The Dinosaur Chronicles (16 page)

From time to time, Brill glanced at the woman’s large black pocketbook. As prepared and rehearsed as the Greavey woman was, no doubt she carried credentials credible enough to pass even a detailed muster.

So, despite the righteous itch in her belly, Gladys Brill suspected that any direct attempt to expose the woman would fail. And result, perhaps, in the loss of Brill’s job, as the Institute squirmed to avoid a suit for slander.

Gladys Brill left the commons at 7 South with a slight wobble in her step. Although she had played her own part well, so she thought, the encounter with the imposter had shaken her.

As she passed through the security checkpoint, Gladys Brill tossed back her head and sucked in her breath. She had intended to return to her work station after saying hello to Eleanor Greavey, but now she turned down another corridor, the one leading to the records room. And with the decision, her step firmed.

—

The Logan Institute, as a mental facility, fell somewhere between the very best the country had to offer and the very worst. It paid its nurses more than the standard rate for such work. It paid its custodians more than minimum wage. And it made certain its patients were treated with as much respect as considerations of health and safety would allow.

On the other hand, the tiles in the hallways of the building had worn smoothly into the tiles that had lain before. Areas of new paint merged garishly with areas of old. And tables and chairs, while functional and comfortable, rarely matched anything else in the wing in which they were found.

So the records room was hardly an automated affair. Newer admissions were entered into a secondhand computer system the Institute had purchased, but older patients had all their information kept on paper.

As she pulled open an olive green file drawer marked G, Brill contemplated the benefits of fraud. Fraud as it applied to Daniel J. Greavey. For Greavey himself, Brill had little feeling. Greavey was a killer, having done away with both his father and brother many years ago. At the Institute, Greavey had behaved himself—at least under Brill’s watch—but in the back of her mind she knew he could be dangerous.

So fraud. What other reason would a woman have for pretending to be his sister? Brill knew nothing about Greavey’s family; perhaps they were wealthy. Perhaps a trust fund terminated for disbursement once Dan Greavey died. Perhaps Greavey himself had money, and the woman wanted his fortune.

It had been years since Brill last looked into Greavey’s file. But now, as she opened the gray manila folder and eyed the portion of Greavey’s records that dealt with finances, the more her thoughts ran in favor of the trust fund angle, for Daniel Greavey’s room and board was paid, every three months, by a check written through a law firm located two time zones away.

Brill paged over to Patient History.

Dan Greavey had been born and raised in Irving, Texas. At the age of fourteen, he had shot and killed his father in a hunting accident. That was 1958. Following the event, one would have expected difficulties for Greavey, both in schooling and in socialization, but Greavey had blocked the incident out of his mind so completely that no apparent aftereffects were noted by his psychiatrist. He was diagnosed with atypical traumatic amnesia and released to the custody of his mother.

Then, in 1965, Greavey killed again. This time the victim was his older brother, Timothy. There had been a violent quarrel the topic of which was not given in the record. Again, Greavey blocked the incident out of his memory. Again, he was diagnosed with traumatic amnesia. But this time he was adjudged dangerous to others and became the Logan Institute’s 117
th
resident. A court order restricted Greavey’s visitors to his mother, his sister and his legal representatives.

Following two attacks by Greavey on an orderly and on his attending physician, guidelines had been issued for staff not to talk to Greavey about his past or about any contentious issues of the day. Brill had been aware of the guidelines but paused to read the passage again. Given his history, she had no doubt Greavey could attack an orderly or a physician, but these were incidents about which she knew nothing.

As Brill parted the drawer’s folders with her left hand and returned Greavey’s folder with her right, a cloud passed, and the sunlight which had poured through the window-bars was replaced, abruptly, with a cold dark gloom startling in its swiftness. Brill stopped and blinked. Just as swiftly, orange light returned, and a sunbeam fell on the gray manila folder and the word “Greavey,” and Brill blinked again. And this time she wondered.

