Doc in the Box (18 page)

“That’s her, all right.”

“A skinny-assed doctor’s wife who knows nothing about guns is not going to use a thirty-eight. She’d get a little sissy twenty-five, maybe, or a twenty-two.”

“Maybe Stephanie used a thirty-eight so Brentmoor’s shooting would look like a man did it.”

“The shootings were all done by the same person,” Katie said.

“Maybe she killed the other four people to cover up her husband’s death.”

This time Katie’s snort nearly took out her sinuses. It was followed by a raucous laugh. “You really think a blond ditz could orchestrate five murders?”

“She’s not stupid or disorganized,” I said. “She’s carpooled two kids and chaired hospital benefits. She’s organized and hard as nails. Five killings would be easier than one hospital benefit and she wouldn’t have to write any thank-you notes.”

“She’s not a serial killer,” Katie said. “You saw how much blood there was with the radiation oncology murders. Could you see this woman ruining three separate outfits?”

She had me there. That was an awful lot of Ralph
Lauren to ruin. Besides, Stephanie did have an airtight alibi. “Maybe she hired someone,” I said, trotting out my hired gun theory one more time.

“Where? Could you see her in a redneck bar? Or reading
Soldier of Fortune
magazine?”

“Okay, you’re starting to convince me.” And a plan was slowly forming. I knew Katie moonlighted at Moorton Hospital, working in the ER to pay off her student loans. I also knew the police couldn’t get into the patient records. All they could do for now was depend on anonymous tips. Even if they got a look at the health insurance files, there would be hundreds of patient records to sort through. I thought I could cut some corners and get the information quicker from Katie. But I had to back into this slowly.

“Can you get patient records at a hospital?” I said.

“If I have privileges there,” she said.

“What records are in the hospital computer?”

“Face sheets—that’s insurance information, next of kin, home addresses, stuff like that—and lab results and surgical pathology reports. If I need more information, I can call the medical records room and have them send me the records. Why?”

I didn’t answer that question right away. Instead I went back to the murders. “I’m trying to make these murders fit together, but I can’t quite. It seems there’s a pattern, and then there isn’t. The first time, the killer shot the receptionist, the doctor, and the radiation therapist. After that, just the doctor was shot, even if the receptionist was sitting in the same office. And the victims’ occupations are all over the place. The dead include the entire radiation oncology department, an oncologist, and then a plain old family
doctor. What’s going on? That’s a wide range of doctors.”

But as I said that, I realized Georgia had all these doctors and more. Her internist referred her to an oncologist, and after surgery she went to radiation oncology.

“Oh, my god,” I said. “The killer has cancer.”

“Or someone in his family has cancer,” Katie said, “and he’s killing doctors for revenge.

“But let’s say it’s an angry cancer patient, offing his doctors. The internist is the one who has to refer him to the oncologist. For some reason, the oncologist screwed up, or the killer thinks he screwed up, so he kills the internist
and
the oncologist. Then he’d have to go to radiation oncology for treatment, and they didn’t cure him, so he kills them, too.”

“Worse. They’re rude and coldhearted,” I added. “They may have insulted the killer while they treated him. I’ve been in that department with Georgia. I wanted them dead, too.”

“I know they’re bad,” Katie said. “That department is notorious. We’ve all complained about it.”

“That’s a terrific theory, Katie,” I said, hoping she would think this was her idea. “And you work at the hospital. You have access to the records the police don’t. You can help me find the killer. The key is right in the computer.”

“Are you kidding?” Katie said. “No way. First, it’s a violation of patient privacy. I could lose my license. Second, I’d have to go through the records of literally hundreds of patients. It would take weeks, even months.” But Katie didn’t sound all that outraged at my request, so I kept arguing.

“It would be a violation if the cops went through
those records. But you’re a doctor. You could look, and not tell me anything except the names of the people you think are suspects.”

“So I’d violate the rights of a handful of people instead of hundreds,” she said.

