Coma

by Robin Cook

  “I must admit I hadn’t thought of that.” Susan gingerly felt her lacerated lip with the tip of her tongue. “But I think this was the real thing.”

  “Conjecture is not what’s needed at this point. I will personally advise the hospital executive committee of this. But, Susan, now is definitely the time for you to withdraw from further involvement. I advised you to do that before, but only because I was afraid it might hurt you academically. Now, it’s apparently a different game. I think professionals should take over. Have you reported this to the police?”

  “No, the threat included my younger brother, and there was a plain warning not to go to the police. That’s why I’ve called you. Besides, if I went to the police, they’d probably dismiss it as a simple attempted rape rather than a specific threat.”

  “I doubt it very much.”

  “Most males would.”

  “But if the threat included your family, you are probably right to be careful with whom you talk. But my gut reaction suggests that you should report the incident to the police.”

  “I’ll give it some thought. Meanwhile, I wondered if you’d heard that I’ve been kicked out of my surgery rotation at the Memorial. I have to go to the V.A. to do my surgery.”

  “No, I’ve not been told about that. When did this happen?”

  “This afternoon. Obviously I’d much prefer to stay at the Memorial. I think that I could prove that I am a good student if given the chance. Since you are Chief of Surgery and since you are aware that I have not been merely goofing off, I thought maybe you might be willing to reverse that decision.”

  “As Chief of Surgery I should have been told about your dismissal. I will get in touch with Dr. Bellows immediately.”

  “I don’t think he knows about it, either, to tell you the truth. It was a Mr. Oren.”

  “Oren? Well that’s interesting. Susan, I cannot promise anything, but I’ll look into it. I must tell you that you have not been the most popular student here with Anesthesia and Medicine.”

  “I’d appreciate anything you can do. One other question. Would it be possible for you to arrange a visit for me to the Jefferson Institute? I’d very much like to visit the patient, Berman. I’m sort of hoping that if I can see him again that maybe I’ll be able to forget this whole affair.”

  “You certainly have a lot of difficult demands, young lady. But I’ll call and see what I can do. The Jefferson is not university-controlled. It was built by government funds through HEW, but its operation has been turned over to a private medical management firm. So I have little voice there. But I’ll check. Give me a call after nine tomorrow, and I’ll let you know.”

  Susan hung up the phone. Obviously in deep thought, she bit her lower lip, as was her habit. The result was painful. She stared at one of the posters on her walls but with unseeing eyes. Her mind raced over the events of the last few days, searching for possible associations that she had missed.

  Impulsively she got up and took out the nurse’s uniform she had purchased. Then she began to dry her hair. Fifteen minutes later, she viewed herself in the mirror. The uniform fitted reasonably well.

  She picked up the photograph of her brother for the second time. At least she felt reasonably confident that there was no immediate danger for her family. It was winter vacation for public schools and her family was skiing in Aspen for the week.

  Wednesday

  February 25

  7:15 P.M.

  Susan had no illusions about her situation. She was in danger and had to be resourceful. Whoever it was that had decided to threaten her undoubtedly expected that she would mend her ways and live in fear, at least for a while. Susan felt that she had about forty-eight hours of relative freedom of movement. After that, who knew.

  The thing that encouraged her the most was that someone had decided that she was important enough to be threatened. It might mean that she was on the right track; maybe she had already found more answers than she could associate. She could be like the professor who had carefully discovered all the information necessary to break the secret of DNA. But he had not arranged it properly, and it took the ingenuity of Watson and Crick to pull it all together, to see the whole molecule as the wonderful double helix.

  Susan carefully leafed through her notebook, reading all that she had written down. She reread her notes about coma and its known causes; she underlined those articles she still planned to read; she underlined the title of the new anesthesiology text she had seen in Harris’s office. Then she reread the extensive material on Nancy Greenly and the two respiratory arrest victims. Susan was sure that the answer was there but she couldn’t see it. She knew that she needed more data to increase the likelihood of making correlations. The charts. She needed the charts from McLeary.

  It was seven-fifteen when she was ready to leave her room. As if she were in some spy movie, she checked out the parking lot from her window, to see if she were under obvious surveillance. She looked over the cars, but saw no one. Susan pulled the curtains closed and locked her door, leaving her lights on. In the corridor, she stood for a moment, then, extrapolating from her movie experience, she rolled a small wad of paper into a ball and carefully inserted it between the door and the jamb, next to the floor.

  In the basement of the dorm there was a tunnel leading over to the Anatomy and Pathology Building. It carried steam pipes and power lines, and Susan and her classmates occasionally used it during inclement weather. Susan had no idea if she would be followed but she wanted to make it difficult, hopefully impossible. From the anatomy building Susan used the passageway to the Administration Building, which she found unlocked. From there she exited by the medical library, catching a cab on Huntington Avenue. She had the cab do a U-turn after a quarter of a mile and drive back, passing the spot where she had hailed it. Nestling down in her coat to keep from being seen, Susan tried to see if anyone was following her. She saw no one at all suspicious-looking. Relaxing, she told the cab to take her to the Memorial Hospital.

