Death Benefit (41 page)

“Thanks,” Neri said, and meant it. He quickly entered through the van’s sliding door.

Prek watched him in the rearview mirror as he pulled off the wet jacket. Genti was tapping a pencil against the dash in time to the music.

“Did the George fellow look at you?” Prek asked, still watching the underling in the mirror. It was easier than turning around.

“He did. He looked me right in the eye. Why do you ask?”

“Just curious.”

“It doesn’t matter, does it?”

“Can’t imagine,” Prek said. “I was hoping they’d be together, but what can you do. When you finish getting settled, bring that milk carton up to the front and sit between us. I want you to look out the windshield for the Grazdani girl along with us. Six eyes are better than four.” The trickle of medical students had swelled to a horde. Like livestock returning from the pasture on their way back to the barn.

The van was parked on the west side of Haven Avenue facing southeast. Prek et al. were facing the medical students coming from the medical center complex, passing the van on the passenger’s side.

“We have one bird in the nest. Now, where the hell is the other one? Where the devil did she go?”

 

 

C
het McGovern waited with anticipation for the beautiful med student sitting in front of him to tell him if there was anything she wanted him to ask Jack Stapleton, who had performed the autopsies on the dead researchers she was interested in. McGovern tried to read her face. She’d looked crestfallen a few minutes earlier when he told her the bodies were gone, but now she seemed to have brightened. After a few moments’ contemplation, something seemed to have occurred to her.

“Well, maybe there is something you could ask,” Pia said.

“What? What would you like me to ask him?” McGovern said. He tried to mask his eagerness, worried it might scare her off.

Pia remembered Rothman’s rebound tenderness, which she had been the first to find. It heralded the peritonitis, which bore witness to what was going on in Rothman’s gut. Typhoid’s target organ was the small intestine. From her recent research she knew that the gut was also sensitive to radiation, particularly the cells that lined the gut. But it was the whole gut, not just the small intestine. If polonium was involved, then the whole gut would have been damaged.

“I’d like to know if the autopsy findings were typical for typhoid fever.”

“Let me go and find him,” McGovern said with alacrity. “Not a problem. Don’t move!”

He jumped up before Pia could change her mind and dashed out of the room, heading down the hall to Jack Stapleton’s office. He knocked on the door and barged in without waiting for an answer. To his dismay, the office was empty.

“Damn!” He then ran down to the office of Jack’s wife, Laurie, whose door was ajar as usual. To his delight both Laurie and Jack were there.

Laurie and Jack liked to hang out in one of their offices after the rush of the day and go over their cases and maybe make plans for the evening. The rush-hour traffic, particularly bad on Fridays, would subside a little if they waited to leave until six, and with the live-in nanny at home tending to JJ’s needs, there was no rush. This was their quiet time, and they relished it because it was in short supply considering how busy they both were.

“Jack. Thank God. Oh, hi, Laurie, how are you? Jack, listen.” Chet was talking excitedly and loudly at first but got mock-conspiratorial. He looked behind him and pushed Laurie’s office door almost closed so no one else could hear.

“Jack, I have got the best-looking fourth-year medical student in my office that I’ve ever seen. I mean ever. I need you to keep her interested until I can get her info. I had nothing to do tonight, but then she showed up. It’s like a sign. You gotta help me, man.”

As usual, Jack was amused by Chet, his former office mate and longtime friend. Jack had heard innumerable episodes of McGovern’s social antics. Laurie, on the other hand, had wearied of Chet’s incessant womanizing. She couldn’t resist baiting him a little.

“Chet, how old are you?” she said.

“I know,” he said, pretending to be sheepish.

“No, seriously, how old
are
you?”

Jack thought he should step in at this point, between his wife and his friend.

“How can I help you, Chet?”

McGovern stuck his head around the door and looked down the corridor to make sure Pia hadn’t left.

