“Call the police, Henry,” she ordered. “It is necessary to report a death when someone dies alone. I’ll wait here until her own physician comes. He’s the appropriate person to sign the death certificate.”
“Yes, ma’am. Yes. Thank you. I’ll call from downstairs.” Henry clearly was eager to be out of the presence of the body.
There was a chair in the corner of the room. Monica pulled it over and sat by the remains of the woman whom she had wanted so much to meet. Obviously Olivia Morrow had been very ill. She looked almost emaciated. Had she really known about me, Monica wondered, or was it all a mistake? Now I’ll probably never know.
Fifteen minutes later, Dr. Clay Hadley came rushing in. He reached under the covers and lifted Olivia Morrow’s hand then gently laid it back down and pulled the covers over it again. “I was here last night,” he told Monica, his voice husky. “I begged Olivia to let me admit her to a hospital or to a hospice so she wouldn’t die alone. She was adamant that she wanted to be in her own bed when the end came. Have you known her for long, Doctor?”
“I never met her. I was supposed to see her this evening. Her voice was soft. “My father was an adopted child and Ms. Morrow claimed she had known my birth grandparents and wanted to tell me about them. Did she ever mention me to you?”
Hadley shook his head.
“Dr. Farrell, please don’t put any stock in anything Olivia said. These past few weeks since I had to tell her how very sick she was she had begun to hallucinate. The poor woman had no family and she began to think that anyone she ever met or heard of was in some way related to her.”
“I see. Frankly, I wondered if that wasn’t the case. I guess I had better stay until the police come because I was with the clerk when we found the body. They’ll probably want a statement from me.”
“Why don’t we wait in the living room?” Hadley suggested.
With a final glance at the bed where Olivia Morrow was lying, Monica left the room. But as she walked down the hall she had the nagging sensation that something was out of order, something was wrong.
Maybe I’m the one who’s going crazy, she thought. I guess I didn’t realize how very much I was counting on Olivia Morrow really being able to tell me about my background. I’m so desperately disappointed.
Sitting in the living room that was a tribute to the discerning good taste of Olivia Morrow, Monica continued to be troubled by the sense that somehow she had missed something important, something that was wrong about the death of a woman she had never met in her life.
But what?
26
On Thursday morning Doug Langdon phoned Sammy Barber. Acutely conscious that what he was about to say was possibly being recorded, he spoke briefly and tried to disguise his voice. “I agree to the terms of your settlement offer.”
“Oh, Dougie, relax,” Sammy told him. “I’m not taping you anymore. I’ve got all I need in case the terms aren’t satisfactory. You got the cash in old bills, right?”
“Yes.” Langdon spat out the word.
“Here’s the way I figure we do it. We each have a big black suitcase, the kind that we can pull down the block. We meet in the parking lot of our favorite diner in Queens. We park near each other and switch bags in the lot. No bothering to stop for a cup of coffee, even though their coffee, as I remember it, wasn’t bad. Sound like a plan?”
“When do you want to meet?”
“Dougie, you don’t sound happy. I want you to be happy. The sooner the better. How about this afternoon, maybe around three? It’s quiet then and the boss at the nightclub wants me to come in early this evening. We’ve got some red-hot celebrities who’ve booked tables, and I’m his man when the jerks try to bother them.”
“I’m sure you are. This afternoon at three o’clock in the parking lot of the diner.” Douglas Langdon no longer tried to disguise his voice. If Sammy Barber took the money and did not fulfill the contract there was absolutely nothing he could do about it. Except, he told himself grimly, find someone to take care of Sammy, but if that came to pass, he would make very sure there would be no way to trace Sammy’s demise back to him.
And yet I think that when he has the money he’ll go through with it, Langdon thought, as he sat in his office waiting for Roberta Waters, his first patient, another one who was chronically late. Not that he cared. He always stopped her at precisely the time her hour was up, even if she had only been on the couch for fifteen minutes. At her protest, he had said, “I cannot delay my next patient. That would not be fair. Think about it. One of the reasons for your strained relationship with your husband is that he gets frantic because you are never on time for anything, and in consequence you make him embarrassingly late for your joint engagements.”
