David weaved his black SL500 Mercedes convertible along the backroads of his Connecticut birthplace, thoughts thrashing through his mind, having conceded that the light but swirly snow had nullified his option of lowering the top-even though he believed he was a better fit when exercising that option.
His stature was a genetic mutation, he theorized quantum leap from diminutive parents. They had operated a small corner store-Brooks Grocery-for thirty-five years before reluctantly folding six months earlier, another casualty of the supermarket blitzkrieg. Along the way, they had budgeted for their only child's college and medical school tuitions at Yale.
David wouldn't activate the heater until the engine had warmed up. Usually when he arrived where he was going. He wore a blue tweed jacket and charcoal trousers. No hat, no overcoat. Just his trademark black scarf and gloves. From December to March, he added t-shirts, his only other winter concession. He eschewed clip-on bow ties in favor of the real McCoy. He appeared top-heavy, with an upper-body contour of a less towering man, perhaps a boxer. Empty-hipped, his trouser legs broke clear to his toes, a sight not lost on most observers. He would offer a dismissive wave. "Helps warm the tops of feet, you know."
It was an effort but he forestalled a consideration of his brush with death. What's there to consider anyway? The killer used a dagger and then a scalpel. Why not a car?
Pondering what he would eventually say to Nick Medicore about the origin of his house call practice, he wondered how much detail he should offer. The bottom line was that he had soured on both private, office-based practice and full-time hospital practice. It was a question of freedom. Freedom from staggering stacks of paperwork, from the annoyances of dealing with insurance companies and Health Maintenance Organizations, and from other elements in the burgeoning Managed Care approach to medicine. Meanwhile, he had become increasingly intrigued by police detective work. He had, in fact, always considered himself a medical detective, deriving more pleasure from making a diagnosis than from treating a disease. Yet, he didn't want to abandon patient care altogether. The solution, then, in avoiding the issues that irked him and in fulfilling his investigative and patient contact interests would be to restrict his practice to afternoon house calls for other doctors and to reserve mornings for sleuthing. David preferred the word, "snooping."
He had been given a brief medical history about Megan Kelly, the patient he would soon examine and knew that a youngster with diabetes was as brittle as they come-that he might find her about to lapse into coma, or about to convulse from too much insulin, or anything else in between. But for the last half-mile to the Kelly apartment, he overrode the medical scenarios he had waded through many times before.
Sure you want sleuthing at this level? Why not? My hospital. My friends-gone. Friends? Cortez maybe. But Bugles? Now, one less Christmas card and no more aftershave stenches. And what's with what's-his-name, Medicore? Just feeling people out?
He told himself he wouldn't miss those mornings in the halls when he was between clinical meetings and the old industrialist strutted around, wearing his Board chairmanship on his sleeve, intolerable but for his money. That was Bugles. Nonetheless, he had been murdered now along with one of Surgery's pioneers.
David aggravated over the two deaths. He had never been so close to major crime before. Never heard the frantic cries of doctors who knew better, in a killing whose M.O. was unspeakable. Never seen a pearly dagger in the chest of a distinguished colleague. Never tasted fumes while brushed by a speeding tire.
But the surgery was brutal murder. A knifing in a sanctum sanctorum. And he was almost number three. Accept the challenge? Bring it on.
David had called on ten-year-old Megan once before, when he had found her on the verge of insulin shock because she had played a vigorous soccer game but had not reduced herinsulin dose beforehand. So, he had no trouble finding the third floor flat behind Hollings' newest strip mall. Small black bag in hand, he climbed the exposed stairs in back, glancing down at a macadam play yard, its icy surface ruptured by frost heaves, like mole work on a spring lawn.
Mrs. Kelly stood at the open door, wringing her hands. "I saw you through the window, Dr. Brooks. Megan's very sick."
"Let's have a look, Mrs. Kelly," he said, handing her his scarf and gloves.
They walked through a kitchen with an uneven floor and by a table whose mustard oilcloth matched the paint chips David noticed beneath a windowsill. A crucifix hung over the door to the child's bedroom.
