Dr. Death (38 page)

No sound from the living room. The entire house was too damn quiet. Then I heard footsteps from above and a few seconds later Stacy entered, followed by the lawyer. Safer was carrying a small floral overnight bag. Stacy looked tiny, shriveled, much too old.

I followed the two of them outside and watched him help her into his Cadillac. Byron remained in the doorway, hands on hips.

"What is he, exactly?" I said.

"Someone who helps me. Richard and Eric seem calm, but just in case."

"Were you an oldest child, Joe?"

"Oldest of seven. Why?"

"You like to take care of things."

His smile was weary. "Don't think I'm paying for that bit of analysis."

He drove away and I watched the Cadillac's taillights disappear. Down the block, the unmarked hadn't moved. The night had turned dank, redolent of fermenting seaweed. My jaw ached and my clothes had sweated through. I trudged to the Seville. Instead of turning around and heading south, I drove farther north till I found it.

Six houses up. Big Tudor thing behind brick walls and iron gates, vines encircling the brick, the tip-off: Judy's white Lexus visible through the rails. Another vanity plate: HCDJ.

Here Come Da Judge.
The first time I'd seen it was when I'd accompanied her from her courtroom to her parking space. One of the many times we'd worked together.

All those referrals. This would be the last, wouldn't it?

I stopped in front of her house, looking for . . . what?

Light glowed behind a couple of curtained mullioned windows. Movement flashed on the second story— central window. Just a smudge of a silhouette, shifting, then freezing, then moving again. Human, but that's about all I could say.

Hooking a three-pointer, my headlights aimed through the Manitow gate, I paused, half hoping someone would notice and show themselves. No one did and I headed back toward Sunset, passing the unmarked. Movement there, too, but the drab sedan remained in place.

I drove east, trying not to think about anything. On the way home I stopped at a twenty-four-hour drugstore in Brentwood and bought the strongest Advil I could find.

• • •

Friday morning, I woke up before Robin, just as the sun whitened the curtains. My jaw felt tender, but the swelling wasn't too bad. I drew the covers over my face, pretended to sleep, waited till Robin had risen, showered and left. Not wanting to explain. Eventually, I'd have to.

Using the bedroom phone, I called Safer's office.

"Good morning, Doctor. How's your battle wound?"

"Healing. How's Stacy?"

"She slept soundly," he said. "I had to wake her to get her to school on time. Lovely girl. She even tried to make breakfast for my wife and me. I hope she survives her family. Psychologically speaking."

I thought about Stacy's little speech about self-determination, wondered if it would stick.

"What she needs," I said, "is to separate from her family. Achieve her own identity. Richard expects her to go to Stanford because he and Joanne did. She should go anywhere but there."

"And Eric's at Stanford," he said.

"Exactly."

"The boy hasn't separated adequately?"

"Don't know," I said. "Don't know enough about him to pontificate." Don't
want
to know if he sat by a bed in a cheap motel and inserted a needle into his mother's vein. "If you have any influence with Richard, you might guide him toward allowing Stacy some choice."

"Makes sense," he said, but he sounded distracted. "I understand the boy's not your primary patient, but he continues to bother me. That level of anger. Any new thoughts on why he'd explode like that?"

"None. How was he last night?"

"Byron reports that father and son cleaned up, then went to sleep. Eric's still sleeping."

"And Richard?"

"Richard's up. Richard's full of ideas."

"I'll bet he is. Listen, Joe, I need to take a look at Joanne Doss's medical records."

"Why's that?"

"To try to understand her death. If I'm going to help Stacy, I need as much information as possible. The medical tests were conducted at St. Michael's. Richard said you've got power of attorney, so please sign a release and fax it over to their Medical Records office."

"Done. Of course, you'll notify me if you learn something I should know."

"Such as?" I said.

"Such as anything I should know." His voice had hardened. "Agreed?"

I thought of all I hadn't told him. Knew there was plenty he hadn't told me.

"Sure, Joe," I said. "No problem."

• • •

Popping more Advil, I iced my jaw, took a short run, cleaned up, walked over to Robin's studio, stuck my head in and got an earful of noise. My beloved, suited and goggled, standing behind the plastic walls of the spray booth as she wielded a lacquer gun. Knowing she couldn't be interrupted and doubting she could see me, I waved and left for St. Michael's Medical Center.

Sunset to Barrington, Barrington to Wilshire. Driving too fast to Santa Monica. No reason to hurry. My reason for checking out the hospital was to look for Michael Ferris Burke, or whatever he was calling himself now. But my fresh suspicions about Eric dimmed any prospects of finding a Michael Burke connection to Joanne's final trip.

Not an evil stranger. Family.

But what else was there for me to do?

And maybe I
would
find something.

That made me laugh out loud. Shrink's denial. I wanted anyone in that motel room other than Eric.

The boy's rage came back to me in a bitter surge, and the facts spat in my face.

Helen, the dog. Guilt and expiation.

That level of anger.

The noblest thing he'd ever done.

Mate's death had stirred up Eric's guilt. Richard's attempt at vengeance had fueled it further.

Eric knowing an innocent man had been targeted, because Mate hadn't brought about Joanne's death.

Wondering what his father would have done to
him
, had he known. Then reversing the anger— turning it on his father. Because Richard had caused it all by not forgiving.

Blaming. Like father . . .

I thought about the way the death plan might've gone down. Weeks, maybe months, of planning between Eric and Joanne. Easy collusion, or had Eric tried to talk his mother out of it? Finally given up and settled for immortalizing her with Polaroids?

