“About an hour after Millgate was taken out of here Thursday night, a priest who called himself Father Dandridge came in to see him. He was very upset about not being able to hear Millgate’s confession.”
“He came from a parish in Boston? Do you remember the name?”
“I’m afraid not.”
Pittman’s spirit sank.
“But you don’t have to phone Boston to talk to him,” Jill said.
“What do you mean?”
“Father Dandridge made a point of telling me that he wasn’t returning to Boston. Not until he had a chance to talk to Millgate. If I heard anything, the priest said, I was to call him at a rectory here in Manhattan. St. Joseph’s. The priest said he’d be staying for the weekend.” Jill glanced at her watch. “Look, I’m sorry, but I’ve been off the ward too long. I have a patient who’s due for his meds.”
“I understand. Thank you. You’ve helped me more than you can imagine.”
“If there’s anything else you need to know…”
“I’ll get back to you.”
Jill set down the cardboard cup and walked quickly toward the elevator.
It took about twenty seconds for the doors to open, and as she waited, facing the doors, obviously aware that he watched her, Pittman was impressed that she didn’t act self-conscious. After she got in the elevator, as the doors closed, for a fraction of an instant she smiled at him. Then she was gone, and the excitement that Pittman felt about what he had learned was replaced by exhaustion that weighed so heavily, his legs bent.
3
Pittman’s sudden weakness alarmed him. Light-headed, he feared that he would lose his balance. He leaned against the coffee machine.
What did you expect? he told himself. The past two days, you’ve had more exercise than you’ve had all year. You’ve been running all over Manhattan. You got a few hours sleep on a park bench. You haven’t had enough to eat. You’ve been strung out from fear and adrenaline. It’s a wonder you managed to stay on your feet as long as you have.
But I can’t collapse. Not here. Not now.
Why not? he joked bitterly. A hospital’s a great place to collapse.
Have to get back to Sean. Have to go back to the loft.
But after Pittman concentrated to steady himself and pushed away from the coffee machine, he discovered that he wasn’t steady at all. His legs wavered more disturbingly. His stomach felt queasy. He gripped the wall, afraid that the janitor at the end of the corridor would look in his direction, see that he was in trouble, and call for help.
Have to get away from here.
Sure, and how far do you think you’ll get? You’re oozing sweat, pal. You’re seeing gray. If you go outside, you’re liable to collapse on the street. After the police find you, after they see the name on your credit card and find that .45 in your coat pocket…
Where, then?
His bitter joke echoed in his mind. A hospital’s a great place to collapse.
4
As the elevator rose, Pittman’s light-headedness increased. When the doors opened on the sixth floor, he strained to look natural and walked toward the intensive-care area. If Jill Warren came out, or the female doctor he’d spoken to earlier, he doubted that he’d have the strength to explain convincingly why he had returned.
But Pittman didn’t have another option. The intensive-care waiting room was the only refuge he could think of that he knew he could get to. Its lights had been dimmed. He veered left from the corridor, passed several taut-faced people trying to doze on the uncomfortable chairs, stepped over a man sleeping on the floor, and came to a metal cabinet in back.
The cabinet contained hospital pillows and blankets, Pittman knew. He had found out the hard way when Jeremy had been rushed to intensive care and Pittman had spent the first of many nights in the waiting room. A staff member had told him about the pillows and blankets but had explained that usually the cabinet was kept locked.
“Then why store the pillows and blankets in the cabinet if people can’t get to them?” Pittman had complained.
“Because we don’t want people sleeping here.”
“So you force them to stay awake in those metal chairs all night?”
“It’s a hospital rule. Tonight I’ll make an exception.” The staff member had unlocked the cabinet.
Now Pittman twisted the latch on the cabinet, found that it was locked, and angrily pulled out the tool knife Sean O’Reilly had given him. His hands trembled. It took him longer than it normally would have. But finally, using the lock picks concealed in the knife, he opened the cabinet.