Megan struggled to push herself up in bed. "Hi … doc … tor," she said breathlessly. Her words brought on a coughing fit. When she settled down, David noted her shallow, rapid respirations. Her mother went to the window and raised the shade.
"Just lie back down, Megan," David said. "That's it, easy does it."
As he leaned over the child and placed his hands on both sides of her neck, he detected the fruity smell of acetone. She felt hot and dry. Her black hair was knotted, her eyes sunken. She scraped her tongue over her lips.
"You checking her urine, Mrs. Kelly?"
"Every day. I checked it four times today."
"What are they showing? Both readings are up, right?"
"Yes, Doctor." She consulted a small piece of cardboard which she pulled from the pocket of her housecoat. "The sugar is four plus," she said, "and acetone reads strong positive. It's been like that for three days." Megan's chest heaved during another coughing paroxysm.
David examined her from head to toe, then returned to her chest. He put his stethoscope aside and said, "There's the problem, Mrs. Kelly. Has she been coughing long?"
"All week. She can't seem to shake it. "
"Well, she has bronchitis and that's upsetting the control of the diabetes. Here's how we should handle it." David scribbled prescriptions for an antibiotic and an expectorant, advised setting up a vaporizer, instructed the mother to triple the child's fluid intake, and explained how and when to increase Megin's insulin dosages.
Winking at Megan, he said, "I know you feel rotten but you're going to do just fine." He motioned Mrs. Kelly to the hallway.
"Now, get the prescriptions filled right away-you know Hatcher's down the corner will deliver-and if she's no better by morning, call Dr. Jasper. Between now and then, if you get worried, call me, okay?"
She nodded and said, "Could you wait one more minute?" She disappeared into a back room and returned waving an insurance form.
He thrust out both hands defensively. "No, no, those things scare me. I'll have Belle at my office contact you." He left, not at all certain he would give Belle a record of the visit.
David raced to his home on the eastern edge of Hollings, a city of 100,000 people-big for Connecticut. Several decaying but proud manufacturing plants clasped hands along the valley river, holdouts to the exodus south, to warmer climates and cheaper human resources. Industrial parks with their prefabricated look-alikes occupied higher ground while yet above them, unpretentious residential houses stocked both hills, each a template for the other. The city's shape and color changed with the seasons, a croissant in foliaged autumn, a warship in the grimy sludge of winter.
He intended to freshen up before returning to the hospital, to splash his face with cold water at the bathroom sink, again ignoring the minor and the reflection of his chin. Another mutation. The cleft there was a shaving trouble spot, a breeding ground for nicks and cuts among inaccessible stubble, always the trigger for morning obscenities and vows to bury the gap in a goatee some day.
David noticed the snow falling more heavily through the dark now, sucked against his windshield like bits of confetti. On the car phone, he called in his report to Dr. Jasper's office-that he had found the child in stable condition but upped her insulin dose in the face of a respiratory infection. He glanced at the dashboard clock which registered five-twenty. "Ah, shoot!" He had missed the start of his karate class. From five to six on Tuesdays, David helped Grand Master Bruno Bateman conduct a class for beginners, and on Thursdays, he polished his own skills during controlled combat with other black belts. He punched in the studio number. Agnes, the receptionist, answered.
"Gorgeous? Tell the boss I'm sorry but I'm tied up tonight."
"He understands, David, and he's already started the class. We caught the news on TV. I couldn't believe my ears-murders like that in a hospital. Guess you'll be preoccupied."
"To say the least, but I'll try to make Thursday-unless things get worse." His last phrase had sneaked out, and he hoped Agnes wouldn't ask him to explain.
"I'll tell Bruno you called, and you be careful, okay?"
Before David and Kathy had cemented their relationship, he and Agnes had shared a drink or two, and more than a few all-nighters. Sometimes he reminded her that she taught him moves which were not exactly martial arts.
"I'll be careful. See you Thursday, I hope."
