Free Life and Limb by Elsebeth Egholm Page A

pitter-pattered to the ground, one by one. ‘Oh, sorry. My fault.’
    He bent down to help.
    â€˜No, no, mine entirely, I’m sure. I’m so clumsy. I just wanted to …’
    She squatted down alongside him. She smelled of lemon or something equally fresh and appealing, so different from the smell of blood and disinfectant in the operating theatre. She was slender and looked like a little girl as she sat on the floor hugging the folders. Her hair was piled up in a messy bun. Her lips quivered as if she were on the verge of tears. And her eyes – he had never seen eyes that colour before.
    â€˜Lena Bjerregaard.’
    Kempinski took her elbow and helped her to stand up.
    â€˜I’m the new secretary,’ she continued. ‘Maternity cover.’
    He had forgotten. As he forgot so many things he considered insignificant. He cleared his throat.
    â€˜Janos Kempinski. Oh, and welcome to our department.’
    They were green or maybe they were blue with a hint of sea and seaweed and sunshine. They caused every other thought to drain from his mind.
    â€˜Thank you, that’s kind of you … Dr Kempinski.’
    â€˜Janos,’ he corrected. ‘We’re on first-name terms here.’
    â€˜Janos,’ she repeated tentatively, as if finding it inappropriate.
    He gulped. Even the tone of her voice was enough to send goose pimples across his flesh. It was so girlish, so vulnerable and so alive. The man on the operating table suddenly seemed very far away.
    For a while they struggled with small talk, which had never been his strong point. Then she came to his rescue and led him through a minefield of conversational pitfalls so he avoided giving the impression that he was a total idiot. She apologised for starting her new job by taking time off but, she explained, she had an appointment with an eye specialist the next morning at ten and everyone knew that such appointments had to be booked six months in advance, at least.
    â€˜Of course. That’s quite all right,’ he said, even though decisions of this kind were not his to make.
    â€˜I can stay late to make up for it,’ she offered.
    â€˜I won’t hear of it,’ he said.
    â€˜Thank you.’
    She was originally from Odense, she told him, and had lived in Aarhus for ten years. She had started studying Danish at the university, except rising unemployment figures for arts graduates had scared her off and she had switched to a business course.
    It was something completely different that scared him: a sudden fear that she might not reappear the following day. That he might never see her again.
    Kempinski tore himself away with difficulty. Heading down the corridor to the dialysis ward, whistling, he felt a hot flush wash through his body and he decided that he had generated sufficient energy to visit the Special Patient, as he had named him.
    Normally he had very little contact with his dialysis patients, but he had taken an interest in this particular patient right from the start, possibly because the man’s exceptional circumstances had aroused his curiosity.
    The Special Patient’s name was Peter Boutrup. He was twenty-nine years old and had come from the new East Jutland State Prison – where he was serving a sentence for involuntary manslaughter – to receive dialysis treatment at the hospital. It had so far proved impossible to determine the cause of his kidney failure, but the situation was critical. If he didn’t receive a new kidney very soon, there would be nothing anyone could do for him.
    Kempinski continued to whistle as he made his way. ‘We Are the Champions’ was one of his favourite tunes, although the notes proved difficult to hit with any degree of accuracy.
    The case of Peter Boutrup had challenged his moral values from the start. It had in fact prompted – in the strictest confidence, of course – a debate among his colleagues on the question of priority