by Larry Hill
PHILANTHROPIST
a novel
By Larry Hill
TEXT COPYRIGHT LARRY HILL 2014
Copyright © 2014 Larry Hill
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 1502448092
ISBN 13: 9781502448095
Library of Congress Control Number: 2014917118 (If applicable)
LCCN Imprint Name: City and State (If applicable)
COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY THE AUTHOR, CIRCA 1969
Dedicated to my teachers, my students and, most importantly, my patients.
“The afternoon knows what the morning never suspected.”
Robert Frost
Table of Contents
JAMESON.. 6
A SCOTCH AND.. 11
TWO SAUVIGNON BLANCS. 11
JAIL. 21
THE NEW WIDOWER.. 24
HOUDINI 28
HENNESSEY VSOP. 36
ERNESTO.. 41
GENERAL HOSPITAL. 47
ON THE MEND.. 56
GOING HOME. 59
TONIC WATER AND A SLICE OF LIME. 62
MEGAN TURNS THREE. 69
BRUNELLO DI MONTALCINO.. 75
THE PHILANTHROPIST. 87
JASON MOVES NORTH.. 92
MORE TWINS. 96
THE PYRAMID.. 110
WE DON’T WANT TO BE MORMONS. 116
STEPMOM... 122
THE TRIAL IS SET. 126
GLEN FIDDICH ON THE ROCKS. 130
THE JUDGE. 132
DOM PERIGNON.. 136
CHATEAU D’YQUEM, 1921. 142
A FUNERAL. 147
A VENEZUELAN.. 150
A CAN OF 7 Up. 154
JAMESON
Ten hours before Fred Klein killed a rich young woman and two days before he appeared on the front page of the San Francisco Chronicle, he learned that he had high cholesterol.
Klein, noted Bay Area philanthropist, rarely went to doctors. In fact, he had not seen his primary care physician, Allison Jameson, in five years. It wasn’t that nothing was ever bugging him; if anything he was a bit of a hypochondriac. On his seventy-second birthday, he consulted a urologist because he had to get out of bed to urinate three or four times a night. The doctor ruled out cancer and told him that he could make the problem go away. Klein refused all treatment. He, by no means, felt great, what with pain in his thumbs, age spots on his face and slowly deteriorating vision, but he figured that those were a result of having turned 75. His poker buddies suggested an orthopedist, a dermatologist and an ophthalmologist but he opted against any and all. Each specialist had his office downtown and parking was too goddam expensive; he refused to take a bus, claimed he couldn’t afford a taxi and refused his young wife’s offer to drive him and sit with him, either in the waiting room or the examining room. Plus he was convinced that nothing good would come of seeing doctors for such minor ailments – in spite of his wealth, he was sure that they would run up big bills on blood tests and X-rays, and come up with nothing that would make him feel any better. Sure, he had Medicare and a supplement but there was always more to it – he invariably had to write a check. “Screw it – I’m going to live to 90 and any more than that won’t do me or anybody else any good.”
A couple of weeks before Fred’s black-letter day, his wife, Jennifer, more than 30 years his junior, came home after a breast ultrasound with a red-letter report – there was nothing to worry about. All is well. Her sister had a breast removed for cancer at 40 so Jennifer was rightfully frightened that she was a victim-to-be. Jen’s annual mammogram suggested that maybe something sinister was growing in her ample left mammary gland; the ultrasound, the following day, proved it to be a simple cyst.
“Damn, I feel good! I don’t have cancer!” she exclaimed. “You know, Fred, you should go find out how you are. You haven’t had a physical since we were married.”
Not pointing out to his wife that she was no better off than she would be had she not had the breast test, he countered, “Maybe after the Super Bowl?” A fan of the new national pastime was he, but she had no sense whatever of the timing of the pro football season; he figured he could sell that as a reason to put off a trip to the internist.
She persisted. “Come on Hon. Do it for me. I didn’t marry you for the short term; I want you around for a while.”
“All right, but this is a one-time thing – don’t expect me to go next year.”
“You gotta deal.”