“Listen! This Columbia med student just came in asking about those two typhoid cases you worked on yesterday. Actually, she came in supposedly interested in an elective, but I guess that was a cover story. For some reason she wants to check the corpses for evidence of alpha radiation because they’d been using some alpha emitter radioisotopes in the lab where your two patients worked. She even brought in her own Geiger counter. When I told her the bodies had already gone she was disappointed. Thanks for being so over-the-top efficient with the death certificates and signing out the cases, Jack!”

“You’re welcome, buddy.”

Jack and Laurie smiled knowingly at each other. This was typical McGovern behavior. Each week there was a new hot prospect. It used to be Laurie felt badly for the man because she thought he was lonely. But that had changed. She was now convinced Chet did not want to find a mate. It was the chase he wanted, and he never tired.

“When I told her the bodies were gone, she wanted to ask you whether your findings were typical for typhoid.”

“Tell her the findings were indeed typical for typhoid, but a very serious case of typhoid from a remarkably virulent strain.”

“How about coming and telling her yourself? She’ll be more impressed.”

Jack looked at Laurie, who shrugged as if to say, “It’s okay by me.” Jack heaved himself to his feet, told Laurie he’d be right back, and followed Chet back to his office.

Chet made the introductions, and Jack could understand Chet’s enthusiasm. Grazdani was fetching. He noticed the Geiger counter. He quizzed Pia about her interest in his cases. She gave him the same story she’d told Chet, and Jack purposely didn’t challenge her although he was tempted. Instead he said, “My understanding is that you’re interested to know if the autopsy findings were typical for typhoid fever. Yes, they were: a very virulent form of typhoid fever. The gut, the target organ of the disease, was in bad shape, which is why they died so quickly. There were multiple perforations into the peritoneal cavity.”

Pia sat up straighter in her chair. “Have you seen anything like that before?” she asked.

“Well, no, not to that extent. But you have to remember that typhoid fever, and especially such a bad case, is rarely seen these days. It’s no longer the scourge it used to be before we had antibiotics.”

Laurie suddenly appeared. She’d decided not to be left out. Chet introduced her to Pia. Pia shook her hand and then turned her attention back to Jack and said, “The strain they were working with and which caused their infections was particularly virulent because it was grown in space, under a NASA program.”

“Really?” Jack said. He made a mental note to ask why no one had mentioned that fact.

“Was the involvement just in the small intestine or was it the whole intestine?” Pia asked.

“It was the whole intestine,” Jack said. “From the duodenum all the way down and including the rectum. In that sense it was unique. Usually it’s just in the small bowel. It was unique enough that I saved some rather large specimens in formalin. I thought they could be used in the future for teaching purposes. We take our teaching responsibilities very seriously around here, right, Dr. McGovern?”

The dig got Chet McGovern to mumble something, and Jack laughed. Pia looked confused, but in actuality she was giddy. She hadn’t even heard Jack’s sarcastic comment. All she had heard was that he’d saved sections of the gut! The bodies were gone, but pieces of the involved intestine were still available.

“I mean, I can’t show you any slides because the specimens haven’t been processed yet because the autopsy was only yesterday. But if you want to view the gross specimens, I’d be happy to show them to you. As for slides, if you provide your contact information, I’ll either tell you when they’re ready and you can come back, or, if you’d prefer, I could send some slides up to you at Columbia Medical School.”

“Oh, absolutely, I want to see the gross specimens,” Pia said. “And I want to see the slides too, when they’re ready.”

Jack looked at McGovern with a smile. “Dr. McGovern, make sure you get Miss Grazdani’s contact information.”

“I’ll be happy to do so,” McGovern said, beaming.

“Well, let’s go up,” Jack said, and all four trooped out of Chet’s office and headed for the stairs. Pia carried both her umbrella and the shopping bag holding the Geiger counter.

On the fourth floor they all filed into the histology lab. The supervisor, Maureen O’Conner, was still on duty. Jack could swear that since redheads had become very cool recently, Maureen’s red curls had gotten redder.

“So what do we have here on a Friday night?” Maureen quipped. “Is this a party or is it work?” She looked from Jack to Laurie to Chet to Pia. Chet made the introductions and Maureen shook hands with Pia.

