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Authors: Robin Hathaway

BOOK: The Doctor Digs a Grave
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SATURDAY EVENING, 6:30 P.M.
O
n the way back to his van, the driver picked at some french fries in a cardboard container. Sucking up the last one, he let the red and yellow box drop to the ground. He started the van and moved it forward a few yards. He got out to check the hole. It was still there. Unlocking the back doors, the driver climbed inside. He reemerged with the slight body of a woman slung over his shoulders in the traditional fireman's grip. Before climbing down, his eyes darted around the enclosure. The space was empty and, except for the shush of traffic at the other end of the alley, it was quiet.
Bending down, he eased the body slowly into the hole. Despite his care, the head, arms, and legs flopped like a doll's. With one hand, he jerked the body upright into a sitting position. Then, with both hands, he shoved it backward until it rested against the back of the hole. The torso remained vertical, but the head persisted in lolling to one side. With a curse, he reached for the spade and began tossing chunks of earth into the body's lap. He paused, spade in midair. Letting the spade fall, he climbed back into the van. When he reappeared, he held a small canvas
bag in one hand. Shoving it roughly down beside the body, he continued to fill up the hole.
A rustle. He spun around.
A pigeon waddled toward him out of the dark. He feinted hitting it with the spade and went back to his work. When he had finished, the rectangle of earth looked like a flower bed waiting for tulip and daffodil bulbs.
As the driver nosed the van out of the alley into the street, he noticed that all the passing cars had their headlights turned on. The job had taken longer than he thought. He might have to jack up the price.
SATURDAY EVENING, 7:30 P.M.
“
P
rasas!
” Fenimore edged his way out of the room in which the meeting of the Cardiology Department was just breaking up.
Prasa
was the Czech word for “pig.” Fenimore's mother was Czech, and she had taught him about “The Three Little Prasas” early in life. The Czech word had more oomph than the English one, he thought, as he surveyed the broad back of the chief hospital administrator. That monument to the medical establishment had just treated the doctors to a lecture on how moving their offices into the hospital complex would increase their “dollars up front.” And his three little MBA assistants had nodded in unison.
Fenimore hurried down the hospital corridor hoping to avoid any further encounters with staff administrators who might want to discuss “cash flow” or “market share.” Vultures! Jackals! Before Fenimore could call up any more unsavory members of the animal kingdom, someone hailed him from across the hall.
“Off on a house call, Fenimore?” Another cardiologist, clad in an expensively tailored suit and Gucci shoes, eyed Fenimore's rumpled jacket and creaseless trousers with barely disguised disdain.
“Right, Thompson. Gotta eat.”
“It must be nice to be able to know your patients,” Thompson said, keeping pace with him. “Mine are in and out.”
Yes, and you're never
in
to hear their complaints, Fenimore wanted to say, but restrained himself.
Failing to get a rise out of him, Thompson left with a wave.
Off to the squash courts, no doubt. Fenimore remembered when the Medicare law was first passed, in 1965. He had been just a kid, about ten years old. A friend of his father's had come for dinner that night, an older doctor who had recently retired, and they had discussed the new law. Growing increasingly agitated during the discussion, the older doctor had finally said, “I'm glad I'm out of it, Fenimore. Mark my words, twenty years from now you won't know this profession.”Then, leaning across the table, he had pointed his dessert spoon at Fenimore's father. “It will become a business, like any other.”
That was thirty years ago, and how often those words had come back to him. The old doctor was long dead. His father had also died. And here he was trying to make a living in this “business”.
Spotting another colleague he wanted to avoid, Fenimore ducked into the mail room. As usual his box was overflowing with notices for more meetings. He tossed the whole lot in the wastebasket. He attended only the ones he had to attend in order to stay on the staff. He had to have one hospital affiliation, a place to admit his few patients when they needed hospitalization. Few, because he practiced solo and all his colleagues practiced in groups. It was hard for one doctor to develop a practice today, when the competition was so highly organized and the group doctors all referred their patients to each other.
He detoured down a back stairway, avoiding the elevator and any further unpleasant encounters.
He'd stick it out awhile longer. But he had to admit that his patient load was dwindling. The older patients he had inherited
from his father were dying out, and their children tended to join HMOs. You could hardly blame them. They heard the ads on the radio and television and they signed up. He had made a pact with his cat, Sal: He would practice solo until he could no longer afford cat food. Then, and only then, would he sell out. Being an independent sort herself, she didn't object.
