Desperate Measures (19 page)

As a siren approached, Pittman shoved his bleeding hand into his overcoat pocket. He stayed with a group of frightened men and women who hurried away. By the time the flashing lights of the first police car arrived, he was turning a corner, hailing a taxi.

"What's all the trouble down there?" the driver asked. "A shooting."

"At a church? God help us."

"Somebody better."

"Where do you want to go?"

A damned good question, Pittman thought. In desperation, he told the driver the first nearby location he could think of. "Washington Square."

Pittman hoped he seemed just one of many Sunday-morning strollers. In contrast with the week's cool, rainy weather, the day was warin and bright. Joggers and bicyclists sped past street musicians and portrait Painters, indigents and street vendors. Near the Washington Arch, students with New York University T-shirts played with a Frisbee while a beard-stubbled man holding a bottle in a paper bag stumbled past them.

Pittman didn't pay attention to any of it. Concealed in his overcoat pocket, his hand continued to throb against a handkerchief that he had wrapped around it to staunch the flow of blood. obviously he was hurt worse than he'd thought. He felt light-headed again, but this time he was sure it was from the blood he'd lost. He had to get to a hospital. But a hospital wouldn't give him treatment unless he showed ID and filled out an information form. If the receptionist recognized his name or if the police alerted the hospitals to be on the lookout for someone with a bleeding hand ... No. He had to find another way to get medical help.

And then what? he kept insisting to himself. Where will you go after that? Father Dandridge was supposed to have all your answers, and now he's dead and you don't know anything more than when you started.

Did they kill him? Pittman thought urgently. If they were after me, why didn't they wait until I left the church?

Because they wanted both of us. They must have been watching him. They were looking for any sign that he was going to act on what Millgate had told him in earlier confessions. And when I showed up, they assumed we were working together.

But what did Father Dandridge know that was so important? Grollier, the prep school Millgate had attended.

It must have some significance. Damn it, somebody's worried enough to kill anybody I come in touch with who might know anything about the thoughts that tortured Millgate in his final hours.

Final hours.

Pittman suddenly knew where he had to go next.

"Detective Logan," he said to the intercom. A buzzer sounded, electronically unlocking the outside door.

Pittman stepped through, noting the attractive wood paneling in the Upper West Side apartment building. He took the woman's elevator to the fifth floor. He'd been worried that her phone number wouldnt be listed or that she wouldn't be home after he checked the phone book and came here. As he knocked on the door, he worried as well that she wouldn't be receptive, but when she opened the door, using her left hand to keep her housecoat securely fastened, squinting at him through sleepy eyes, she looked puzzled more than upset.

Silhouetted by sunlight streaming through a living room window behind her, Jill Warren murmured, "Don't you know its the middle of the night?"

That was something Pittman had hoped for-that instead Of going out to enjoy the day, she would be home, sleeping after she finished her night shift at the hospital.

"Sorry," he said. ,I didn't have a choice."

Jill yawned, reminding Pittman of a kitten pawing at its face. Although her long blond hair was tangled and her face was puffy from just having been wakened, Pittman thought she was beautiful.

"You need to ask me more questions?" "A little more than that, I'm afraid."

"I don't understand."

"I need help." Pittman withdrew his bloodstained hand from his overcoat pocket.

"My God." Jill's eyes came fully open. "Huffy. Come in." She gripped his arm, guiding him through the doorway, quickly closing it.

"The kitchen's this way. I wondered why you looked so pale. I thought maybe you hadn't gotten any sleep. But ... Here, put your hand in the sink." As Pittman wavered, she hurriedly brought a chair from the kitchen table and made him sit beside the sink while she pulled off his overcoat.

The .45 concealed in its right pocket thunked against the chair and made Jill frown.

"Look, I know this is an imposition," Pittman said. "If I'm interrupting anything ... If someone's here and .

"Nobody At the hospital, PPittman had noted that she wasn't wearing a wedding ring. Nonetheless, he'd been concerned that she might be living with someone. Her roommate might have gone out for the day to avoid making noise, to let her sleep.

"I live alone," Jill said. "This handkerchief is stuck to your wound.

I'm going to run cool water over it andpeel it off. How did you-? Good. It's coming off. Does that hurt?"

I "No.

"Sure. That's why your face turned gray. This looks like a cut. " ."Broken glass."

"Deep. You should have gone to the hospital instead of coming here. " "Your apartment was closer."

"You need stitches."

"No," Pittman said.

Jill frowned at him, then returned her attention to Pittman's hand. "Which do you object to, the hospital or the stitches?"

Pittman didn't answer.

Jill rinsed the crusted blood off the hand, then directed a gentle flow of water into the cut. "Keep your hand under the water. I have to get bandages and disinfectant."

Then she was gone. Pittman worried that she might decide to run from the apartment.

To his relief, he heard her opening drawers in another room. He stared at the blood welling from his hand, the water diluting it, pink fluid flowing down the drain. Weary, he looked away, feeling oddly at a distance as he scanned the small, bright, neatly arranged kitchen. A pot holder in the shape of a cat seemed more amusing than it should have been.

"Your face is grayer," Jill said with concern, hurrying back. "I can't imagine what you're smiling about. Do you feel delirious?"

"A little off balance."

"For God sake, don't fall off the chair." Jill put her arms around him, leaning past him, over the sink.

He felt her breasts against his back but was too tired to respond with anything but gratitude that she was taking care of him.

Gently she washed his hand, blotted it with a towel, applied amber disinfectant to the cut, put a dressing on a gauze pad, and wrapped a bandage around the hand. Blood soaked through the first layer. Jill bandaged faster, adding layer after layer.

