Murder in Ballyhasset (14 page)

The next day, Libby called to see Kathleen's boss at St Gabriel's, Dr Moran at his outpatient clinic. She wanted to ask him more about why Kathleen had left her previous job.

He was coming out of a patient's cubicle, dressed in blue scrubs, when she spotted him. Rushing forward, she asked him to spare her a minute.

'As you can see I'm quite busy, so you'd better make it quick.' His voice was pleasant, but impatient. He sat down at a large desk, piled with papers and files, and motioned to Libby to sit on the opposite chair.

'Where did Dr Kathleen Lynch work previously?'

The surgeon leant back in the chair. 'The Bon Secours in Cork, as far as I recall.'

'She worked as a consultant there?'

'That's right.' Dr Moran hesitated. 'There was some scandal, however. One of her patients died during labour.' Libby's eyes opened wide at this news.

'Was she a good doctor, in your opinion?' Libby asked.

'Kathleen was a brilliant student, she always got top marks. She got first place in the Finals.'

Libby whistled. 'Wow, she must have worked hard.'

The consultant continued, 'She intended to be a general surgeon, but she failed the first part of the fellowship.' He picked up a file from his desk and opened it. He read through the starting page and closed the file again quickly. He glanced up at Libby and said, 'Kathleen worked with Professor Muldowney for two years. He's the head surgeon in Cork University Hospital.'

'She switched then to obstetrics?' Libby asked.

'Yes, it's a much shorter course than general surgery. She passed all the exams quickly.'

Libby thanked him and returned home. She rang Mick Doody at his office. 'Did you hear about one of Kathleen's patients dying during labour?'

'No, of course not. Good heavens, that's a serious allegation.' Mr Doody's voice was loud and cold. 'Who told you that?'

'I'm afraid I can't say,' Libby replied, with hesitation.

'You shouldn't be listening to such wild accusations.' His voice was steely hard.

'Can't you give me a straight answer?' Libby asked, losing patience with him. 'Yes or no?'

'I told you she never discussed her work with me,' he said slowly. He was silent for a moment. 'But I can tell you this much, Kathleen never made mistakes.'

'Everyone makes mistakes,' replied Libby. 'It's just a question of how serious they are.'

'Kathleen was an excellent doctor. No one ever questioned her ability.'

'Did any patient sue Kathleen?' Libby asked in a quiet voice.

Mick said angrily, 'Certainly not. Look, can we speak another time? I'm late for a meeting.' He banged down the phone.

I can easily find this out anyway from public records, if I have to, she thought.

***

Libby rang the Bon Secours in Cork and spoke to Dr Henry. She mentioned about wanting to talk to him about Kathleen Lynch's death and made an appointment to see him that afternoon. Traffic was heavy, so the journey from her home took longer than expected.

She met Dr Henry in his outpatient rooms at the hospital. A pleasant grey-haired man, he spoke with a soothing voice.

'I heard about Kathleen's tragic death.' He paused. 'A terrible shock for us all, it was. I feel very sorry for her husband. Kathleen was only young, she had her whole life ahead of her.'

'Did this hospital sack her from her position here?' Libby asked.

'No, her one-year contract was up. We didn't renew it, however, after the scandal.'

'The woman who died in childbirth - she was Dr Lynch's patient, isn't that right?'

'Yes, Fiona Browne was her maiden name. Kathleen admitted she should have operated sooner on Mrs Browne.' He grimaced slightly.

Libby said, 'Does that mean she made a gross mistake?'

Dr Henry nodded slowly. 'Well, Kathleen admitted she had made an error in not seeing the patient sooner. I have the file here because I rooted it out after you rang.' He picked out a brown file from a pile on the desk, and flicked through it briefly. 'But not a gross error. She maintained the outcome would have been the same whether she had operated earlier or not.' Libby felt confused. 'Can you say that again?'

 'Fiona would have died anyway, Kathleen maintained. The post-mortem findings here in this file agree with what Kathleen said. In fact, Mrs Browne suffered from a rare, undiagnosed clotting disorder.'

'And this led to her death?' asked Libby.

The consultant sighed. 'She died from massive bleeding from her womb after giving birth. I explained this to the family, but I still expect them to pursue a court case against this hospital.'

'Why?' Libby asked. 'If the doctor didn't do anything wrong, why would they sue?'

'Well, because the woman died,' he replied. 'Death in labour is rare in this country. We only get a few in the whole year, thank heavens.'

He lifted up the phone. 'I'll call in the midwife who attended Fiona during her labour. She remembers more about the case than I do.'

He rang the midwife, Angela, and asked her to join him in his office. He asked her to bring along her file on Fiona Browne. A while later, a Filipino nurse, armed with a large file, appeared. She was about thirty-five. Thick brown hair framed a wide face with big brown eyes and sallow skin. She wore a white nurse's dress and smiled pleasantly at Libby.

 She took a seat beside the consultant, facing Libby, placing her file on the desk as she opened it. Libby introduced herself.

The midwife said, 'I keep my own patient notes. I remember poor Fiona well.'

'Can you tell me a bit about her?'

The midwife read her notes, and then looked up. 'Fiona was aged twenty-eight. It was her first pregnancy. She worked hard, she owned a few small shops, and she travelled a lot. Fiona was expecting twins.'

'Twins?' Libby jerked her head in surprise.

'Yes, it was her first pregnancy, but she had several previous miscarriages.'

'So Fiona was a complicated case.'

'Yes, definitely. She suffered a lot during the pregnancy with morning sickness and tiredness also. 'Fiona's labour started normally. Her waters broke, and then her cervix dilated a certain amount. However, I noticed after three hours nothing further had happened.'

'What did you do?'

'I listened to the foetal heartbeat, I could get no sound.'

'Then what?'