As he made his way toward the men's room, he thanked God for his other little business, his sideline. If it weren't for his private investigating, he wasn't sure he could keep his sanity—or his solvency. He didn't need a big brick building, a lot of shiny equipment, or a team to keep his clients happy. There were few forms to fill out, no client review boards, no government inquiries. It was a one-on-one relationship. And the only people he had to answer to were his clients—and himself.
While washing his hands, he inadvertently glanced in the mirror, something he usually tried to avoid. God, what a face. What did Jennifer see in him? He had none of the attributes women usually go for. He wasn't tall or dark, and he certainly wasn't handsome. In one of their more intimate moments, she had murmured something about his “deep brown eyes.” He had immediately thought of a cow. Another time she had spoken about his hands. “You should have been a surgeon,” she said, tracing his fingers with one of her own.
“Have you ever seen a surgeon's hands?” he asked.
She looked at him.
“They're almost always short, thick, and muscular.”
“Hmm.” She had looked back at his hand. “Then I wouldn't want them to touch me.”
“If you needed an operation, you would.”
She laughed. “Then I'd be asleep and wouldn't care.” “Fenimore!”
He turned. The tall young man at the next sink was looking quizzically at him. “I spoke to you three times.”
“Sorry, Larry.”
“What do you think about that case in 340? Mr. Liska. The boys want to do an angioplasty of course, but he's eighty-six. Don't you think we could handle him medically?”
Larry Freeman was Fenimore's favorite resident, one of the few who actually put the patient's welfare before the almighty dollar. “I agree. His coronaries aren't that bad, and his heart is working well.” Fenimore rubbed some soap vigorously into his hands.
“It won't be easy.” Larry frowned.
“No, but they haven't scheduled the procedure yet, and if we stick together …”
Larry grinned. “You're on.”
Fenimore tossed the crumpled towel in the basket and followed him out. As he pushed through the back door of the hospital, he was already planning his strategy for treating Liska with a conservative, noninvasive approach. Running into Larry was a breath of fresh air. There are a few of us left, he thought. And Larry was young. That was a good sign. As he strode toward the doctors' parking lot, he began to whistle.
SAME EVENING, 8:00 P.M.
H
oratio had no trouble finding Fenimore's old town house, the one that served as both his office and home. A yellowed sign rested in the front window. ANDREW B. FENIMORE, M.D., it read, and underneath, BY APPOINTMENT ONLY. A relic from when Fenimore's father had practiced there. There had been no reason to change it—the name was the same. Mounting the three marble steps in a bound, the boy leaned on the bell. The doctor had been waiting.
Together they set off—Fenimore with the spade, Horatio with the sack. Side by side this time. As they walked, Fenimore couldn't resist giving the boy a history lesson.
“Long ago, all this,” his hand swept over the city street, “was nothing but forest, populated by a few Indians.”
Horatio tried to imagine a dark and silent forest in place of the neon glare and traffic din.
“They lived and hunted happily here before the European settlers came. Then everything changed. The settlers had strange ways. Instead of sharing the land, they fenced it off into small
parcels and protected it with guns.” He glanced at the boy to see if he was listening.
Horatio, eyes front, gave no clue. But he seemed more relaxed, less wary. Maybe he had decided that an old codger (anyone over thirty was old to a teenager) who gave long-winded lectures on American history must be harmless.
“They cut down the trees and built houses, stores, and churches,” Fenimore went on, “and turned the forest footpaths into roads for carts and wagons. A few settlers treated the Native Americans fairly. Paid with goods for the land they took, instead of just stealing it. The most famous, of course, was William Penn.”
“That dude on top of City Hall?”
Fenimore nodded. “He was an honest man and made a treaty with the Indians that stipulated—”
“Huh?”
“He saw to it that certain Indian burial grounds remained sacred and no one was allowed to build on them, like this one we're headed for now.” They paused at Broad Street for the light. “Somehow, through all the growth and change in this huge city, that little plot has remained intact.” They crossed and came to the alley. Fenimore started to turn in, but Horatio hung back.
“What's wrong?”
“Are there … Indians buried there now?”
“Yes, but they're nothing but dust.”
“But their ghosts … ?”
“Don't worry.” The doctor smiled and shook the spade. “I'll take care of them.”
The site seemed smaller at night. Damn. He'd forgotten his flashlight. He glanced up to remind himself there was sky overhead. A few pinpricks of stars convinced him they weren't sealed in a tomb. When he first touched the ground with the shovel, it made a rasping sound. They both jumped.