Dizzy, nauseous, he lay among others in the most murky corner of the waiting room, a pillow beneath his head, a blanket pulled over him. Despite the hard floor, sleep had never come quicker or been more welcome. As he drifted into unconsciousness, he was dimly aware that others in the waiting room groped toward the pillows and blankets in the cabinet that he had deliberately left open.
He was disturbed only once—an elderly man waking a frail woman. “She’s dead, May. Nothin’ they could do.”
5
Daylight and voices woke him. Those who’d remained all night in the waiting room were rousing themselves. Others, whose friends or relatives had evidently just been admitted to intensive care, were trying to acquaint themselves with their new surroundings.
Pittman sat up wearily, concentrated to clear his head, and stood slowly with effort. The combination of the hard floor and his previous day’s exertion made his muscles ache. After he folded the blanket and put it and the pillow into the cabinet, he draped his overcoat over an arm, concealing the heavy bulge of the .45 in his right pocket.
A hospital volunteer brought in a cart of coffee, orange juice, and doughnuts. Noticing a sign that said PAY WHAT YOU CAN, Pittman couldn’t find any more change in his pockets. Sean O’Reilly had lent him twenty dollars, and Pittman guiltily put in one of those dollars, drank two cups of orange juice, ate two doughnuts, and suddenly was afraid that he would throw up. In a washroom down the hall, he splashed cold water on his face, looked at his pasty complexion in the mirror, touched his beard stubble, and felt demoralized. How can I possibly keep going? he thought.
The suicide that he had almost committed four nights earlier beckoned.
Why bother trying? I’m in so much trouble, I can never get out of it, he thought. Even if I do get out of it, Jeremy will still be dead. What’s the point? Nothing’s worth what I’m going through.
You can’t let the bastards destroy you. Remember what you told yourself—it has to be your idea, not theirs. If you kill yourself now, you’ll be giving them what they want. You’ll be letting them win. Don’t let the sons of bitches have that satisfaction.
A short, dreary-looking man whom Pittman recognized from the waiting room came into the washroom, took off his shirt, chose the sink next to Pittman, opened a travel kit, lathered his face, and began to shave.
“Say, you wouldn’t have another one of those disposable razors, would you?” Pittman asked.
“Do what I did, buddy. Go down to the shop in the lobby and buy one.
6
St. Joseph’s hadn’t benefited from the renovation that, thanks to an influx of Yuppies during the eighties, had taken place in other parts of SoHo. Although small, the church’s architecture resembled a cathedral, but its sandstone exterior was black with soot, its stained-glass windows grimy, its interior badly in need of painting.
Pittman stood at the rear of the church, smelled incense, listened to an organ that sounded as if it needed repair, and surveyed the impressive amount of worshipers who, unmindful of the bleak surroundings, had come for Sunday Mass. The front of the church wasn’t bleak, though. A golden chalice gleamed on the altar. Candles glowed. A tall, intense priest wearing a crimson vestment read from the Gospel, then delivered a sermon about trusting in God and not giving in to despair.
Right, Pittman thought bleakly. He sat in a pew in back and watched the continuation of the first Ma
ss he’d attended in many years. He had never gone to church on a regular basis, but after Jeremy had died, his indifference had turned to rejection. As a consequence, he couldn’t account for his impulse when the time came for communion and he followed parishioners toward the altar. He told himself that he wanted to get a closer look at the priest, for an assistant at the church’s rectory had told Pittman that Father Dandridge would be conducting this particular Mass.
Coming near to him, Pittman saw that the priest was in his middle fifties and that his strong features had deep lines of strain. He had a jagged scar across his chin, and his left hand was welted from what looked like the consequence of a long-ago fire.
When Pittman received communion, the emptiness inside him felt immense.
The priest ended the Mass. “Go in peace.”
Not just yet, Pittman thought.