David hung up the phone and resumed his silent monologue.
How did the killer know he was involved-if it was the killer who ran him down? Had he been seen in the amphitheater? Surgery? The lab? And he had to know where the parking space was-or, if not, he had to go look for it. In either case, he most likely knew there was still one there.
David dodged answers that came at him like flashes from a strobe. He settled on a few and also concluded he would not inform the others of the ambush; they might somehow limit his movements.
He ran through a list of possible suspects as well. At the top was Dr. Ted Tanarkle, the pathologist. The blood led to his department. He was off for the day. But, killing like that? Why, for God's sake? And taking a swipe at his good buddy?
Oak Lane. 10 Oak Lane. He sideslipped into the driveway of his yellow, four-room ranch which was cloned in a cul-de-sac. From out back, heavy oak trees hung over it, trees which David had often spoken to. He would level with Kathy about his silent conversations and, although certain she had rolled her eyes whenever she turned away, he couldn't recall that she had ever challenged his sanity.
Inside, after his sink ritual, he slipped on a shoulder rig containing a semiautomatic Beretta Minx.22 and gathered up his attache case. On the ten-minute ride back to the hospital, he told himself that most likely no one had ever seen him open the leather case, and he liked that. Not much visible in it except an Undercover.38 Special wrapped in terry cloth and some extra rounds of ammo. Hidden behind a retractable panel beneath its lid, however, were a whistle, a small cylinder of Mace and a Scout knife. He also liked the fact that the case announced he was in his detective mode, often parodying, "Some wear two hats; I carry two bags." He would smile. "Two guns, too." He had a name for his case: Friday. Nothing to do with Joe Friday or Girl Friday, just the day he bought it.
A quarter mile from the hospital, a formidable complex crammed into the eastern hillside, David's eyes caught its commanding clock tower on the horizon, a reflex he was certain all visitors shared. Six-fifteen. This wasn't the first time he admired the hundred-year-old structure, a landmark continuation of the elevator shaft still in use for the administrative section of the building complex. Half again as tall, it sported silent clocks on three sides, shaded by a copper cupola; and, in David's mind, it pierced the sky like a foundation pile in reverse. Architecturally, it was the only feature of the hospital he liked, tested and timeless amidst a mishmash of wings and additions, red brick against greys and tans and glass.
Inside, he discovered that Suite 7, the locker room and both hallways on either side had been cordoned off. Also, the stairs to Pathology. Kathy and Nick stood talking to a police officer.
"Aha, there you are," she said, "we're starved." "You're through?" David asked.
"Yep."
"At both scenes?"
"Sparky's not done but we are. He just started with Cortez. Let's go eat. Is the cafeteria still open?"
"Better be. Sure, let's go; I can do my thing later. I'd like to see the legitimate surgeons at the operation before they go off gallivanting or something. Hope they're still around."
"Are you kidding?" Nick said. "We detained everybody within earshot, like good police are supposed to. We already interrogated the doctors. They're in the caf right now. They wanted to go home but we told them to wait for you."
"You mean you're running interference for me?" Nick nudged Kathy with his shoulder. "She said I'd better or she'd make my life miserable."
"Who's the supervisor here?" David asked, his smile improvised.
"I just arrived, so she is until I get the lay of the land. Eventually, I get brutal."
They sat in a corner of the cafeteria, their meals on trays before them. Elongated planters defined rows of tables. They deaden the noise, David had once been told. Here and there, young men coated in white and collared with stethoscopes either gobbled down food or fiddled with their pagers. Nurses in multicolored uniforms picked at salads. Recognizing the Chief of Surgery who sat with his associate several tables away, David spread out his fingers to gesture he would visit them in twenty minutes. They ate in silence, avoiding each other's look. Even from a distance, David could see splotches of black blood on the scrub suits beneath their unbuttoned lab coats.
He addressed Nick. "Shall we compare notes?"
"Compare with Kathy," Nick answered, winking.
"I'm observing."
