"My plan of attack was a bit
spur-of-the-moment, but I was improvising. I thought I’d start by making an
incision around the top of neck above the Adam’s Apple. I suspected that this
old fellow had died from something cancerous, for which he was taking no
serious treatment: there were plenty of syringe marks on his arms indicating
regular doses of something, most likely painkillers, but there was no sign that
he’d been on a drip. No chemotherapy then; the full head of hair was also a
giveaway. With the lack of personal hygiene and the bedsores, I figured that
he’d probably come to us from a hospice, where he’d been a cranky patient, left
‘til last on some nurse’s “To-Do” list. I was unsure about how well plumbed-in
this operating table was, so I thought I’d take this first cut nice and easy,
avoid slicing open as many of the larger neck vessels as I could so as to not
make a mess.
The bright edge of the scalpel sank into
the skin, just below the left point of his jaw. A vivid red trickle ran out and
curved away to the back of his neck..."
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