'I rang Kathleen, Dr Lynch twice, asking her, begging her, to come in immediately, but Kathleen didn't arrive till two hours later.'

'Why did she delay coming?'

'She said something about her car having broken down, but at the time I didn't believe that was a valid excuse. She could have got a taxi and she didn't live far from the hospital. It was Christmas Day, I remember.'

Libby's eyes widened. 'She probably resented being called away from the big dinner.'

'Yeah,' said the nurse, 'it was around lunchtime. I can see that here, from the chart. Perhaps that's why.'

Dr Henry frowned as he listened.

The nurse continued,  'When Kathleen did come, she did an ultrasound test. Straight away then, she organised an emergency Caesarean Section. She tried to save the babies, but they were born dead. Just after the operation Fiona's blood pressure fell rapidly. We knew she was bleeding internally.'

Libby asked, 'Did the bleeding come from her womb?'

'Yes,' the nurse replied, 'Kathleen Lynch gave her more Oxytocin, more IV fluids and a blood transfusion. But sadly, in spite of all our efforts, we failed to stop the bleeding.'

'Then what did Dr Kathleen do?'

'She gave Fiona another blood transfusion, but Fiona went into severe shock.' The nurse hesitated for a moment. 'And then she died.'

'Do you think Dr Lynch was negligent?'

'No, I don't. She came in late, true enough, but she could not have prevented the postpartum bleed. Fiona would have died, no matter what Kathleen did. The real problem was, no one knew about Fiona's blood disorder.'

'Would Kathleen have saved the babies' lives had she come earlier?' Libby asked.

'Yes, she may have, but not the mother's life.' The midwife sighed deeply. 'Poor Fiona. Life is so unfair sometimes.'

The phone rang, Dr Henry answered. He told Libby he had to go out for an errand, and left the office.

Libby seized the opportunity to question the nurse alone, away from the consultant. 'What did her patients think of Dr Lynch?'

'Not much, I'm afraid,' replied the midwife.

'I expect the mums are in good form when they have their new babies,' said Libby.

'Yes, they chat a lot to me and each other, so I hear a lot of gossip.' The nurse smiled.

'Did Fiona like Kathleen Lynch?'

The nurse shook her head. 'She told me she found Kathleen cold and rude.' As did everyone else, thought Libby.

'Why didn't Fiona change her doctor, then?'

The nurse said, 'I asked her that, I remember. She had heard that Kathleen was the best around. She said she didn't care how rude Dr Lynch was if she was good at her work.'

But she wasn't good, at least, she wasn't good enough to prevent a patient dying, Libby thought, but remained silent.

Dr Henry, the consultant, came back into the room and sat down.

Libby asked, 'What's his name, Fiona's husband?'

'Just a minute, I'll check.' The nurse searched through the file. 'The surname on this file is Browne, which was Fiona's maiden name, I know. This is odd - it's not here, the husband's name.' She flicked again through the file and then handed it to the consultant. He went through the pages again, carefully. He frowned and said, 'There's a page missing.'

That husband could be Kathleen's murderer, thought Libby.

The consultant jerked his head. Then he was silent for a moment. He scratched his chin with his long fingers. 'Another young woman recently asked me all the same questions you've just asked. A doctor, in fact.'

Libby asked suddenly, 'When was that?'

'About two weeks ago. She said she had worked with Kathleen Lynch.'

'Was her name Pamela Kelly?' Libby asked, with a sinking feeling in her insides.

'That's right,' replied Dr Henry, with surprise.

Libby sank back in the chair. This was sad news. Evidently, Pamela had arrived at the truth before they had. Why didn't she come to the police or me first, instead of confronting the killer? Libby wondered. We could have protected her and saved her life.

Dawn called to see Nuala Sullivan to find out more about her brother.

Dawn introduced herself and Nuala brought her in. She made them both a cup of tea while Dawn sat at her kitchen table.

Dawn talked about her mother.

Nuala said, "My mother's dead a year now. She had Alzheimer's.'

'I'm sorry to hear that,' Dawn said.

Nuala placed a plate of biscuits on the table and sat down on the opposite chair. She sighed. 'Yeah, Ma was there for two years. She was very hard for the nurses to manage. I could see that clearly, because every time I visited she was always trying to get out the window. The nurses told me they had to strap her in the bed and sedate her at night to stop her roaring. Ma was a handful.'

'Do you think the nurses gave her good care?' Dawn asked, taking a biscuit.

'Oh yes. Ma's mind was gone, nothing could bring it back.'

'They weren't too harsh?'

Nuala said, 'Not at all. Of course Brendan didn't see it like that.'

Dawn put down her cup quickly. 'Your brother Brendan?'

She nodded. 'He blamed the staff up there for Ma's death, and the nursing home owners, in particular. He said Matron Murphy should be shot. Brendan doesn't understand what dementia is, he thought Ma could be cured.'

Dawn gazed sharply at Nuala. 'Well, the thing is, someone did kill Mrs Murphy, so I heard.'

Nuala's eyes grew large. 'I never knew that. And you think Brendan did, do you?'

Dawn remained silent.

'No, you're completely off track there. He wouldn't hurt a fly.'

'It's just that Libby tells me he's a bit well...volatile,' Dawn hesitated. 'She says he got into a state about Conor going missing.'

Nuala sighed. She was evidently not surprised at hearing this. 'Brendan's very sincere, but he does tend to overreact when things go wrong. Brendan was devoted to our mother, and devastated when she died. He had just managed to get over her passing when his own wife died. That knocked him back altogether; he took it really hard. She was only a young woman, you see.'

'I'm sorry to hear that.' Dawn thanked her for the tea and left. I need to talk to Libby urgently about this, she thought. Brendan is a man who holds a serious grudge. Maybe he's not the harmless character he seems to be.