  Like any professional “hit man,” Angelo D’Ambrosio felt an inner satisfaction at having successfully completed a job. After communicating the message he had for Susan, he had walked back to Huntington Avenue and caught a cab near the corner of Longfellow. The taxi driver was delighted: finally he’d found an airport run which meant a decent fare and undoubtedly a good tip. Prior to D’Ambrosio he’d had nothing but old ladies going to the supermarket.

  D’Ambrosio settled back in the cab, content with his day’s work. He had no idea why he had been contracted to do what he had done in Boston that day. But D’Ambrosio rarely knew why, and in fact he did not want to know why. On the few occasions when his information and briefing had been more complete, he had had more trouble. On the current assignment, he had been merely told to fly to Boston in the evening of the twenty-fourth and stay at the Sheraton Downtown under the name of George Taranto. The following morning he was to proceed to 1833 Stewart Street and to the basement apartment of a man named Walters. He was to have Walters write a note saying, “The drugs were mine. I cannot face the consequences.” Then he was to dispose of Walters in a fashion that would suggest suicide. Then he was to isolate a female medical student by the name of Susan Wheeler and “scare the shit out of her,” telling her that she would be in danger if she did not return to her usual occupation. The orders had ended with the usual exhortations about being careful. There was a packet of information about Susan Wheeler, including the photo of her brother, some background, and a schedule of her current activities.

  Looking at his watch, D’Ambrosio knew that he could easily make the 8:45 American flight back to Chicago. He also knew his thousand dollars would be in the usual twenty-four-hour locker, number 12 near the baggage claim for TWA. Contentedly, D’Ambrosio watched the play of lights flicker past the window. He thought about the ghoulish Walters and tried to imagine the connection he could have with the attractive Wheeler. D’Ambrosio remembered Susan’s appearance, and how he had had to fight with himself
not to put it to her. He began to imagine a series of sadistic delights that awakened his sleeping penis. D’Ambrosio found himself hoping that he’d be ordered back to make a second contact with Miss Wheeler. If he ever was, he decided he’d screw her in the ass.

  When he reached the airline terminal D’Ambrosio entered a phone booth. There remained one small detail in a routine assignment: he had to call his central contact in Chicago and report that the job was done.

  The number rang the agreed-upon seven times.

  “The Sandler residence,” answered a voice on the other end.

  “May I speak to Mr. Sandler, please,” said D’Ambrosio, bored. He did not quite understand this maneuver and it took a few minutes. He always had to remember the current name. If the wrong name was used he was supposed to hang up and call an alternate number. D’Ambrosio wet his index finger with his tongue and drew circles of saliva on the phone booth glass. Finally the voice returned.

  “It’s clear.”

  “Boston’s done, no problems,” said D’Ambrosio with no inflection in his voice.

  “There’s an update. Miss Wheeler is to be disposed of as soon as possible. The method is up to you but it must appear to be a rape. You understand, a rape.”

  D’Ambrosio couldn’t believe his ears. It was like a dream come true.

  “There’ll be an extra charge,” said D’Ambrosio matter-of-factly, carefully concealing his anticipation of sexually assaulting Susan.

  “There will be an extra five hundred dollars.”

  “Seven hundred fifty. This won’t be so easy.” Easy? It was going to be a breeze. D’Ambrosio thought that he should really be paying.

  “Six hundred.”

  “You’re on.” D’Ambrosio hung up the phone. He was immensely pleased. He checked the night flight schedule. The last departure for Chicago was 11:45 TWA. D’Ambrosio thought he could get his little kicks and still make that one. He descended to the baggage area and caught a cab. He told the driver to take him to the comer of Longwood and Huntington avenues.

  By seven-thirty the ebb and flow of humanity slowed to a trickle at the Memorial. Susan entered through the main entrance. In her nurse’s uniform no one even gave her a second look. She first went up to the lounge on Beard 5 and left her coat. Then she checked McLeary’s office on Beard 12. The door was locked as she expected and the lights were off. She checked all the nearby offices and labs. All were empty.

  Susan returned to the main entrance and walked down the corridor toward the emergency room. Unlike the rest of the hospital, as evening fell the ER became more active. There were a few gurneys with their respective patients parked in the corridor. Susan turned left just before the ER and entered the hospital security office.