God, was he sick of that woman!
Face it, he was sick of them all. But be careful, he warned himself. You’ve been getting pretty snappy with Beatrice, who is after all a good secretary, and no question, she was oozing curiosity when Sammy showed up here.
The phone rang. A moment later Beatrice announced, “Dr. Hadley calling, sir.”
“Thank you, Beatrice.” Doug forced warmth into his voice. His tone changed when he heard her click off. “I tried to get you last night. Why didn’t you answer your phone?”
“Because I was a wreck,” Clay Hadley replied, his voice quivering. “I’m a doctor. I save lives. It’s one thing to talk about killing someone. It’s another to hold a pillow over the head of a woman who was my patient.”
Disbelieving, Doug Langdon heard the unmistakable sound of sobbing on the other end of the line. If Beatrice hadn’t disconnected immediately she would have heard the outburst, he thought frantically. He wanted to shout at Hadley to shut up, but then he swallowed over the tightness in his throat and said calmly, “Clay, get hold of yourself. At the most Olivia Morrow had only a few days to live. By eliminating those few days you saved yourself from spending the rest of your life in prison. You did tell me she was going to tell Monica Farrell about Alex and the Gannon fortune?”
“Doug, Monica Farrell was in Olivia’s apartment when I went back yesterday evening. She was in the bedroom, sitting by Olivia’s bed. She’s a doctor. She may have noticed something.”
“Like what?”
Langdon waited. Hadley had stopped sobbing, but there was a hesitation in his voice when he said, “I don’t know. I guess I’m just nervous. I’m sorry. I’ll be all right.”
“Clay,” Langdon began, trying to keep his voice reassuring, “you have to be all right, for your sake and for mine. Think about all the money you have in that Swiss bank account and the life you can lead with it. And think about what will happen to you and to me if you don’t stay calm.”
“I hear you. I hear you. I’ll be all right. I promise.”
Langdon heard the click in his ear as the other phone rang. With his handkerchief he dried the perspiration from his forehead and his hands.
The intercom came on. “Doctor, Mrs. Waters is here,” Beatrice announced. “And she’s so happy. She wants me to point out to you immediately that today she’s only four minutes late. She said she knew that would make your day.”
27
Andrew and Sarah Winkler had lived all their married lives in a comfortable apartment on York Avenue and Seventy-ninth Street in Manhattan, a block from the East River. Childless, they had never been tempted to move to the suburbs. “God forbid,” Andrew would say. “When I see a pile of leaves, I want them to belong to someone else.” Andrew, a retired accountant, and Sarah, a retired librarian, were perfectly content with their lifestyle. Several evenings a week they were at Lincoln Center or a lecture at the 92nd Street Y. Once a month they treated themselves to a Broadway show.
A fixture in their daily routine was their after-breakfast walk. They never broke that personal commitment unless the weather was extreme. “Mist is okay, but not a downpour,” Sarah would explain to her friends. “Cold okay, but not below twenty degrees; warm okay, but not if the thermometer hits nine
ty. We don’t want to turn into couch potatoes, but neither do we want to die of frostbite or heatstroke.”
Sometimes they would stroll in Central Park. Other days they would choose the pedestrian path along the East River. This Thursday morning they had opted for the river walk, and set out for it in their matching all-weather jackets.
It had rained unexpectedly during the night, and Sarah remarked to Andrew that the weatherman never gets anything right and that it made you wonder how much they got paid to stand up in front of the camera and point to the map, waving their arms to show wind currents. “Half the time when they say rain is a possibility, if they opened the window they’d be drenched,” she commented, as they approached the area of Gracie Mansion, the official residence of the mayor of New York. “But at least it cleared up nicely this morning.”