The next afternoon, she interrupted his Netflix. “Did you call Dr. Jameson’s office?”
“Forgot all about it. I’ll call tomorrow.”
“Huh-uh,” Jennifer growled. “I’ll call today.”
Half an hour later, as the sci-fi film neared its destructive climax, she returned to the TV room. “You’re on for next Tuesday, 9 AM.” I made sure to get you her first appointment so you won’t go nuts waiting.” Klein was not a patient patient – once he’d walked out of an ENT office fifteen minutes after his scheduled appointment, even after being told the doctor was in the midst of a tonsillectomy gone bad and would be just a bit late.
“And, you’ve got to go to the lab Monday morning to get blood and urine tests. You can’t eat or drink anything after midnight on Sunday.”
“That’s a load of crap,” he snorted. “I can’t do a thing until I’ve had my coffee and bagel.”
The lab was on Sutter, across the street from the old Jewish hospital, now an annex of the University. For reasons beyond Klein’s understanding, all of the others waiting for their blood draws were Russian. He waited hungrily, surrounded by Slavs and their guttural tones, until his turn came. He had nearly left, but knew that Jennifer was waiting in the car out front and would not allow him at her side without a bandaid in the crook of his arm. The pretty blond Russian phlebotomist-in-training, younger than Jen, tried three times to get blood from Fred’s deep veins, failing with each effort. Only after her weight-lifter of a boss tried once without luck and then succeeded on attempt #2, were the three test tubes filled with his hemoglobin and serum. He filled half of the plastic cup with urine and was embarrassed as he left the lavatory and walked through the waiting room, sample in hand. Five minutes later, Fred and Jen seated themselves at the last table at House of Bagels.
Fred drove his year-old Lexus into the parking lot underneath the medical office building well before his 9 o’clock appointment. He noticed the posted price list as he took his ticket from the machine - two dollars for every twenty minutes - and berated himself for having come early. By 9:05 AM, he was called by the medical assistant, a Lois Lane look-alike. He reluctantly put down the People magazine, having read part of its feature Tiger Woods article and was marched back to one of the two examination rooms. “Please take off your shirt, Mr. Klein,” said the assistant.
“No,” he responded gruffly. “I’m not going to freeze my ass off here waiting for the doctor. I’ll take it off when she comes through that door.”
“I’m so sorry, sir. I just wanted to do an EKG before Doctor sees you.”
“Why do I need an EKG? I don’t have any chest pain. And, do you know how much those goddamn things cost? I’d bet its $300. No EKG for me.”
“Yes, sir.” She left the room, closing the door with a muted slam.
The doctor entered the room seconds after the departure of her assistant. Allison Jameson, MD, was distantly related, without a fiduciary connection, to the Irish Whiskey Jamesons. Fred had only seen her twice in the five years since he switched from his 83- year-old GP. Once was for advice about stopping the antidepressants that he had taken since the death of his first wife, the other for blood tests before he married Jennifer. “Good morning, Mr. Klein. Mind if I call you Fred?”
In spite of the physician’s 68 years, Klein looked at her as very much his j
unior and was taken aback by the request. But he, after some hesitation, nodded in the affirmative. He assumed that she knew of his refusal to have the cardiogram.
“What brings you in today, Fred?”
“My wife. She demanded it. I’m just wasting your time, Doctor. I’m fine.”
“That’s great news, especially for someone who’s been around as long as you. Are you sure there aren’t any symptoms that are bothering you? You’d be a rare 75-year-old if there weren’t.”
“My thumbs hurt and I can’t pee as well as I used to and I have a few itchy spots on my face and arms.”
They spoke about the symptoms and the doctor did the usual physical exam finding the blood pressure to be just a few points higher than normal for adults younger than he, a regular pulse, normal sounding lungs and heart, and normal feeling liver and lymph nodes. The rash was nothing that a little over-the-counter cortisone cream couldn’t cure, the thumb joints were arthritic like those of so many seniors, and his weight of 215, coupled with a height of six feet, suggested that he probably needed to eat less or exercise more.