How had she convinced him? Telling him it was
noble
?

Or had he needed little convincing— enraged at her, too. One of those terrifying kids who are missing that little, secret shred of brain tissue that inhibits evil?

The scheme, then the night of judgment . . . surreptitious mother-son outing on one of the many nights when Richard was out of town. Eric driving, Joanne riding along.

The long, dark trip to the edge of the desert. Lancaster, because Mom was adamant about that.

Obscene. How could a mother do that to a son? What transgression had she committed that could've been worse than
that
?

I was unlikely to find the answer in her hospital chart. But one did what one could.

One did what was right. And hoped for some final day of judgment.

Transcendence.

Absolution.

• • •

The limestone and mirrored mass of St. Michael's filled several square blocks on Wilshire, in Santa Monica, half a mile east of the beach. I'd lectured there a few years earlier, teaching family-practice residents about divorce and child abuse and bed-wetting, but I had no idea how to find Medical Records and the personnel office.

I got directions from a kid with a skimpy blond beard and a badge alleging he was an MD. North side of the complex, adjoining buildings.

I hit personnel first— Human Resources. Most companies call it that now— warm fuzzy twist on the lexicon. Does it ease the pain when they fire you?

The office was small, stark, sterile, occupied by an imperious-looking black woman in an orange suit who sat entering columns of data into a PC. I was wearing my Western Pediatrics badge, had my I.D. card from the med school crosstown ready as backup. But she smiled when I told her I was in charge of arranging a faculty party and needed some office addresses, and handed over a phone-book-size volume marked Staff Roster. Her openness felt fresh and clean and odd. I'd been hanging around too long with cops, lawyers, psychopaths, other evasive creatures.

She returned to her desk and I thumbed through the book. The professional staff was listed at the front. Pages of doctors. Names, office addresses, photos. No personal data. No one who resembled the various faces of the man Leimert Fusco claimed was the real Dr. Death. The same went for the rear sections listing social workers, physical therapists, occupational therapists, respiratory therapists.

When I brought the book back, the woman in orange said, "Hope it's a good party."

Medical Records was a bit more complicated. The receptionist was one of those pucker-mouthed types weaned on skepticism, and she hadn't seen Joe Safer's faxed authorization. Finally the paperwork materialized and she produced Joanne Doss's inch-thick chart.

"You need to read it here. That fax doesn't authorize photocopying."

"No problem."

"That's what they all say."

"Who?"

"Doctors who work for lawyers."

I took the file across the room. Multicolored pages of lab reports. Numbers in boxes. Motley samples of physician scrawl. Bob Manitow's name appeared only on the referral form. Fifteen other doctors had attempted to discern the cause of Joanne's misery.

Blood work, urinalysis, X rays, CAT scans, PET scans, MRIs, the lumbar punctures Richard had told me about because nothing else had turned up.

The operative word: "negative."

Clear spinal fluid.Normal BUN, creatinine, calcium, phosphorus, iron, T-protein, albumin, globulin . . .

Morbidly obese white female . . .

Complains of joint pain, lethargy, fatigue . . .

Onset of symptoms 23 mo. ago, steady weight gain of nearly 50 kg . . .

Thyroid function normal . . .

All endocrine systems normal, except for glucose of 123. Glucose tolerance borderline, possible prediabetic condition, probably secondary to obesity.

BP: 149/96. Borderline hypertension, probably secondary to obesity.

Repeat of blood work, urinalysis, X rays, CAT scans . . .

No MD's name that matched any of Grant Rushton's incarnations.

The last notation read:
Psychiatric consultation suggested, but patient refused. . . .

Of course she had.

Too late for confession.

• • •

On the way out, I stopped at a pay phone and checked in with my service.

Last guy in L.A. with no cell phone. It had taken me years to buy a VCR, a good deal longer to get cable hookup. I'd stalled at getting a computer even after the libraries at the U. abandoned their card catalogs. Then my electric typewriter broke and I couldn't find replacement parts.

My father had been a machinist. I stayed away from machines. Lived with a woman who loved them. No sense introspecting.

The operator said, "Only one, it just came in. A De- tective Connor. That's not the one who usually calls you, is it?"

"No," I said. "What did she want?"

"No message, just to call."

Petra had left her number at Hollywood Division. Another detective answered and said, "She's out, want her mobile?"

I got through. Petra said, "Milo asked me to let you know that we found Eldon Salcido. He thought you might want to take a look at him."

Milo sending a message through her, rather than calling himself. Knowing he and I were firmly planted on opposite sides of the Doss investigation.

Had Safer warned him off, or was he opting for discretion on his own? Either way, it felt weird.

"Did he say why I should take a look?"

"No," she said. "I assumed you'd know. It was a short conversation. Milo sounded pretty hassled, still fighting to get warrants on that fat cat."

"Where'd Salcido show up?"

"On the street. Literally. Messed up— beat up. Looks like he ran into the wrong bunch of butt-kickers. A resident coming out to collect the morning paper found him. Salcido was lying in the gutter. His pockets were empty, but that doesn't mean he was robbed, he might not have carried a wallet. One of our cars got the call, recognized him from a picture I hung up in the squad room. He's at Hollywood Mercy."

"Conscious?" I said.

"Yes, but uncooperative. I left your name with the nurses." She gave me a room number.

"Thanks," I said.

"If you have any problems, call me. If you learn anything interesting from Salcido, you can call me, too."