The Assailant

by James Patrick Hunt

  “I know that,” Hastings said. “But let’s check on what we know first.”

  •

  Reesa Woods’s apartment was in the Soulard area. It was on the first floor, a short set of brick steps leading up to the door.

  Hastings knocked on the door, calling out “hello” after three raps.

  Klosterman looked into the front window. The lights were out. Klosterman said, “I don’t see anyone. I’ll go check the back.”

  He did so while Hastings remained at the front door. The apartment was one of many in a set of buildings in a row, so Klosterman had to walk all the way around the block and come back up the alley. Hastings looked into the windows. Soon he heard Klosterman’s knocks on the back door. Hastings drifted down to the Jaguar parked at the curb. He knew there was no one home. He was getting cold.

  Klosterman came back, holding up his arm. “Nothing,” he said. “We got the telephonic warrant.”

  “Let’s find the super. Get him to let us in.”

  It took some time, but they found the night manager of the complex. She let them into the apartment. It was well furnished and clean, but there were few if any signs of warmth. Above her bed was a poster of Marilyn Monroe nude. The one she did for the first issue of Playboy. A couple of hardback books that didn’t look like they’d been read. The bed was not made. An empty refrigerator, an unopened box of Pop-Tarts in the cupboard.

  They spent the next two hours going through the apartment and another half hour questioning the night manager. They didn’t learn anything helpful.

  They were both in lousy moods when they left.

  Klosterman said, “I get the feeling she didn’t spend much time there.”

  “Me too,” Hastings said.

  NINE

  He called Carol from his car on the way home.

  She answered the phone, “Yeah?”

  “Hi. Uh, do you still want to go out for dinner?”

  “Well, it’s almost eight thirty. It would be nine before we sat down. I don’t know . . .”

  “Well, I could stop by someplace and pick something up.”

  “Maybe we could have dinner tomorrow night.”

  “I’d like to, but I’m picking Amy up tomorrow night,” Hastings said. “But the three of us could have dinner.”

  “Well . . . let’s see,” Carol said. He heard her sigh. And Hastings felt it then. A funk. She had spent the day alone and he had let her down. But a girl had been murdered, and it was better to chase leads when they were hot.

  Hastings said, “Do you want to be alone?”

  “No. I didn’t say that. Just come over.”

  “Do you want me to bring food?”

  “No. Just come over.”

  “Okay.”

  Hastings clicked off the phone and his first thought was, Okay, but what am I going to eat?

  A fine rain had begun. He turned on the windshield wipers.

  Hastings drove to a Coney Island stand and ordered two hot dogs with mustard and onions and a Dr Pepper. His plan was to eat them in the car before he got to Carol’s. He felt little guilt about this. It added about five minutes to his trip to her place, and his being hungry and cranky wasn’t going to be good for either of them. He felt better after he ate.

  Driving north on Skinker Boulevard, Hastings considered his relationship with Carol McGuire. He understood that she probably had justification to be irritated with him. He did not consider himself a workaholic, and he often got bored with people who had little to talk about outside of work. It led to even duller conversations about things like the Cardinals, but at least it was something else. In a sense, he and Carol McGuire were part of the same community. She was a criminal defense attorney who had cut her teeth in the public defender’s office. They worked opposite sides, so to speak, but they knew a lot of the same people and the same cases. When they first met, it was under conditions that could arguably have been called hostile. She got a witness out of jail, whom Hastings wanted to question. Both of them thinking they needed to be adversarial to the other, but soon realizing their goals were not all that different.

  Carol McGuire had been tentative with him at first. She recognized, as others had, that George Hastings could read people well enough, whether or not they were subjects in a criminal investigation, but that he may not have been the best person to read himself. In the first few weeks they started to see each other, Carol said they should remain friends. A not-so-subtle way of telling him that he wasn’t going to get her in bed too soon. That lasted about six weeks, and after the first few times they made love, she asked him whether he would take Eileen back if she asked.

  He expressed surprise at this, if not indignation.

  “Take her back? She’s married.”