“I want to look at some samples, if it’s okay, Maureen,” Jack said. “I know it’s late.”

“Ah, it’s never too late for you, Jack,” Maureen said, and Laurie rolled her eyes. Maureen had taken an early liking to Jack and babied him with special attention. Jack’s slides were always available a little quicker than everyone else’s.

Under Jack’s instruction, Maureen took out a number of formalin-filled sample bottles from the sample storage area and put them on an available and reasonably empty bench.

After donning gloves, Jack took out the pale intestine samples and put them on the countertop. He showed Pia the perforations and the marked erosion of the internal, mucosal epithelium that lined the organ. When she saw that Jack was ready to put them back into the sample bottles, Pia asked a question as casually as she could.

“Would you mind if I checked the sample with my Geiger counter?”

Jack shrugged. “It’s okay with me.”

Pia pulled the Geiger counter out of the shopping bag. After opening up the mica port specifically designed for alpha particles, Pia turned on the machine and positioned the Geiger counter as close to the intestinal sample as possible without touching it. Immediately the counter started giving off the clicks that announced the presence of radiation. As Pia moved the instrument even closer the clicks intensified until they were a continuous noise. Then the needle on the counter’s gauge went off the scale.

“Whoa,” said Jack. “What’s that about?”

Pia said nothing and moved the counter away from the sample and then back. It was unmistakable, the sample was emitting radiation, a lot of radiation. She did it again just to be certain, then turned off the Geiger counter and slipped it back into the shopping bag.

The three shocked MEs looked at one another and then at the young med student. Something wasn’t adding up at all. The sample of intestine had come from a man who had been signed out as having died of salmonella poisoning, yet the sample was emitting extremely high levels of alpha-particle radiation. This student had said that they had used radioisotopes in the laboratory as part of the experimental regimen, but could that have caused this radiation?

“What’s going on here?” Laurie asked, addressing Pia. Her voice was even, unchallenging. “This is all rather surprising. Do you have any explanation?”

Pia’s heart was racing, and she felt as though she might actually be in shock. She was not prepared to face the reality that Rothman’s and Yamamoto’s deaths might be a copycat of Alexander Litvinenko’s in London. Pia was terrified of not being able to get to the truth. Now, when it appeared that she’d found it, all she could feel was a rush of anxiety and paranoia. All she wanted to do at that moment was to get the hell out of the OCME, go back to the dorm, and give herself an opportunity to think about the implications of the discovery and what her next step should be.

“Miss, we need you to tell us what you think is going on,” Laurie said, her voice hardening to a degree. “This is an unexpected and very significant finding.”

Pia said nothing. She could feel the eyes of the MEs boring into her. She’d never had any reason to trust anyone in a position of authority. These three weren’t the police or hospital security, but they did work for the city. Who are the bad guys and who are the good guys? She didn’t know. The bigger question was, are there ever any good guys? She had to get away.

Jack was as flabbergasted as anyone else. “You mentioned isotopes, radioisotopes being used in Dr. Rothman’s lab?”

“Um, I’ll have to find out for sure,” Pia said. “I can get back to you in the morning. Do you come in on Saturdays?” She picked up her umbrella and hooked the shopping bag over her shoulder. She eyed the door to the hall.

Chet McGovern was trying hard to think of what Pia had told him about alpha emitters. “Earlier you mentioned something about lead and bismuth, something like lead-213 and bismuth-212, was that it?”

“It was the other way around: lead-212 and bismuth-213, actually. But yes, I did mention those isotopes, and now I have to go back and check to make sure they were the ones being used. I really need to leave.” Pia checked her watch. “Oh my goodness, it’s almost six o’clock. I promised to be back by six and it’s a forty-five-minute subway ride up to Washington Heights.”

The MEs could sense Pia’s acute anxiety. No one was convinced by her display of surprise at the time.

“I think you need to stay here until we get to the bottom of this,” Laurie said. “You might have been exposed yourself. Alpha emitters are dangerous if either ingested or breathed in. There might be other people who need to be checked out.”