Elizabeth Sargan was another long-time resident of the Institute. Gladys Brill opened the “S” drawer and noted the woman’s tattered yellow folder and her number: Patient 109. George Kelly was another. In the I-J-K drawer, as Patient 225, he too had a much-dogeared yellow folder. Nurse Brill hesitated. She would soon be missed from her station. Still—

Brill opened Drawer A. Her fingers whipped over the folders even as her mind registered colors and patient numbers. Drawer A slammed shut and Drawer B opened. The process was repeated. Once she broke a nail and muttered an oath. Twenty minutes later, still in Drawer S, the bell for shift change rang through the building and she knew she had to get back to her station. But she had seen enough.

Except for the files in Drawer G, all gray folders fell within patient numbers from about 600 to 1000, and all of the oldest patients, except for the files in Drawer G, had yellow folders.

Brill didn’t know what it all meant, but she was certain of one thing: During a time when the Institute was buying and using gray folders, Daniel Greavey’s records had been reworked.

—

As Nurse Supervisor, Brill’s shift overlapped, by an hour, that of the next shift supervisor. This was so she could pass on information of a critical nature, and so that the transition to second staff went smoothly. A similar overlap existed for third staff’s arrival.

Most days Brill did not need to stay the full hour. Most days she was out the door at ten minutes past four. Today she made it a point to dawdle: she cleaned and dusted her desk, she filed her nails, and she indulged herself two cups of coffee that stayed hot because she wasn’t called off in the middle of a sip to address one problem or another.

Brill’s behavior did not go unnoticed by the second staff supervisor.

“Are you waiting for a taxi, or is it time for my annual review, and is Dame Schiffler having you check up on me?”

Brill, coffee in hand, looked up at Ogust Dennever. Nursing was still a mainly feminine occupation, but Ogust had broken the gender barrier years ago. The staff liked him because he treated them fairly, and they liked him because he kept his hands to himself.

Brill grinned. “Waiting for a telephone call, Ogee.”

“It must be important. You look relaxed, but I’m surprised you haven’t filed your nails to a point.”

Another reason Ogee was good at his job was his ability to read people. Normally Brill would tell him what was going on, but because she didn’t know herself what was going on, she demurred. “Tell me something, Ogee. You’ve been here a while. Why were the patient folders in Drawer G reworked?”

Ogee Dennever sat on the edge of Brill’s desk. Blue eyes twinkled under a balding scalp. “I wasn’t aware they had been.”

“I think it was some time ago, when the Institute was using the old gray folders for patient records.”

“I’m old, but not that ancient. Must have been under Carfack’s regime.”

Aloysius Carfack had been the Institute’s first director. It was he who had set the Institute’s monetary priorities: staff and patients first, everything else secondhand.

Brill asked, “Do you know if he’s still alive?”

“Last I heard, yes. He retired in town, you know, because retirees have cafeteria privileges. It saved him money.” Ogee scratched his head. “I don’t know if he’s been by recently, though.”

“Is he in the phone book?”

“Should be.”

The phone on Brill’s desk rang, and Brill scooped it out of its cradle. “Brill here ... Okay, Dmitri. I’m on my way.”

Brill grabbed her handbag and a brown paper sack and rose to leave. Ogee wore a puzzled frown on his face.

“Dmitri is married, Gladys.”

Brill laughed. “He’s also the guard at the 7 South station.”

Before Ogee could say any more, Brill was skipping down the hall at a pace normally seen only in bus and train terminals. She took the stairs, not the elevator, and arrived at the visitor station eight steps ahead of Eleanor Greavey.

By this time Brill had slowed her pace to an everyday stride. The arrangement she had made with the 7 South guard to warn her when Eleanor Greavey left had given Brill just enough time to intercept the woman.

Because the visitor station was just inside the main entrance of the Institute, Brill’s presence could not be taken as unusual, though in practice she used a guarded, employees-only exit to the parking lot.

Brill turned her head, apparently in a absent-minded gesture. “Oh! Ms. Greavey, how fortunate to see you again.”

That was playing things thick, thought Brill, but here was a chance for Eleanor Greavey to pass a test.

Eleanor Greavey’s smile this time was less perfect than the one she had worn for the meeting in the 7 South commons. “Nurse Brill. I see you’ve worked late. The hospital’s not short-handed these days, is it?”