Kathy, who had dug into a sandwich, looked up at Nick and said, "You know, you're one heck of a boss." David gathered she was finally able to insert the comment she hesitated making earlier.
"Like I said, give me time, I'll get worse."
David pitched in: "I find that hard to believe." He waited for a response and, hearing none, said, "I haven't found much except the obvious. You saw the stains, I take it?"
"They tracked to Pathology," Kathy said.
"Or through Pathology."
"There are stains on the other side of Pathology?"
"What I mean is," David said, "the killer may have gone through the department. That is, he didn't stop there. No, I don't think there's any blood on the other side."
"`Think'? Did you check?" Kathy asked.
"Well … no."
There was an awkward silence before David said, "See, I'm learning."
Kathy said gently, "We found no stains there." She buttered a roll. "Did you see the Chairman's body up close?"
"Unfortunately, yes, and it's hard to believe Mr. Killer did what he did. Right under our noses, too. He sure had…block your ears, Kath…balls." He watched her for a moment and then added, "You should be blushing."
"David, my darling, after years with you, I'm beyond that."
"You sure you didn't stop blushing before you met me?"
Kathy crimped her mouth in annoyance.
Nick said, "Now what do you see in a guy like that?"
"Oh," Kathy replied, "blond hair, blue eyes, gorgeous physique-but who's bragging? I don't know about that mustache though-it might have to go after the wedding this summer. That, and the little house."
"Samson's strength was in his hair, you know. I'm not Samson, but I am David."
"Don't shave it off," Kathy countered. They chuckled.
"And I like my small house," David said.
"Un huh."
They had dated on and off in college and then veered apart not only vocationally but romantically. It was a decision of David's choosing, colored by a fierce determination to train hard for a medical career, unencumbered by any serious personal relationships. They continued to exchange more than Christmas greetings but, by the time he was discharged from the Navy, Kathy had been married and widowed. Her husband and fellow police academy graduate had been shot and killed in a drug raid. And though he shared her grief, in the decade since her husband's death, David came to believe fate had gradually emboldened his love for her. Over half that interval, he had become a one-woman man. Plus now they worked together in police investigations.
Near the end of his meal, Nick removed his glasses and gesticulated with them as he spoke. "Dr. Brooks, in twenty-four years of detective work, I never came across an M.O. like this, so we can't round up the usual suspects. Besides, it's most likely an inside job, don't you think?"
"It seems that way, but we'll see"
"Do you know of anyone in this hospital who would kill so dramatically?" Nick continued. "Especially the surgery bit. He seemed to be making a point, not to mention thumbing his nose."
"Or revealing a machismo complex," David said. "There are lots of guys here with that. But driven to murder? I can't say that."
"Now, here's where you can top us, David," Kathy said. "Those were slices through those organs? Liver and-what-the spleen?"
"That's part of what killed him. Blood loss from there plus the arteries to the kidneys were cut clean. So he bled to death."
"Hold it, you guys," Nick said, "I'm having calve's liver here, remember?" He stared at his plate, then pushed it aside. "Think I've had enough. I'm going back for some coffee. You want some?" They both nodded.
David answered more of Kathy's anatomy questions and when Nick returned, he said, "Dr. Brooks, I've been wondering-how can you fit in criminal investigations with your practice?"
"What practice? That's gone, finis. I didn't like it so it didn't last long-maybe four years."
"I still don't understand the house calls."
"I make them full time. For other doctors. Well, not exactly full time-afternoons. But it's all I do. Except for today, and that's only because I had recommended Cortez."
"And except for karate, guns, communing with nature, the theater," Kathy said. There was a touch of resignation to her voice.
"Wait a minute, you go with me to the theater. And you probably know more about handling a gun than I do." "Maybe, but I don't collect them. You should see his basement, Nick."
"Almost every gun there was given over to me by Dad."
She stirred her coffee and said, "I've never thought of it this way before, David, but, you know, you're a series of contradictions."
"Meaning?"
