The Infirmary (DCI Ryan Mysteries prequel)(61)

“That’s true enough,” Ryan agreed. “But the hospital seldom dishes out a quarter of a million just to make them feel better. That’d be a road to bankruptcy. No, Sebastien, I’m talking about the complaint made recently, the one where it’s alleged you were operating under the influence of drugs or alcohol.”

Draycott let out a nervous laugh and ran a trembling hand through his hair.

“I—I—”

“Is that why you won’t turn over your records, Mr Draycott? Is it because you’re part of the reason drugs are being skimmed off the top?”

The surgeon turned red and then white again. Unforgiving light filtered through the window and showed up every hollow on his face, every line around his mouth. Here, in his own home, Draycott was just another man and wielded no special power.

“It’ll ruin me,” he said eventually. “Please. It’ll finish my career.”

“I want all your files,” Ryan said. “Without delay.”

“Yes—I…yes. What are you going to do?”

Ryan looked at the man long and hard. Undoubtedly, there had been many patients he had saved, people whose lives continued because he had been there to use his skill. But that was only one side of the story.

“How did it start?”

Draycott looked away, ashamed.

“Tell me where it began,” Ryan persisted.

“Eighteen months ago, I was the passenger in a road traffic accident. Nothing serious, except it jarred my back. In my profession, I’m constantly required to lean over patients and the pain was agonising. I went through all the usual treatment and was prescribed codeine. As you may be aware, it contains morphine, which is highly addictive.”

He let out a short, self-deprecating laugh.

“I, of all people, know its properties. I knew the dangers of becoming reliant on the pain relief but…it helped. When the prescription ended, I started topping it up with a couple of pills here and there. We keep a box of medicines available in the department to give to patients,” he explained. “Nobody noticed a box or two going missing, but I needed more.”

“So, you found more.”

Draycott nodded, resigning himself to professional ruin.

“But I didn’t realise there was already a drugs ring in operation. I swear it,” he said, with apparent sincerity. “I didn’t know it was already established and it came as quite a shock. But…addiction can change a person.”

Ryan looked at him for long seconds.

“I understand that addiction is debilitating but people are placing their lives in your hands every time they pass through the door. I can’t let that continue, much as I admire the work you may have done in the past. Your inaction has enabled unscrupulous people to peddle drugs to vulnerable people and God knows who else. It may turn out that it has enabled a murderer to access the tools of his trade.” Ryan’s face was hard as granite and just as unyielding. “I want every member of the Emergency Medicine Department to submit to a drugs test. I want every locker searched. Do we have your permission?”

Draycott nodded, feeling his life slip away like sand through his fingers.

“Good. Phillips? Get a team together and let’s make a start. Draycott? You’re with me. I want your staff to see that this is coming from their leader, such as he is.”

*

He stared at the front page of the broadsheet newspaper, reading and then re-reading the headline until the lettering became illegible to his addled mind.



HACKER’S KILLING SPREE CONTINUES



Very slowly, very deliberately, he set the newspaper down.

His anger was so strong it took several minutes to bring himself under control again.

Hacker?

They dared to call him The Hacker?

It was such an insult to his sensibilities, he was almost reduced to tears. After all his careful work, all his planning and skill, that was the best they could come up with? It reduced him to little more than a butcher, some bumbling moron with a meat cleaver and not a man of refined taste and judgment, a giver and taker of life.

He spent several more minutes imagining the many and varied ways in which he would punish the person responsible. There would be no pain relief; oh, no. He would take them quickly and silently to a place where nobody would hear their screams and he would kill them slowly, removing their bowels and tearing them limb from limb, like in the old days. If it was good enough for ancient kings, it was good enough for him.

Afterwards, he felt better, the red mist having dissipated enough to allow him to think clearly again.

He decided he should be flattered, really. All the best killers had a title, something designed to strike fear into the masses. Hadn’t he always longed to be feared and revered, after so long living in the shadows?

His spirits lifted immeasurably at the prospect.





CHAPTER 26


Ryan had to admit that Draycott put on a good show.

When they returned to the hospital together, there was no outward sign of his earlier remorse or any indication that he was anything other than in complete control of himself and his department. He seemed to take on a cloak of invincibility within the confines of the hospital and they watched the staff defer to him like sheep to their shepherd.

Records were seized, the pharmacist was taken in for questioning and the staff locker room was held under guard as each locker was searched for signs of unauthorised substances or material evidence. Everything was done by the book, with representatives from the Drugs Squad in attendance.