“I love you, too, Kat.”
I’ll have to get him that money, somehow, Kat thought. Mike’s all I have in the world.
Dr. Isler had been looking forward to working with Honey Taft again. He had forgiven her inept performance and, in fact, was flattered that she was in such awe of him. But now, on rounds with her once more, Honey stayed behind the other residents and never volunteered an answer to his questions.
Thirty minutes after rounds, Dr. Isler was seated in Benjamin Wallace’s office.
“What’s the problem?” Wallace asked.
“It’s Dr. Taft.”
Wallace looked at him in genuine surprise. “Dr. Taft? She has the best recommendations I’ve ever seen.”
“That’s what puzzles me,” Dr. Isler said. “I’ve been getting reports from some of the other residents. She’s misdiagnosing cases and making serious mistakes. I’d like to know what the hell is going on.”
“I don’t understand. She went to a fine medical school.”
“Maybe you should give the dean of the school a call,” Dr. Isler suggested.
“That’s Jim Pearson. He’s a good man. I’ll call him.”
A few minutes later, Wallace had Jim Pearson on the telephone. They exchanged pleasantries, and then Wallace said, “I’m calling about Betty Lou Taft.”
There was a brief silence. “Yes?”
“We seem to be having a few problems with her, Jim. She was admitted here with your wonderful recommendation.”
“Right.”
“In fact, I have your report in front of me. It says she was one of the brightest students you ever had.”
“That’s right.”
“And that she was going to be a credit to the medical profession.”
“Yes.”
“Was there any doubt about…?”
“None,” Dr. Pearson said firmly. “None at all. She’s probably a little nervous. She’s high-strung, but if you just give her a chance, I’m sure she’ll be fine.”
“Well, I appreciate your telling me. We’ll certainly give her every chance. Thank you.”
“Not at all.” The line went dead.
Jim Pearson sat there, hating himself for what he had done.
But my wife and children come first.
Chapter Eight
Honey Taft had the bad fortune to have been born into a family of overachievers. Her handsome father was the founder and president of a large computer company in Memphis, Tennessee, her lovely mother was a genetic scientist, and Honey’s older twin sisters were as attractive, as brainy, and as ambitious as their parents. The Tafts were among the most prominent families in Memphis.
Honey had inconveniently come along when her sisters were six years old.
“Honey was our little accident,” her mother would tell their friends. “I wanted to have an abortion, but Fred was against it. Now he’s sorry.”
Where Honey’s sisters were stunning, Honey was plain. Where they were brilliant, Honey was average. Her sisters had started talking at nine months. Honey had not uttered a word until she was almost two.
“We call her ‘the dummy,’” her father would laugh. “Honey is the ugly duckling of the Taft family. Only I don’t think she’s going to turn into a swan.”
It was not that Honey was ugly, but neither was she pretty. She was ordinary-looking, with a thin, pinched face, mousy blond hair, and an unenviable figure. What Honey did have was an extraordinarily sweet, sunny disposition, a quality not particularly prized in a family of competitive overachievers.
From the earliest time Honey could remember, her greatest desire was to please her parents and sisters and make them love her. It was a futile effort. Her parents were busy with their careers, and her sisters were busy winning beauty contests and scholarships. To add to Honey’s misery, she was inordinately shy. Consciously or unconsciously, her family had implanted in her a feeling of deep inferiority.
In high school, Honey was known as the Wallflower. She attended school dances and parties by herself, and smiled and tried not to show how miserable she was, because she did not want to spoil anyone’s fun. She would watch her sisters picked up at the house by the most popular boys at school, and then she would go up to her lonely room to struggle with her homework.
And try not to cry.
On weekends and during the summer holidays, Honey made pocket money by baby-sitting. She loved taking care of children, and the children adored her.