As the parishioners left, he made his way toward the front of the church, went through a door on the right, and found himself in the sacristy, the room next to the altar where objects needed for Mass were customarily stored.
7
The priest was taking off his vestments, setting them on a counter, when he noticed Pittman enter. Deliberate movements and cordlike sinews visible on the priest’s forearms suggested a man who kept his mind and body in condition and control. He became still, watching Pittman approach.
“May I help you?” the priest asked.
“Father Dandridge?”
“That’s correct.”
“I need to speak to you.”
“Very well.” The priest waited.
As Pittman hesitated, the priest cocked his head. “You look nervous. Is this a personal matter… something for confession?”
“No. Yes. I mean, it is personal, but… What I need to speak to you about—” Pittman felt apprehensive about the reaction he would get—“is Jonathan Millgate.”
The priest’s dark eyes assessed him. “Yes, I remember you from the Mass. The anguish on your face as you came up for communion. As if the weight of the entire world were on your shoulders.”
“That’s how it feels.”
“Understandably. If what the newspapers say about you is correct, Mr. Pittman.”
Panic. It had never occurred to Pittman that the priest would be able to identify him. Nerves quickening, he swung toward the door, about to flee.
“No,” Father Dandridge said. “Please. Don’t go. Be calm.”
Something in the priest’s voice made Pittman hesitate.
“I give you my word,” Father Dandridge said. “You have nothing to fear from me.”
Pittman’s stomach cramped. “How did you know… ?”
“Who you are?” Father Dandridge gestured, inadvertently drawing Pittman’s attention to his scarred left hand. “Jonathan Millgate and I had a special relationship. It shouldn’t be surprising that I would have read every newspaper article and watched every television report I could find to learn more about what happened to him. I have studied your photograph many times. I recognized you immediately.”
Pittman couldn’t seem to get enough air. “It’s important that you believe this. I didn’t kill him.”
“Important to me or you?”
“I tried to save him, not harm him.” Pittman was suddenly conscious of the amplifying echo in the small room. He glanced nervously toward the archway that led to the altar.
Father Dandridge gazed in that direction, as well. The church was almost empty. A few elderly men and women remained kneeling, their heads bowed in prayer.
“No one seems to have heard you,” Father Dandridge said. “But the next Mass is scheduled to begin in half an hour. The church will soon be full.” He pointed toward two men who entered at the back of the church.
“Is there somewhere we can talk?”
“I ask you again, do you want confession?”
“What I want is what you promised at the end of the Mass. Peace.”
Father Dandridge intensified his gaze, then nodded. “Come with me.
8
The priest led the way toward a door at the back of the sacristy. When he opened it, Pittman was amazed to look out toward a garden, its well-kept appearance in contrast with the decay at the front of the church. Neatly mowed grass was flanked by blooming lilacs, their fragrance wafting through the open door. The rectangular area was enclosed by a high brick wall.
Father Dandridge motioned for Pittman to precede him.
When Pittman didn’t respond, the priest looked amused. “Suspicious of me? You don’t want to turn your back on me? How could I possibly hurt you?”
“Lately, people have been finding ways.” Keeping his hand on the .45 hidden in his overcoat pocket, Pittman glanced back through the arch toward the church, which was rapidly being filled. He followed the priest into the garden and shut the door.
The morning sun was warm and brilliant, emphasizing the jagged white scar on Father Dandridge’s chin. The priest sat on a metal bench. The sound of the city’s traffic seemed far away.
“Why should I believe that you didn’t kill Jonathan Millgate?”
“Because if I did, I ought to be on the run. Why would I come to you?”
Father Dandridge raised his shoulders. “Perhaps you’re as deranged as the news reports say. Perhaps you intend to kill me, as well.”
“No. I need your help.”
“And how could I possibly help you? Why would I want to help you?”
