Contagion (41 page)

     “Why was he beaten up?” Lou asked.

     “Supposedly as a warning for him not to go to the Manhattan General Hospital,” Laurie said.

     “Whoa!” Lou said. “What are you talking about?”

     “I don’t know the details,” Laurie said. “But I do know he’s been irritating a lot of people over there, and for that matter, over here as well. Dr. Bingham has been ready to fire him on several occasions.”

     “How’s he been irritating everyone?” Lou asked.

     “He has it in his mind that a series of infectious diseases that have appeared over at the General have been spread intentionally.”

     “You mean like by a terrorist or something?” Lou asked.

     “I suppose,” Laurie said.

     “You know this is sounding familiar,” Lou said.

     Laurie nodded. “I remember how I felt about that series of overdoses five years ago and the fact that no one believed me.”

     “What do you think of your friend’s theory?” Lou said. “By the way, what’s his name?”

     “Jack Stapleton,” Laurie said. “As to his theory, I don’t really have all the facts.”

     “Come on, Laurie,” Lou said. “I know you better than that. Tell me your opinion.”

     “I think he’s seeing conspiracy because he wants to see conspiracy,” Laurie said. “His officemate told me he has a long-standing grudge against the health-care giant AmeriCare, which owns the General.”

     “But even so, that doesn’t explain the gang connection or the fact that he might have knowledge of the woman’s murder. What’re the names of the homicide victims?”

     “Elizabeth Holderness and Reginald Winthrope,” Laurie said.

     Lou wrote down the names in the small black notebook he carried.

     “There wasn’t much criminologist work done on either case,” Laurie said.

     “You of all people know how limited our personnel is,” Lou said. “Did they have a preliminary motive for the woman?”

     “Robbery,” Laurie said. “Rape?”

     “How about the man?” Lou asked.

     “He was a member of a gang,” Laurie said. “He was shot in the head at relatively close range.”

     “Unfortunately, that’s all too common,” Lou said. “We don’t spend a lot of time investigating those. Did the autopsies show anything?”

     “Nothing unusual,” Laurie said.

     “Do you think your friend Dr. Stapleton comprehends how dangerous these gangs can be?” Lou asked. “I have a feeling that he’s walking on the edge.”

     “I don’t know much about him,” Laurie said. “But he’s not a New Yorker. He’s from the Midwest.”

     “Uh-oh,” Lou said. “I think I’d better have a talk with him about the realities of city life, and I’d better do it sooner rather than later. He might not be around long.”

     “Don’t say that,” Laurie said.

     “Is your interest in him more than professional?” Lou asked.

     “Now let’s not get into that kind of discussion,” Laurie said. “But the answer is no.”

     “Don’t get steamed up,” Lou said. “I just like to know the lay of the land.” He stood up. “Anyway, I’ll help the guy, and it sounds like he needs help.”

     “Thank you, Lou,” Laurie said. She got up herself and gave the detective another hug. “I’ll have him call you.”

     “Do that,” Lou said.

     Leaving Laurie’s office, Lou took the elevator down to the first floor. Walking through the communications area, he stopped in to see Sergeant Murphy, who was permanently assigned to the medical examiner’s office. After they talked for a while about the prospects of the Yankees and the Mets in the upcoming baseball season, Lou sat down and put his feet up on the corner of the sergeant’s desk.

     “Tell me something, Murph,” Lou said. “What’s your honest take on this new doctor by the name of Jack Stapleton?”

     After having fled from the drugstore, Jack had run the length of the alley and then another four blocks before stopping. When he had, he was winded from the exertion. In between breaths he heard the undulating wails of converging police sirens. He assumed the police were on their way to the store. He hoped that Slam had fared as well as he.

     Jack walked until both his breathing and his pulse were back to a semblance of normal. He was still shaking. The experience in the store had unnerved him as much as the ordeal in the park, even though the store episode had taken only seconds. The knowledge that once again he’d been stalked in an attempt to kill him was mind numbing.