She broke off her commentary on the exasperating unpredictability of meteorologists by suddenly clutching her husband’s arm. “Andrew, look! Look!” They were passing a bench along the path. Partially wedged under it was an oversized garbage bag, the kind used on construction sites. Protruding from the bag was a foot with a woman’s high-heeled shoe dangling from it.
“Oh my God, my God . . . ,” Sarah moaned.
Andrew reached in the pocket of his jacket for his cell phone and dialed 911.
28
On Thursday morning, Monica went straight to the hospital, after her nearly sleepless night. Sometime around three A.M. she had tried to assuage her crushing disappointment at the death of Olivia Morrow by promising herself that she would hire a detective if necessary to investigate any possible connection Morrow might have had with her birth grandparents.
But even so, the sense of missed opportunity haunted her, and it didn’t make matters easier when Ryan Jenner stopped at the pediatric floor looking for her. “Monica, how did that interview at the Bishop’s Office go?” he asked.
“Pretty much as I expected. I talked about the possibility of spontaneous remission and they talked about miracles.” As she spoke, Monica unwillingly realized how good it felt to be so close to Jenner, to relive for the moment the sensation of sitting next to him in the restaurant on Friday night, their shoulders touching at the crowded table.
“I’ll be honest, Monica, I can’t get the Michael O’Keefe file out of my head. It does include everything from the first CAT scan you ordered to the MRIs and CAT scans a year later showing the total disappearance of the cancerous tumor, doesn’t it?”
“Absolutely. The whole works.”
“Would you lend the file to me for a few days? I really want to study it. I still find it hard to believe what I saw.”
“That was my reaction, too. After the doctors in Cincinnati confirmed my diagnosis, the O’Keefes took Michael home. I phoned from time to time and all they said was that he was holding his own. In the beginning he continued to have seizures, but then they moved to Mamaroneck and stopped coming to my office. Mrs. O’Keefe did not want more medical procedures, even MRIs, because they frightened Michael. But when she finally did bring him in, I knew I was looking at a healthy little boy, and the tests confirmed it.”
“Then is it okay if I borrow the file? I can stop by late this afternoon at your office for it. And I will be on time.”
“That’s fine. I’ll be there until about six.” As Ryan turned to go she asked, “How was the theatre?”
He stopped and turned back. “Great. It was the revival of Our Town. That’s always been one of my favorite plays.”
“I played Emily when I was in high school.” Why am I telling Ryan that? Monica asked herself. Is it because I want to prolong this conversation?
Ryan smiled. “Well, I’m glad you were acting. I still get a lump in my throat at the end, when George throws himself on Emily’s grave.” As he turned again to leave, he gave her the quick smile that she knew would instantly be replaced by his usual serious expression.
She had been standing by the nurses’ desk. She turned back to it. Rita Greenberg was sitting there, her eyes on Ryan’s retreating figure.
“He sure is cute, isn’t he, Doctor?” Rita sighed. “He has so much authority, and yet he seems a little shy.”
“Um-hum,” Monica answered noncommittally.
“I think he likes you. This is the second time he came down looking for you this morning.”
Good Lord, Monica thought. That’s all I need, to have the nurses talking about an office romance. “Dr. Jenner wants to look at the file of one of my patients,” she said crisply.
It was clear that Rita had gotten the implied rebuke. “Of course, Doctor,” she said, her voice equally crisp.
“I’m off. You know where to get me,” Monica said as she felt the stirring of her cell phone in the pocket of her jacket.
It was Kristina Johnson. “Doctor,” she said, her voice frightened, “I’m in a cab on the way to the hospital. Sally is really, really sick.”
“How long has she been sick?” Monica asked, the question rushing from her lips.
“Kind of since yesterday. She was wheezing, but then she slept pretty well. But this morning it kept getting worse, and I got really scared. She was gasping for breath.”
In the background Monica could hear the combined coughing and sobbing of little Sally Carter. “How far from the hospital are you?” she snapped.
“We’re on the West Side Highway. We should be there in fifteen minutes.”