  “I know. She left you for another man. But what if she gave that up, came back to you, and said, ‘Okay, I’ve changed. We’ll do it your way. Take me back.’ ”

  “She’s not going to do that.”

  “But what if she did?”

  “She won’t.”

  “But what if she did?”

  “That’s like asking, what if she grew wings? She’s not going to do that.”

  “She’s not going to what?”

  “She’s not going to—change.”

  Carol McGuire said, “Are you sure of that?”

  “I think so,” Hastings said.

  “I wish you were sure.”

  “Come on. What is this?”

  “George, can you admit some things?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like, you fell in love with a girl because she was pretty and charming and you hoped to turn her into what you wanted. A good wife, a good mother. A PTA mom. You thought she would become those things because you picked her.”

  “That I would be her Pygmalion.”

  Carol smiled. “Okay, she said that, not me. But was she really that far off?”

  “Wait, let me understand this: you’re defending her?”

  “No, not really. This isn’t really about her. You know I’m not a fan of Eileen’s. I’m just saying that I understand where she was coming from.”

  “So she was right to leave me?”

  “Oh, Jesus Christ. No. I’m saying that you and her wanted different things. She knew it, but you didn’t. Her husband is an idiot, but he’s far better suited to her than you.”

  “I don’t know about—”

  “George, he is. He is. This is part of the problem with you. Part of what makes you a good detective is this, for lack of a better word, arrogance you have. But it has its drawbacks too. You see Eileen with Ted and you wonder how she could go from you to him. Am I right?”

  “No.” But she was. And he knew it.

  Carol said, “See, it’s who she is. Maybe it’s always who she was. But you can’t see that because you get in the way. You think because she was your wife, she had the same sort of character you have. Or you could get her there. What I’m saying is, you’re only seeing it through your perspective.”

  “So I’m the one that’s delusional?”

  “You were both delusional. Eileen probably always will be. But you, well . . . there’s hope for you yet.”

  “Gee, thanks.”

  He had been rankled by this analysis. But in time he had grown to understand it. And as the months passed by, he had come to respect Carol in a way that he had probably never respected Eileen.

  So the divorce was behind him and he had come to terms with it. But as he washed the hot dogs down with Dr Pepper, he thought now of what Claude Dwyer, his old patrol sergeant, had once told another middle-aged cop who recently got divorced. The freshly divorced cop bragged that he had another girlfriend, this one much younger and thinner than his ex, and she was moving in with him and, boy, was he getting the action now.

  Sergeant Dwyer said, “Yeah? You want some free advice?”

  “What?”

  “Get a vasectomy. And I mean now.”

  The middle-aged cop gave Dwyer a puzzl
ed frown, but a couple of the wiser cops laughed because they knew where the old sergeant was coming from. That is, that a man freshly divorced doesn’t know his head from his ass. Particularly if he’s middle-aged and a cowboy cop to boot. Dwyer knew that a man in that situation would not be himself for a couple of years and in that interval was likely to seek a quick emotional solution with another woman. My new girlfriend’s pregnant and we’re going to get married and, goddammit, this time everything’s gonna be just great. From one disaster to another.

  Hastings smiled at the memory. He hadn’t gotten a vasectomy. Carol used the pill. And they had never discussed children.

  •

  Carol was watching the news when he got to her apartment. She kissed him on the cheek and said, “It was on the news. The murder.”

  “Yeah? Aaron give a statement?” Aaron Pressler, the department’s media spokesman.

  “No,” Carol said. “Not on television. The newscaster just said the police were investigating it. I guess it’s not that big a story. Do you want a beer?”

  “Yeah, thanks. I can get it.” He went to the refrigerator as she took a seat on the divan. On TV, the local PBS station was playing an old Preston Sturges film. William Demarest in a marine uniform telling small-town folk that he was at Guadalcanal and that was no fooling.

  Hastings said from the kitchen, “I wouldn’t say it wasn’t important.”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  He came back to the living room and took a seat next to her. He said, “No, you didn’t. Sorry.”

  “It’s all right. The news said she was a coed.”

  “They used that word? Coed?”

  “Yeah, they like stuff like that. Coed murder.”