Klein balked when Jameson started putting on the latex glove suggesting a prostate exam was to be done. He was not pleased by the idea that this…woman… was going to put a finger in his anus. “I don’t think I need that. I recently saw Dr. McAlpin.”
“The urologist?”
“Yeah.
“When?”
“Three years ago.”
“Not exactly yesterday, Fred. If you are still having symptoms, we ought to check it out.”
“So you think I have cancer?”
“I doubt it. I’m sure Bill McAlpin told you that most urine flow issues in your age group are due to enlargement of the prostate, not cancer, but you have to be sure, and the best way to do that is a rectal exam and a PSA blood test.”
“What’s my PSA? Was it high?”
“I didn’t order it. I didn’t know you had any problems down there.”
“OK – go ahead, goddamit.” She did. He held back a yelp.
“Yeah, enlarged but I don’t feel any nodules to suggest cancer. We’ll make sure with the PSA.”
“No. No more blood tests for me. They had to stick me five times to get blood for this visit – that’s it for a while.”
“OK. If that’s what you want.”
“Plus, I read in the Times about prostate cancer. They say that treatment in old men like me isn’t worth doing. Why try to diagnose something if treatment doesn’t help?”
“You know, I can’t argue with that approach. Let’s watch and wait. By the way, I did get the blood and urine test results. Good news, bad news. You’re not anemic, your liver and kidneys are fine but your cholesterol is too high; it’s 260 and we want to see it below 200.”
“And, doctor, if it isn’t below 200, what’s going to happen to me?”
“You’re a well-read man, Fred. You know that high cholesterols are associated with heart attacks, and maybe with strokes.”
“So what do I have to do not to have one of those?”
“You have to change what you eat. Take this brochure, follow it as best as you can, and let’s repeat the test in a couple of months.”
“A friend of mine says that he takes some pill and never worries about what he eats. Can’t you just give me a prescription?”
“I’d prefer we did this without pills if possible. Those drugs, statins, do have side effects, so let’s try diet and use the pills only if that’s not enough.”
“OK,” Fred grumped.
On his way out of the office, he found no patients waiting and the opaque window separating the waiting room from the receptionist’s desk closed. He stealthily slipped the People magazine, with the unfinished Tiger article, into his deep pocket, promising himself he would return it at his next visit.
“How’d it go, Honey?” Jennifer inquired as her husband exited the Lexus.
“I don’t know why the fuck I let you make me an appointment. I was feeling fine when I went in and now you’d think I need to be in a rest home.”
“Huh – what did the doctor say?” she asked nervously as they went into the house. Does he have Alzheimer’s? Cancer?
He slammed down the brochure on the dining room table. “Look at this!” The document, if followed to the letter, was going to more than alter his diet; it would take away one his two great pleasures in life. If given the choice of eliminating his occasional Viagra-facilitated roll in the sack with his trophy wife, or cutting out saturated fats and cholesterol, i.e., most of the good tasting items of his regimen, like butter, bacon, eggs, whole milk, white bread, marbled beef and kosher dogs, he wasn’t sure that he’d be able to decide.
“Son of a bitch. I’m 75 and feel fine. I may have another ten, maybe twenty years left and then again, I might not. But I sure as hell don’t want to have to take up an all-plant diet. I’m not going to give up chocolate cream pie for yoghurt or steak for tofu. Screw that doctor! I want to find an old fat guy to take care of me.”
“Honey, honey, honey. Take it easy. It won’t be so bad. There are some great cookbooks for cholesterol-free cooking. I’ll buy one tonight while you play cards.”
Fred called his closest buddy, in fact, his only close friend, Art Schofield. Art and he spoke almost every day. They didn’t email; neither was comfortable on line. Fred relayed the events of the medical encounter, getting more than a bit worked up over the dietary instructions.
“Come on Freddy. It’s no big deal. Eat a couple of fruits and vegetables and maybe skip the bacon and eggs and the corn beef from time to time. They’ll check your cholesterol in a few months and it’ll be OK or not OK. If not OK, she’ll give you Lipitor. I’ve been on that stuff for years and my counts are real good. And, you know as well as I do that I don’t suffer when it comes to eating what I want. I gotta run. See you tonight at Kreutzer’s.”