"You'd better hope this stops the bleeding, or you'll be going to the hospital whether you like it or not," she said.

Pittman stared at the thick padding around his hand. A portion of it turned pink, but it didn't spread.

"One more layer for good luck." Jill wrapped it again. "Now let's get you into the living room and up on the sofa."

"I'm fine," Pittman said. "I can do it myself."

"Yeah, sure, right." Jill lifted him, putting an arm around him as his knees bent.

The sunlit living room turned shadowy for a moment. Then Pittman was on the sofa. "Lie down."

"Look, I really am sorry."

"Put your feet on this pillow. I want them higher than your head."

"I wouldn't have come here if there was any other way t, "Stop talking. You sound out of breath. Lie still. I'm going to get you some water."

Pittman closed his eyes. The next thing he knew, Jill was cradling his head, helping him to drink.

"If you don't feel queasy after this, I'll get you some juice. Do you think you could eat? Would you like something bland like toast?"

"Eat?"

"You make it sound like a new idea."

"The last time I ... You could say my meals have been irregular. "

Jill frowned harder. "Your overcoat's torn. Your pants have dirt on them, as if you've been crawling on the ground. -What's going on? How did you get hurt?"

"A broken window." I 'You look like you've been in a fight." Pittman didn't answer. "We're not going to get anywhere if you're not honest," Jill said. "I'm taking a big chance by helping you."

"I know" you're not a policeman. You're Matthew Pittman, and the police are hunting you."

The shock of her statement brought Pittman upright. "No," Jill said. "Don't try to sit."

"How long have you-?"

"Lie back down. How long have I known? Since about thirty seconds after you started talking to me at the hospital. "

"Dear God." This time when Pittman tried to sit up, Jill put a hand on his chest.

"Stay down. I wasn't kidding. If the bleeding doesn't stop, you'll have to go to a hospital."

Pittman studied her and nodded. Adrenaline offset his lightheadedness. "Matt."

"What?"

"You called me Matthew. My friends call me Matt."

"Does that mean I'm supposed to think of you as a friend?" "Hey, it's better than thinking of me as an enemy."

"And you're not?"

"Would you believe me if I said no?"

"It's not as if you never lied to me before."

"Look, I don't get it. If you knew who I was at the hospital, why didn't you call the police?"

"What makes you think I didn't? What if I told you I played along with your charade because I was afraid of you?

You might have hurt me if I let on I knew who you really were." "Did you phone the police?"

"You don't remember me, do you?" Jill asked.

"Remember? Where would we have . - . '?"

"I'm not surprised. You were under a lot of stress. About as much as anybody can take."

"I still don't - . ."

"It's only in the last six months that I've been working in adult intensive care."

Pittman shook his head in confusion.

"Before that, I worked in the children's section. I left because I couldn't stand seeing ... I was one of Jeremy's nurses."

Pittman felt as if his stomach had turned to ice.

"I was on duty the night Jeremy died," Jill said. "In fact, I'd been on duty all that week. You'd received permission to sit in a corner of the room and watch over him. Sometimes you'd ask me about the meaning of some of the numbers on his life-support machines. Or you'd get a look at his chart and ask me what some of the terms meant. But you weren't really seeing me. Your sole attention was toward Jeremy. You had a book with you, and sometimes if everything was quiet, you'd read a page or two, but then you'd raise your eyes and study Jeremy, study his monitors, study Jeremy again. I got the feelingthat you were focusing all your will, all your energy and prayers, as if by concentrating, you could transfer your strength to Jeremy and cure him."

Pittman's mouth felt suddenly dry. "That's what I thought. Dumb, huh?"

Jill's eyes glistened. "No, it was one of the most moving things I've ever seen."

Pittman tried to sit up, groping for the glass of water on the table beside the sofa.

"Here, let me help." Jill raised the glass to his lips.

"Why do you keep looking at me that way?" Pittman asked.

"I remember," Jill said, "how you helped take care of Jeremy. Little things. Like dipping a washcloth into ice water and rubbing it over him to try to bring down his fever. He was in a coma by then, but all the while you washed him, you were talking to him as if he could hear every word you said.

Pittman squinted, painfully remembering. "I was sure he could. I thought if I got deep enough into his mind, he'd respond to what I was telling him and wake up."

Jill nodded. "And then his feet began curling. The doctor told you to massage them and his legs, to try to keep Jeremy's muscles limber so they wouldn't atrophy."

"Sure." Pittman felt pressure in his throat. "And when his feet still kept curling, I put his shoes on him for an hour, then took them off, then put them on in another hour, After all, when Jeremy would finally come out of the coma, when his cancer would finally be cured, I wanted him to be able to walk normally."

Jill's blue eyes became intense. "I watched you every night of my shift all that week. I couldn't get over your devotion. In fact, even though I was due for two days off, I asked to stay on the case. I was there when Jeremy went into crisis, when he had his heart attack."

Pittman had trouble breathing.

"So when I read the newspapers and learned all the murders you were supposed to have committed, I didn't believe it," Jill said. "Yes, the newspapers theorized you were so over come with grief that you were suicidal, that you wanted to take other people with you. But after watching you for a week in intensive care, I knew you were so gentle, you couldn't possibly inflict pain on anyone. Not deliberately. Perhaps on yourself. But not on anyone else."

"You must have been surprised when I showed up at the hospital.

"I couldn't understand what was going on. If you were suicidal and on a killing rampage, why would you come to the intensive-care ward? Why would you pretend to be a detective and ask about Jonathan Millgate's last night in the ward? That's not how a guilty person would act. But it is how a person who's been trapped would act in order to get answers, to try to prove he didn't do what the police said he did. "