The fact that the Greavey woman knew Brill’s shift hours was not lost on the nurse. Also the fact that Eleanor Greavey was trying to steer the conversation into neutral waters. “Oh, no,” Brill said. “It’s just been a little busy today. Do you know, I wanted to come back to the commons to show you the picture of my niece? You remember I mentioned her to you?”

As Eleanor Greavey’s brow furrowed, Brill pulled a portrait of a young girl, perhaps five or six years old, from the brown paper sack. It was set under glass in a stainless-steel frame with a tethered flap in back, the type of frame that could sit, unsupported, atop a desk. Brill handed the woman the portrait.

Eleanor Greavey took the picture and said, slowly, “Gladys, she’s a beautiful child. I-I’m not sure I remember you saying much about her ...”

Brill ignored the apology and launched into a brief soliloquy about the girl—her hobbies, how well she was doing in Kindergarten and how proud her parents were of her. Brill could see the Greavey woman tense up as she stoically tolerated Brill’s character sketch.

When Brill finished, Eleanor Greavey handed back the picture. Greavey said, “Her parents aren’t the only ones proud of her; I can tell.”

Brill allowed herself to blush. The stress of lying made blushing easy, and till now it had been hard to hold back the rush of blood. Brill put the picture back into the paper sack. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to go on so.” Brill lowered her eyes. “Well—till next time, then.”

“Yes,” Eleanor Greavey said slowly. “Till next time.”

Chapter 2

Gladys Brill had two things going for her: A large bookshelf filled with Masons, Marples and Maigrets, and a job that often obligated people to her.

With regard to the bookshelf of mysteries, the ploy with the portrait of the niece had been totally bogus. The portrait belonged to a nurse currently on vacation, and the girl was the woman’s daughter. Eleanor Greavey’s admission that she didn’t recall Brill talking about her “niece” was absolutely correct, because Brill hadn’t. So the Greavey woman had passed part one of the test. Part two of the test she could not, of course, “pass,” no matter what she did.

With regard to the fact that her job often obligated people to her, Brill now pulled her plum-colored Cavalier into a parking space in front of the Baxter building. The Baxter building housed various white-collar businesses, including architects, accountants and insurance companies. But to one side of the main entrance was a dull brown entranceway marked in small letters “Pengold Investigations.”

The entrance led to an anteroom with another door. Brill pressed the doorbell and a moment later heard the dull thud of an electric latch. She turned the knob and stepped inside.

In a 12-by-12 office lit by a ceiling fixture dotted with dead insects, Montgomery James Pengold sat on a swivel chair behind an old laminated desk. Papers cluttered the desktop so completely no wood at all was visible. At one corner of the desk a personal computer dangled cables; at the other corner a small gray monitor showed the contents of the anteroom in which Brill had just stood. She knew this from an earlier visit to Pengold’s office, from a time when Pengold had asked Brill for help.

Pengold himself had aged poorly. In the ten years since she’d seen him, his white shock of hair had thinned to a spiderwebby swirl. His once-plump jowls had sunken, leaving flaps of skin that made the P.I.’s resemblance to a bulldog pathetically ironic.

Still, the amiable grin remained.

“Gladys Brill! What’s it been? Eight years?” Pengold had a habit of silently drumming his fingers as he spoke, and the digits of his right hand crabbed through the clutter on his desk.

“Ten years, Monty. But who counts?” Brill took a seat in the client’s chair that faced the large wooden desk. “How’ve you been?”

Pengold shrugged. “After Delores died, I fell off the wagon and nearly killed myself. Been clean two years, eight months now.”

Delores had been Pengold’s wife, and Brill had overseen her care at the Institute. Pengold had suspected abuse, and through Brill’s vigilance an orderly had been caught using excessive force on the woman. Brill asked, “AA?”

Pengold nodded. “It’s remarkable how many former clients I run into at those meetings.”

Brill lowered her eyes. “I need a favor.”

“I told you if ever you needed the kind of help I could give you, I would. Delores would never have lasted as long as she did without your help.”

Brill wondered whether, in the end, that had been a good thing. Each time Pengold had visited his wife, he too had died just a little. Aloud, Brill told him about the Eleanor Greavey mystery, about meeting the woman in the commons, and about her last encounter with the woman at the visitor station.