     Additional sirens now competed with the normal clatter of the city, and Jack wondered if he should go back to the scene to talk to the police and perhaps help if anyone had been struck with a bullet. But Warren’s admonitions about talking to the police about gang affairs came to mind. After all, Warren had been right about Jack needing his protection. If it had not been for Slam, Jack sensed he would have been killed.

     Jack shuddered. There had been a time in the not-too-distant past when he’d not cared particularly if he lived or died: But now, having come close to death twice, he felt differently. He wanted to live, and that desire made him question why the Black Kings wanted him dead. Who was paying them? Did they think Jack knew something that he didn’t, or was it just because of his suspicions concerning the outbreaks at the Manhattan General? Jack had no answer to these questions, but this second attempt on his life made him more confident that his suspicions were correct. Now he had only to prove them.

     In the middle of these musings Jack found himself in front of a second drugstore. But in contrast to the first, it was a small, neighborhood concern. Entering, Jack approached the pharmacist who was manning the store by himself. His name tag said simply “Herman.”

     “Do you carry rimantadine?” Jack asked.

     “We did last time I looked,” Herman said with a smile. “But it’s a prescription item.”

     “I am a doctor,” Jack said. “I’ll need a script.”

     “Can I see some identification?” Herman asked.

     Jack showed him his New York State medical license.

     “How much do you want?”

     “Enough for at least a couple of weeks,” Jack said. “Why don’t you give me fifty tablets. I might as well err on the plus side.”

     “You got it,” Herman said. He started working behind a counter.

     “How long will it take?” Jack asked.

     “How long does it take to count to fifty?” Herman replied.

     “The last store I was in told me it would take twenty minutes,” Jack said.

     “It was a chain store, right?” Herman said.

     Jack nodded.

     “Those chain stores don’t care a whit about service, Herman said. “It’s a crime. And for all their poor service, they’re still forcing us independents out of business. It’s got me angrier than hell.”

     Jack nodded. He knew the feeling well. These days no part of the medical landscape was sacrosanct.

     Herman came out from behind his counter carrying a small plastic vial of orange tablets. He plunked it next to the cash register. “Is this for you?” he asked.

     Jack nodded again. Herman rattled off a list of possible side effects as well as contraindications. Jack was impressed. After Jack paid for the drug, he asked Herman for a glass of water. Herman gave him some in a small paper cup.

     Jack took one of the tablets.

     “Come again,” Herman said as Jack left the store.

     With the rimantadine coursing through his system, Jack decided it was time to visit Gloria Hernandez from central supply.

     Stepping out into the street, Jack caught a cab. At first the driver demurred about going up into Harlem, but he agreed after Jack reminded him of the rules posted on the back of the front seat. Jack sat back as the taxi first headed north and then across town on St. Nicholas Avenue after passing Central Park. He looked out the window as Harlem changed from predominantly African-American neighborhoods to Hispanic ones. Eventually all the signs were in Spanish.

     When the cab pulled up to his destination, Jack paid the fare and stepped out into a street alive with people. He looked up at the building he was about to enter. At one time it had been a fine, proud single-family home in the middle of an upscale neighborhood. Now it had seen better days, much like Jack’s own tenement.

     A few people eyed Jack curiously as he mounted the brownstone steps and entered the foyer. The black-and-white mosaic on the floor was missing tiles.

     The names on a broken line of mailboxes indicated that the Hernandez family lived on the third floor. Jack pushed the doorbell for that apartment even though his sense was that it didn’t work. Next he tried the inner door. Just as in his own building, the lock on the door had been broken long ago and never repaired.

     Having climbed the stairs to the third floor, Jack knocked on the Hernandezes’ door. When no one answered he knocked again, only louder. Finally he heard a child’s voice ask who was there. Jack called out he was a doctor and wanted to speak with Gloria Hernandez.

     After a short, muffled discussion that Jack could hear through the door, the door was pulled open to the limit of a chain lock. Jack saw two faces. Above was a middle-aged woman with disheveled, bleached-blond hair. Her eyes were red and sunken with dark shadows. She was wearing a quilted bathrobe and was coughing intermittently. Her lips had a slight purplish cast.