It suddenly occurred to Monica that Renée Carter, Sally’s mother, should have been the one calling her. “Is Ms. Carter with you?” she asked sharply.
“No. She hasn’t been home in two days, and I haven’t heard from her.”
“I’ll meet you in the emergency room, Kristina,” Monica said. She turned off her cell phone and dropped it in her pocket.
Rita Greenberg had been listening. “Sally’s had another asthma attack.” It was not a question.
“Yes. I’m going to admit her, and before I release her again I’m going to have Family Services look into that situation. I only wish I had done it last week.”
“I’ll have a crib all set up,” Rita promised.
“Put her in the alcove again. The last thing she needs is to pick up a bug.”
Fifteen minutes later Monica was standing at the entrance to the emergency room when the cab pulled up. She ran over to it, opened the door, and reached inside. “Give her to me.” Not waiting for Kristina to pay the driver she raced back into the hospital. Sally was wheezing and gasping. Her lips were blue and her eyes were rolling back in her head.
She can’t breathe, Monica thought as she carried her to a cubicle and laid her on a stretcher. Two nurses were waiting for her. One of them swiftly undressed Sally and Monica saw that the labored gasps of breath were coming from her lips not her chest. It’s gone into pneumonia, Monica thought as she reached for the oxygen mask the nurse was holding out to her.
An hour later she was settling Sally in the intensive care unit on the pediatric floor. The oxygen mask was still in place. Intravenous fluids and medicine were dripping into Sally’s arm. Her hands had been tied to keep her from pulling the needle out. Her frightened wails had given way to sleepy moans.
Kristina Johnson, her eyes welling with tears, had followed them and was waiting for Monica to leave the side of the crib. Monica looked at the young girl’s tired, worried face and the admonition she had intended to give died on her lips.
“Sally is a very, very sick baby,” she said. “Kristina, am I right that you said her mother has not been home in the last day or two?”
“She left night before last. Yesterday was supposed to be my day off. But when I woke up I could see that her bed wasn’t slept in. I haven’t heard from her at all.”
Kristina began to cry. “If anything happens to Sally it’s my fault, but Doctor, I was afraid if I brought Sally in yesterday, Ms. Carter would be furious. And Sally didn’t really seem that sick until she was going to bed last night. So I put on the vaporizer and I slept on the couch in her roo
m and I was sure her mother would come home and look in, then maybe we’d bring Sally to the hospital if she started wheezing any harder and . . .”
Monica stopped the flow of words. “Kristina, this is not your fault. Why don’t you go back to Ms. Carter’s apartment and get some rest. I’m going to stay here until I’m sure Sally is breathing properly. In the morning, if Ms. Carter still has not shown up, I would suggest you leave a note for her and go home. I intend to take up her absence with the authorities.”
“Is it all right if I visit Sally tomorrow?”
“Of course it is.”
A warning alarm from the crib made Monica spin around. As an intensive care nurse rushed toward them, Sally’s labored breathing stopped.
29
She was about five four, give or take an inch, nice figure, early thirties, short reddish brown hair, expensive clothes,” Detective Barry Tucker told his wife when he called her to say he’d be late getting home. “The body was found by some old couple who told me they walked every day after breakfast.”
He was back at headquarters, having a cup of coffee and grinned at her response. “Yeah, honey, I know I could use a walk every day. Maybe even a run. But the city of New York pays me to arrest criminals, not take walks.”
Again he listened. He was a rotund man in his early thirties with a benevolent expression. “No jewelry, no purse,” he answered. “We figure it was a robbery that got out of hand. She may have been fool enough to put up a struggle. She was strangled. Never had a chance.” His tone now edged with impatience, he said, “Listen, honey, I’ve gotta go. I’ll call you when I’m ready to leave. Good . . .”
With less patience, he listened again. “Yeah. Everything she had on looked new. Even the shoes, those crazy ones that are like stilts. They looked as though she was wearing them for the first time. Honey, I . . .”
The Shadow of Your Smile Page 10