It was no easy job to dig where the earth had been trampled
for a couple of generations. Without any real hope, Fenimore felt around blindly with his shovel for a softer spot. Unexpectedly, he found one. As his eyes grew accustomed to the dark, he realized that the softer area was where the van had been parked that afternoon. The van was gone now, and the space where it had been was dug up. Strange. He felt the boy watching him and began to dig. Within a few minutes he had made a nice cavity, just about the right size for a cat. One more shovelful. As he dug, his shovel bounced a little, as if hitting something resilient. He reached down, probing, and snatched his hand back. He had felt something remarkably like a clavicle.
The boy moved closer. “Is it ready?”
“Not quite.” Fenimore pulled the shovel out, moved a few feet to the left, still keeping to the soft patch, and began to dig again.
“Hey! What was wrong with that one?”
“I hit a rock,” Fenimore lied, digging feverishly. When he finally had a new hole the same size as the old one, he reached for the sack.
“Let me.” Horatio gently lowered the sack into the hole.
“Here.” Fenimore handed him the spade.
Carefully, the boy shoveled the loose dirt over it. When the hole was filled, Fenimore said, “Do you want to say anything?”
Horatio shook his head.
“What was his name?”
“Danny.”
Horatio's mother, obviously, had not had a hand in that one. “Good name. My best friend's name is Dan.” He refrained from mentioning that his friend was a cop. Fenimore was finding it hard to concentrate on the funeral ceremony. His mind kept leaping back to that first hole. He had a strong desire to recite “The Jelico Cat” by Eliot, but thought better of it. Instead, he fell back on the old litany, “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Amen.”
The boy crossed himself.
Fenimore steered him through the alley, back to the street. “I've got a cat,” he said. “Her name's Sal. She's due for a litter in a month. Stop by and I'll save one for you.”
Horatio nodded and took off. Relieved of the encumbrance of the sack, he loped easily down the street.
Fenimore waited until the boy was out of sight before he headed for the nearest phone booth.
“Dan?”
“Yeah, Doc.”
“Can you get over to Walnut and Watts, right away?”
“What?”
“Yes. Watts. That alley behind Fidelity Bank.”
“Watts up?”
“Funny. This is serious.”
“But the Phillies are beating the Braves.
That's
serious.”
Fenimore could picture Rafferty's big frame hunched over his desk, peering intently at the little black-and-white TV set, the only one the department allowed.
“Sorry, Dan. And bring a powerful flashlight.” He hung up on his friend's groan.
 
Fenimore went back to the burial ground to wait. The street sounds were muted and far away. A man came out the rear door of the hotel, dumped some trash in a can with a clatter, and went back inside. It was even quieter after he had gone. Fenimore wished he had his pipe. The red glow of a pipe, or even a cigarette, was a comfort in the dark. As he raised his eyes, the band of lighted windows on an upper floor of the bank turned black. He jingled his keys in his pocket, a faintly cheering sound. He was itching to investigate that first hole again. But he had no flashlight and only a crude spade. Besides, police procedure was very strict about that. Where was his spade, anyway? He glanced around. He was sure he'd left it leaning against the bank wall when he'd ushered Horatio out. It wasn't there now. That call to
Rafferty had taken only a few minutes. Could someone have nipped in and swiped it while he was gone? He turned to scan the rest of the enclosure and caught the full force of the spade on his left temple.
 
“Fenimore … Fenimore …”
Someone shaking his shoulder. A bright light in his eyes. A searing pain in his head. He shut his eyes.
“Wake up. It's me, Dan.”
Moan.
“What happened?”
“Take that damned light away.”
It went away. He tried to raise himself to a sitting position. Another moan.
“Easy. Someone's given you a whack on the head.”
“Thanks for the diagnosis.” Fenimore gingerly felt his left temple. His fingers came away wet.
“Don't touch it. What the hell were you doing here, anyway?” Rafferty glanced around. “Planning a Halloween party?” Suddenly an idea struck him. “How the hell did you manage to call me
before
you got mugged?”
“Neat trick, eh?” Fenimore attempted a grin, but it turned into a wince. He felt in his back pocket. His wallet was still there, crammed with the bills he'd withdrawn that morning from the ATM machine. He showed it to Rafferty.
Rafferty was crouching in front of Fenimore, who was slouched down against the bank wall. “Start at the beginning,” he said.
Between jabs of pain, Fenimore slowly recounted the story of the boy, his cat, and the grave. When he had finished, Rafferty stood up and went over to the patch of ground that Fenimore pointed out to him. He knelt, and, as Fenimore had done before him, prodded in the soft dirt. And, like Fenimore, he snatched back his hand.

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