The Clinic

Book excerpt: Kathleen Erickson, M.D. works part time in THE CLINIC caring for young women whose needs range from counseling, to birth control, and to therapeutic abortion. Kathleen, a 38 year old widow with two children, is a very active pro-choice obstetrician and gynecologist. As such she receives many threats to her life, including a gunshot wound in the middle of the night. She is sued for malpractice after performing a legal therapeutic abortion. A charge of manslaughter is added when the plaintiffs attorney discovers that all signed permits for the surgery have disappeared. The major frustration in her life is that of exposing a traitor, a Judas in THE CLINIC, whose hidden aim is to eliminate all abortion clinics by law or bombing. The final pages disclose this Judas as a most unlikely individual.