"It's nothing really earth shattering: you drive a Mercedes but you've got a tiny house up in splinter village. There's karate but you like opera. My heavens, you read mythology! What else? Oh, the gun collection but you adore animals. And how about the business of talking to your trees?"
"Kathy, don't! What is this? We've got dead bodies here and you're talking mythology?"
Kathy reached across the table, grabbed his hand, rose up and kissed it. "Don't be hurt. It's part of what I love about you." She sat back in her chair but still stroked his hand with the tips of her fingers.
"You two want me to leave?" Nick asked.
"Sorry, Nick," Kathy said. She drew back her hands and explored David's face. "You look tired," she said, "and when you're tired, you get effusive. Why not give him the whole spiel?"
"You mean effuse it to him? And I'm not tired."
"Effuse the spiel?" Nick said. They giggled like teenagers over a raunchy joke. David sensed most heads turning their way.
He shrugged and whispered, "We'd better cool it, folks." They shifted in their chairs. Kathy swept away some crumbs.
"Okay, Nick," David said, "the background, quick and simple. After the Navy, I tried private practice but it wasn't for me. They were looking for a full-time doctor here, working on the administrative side of things in conjunction with Dr. Tanarkle. So I signed on."
"The pathologist?" Nick interrupted.
"The pathologist. Terrific guy. He taught me a lot-especially forensics. Shipped cases to me or recommended me because he knew I was interested."
"And he's now a suspect."
"Now a suspect. God, I pray it doesn't pan out." David crossed his fingers in the air. "Anyway, despite Ted, the challenge was never there and I did miss patient contact, so I quit after being assured by enough of my colleagues that they'd use me for house calls. I latched onto Belle who works out of the Hole in the morning and sets up my afternoon schedule. We usually have lunch here and then she comes with me on the calls. Handles the paper work plus all the other details. And here I am-been at it for a year, now. So far, so good, and I have more time for snooping … ah, sleuthing … and those other things Kathy blasted."
"I didn't blast them."
"I mean, referred to." This time, David reached for Kathy's hand and said, "So she's doing what she likes, I'm doing what I like, we're racing each other to forty and we're getting hitched in six months."
"Married. And you're the one who said `blasted.' "Married and hitched."
"You're so into control."
Nick ran his hand over his scalp. "Now, just to firm up this investigation," he said. "Of the three of us, I'm needed the least for day-to-day operations, so you two take over. But keep me posted. You know, the press, city hall. They're all watching."
Kathy glanced at David and said, "And between the two of us, I need your help more than you need mine, so you sort of take over. Keep me posted, too, and just remember, I love you, honey, but let's not blow it."
David, surprised but reassured, pressed on a rare twitch in his toe and said casually, "Don't I always keep you informed?" He believed the comment didn't fit and added, "It's bigger than what I've been doing."
"Well, you wanted more experience," Kathy responded. "You certainly know your way around the hospital. And it's not that you won't have forensic support from our department."
David felt obliged to indicate he'd check with them on a regular basis.
"That's important," Nick said. "We're really accountable to city government. And you're private. Besides, I've learned fast that we have a cut-every-year budget and we're short-handed. The entire police detective division is running on a shoestring. Crime scene search units are way understaffed, as you saw. Our homicide squad's been cut in half so Kathy here has twice as much to do." He counted on his fingers. "Electronic Unit, Polygraph Section, Forgery Squad-forget it. Sparky does it all. Precinct squads? We're lucky to have any at all; some have been moved to Narcotics and some to Sex Crimes. So you see, Dr. Brooks, we're simply enlisting your assistance at a time when things are piling up. You can be the point man, but it has to appear as though Kathy and I are. It shouldn't be a problem."
"I understand." David did, but he also judged it to be a half-baked endorsement. Homicides? Never sifted through them before. Nick knows it. Certainly Kathy knows it. So even if our investigations run parallel, they've given me some slack. They've talked this over plenty. Obvious. But, as Nick said, they've got other things, plus they're hurting. Me? Give it full attention, maybe take some afternoons off, beat them to the punch. Yeah, that's it. Problem is though, beating the killer to the punch.