     Below was a cherubic child of nine or ten. Jack wasn’t sure if it was a boy or a girl. The child’s hair was shoulder length, coal black, and combed straight back from the forehead.

     “Mrs. Hernandez?” Jack questioned the blond-haired woman.

     After Jack showed his medical examiner’s badge and explained he’d just come from Kathy McBane’s office at the Manhattan General, Mrs. Hernandez opened the door and invited him inside.

     The apartment was stuffy and small, although an attempt had been made to decorate it with bright colors and movie posters in Spanish. Gloria immediately retreated to the couch where she’d apparently been resting when Jack knocked. She drew a blanket up around her neck and shivered.

     “I’m sorry you are so sick,” Jack said.

     “It’s terrible,” Gloria said. Jack was relieved that she spoke English.

     His Spanish was rusty at best.

     “I don’t mean to disturb you,” Jack said. “But as you know, lately people from your department have become ill with serious diseases.”

     Gloria’s eyes opened wide. “I just have the flu, don’t I?” she asked with alarm.

     “I’m sure that’s correct,” Jack said. “Katherine Mueller, Maria Lopez, Carmen Chavez, and Imogene Philbertson had completely different illnesses than you have, that is certain.”

     “Thank the Lord,” Gloria said. She made the sign of the cross with the index finger of her right hand. “May their souls rest in peace.”

     “What concerns me,” Jack continued, “is that there was a patient by the name of Kevin Carpenter on the orthopedic floor last night who possibly had an illness similar to your own. Does that name mean anything to you? Did you have any contact with him?”

     “No,” Gloria said. “I work in central supply.”

     “I’m aware of that,” Jack said. “And so did those other unfortunate women I just mentioned. But in each case there had been a patient with the same illness the women caught. There has to be a connection, and I’m hoping you can help me figure out what it is.”

     Gloria looked confused. She turned to her child, whom she addressed as “Juan.” Juan began speaking in rapid Spanish. Jack gathered he was translating for him; Gloria had not quite understood what he’d said.

     Gloria nodded and said “si” many times while Juan spoke. But as soon as Juan finished, Gloria looked up at Jack, shook her head, and said:

     “No!”

     “No?” Jack asked. After so many yeses he didn’t expect such a definitive no.

     “No connection,” Gloria said. “We don’t see patients.”

     “You never go to patient floors?” Jack asked.

     “No,” Gloria said.

     Jack’s mind raced. He tried to think what else to ask. Finally he said:

     “Did you do anything out of the ordinary last night?” Gloria shrugged and again said no.

     “Can you remember what you did do?” Jack asked. “Try to give me an idea of your shift.”

     Gloria started to speak, but the effort brought on a serious bout of coughing. At one point Jack was about to pound her on her back, but she raised her hand to indicate she was all right. Juan got her a glass of water, which she drank thirstily.

     Once she could speak, she tried to recall everything she’d done the evening before. As she described her duties, Jack struggled to think if any of her activities put her in contact with Carpenter’s virus. But he couldn’t.

     Gloria insisted she had not left central supply for the entire shift.

     When Jack could not think of any more questions, he asked if he could call if something else came to mind. She agreed. Jack then insisted she call Dr. Zimmerman at the General to let her know how sick she was.

     “What could she do?” Gloria asked.

     “She might want to put you on a particular medication,” Jack said. “As well as the rest of your family.” He knew that rimantadine not only could prevent flu, but if it was started early enough in an established case, it might reduce the duration and possibly the severity of symptoms by as much as fifty percent. The problem was, it wasn’t cheap, and Jack knew that AmeriCare was loath to spend money on patient care it didn’t feel it had to.

     Jack left the Hernandez apartment and headed toward Broadway where he thought he could catch a cab. Now, on top of being agitated from the attempt on his life, he was also discouraged. The visit to Gloria had accomplished nothing other than to expose him to Gloria’s influenza, which he feared might be the strain that so readily killed Kevin Carpenter. Jack’s only consolation was that he’d started his own course of rimantadine. The problem was, he knew rimantadine wasn’t one hundred percent effective in preventing infection, particularly with a virulent strain.