“The folks getting shot are having their rights violated, too.”

“Look, Francesca, even if I wanted to do that, and I’m not sure I do, there are too many records to go through right now. One person couldn’t do this work. You’d need an army. We need to know what kind of cancer the killer has. Then I can narrow it down.”

“How are we going to find that out?” I asked.

“Wait for the next murder,” she said.

Dr. Hale Tachman spent the last morning of his life trying to commit adultery, according to a nurse. She told police the doctor kept coming back to the filing area and flirting with the new bleached blond secretary. Two days ago he’d yelled at the same secretary for a typo in a letter. But yesterday she’d been shimmying around in a skirt that looked painted on, in the nurse’s opinion, and the doctor had a change of heart, or something. He spent a lot of time watching her bend down for the V-Z files. Today, he’d come in all spruced up and the nurse heard him ask the secretary to lunch at the Channing Hotel, which everyone at Moorton Hospital knew was tantamount to asking her to sleep with him.

Unfortunately, the nurse didn’t hear the answer. A patient hit the emergency call button in the bathroom and needed immediate attention, but the nurse noticed the doctor was going around whistling all morning.

The secretary told police that of course she refused Dr. Tachman’s invitation. He was a married man with two little children. And besides, she added, why were
the police listening to that nurse? It was common knowledge that she’d had an affair with Dr. Tachman last summer and he’d dumped her. The nurse was just jealous.

Dr. Tachman was a gastroenterologist. When he wasn’t hitting on the staff, he gave sigmoidoscopies at Moorton, using a long, flexible tube with a tiny light to examine patients’ colons. It was a primitive and painful procedure compared to a colonoscopy, and people dreaded it. They dreaded it more when Tachman worked on them. He was always in a hurry, and preferred to use the rigid sigmoidoscope, instead of the flexible one. The rigid sig was faster, but he couldn’t see as much of the colon with it, which meant he could miss a “right-sided” tumor. This never worried Tachman, and his patients didn’t know there were different kinds of sigmoidoscopes. They did know he was preoccupied, impatient, and unnecessarily rough, and complaints were made to the head of the gastroenterology department. Today, he was rushed, as usual. He finished his last scheduled morning procedure at eleven forty-five.

Dr. Tachman never made it to lunch, with or without the secretary. He was shot when he stopped in his private office to pick up his jacket around eleven-fifty. Dr. Tachman’s office was at the end of a long corridor, right by the exit to the stairs. He’d complained about this office ever since he’d been assigned it. He wanted one that was bigger and not so isolated.

The doctor was right to complain. Police believed the killer simply stepped out of the exit door, shot the doctor four times as he paused to unlock his office, then ran back down the stairs and out on some other
floor, where he blended with the crowd that was always at the hospital. No one saw the killer and the new staircase security camera was malfunctioning that day. Once again, the Doc in the Box killer got away.

I heard all the details from Tina when I got back to the newsroom. Tina was on the Doc in the Box team and covered this murder, too.

Katie had told me less than half an hour ago that we’d have to wait until the next murder to figure out what kind of cancer the killer had. Another doc was dead—a gastroenterologist—so now we’d know, and know quickly. That is, if Katie and the police were correct. I still wasn’t ruling out the doctor’s wife or, after Tachman and his antics, maybe a consortium of wives, as the killer. But I immediately beeped Katie. Ten minutes later she called back.

“We didn’t have to wait long,” I told her. “There’s been another Doc in the Box killing.”

“Who did he bump off?” she asked.

“Dr. Hale Tachman. A gastroenterologist. Did you know him?”

“Yes. He was an asshole,” she said. “No wonder he specialized in looking at them. Takes one to know one.”

“We have our next dead doctor. Now can you tell me what kind of cancer the killer has?”

“I can’t talk,” she said. “Want to meet for dinner?”

“Sure. Name the place.”

“Blueberry Hill. Seven o’clock.”

