or ensuring the patient in question, was the correct one.
But everyone had a second number, one that was rarely used in hospitals and she could not even remember the last time it had come to purpose.
‘NHS number…’ she whispered between her intertwined fingers.
Visualising the number on the screen gave her a nudge; the white painted numbers on the outside of the portacabin. She had thought it was portacabin fifty-five but actually was it 5-5? Was that significant, the hyphen sandwiched between the two digits?
She licked her lips, a fruitless attempt to keep them moisturised to some extent.
Jonathan Wickshaw was on Surgical Four, Bed Sixteen. She added another column to her table, then wrote the numbers: 416.
Mary Surrey was on Medical Six, Bed Two. She continued: 62.
That meant the next two numbers would be 55 and lastly for Eric Pails… 218.
Philippa counted ten digits: the length of an NHS number – the unique tag that stayed with us until death did us apart.
Was she over-thinking this?
But the matching number of digits could not be a coincidence and the hyphen lay perfectly in line with where it should be.
416-625-5218.
Enter.
A hypnotic flashing sand-timer rotated clockwise in the middle of the screen.
She almost hoped that she was wrong; she was scared of who the computer would return with.
The sand-timer disappeared.
The NHS number did exist and it belonged, as it would, to a single name.
Every few days... 