Every other Friday was poker night. All the players brought snacks. As he was leaving the house, to stop at the 7-Eleven, Klein’s wife showed up with a platter full of celery, broccoli and baby carrots. “Take these – I’m sure the other guys will appreciate the change.” Fred always brought Doritos and dip. It was all he could do to not hurl the platter at the wall.
His poker games were post-dinner affairs. As usual, Klein had a scotch-on-the-rocks before dinner and a glass of sauvignon blanc with the meal. A second glass of wine was downed to punish Dr. Jameson. Fred was not worried about his driving capacity; he handled this little bit of alcohol just fine, thank you. Jennifer served grilled chicken, no sauce, steamed broccoli and a green salad with a hint of oil and vinegar. Klein ate it, knowing that there would be snacks at the game.
It was Bill Kreutzer’s turn to host the game; he lived less than two miles from the Kleins. The 7-Eleven, depository of the widest nearby selection of chips and dip, was about midway, on California Street. Fred drove the Lexus. The celery, broccoli, and carrots sat covered in Saran on the passenger seat. Obsessed by the new restrictions which he knew were going to be strictly adhered to by Jennifer the Enforcer, Fred was two blocks beyond the convenience store before he recognized that he had passed it. “I can’t just bring vegetables! He made a U turn.
Meagan Spencer, 2, was wet. Her mother, Teresa had run out of Pampers. Dad Mark, a venture capitalist successful beyond even his fondest dreams, was on a seven day excursion to West Africa looking for opportunities in cocoa.
“We’ve got to go to the store to buy diapers,” Theresa said to Meagan, as if she were a lot older than 2. She buckled the child into the rear baby seat and had the beagle Bob jump in the front passenger seat of the Nissan SUV. The 7-Eleven was only five blocks away. As she turned on to California Street, three blocks from her destination, Bob leaped onto her lap as he had spotted a large dog being walked on the other side of the street. “Damn it, Bob,” she said pulling over to the curb so she could get out and put him in a harness set-up in the seat behind her own.
Fred Klein peripherally noted a pers
on walking to the right of his passenger door but chose not to react to the minor bump and drove on to Kreutzer’s house, not stopping for chips and dip.
The police report described a “late model silver luxury car, probably either a Lexus or Infinity, traveling about 45 miles an hour in the 30 MPH zone…which left the scene without stopping or slowing down.” A young couple who had been walking their German shepherd across the street recognized the car as a luxury vehicle but were unable to describe the driver, except to say that he wore a beret. The man made note of the three numbers on the license plate, but failed to remember the letters. They said that the victim was knocked several feet to the right and her head collided with the concrete curb. When the woman dog walker, a one-time nurse’s aide, came to the side of the victim, Teresa was breathing but unresponsive. They called 911 on her cell and quickly looked back into the car where a baby and a small dog were both asleep.
A SCOTCH AND TWO SAUVIGNON BLANCS
“How’d you do, hon?” Jennifer asked sleepily when Klein returned to their bedroom about 1 AM. On poker nights, she battled against falling asleep. Fred always relayed the win/loss outcome to her, even if it required her being awakened for the news.
“Not so good – lost about fifty bucks. I didn’t play good – too wired about this diet shit.” In spite of their high six figure income and nine figure net worth, he played poker for a pittance and felt that fifty dollars was a meaningful loss.
“Sorry to hear it, my love. Better luck next time. Oh, by the way, how did the guys like the veggies?”
“Nobody ate ‘em. They’re still in Bill’s fridge.”
Jennifer rolled over and turned off the light. Sex was not in the cards after a card game. Jen knew that her mate would not sleep well. He never did after a poker game, either reveling in his victory or replaying the hands that he lost. He’d toss, turn, and blurt out comments like “I shoulda folded the hand.” She swallowed half an Ambien and offered the same to Fred knowing that he wouldn’t accept.