  “Hmmm. She was a call girl.”

  “She was?”

  “Yeah. An escort. They probably marketed her as a college girl. It helps, I guess.”

  “They—the escort service?”

  “Yes.” Hastings put his head back and closed his eyes. It was an involuntary communication. It meant that he didn’t want to talk about it anymore. Half of the first forty-eight hours gone and they had made little progress in finding the girl’s murderer. Tomorrow was Sunday. He had responsibilities to his work and to his daughter. But he would think about that later.

  “George?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you want to go to sleep?”

  “No, I’m fine. What’s on television?”

  “A movie. Hail the Conquering Hero. It’s pretty good.”

  “Okay.” He opened his eyes to watch it.

  Five minutes later he was asleep. Carol McGuire took the nearly full beer from his hands and set it on the coffee table.

  TEN

  “Can I get you a drink, Raymond?”

  Raymond Sheffield held up his glass. It was about three-quarters full.

  “Oh,” Carla Monroe said. “Drinking the white liquor, eh?”

  Raymond said, “It’s club soda.”

  Carla Monroe was a nurse. She was heavyset, her face almost balloonlike when she smiled. She smelled of wine. She said, “I forgot, you don’t drink.”

  The party was at Ted Zoller’s house in Kirkwood. Ted was the hospital’s premier chest surgeon. He was leaving St. Mary’s to take a position at a clinic in Ladue. He and his wife had invited most of the staff to his going-away party. His home was smaller than Raymond had thought it would be.

  Raymond recognized about half the people at the party from work. The other half were Dr. Zoller’s friends and family outside the hospital. A few of them were doctors.

  Raymond made small talk with a couple of schoolteachers, one of whom had spent the previous year in China. She had brought her photos to the party, and Raymond politely went through them, asking simple questions about some of the people and places every few photos. He stopped only when Dr. MacDonald raised his voice to say that he wanted to say a few words about Ted. The guests gave him their silence and then laughed appropriately at his jokes and warm remarks for Dr. Zoller, and after glasses were raised to toast the good doctor with a great future, Dr. Zoller was forced to say something in response.

  When that was done, the schoolteacher who had gone to China said to Raymond, “Are you a doctor too?”

  “Yes,” Raymond said.

  “You worked with Dr. Zoller?”

  “Yes. For a short time.”

  The girl was around twenty-seven, and she had healthy blond hair and a clean, athletic look. She paid little attention to her boyfriend. Her name was Tracy.

  There was a pause. Tracy was waiting for Raymond to say something else.

  When he didn’t, she said, “I went to school with Jeff. That’s Dr. Zoller’s son.”

  “I see.”

  Tracy thought that she could tell him more about that. That she was the son’s first girlfriend . . . in a way, though probably more of a female friend than a girlfriend. But she didn’t think this man would find it that interesting. She thought, You’re too old to be explaining things like that anyway. She thought the doctor was an interesting figure. He wore a herringbone jacket and tie and he looked like he belonged in the 1950s or early ’60s. He was not overly handsome, but there was something interesting about him. He looked a bit like a young Martin Sheen. She saw no wedding band on the man’s finger. She wondered if he was bored by her company. He didn’t seem very interested in what she had to say. He seemed indifferent, in fact. Yet at the same time, he did not seem uncomfortable. She wondered if he would remain seated with her until he had to use the bathroom or if he would excuse himself before that.

  Another man approached them. An older guy with a big stomach and glasses and a frog’s face. He said something to the doctor next to her, but Tracy could see that it was a pretense to get closer to her.

  The man sat on an ottoman and said, “Ray, you trying to keep this pretty young lady all to yourself?” Haw-haw. The doctor smiled thinly, and before he could say anything, the fat man extended his hand to Tracy and said, “Don McGinnis. How are you doing?”

  “Fine.”

  “And you are?”

  “Tracy.”

  “And how did you end up with Dr. Sheffield here?”

  “I did—I’m here with my boyfriend. He’s over there by the bar.”

  “Ohhh.” The frog-faced man said it brightly, underlining the opportunity. Haw-haw.