"Publicly, it will seem like a natural," Nick continued. "An M.D. sleuth whose stomping grounds are where the crimes were committed. And, if this is what you want, have a go at it, and you're lucky, you know, because we've, like, come to you. Back in San Diego, we had guys knocking down our doors to get a little business."
Yeah, they talked it over all right. That's how Kathy would put it: "Tell him he's lucky, Nick."
Kathy said, "I'm confident you're ready to handle it. Just remember it's not just another 10–65."
"Why does everybody in law enforcement always bring up Missing Persons with me?"
"Because that's what you always complain about. And, really, that's about all you've handled till now."
"Not so. I never told you I had a 10-91H when you were at that convention a couple months back."
Kathy stifled a laugh poorly. "A stray horse?"
"Sure, rode him back to the farm, too."
"You would."
"Why wouldn't I?"
"Because you never rode a horse."
"I have now." They got up to leave.
"And incidentally, Kath, speaking of horses, if you were one, you'd probably be a Shetland." David held his arm at a right-angle over her head. "Have you cleared five feet yet?"
"I'm way past that."
"What? Half an inch?"
"No, a full inch," she replied with an exaggerated nod. She stomped her foot in the process.
David reminded them he would walk over to see the Surgical Chief and his associate. He shook Nick's hand and kissed Kathy lightly on the lips. "Thank you both."
"So long, cowboy," she replied.
David joined the two surgeons halfway across the room. They stood when he arrived, and he felt the air crackle with tension. The Associate's face was scarlet. David continued his handshake with the Chief as he spoke: "Ned, Steve, thanks for waiting. Sorry-must have been agony witnessing that butchering."
"I feel awful about it," the Chief said. "Two murders like that, and what's it do to our new program?"
"I know. Look, I won't keep you long. Okay for just two questions?"
"Take all the time you need, David."
"Well, first and foremost, how'd that creep end up taking Cortez's place?"
"We blew it," the Chief said. "I thought Steve here would be meeting with him before the procedure and he guessed I would."
"Not `guessed,' the Associate snapped. "You told me you would. I can still hear your words."
The Chief scowled. "We'll talk about that later. Anyway … "
David broke in as if to minimize their bones of contention. "Did either of you recognize who the imposter was?"
"We never saw his face," the Chief answered. "He came in wearing a surgical mask. Later, I took it upon myself to ask the same thing of the nurses and technicians. They saw him only masked. Even beforehand, while he scrubbed. I checked at the desk; nobody saw him come in. And, I'm kicking myself for not arriving sooner, but, as I said, I assumed Steve would be here. The guy never said a word during the surgery … if that's what you call it … never asked for an instrument, just reached out. You know how it works, the scrub tech automatically snaps them into your hand."
The Chief exhaled as if blowing out a match. He continued: "Earlier, when I said, `Good afternoon, Dr. Cortez,' he just nodded. But, I figured, hell, he's the dignitary. He's the one getting our organ transplant program off the ground. Don't interfere with his concentration. And, David, as I look back, his eyes were so eerie. They never stopped moving around. They were everywhere. How anything had a chance to register with him, I don't know."
"Tell me, did he seem to know what he was doing?"
"To the point when all hell broke loose, I suppose he did. But, you know the usual procedure, David. After his initial incision, I entered the peritoneum for him, just like a resident would. He never got to the pancreas, but he sure knew where the renals were."
"And the liver and spleen," the Associate said.
"And the liver and spleen. Everything happened so damn fast. It was like his punctuation mark," the Chief said. "You saw what he did?"
"Yes."
David rose. "I said I'd bother you with only a couple questions, and that's all the information I need for now." He looked at his watch. "It's after seven and you two must be bushed. Thanks for waiting-I'll be in touch. And, oh, by the way, how did the transplant brouhaha settle out with Bowie County across town?"
"Some friendly sister hospital. It never did settle out. They made it quite clear that if they didn't get a piece of the action, they'd refer their cases out-of-state."