“In the news reports, Millgate’s people claim they took him from the hospital to protect him from me, but that’s not true,” Pittman insisted. “The real reason they took him is they didn’t want to expose him to reporters after the story broke about his supposed connection with trying to buy nuclear weapons from the former Soviet Union.”
“Even if you can prove what you say…”
“I can.”
“… it’s irrelevant to whether or not you killed him.”
“It’s very relevant. Look, I followed him from the hospital, yes. But I wasn’t stalking him. I wanted to find out why he’d been taken. At the estate in Scarsdale, the nurse and doctor who were supposed to be caring for him left him alone. He became disconnected from his life-support system. I managed to get into his room and help him.”
“But a witness claims it happened the other way around, that you cut off his oxygen and caused him to have a fatal heart attack.”
“A nurse came in when I was putting the oxygen prongs into Millgate’s nostrils. She heard Millgate tell me something. I think that’s what all of this is about. His people were afraid of reporters asking him questions. But I’m a reporter, and what Millgate told me may have been exactly what they didn’t want anybody to know. They tried to stop me, but I got away, and…”
Father Dandridge added, “So they decided to cut off Jonathan Millgate’s life-support system, to let him die to prevent him from ever telling anyone else. Then they blamed his death on you so that even if you tried to use what you were told, you wouldn’t be believed.”
“That’s right,” Pittman said, amazed. “That’s the theory I’m trying to prove. How did—?”
“When you hear enough confessions, you become proficient at anticipating.”
“This isn’t confession!”
“What did Jonathan Millgate say to you?”
Pittman’s energy dwindled, discouragement overcoming him. He rubbed the back of his neck. “That’s the problem. It doesn’t seem that important. In a way, it doesn’t even make sense. But later a man tried to kill me at my apartment because of what Millgate had told me.”
“Now you tell me.”
“A man’s name.” Pittman shook his head in confusion. “And something about snow.”
“A name?”
“Duncan Grollier.”
Father Dandridge concentrated, assessing Pittman. “Jonathan Millgate was perhaps the most despicable man I have ever met.”
“What? But you said that the two of you were friends.”
Father
Dandridge smiled bitterly. “No. I said that he and I had a special relationship. I could never be his friend. But I could pity him as much as I loathed his actions. I could try to save his soul. You see, I was his confessor.”
Pittman straightened with surprise.
“When you saw me in the sacristy, you couldn’t help noticing my scars.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…”
“It’s quite all right. There’s no need to worry about my feelings. I’m proud of these scars. I earned them in combat. During the Vietnam War. I was a chaplain in I Corps. A base I was assigned to—close to the demilitarized zone—came under siege. Bad weather kept reinforcements from being brought in. We were under constant mortar bombardment. Of course, as a noncombatant, I wasn’t allowed to use a weapon, but I could care for the wounded. I could crawl with food and water and ammunition. I could give dying men the last sacrament. The scar on my chin is from shrapnel. The scars on my hand are from a fire I helped to put out. When I say I’m proud of these scars, it’s because they remind me of what a privilege it was to serve beside such brave men. Of two hundred, only fifty survived by the time reinforcements were able to come. None of those who died was older than twenty-one. And I blame Jonathan Millgate for those deaths, just as I blame him for the entire forty-seven thousand men who died in battle in that war. A hundred and fifty thousand men were wounded. Thousands of other lives were destroyed because of the psychological effects of the war. And why? Because Millgate and his four colleagues”—the priest twisted his lips in contempt—“the so-called grand counselors—advised the President and the nation that the domino theory was something worth dying for, that if we didn’t keep the Communists out of Vietnam, the rest of Southeast Asia would fall to them. A quarter of a century later, communism is a crumbling philosophy, and Southeast Asia is becoming ever more capitalistic, even though South Vietnam was taken over by the Communists. The war made no difference. But Jonathan Millgate and the other grand counselors became obscenely rich because of their relationship with the arms industry that inevitably profited from the war the grand counselors insisted was necessary.”
Desperate Measures Page 14