  Dr. Sheffield said, “Dr. McGinnis is our chief ob-gyn resident.”

  Tracy said, “Is that right?” Her tone polite but uninterested. She hoped he would take the cue. He didn’t.

  Dr. McGinnis said, “Yeah, St. Mary’s is a good little hospital. It’s not Barnes-Jewish, but sometimes less is more, you know?”

  “Hmmm-mmm.”

  “A place like that, you’re just a cog in a big machine.”

  After a moment, Tracy said, “A place like what?”

  “Barnes.”

  “Oh. I don’t work in medicine, so I . . .” She raised her hands, as if to say that he was wasting his time talking shop to her, but that didn’t work either.

  Another couple drifted over, the nurse who had offered to get Dr. Sheffield a drink and an intern from the hospital. A new conversation bouquet formed.

  It began then. A couple of professional men, one of them in his middle years, and a woman whose best years were behind her, all of them consciously or unconsciously aware of her, young and pretty, and wanting to impress her. It had happened before. It happens to the most well intentioned of people.

  The intern said that Dr. Zoller was smart, getting out of the hospital now. He didn’t have the exact figures, but he was sure that the man’s income would at least double. Dr. McGinnis said, sure, but there were other factors besides money to consider. He said that you could work outside the hospital system if you wanted, but then you were in the business of getting and keeping patients. He said, “Have you noticed that doctors are becoming like lawyers?”

  The intern said, “How do you mean?”

  “
I mean,” Dr. McGinnis said, “all the advertising. Look at the phone books, the billboards, the local magazines. Doctor ads everywhere. It’s the sort of thing we used to criticize lawyers for. Ambulance chasers, we called them. Trolling for clients. Who’d’ve thought our profession would end up doing the same thing?”

  The nurse said, “I don’t think it’s as simple as that.”

  “Isn’t it?” McGinnis said. “Look at all the photos of doctors. They’re everywhere. Like real estate salesmen. ‘Introducing ten new physicians and three convenient new locations to care for you and your family.’ ”

  The intern said, “Well, it is a business. You need patients.”

  McGinnis shrugged and raised his glass to tip more Dewar’s into his mouth.

  Dr. Sheffield said, “I think what Dr. McGinnis is saying is that something has been lost.”

  The intern said, “Excuse me?” having almost forgotten that Dr. Sheffield was there.

  “I think what Dr. McGinnis is saying is that the medical profession is supposed to be that: a profession. Not a business.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “There is a difference. You either see it or you don’t.”

  “Oh, come on. Are you saying you consider this profession a calling?” The intern was smiling to himself now.

  “A calling.” Dr. Sheffield smiled then, just. Then he said, “It should be, of course. Ideally, it should be. We should be in the ‘business’ of healing. But are we?”

  “Yes,” the nurse said.

  Dr. Sheffield smiled again, wider this time. He looked down.

  Tracy said, “You were going to say something else.”

  He shrugged.

  “No, come on.”

  “I was only going to say something about reconstructive surgery.”

  The intern said, “You mean breast implants.” He was smirking. “It always comes back to tits, huh?” The joke brought him a couple of tired smiles but only that.

  “Well,” Dr. Sheffield said, “I was only going to point out that reconstructive surgery is perhaps a misnomer. A woman’s face is shattered in an auto accident. We want to rebuild her face, fix the disfigurement so that she’s presentable to the public. That is reconstructive surgery. That is a genuine healing. But contrast that with a woman who goes to a doctor complaining that her breasts are sagging. That there are lines developing on her face and forehead. In other words, that she is suffering from the ravages of age. Of time. Of the natural order. Do we say to this woman, ‘This is nature. This is the passage of time.’ That ‘a struggle against time and nature is both futile and immature’? No, we do not. We take this woman’s anxiety and depression as if they were symptoms of a disease. When there is no disease. There is no sickness. And in so doing, we do not heal this woman. Indeed, we exacerbate her condition. We increase her anxiety because we help foster her immature, unrealistic view of the world. We foster her childlike narcissism. When we do that, we are not healing. We are profiting from something that helps no one. We engage in something that demeans both the physician and the patient.”