I had to spend the afternoon at radiation oncology with Georgia. She had a later appointment today, because Charlie had called a long morning meeting she couldn’t miss. She was in a good mood. The doctor’s
reports were excellent, her white blood cell count was good, she’d quit losing weight, and she had more energy.

I recognized some of the regulars. Mrs. Turban was looking better today, more alert. I saw a new couple, a man in his fifties, waiting with his wife, who was about the same age. She was wearing a perky blue hat to cover her chemo baldness, and looked very pretty. As she sat down, he gave her bottom a little pat. She smiled at him. He smiled back. I felt terribly alone, and thought of Lyle, then pushed that thought away.

“God dammit, give him a call,” said Georgia, who had a spooky way of reading my mind. I shook my head. I just hoped I could talk Katie into going through the hospital files tonight. I was actually looking forward to being awake most of the night looking at medical records. I’d rather go through old files than old memories of Lyle.

After the hospital, I stopped at Kopperman’s deli and picked up some bagels and chicken soup for Georgia’s dinner. Then I took her home. I got to Blueberry Hill ten minutes late. Katie was already sitting in a booth and had ordered a beer.

Blueberry Hill was in University City, an older suburb of St. Louis around Washington University. It had a delightful collection of boomer toys and memorabilia: gorgeous glowing old jukeboxes, Howdy Doody dolls, Beatles toys. Rock-n-roll legend Chuck Berry still did his famous duck walk once a month in the downstairs Duck Room, named in his honor. Even the bathroom walls were entertaining. My favorites included: “I’m so broke I can’t pay attention” and “Gravity: It’s not just a good idea—it’s the law!”
Blueberry Hill also had a fast, efficient staff, cold beer, and a juicy burger.

As soon as I sat down, a waiter with an earring took our orders. Katie wanted a plain burger, medium rare, and a small salad instead of fries. I figured my fat cells would get extra credit just sitting next to a salad, so I ordered the cheddar burger with double fries. I had a long night ahead of me and needed the fuel. So did Katie, but she didn’t know it yet.

The latest Doc in the Box victim had arrived at the morgue, Katie said, but she probably wouldn’t do the autopsy. Her boss liked to do the celebrities.

“Do you know the kind of cancer now?” I asked.

“I have a pretty good idea,” she said. “I think the odds are it’s colon cancer. There are a couple of others a gastroenterologist would be looking for, but colon cancer is the most common. It’s one of the big killers, right up there with breast and lung cancers. Colon cancer is more likely to hit men. Breast cancer generally goes for women.”

“So we’re looking for a man?”

“Probably. But women get it, too.”

That was the problem with good doctors. They never gave you a straight yes or no answer.

The waiter brought our food, and I waited until the plates were on the table before I started talking. “Now that you’ve narrowed it down, you can check the patient records for likely suspects, right?”

“Wrong,” she said. “I can get fired and lose my license. Unauthorized use of patient files is illegal and a breach of medical ethics.”

“Come on, Katie. I’ve spent too much time around hospitals. Those records are not sacred, and the staff gossips like a small-town sewing circle. Anyway,
who’s going to know? You think I’m going to tell? If anyone asks me where I got the lead, I can say I overheard a patient talking. Everyone knows I practically live at Moorton these days.”

“No,” she said. “It’s too dangerous.”

“It’s more dangerous not to find this killer. He’s got a grudge against Moorton. You work there in the ER. Maybe you treated him. How do you know he won’t come after you?”

“Because I keep a shotgun loaded with double-ought buckshot in my bedroom,” she said, and bit fiercely into her burger.

“He won’t be in your bedroom. He’ll shoot you at the hospital, where they frown on doctors toting shotguns. Even if you are carrying a gun, you’ll be dead before you can get it. Look what happened to Tachman. A gun wouldn’t have helped him. He was ambushed outside his office.”

We both chewed in silence for a while. I hoped that would persuade her. It didn’t.