  The office was small and cluttered. The entire far wall was a bank of TV screens, about twenty or twenty-five of them. Displayed on each screen were images of the entryways, corridors, and key areas of the hospital, including the ER area, televised to these monitors from remote control video cameras. Some of the cameras were stationary; others repeatedly panned over an area. Two uniformed guards and one plainclothes security officer occupied the room. The plainclothesman sat behind a tiny desk, seeming even smaller next to his obese hulk. The skin on his neck overlapped his shirt collar. His breath came in audible gasps.

  All three men were oblivious to the TV monitors they were paid to watch. Instead, their eyes were fixed on the screen of a small portable TV set. They were engrossed in the furious combat of a televised hockey game.

  “Excuse me, but we have a problem,” said Susan, addressing the plainclothes officer. “Dr. McLeary left tonight without returning some charts to 10 West. And we cannot medicate the patients without the charts. Can you people open his office?”

  The security man gave Susan a tenth of a second with his eyes, then returned to the power play in progress. He spoke without looking up.

  “Sure. Lou, go up with the nurse here and open the office she needs.”

  “In a minute, in a minute.”

  All three watched intently. Susan waited. A commercial came on. The guard leaped to his feet.

  “OK, let’s get this office open. Let me know if I miss anything, you guys.”

  Susan had to run a few steps to catch up with the great determined strides taken by the guard. En route he began sorting through an immense collection of keys.

  “The Bruins are down by two. If they drop this one too, I’m movin’ to Philly.”

  Susan didn’t answer. She hurried along with the guard, hoping that no one would recognize her. She felt a slight sense of relief as they entered the office area. It was deserted.

  “Goddamn, where’s that key?” cursed the guard as he had to try almost every key on his ring before finding one which would open McLeary’s door. The delay made Susan rather nervous, and she began to look up and down the corridor, expecting the worst at any moment. As he opened the door, the guard reached in and flicked on the light.

  “Just pull the door closed when you leave. It will lock by itself. I’ve got to get downstairs.”

  Susan found herself alone in the outer room of McLeary’s office. Quickly she entered the inner room and turned on the light. Then switching off the light in the outer room, she closed herself in McLeary’s inner office.

  To her dismay, the charts were no longer on the shelf where she had seen them in the morning. She began to search the office. The desk was first. No sign of them. As she closed the center drawer, the phone immediately under her arm began to ring. In the silence the noise seemed earsplitting and it startled her. She looked at her watch and wondered if McLeary often got calls in his office at a quarter of eight in the evening. The sound stopped after three rings, and Susan recommenced her search. The charts were of sufficient bulk so that they could not be hidden in many places. As she pulled out the last drawer of the file cabinet she heard the unmistakable sound of footsteps in the hall. They grew louder. Susan froze, not daring to push the drawer back into the file cabinet for fear of the sound.

  To her consternation she then heard the footsteps, and a key go into the lock in the outer door. Susan looked around the room in a panic. There were two doors, one to the outer office, another presumably to a closet. Susan glanced at the position of the furniture, then she snapped off the light. As she did so she heard the outer door open, and the light went on in the outer office. Susan moved toward the closet door, feeling the perspiration appear on her forehead. A metallic sound came from the outer office, then another. The closet door opened easily and Susan eased herself in as quietly as possible. With difficulty she closed the closet door. Almost simultaneously the door to the inner office opened and the light went on. Susan expected the closet door to be yanked open at any second. Instead she heard footsteps going toward the desk. Then she heard the desk chair squeak, as someone sat in it. She thought it was McLeary and she wondered what he was doing in his office at this time. What if he discovered her? The thought made her weak. If he opened the door, Susan decided she would try to bolt.

  Then the phone was taken off the hook and Susan heard the familiar sound of dialing. But when the person phoning spoke, the voice confused her. It was female. And the caller was speaking in Spanish. From her own meager Spanish Susan was able to make out a part of the conversation. It was about the weather in Boston, then in Florida. All at once Susan realized that a cleaning lady was plopped down in McLeary’s office using the hospital phone to make a personal call to Florida. Maybe that explained hospital overhead.

  The call lasted almost a half-hour. Then the cleaning lady emptied the wastebasket, turned out the light, and departed. Susan waited for several minutes before opening the closet door. She headed in the direction of the light switch but her shin thumped painfully into the open file cabinet drawer. Susan cursed and realized what a terrible burglar she would make.

  With the light on again Susan resumed her search. Out of curiosity to see where she had been hiding, she checked the closet. On the lowest shelf,
stacked among boxes of stationery, she found the charts she wanted. She wondered if McLeary had actually tried to hide them. But she did not dwell on the mystery. She wanted to get out of McLeary’s office.

  Drawing on her basic resourcefulness, Susan piled the charts into the freshly emptied wastebasket. Then she left the office, unlocking the door. And as she had done in the dorm, she placed a minute wad of paper between the door and the jamb.

  Susan carried the charts up to Beard 5 and entered the lounge. She got out her black notebook and poured herself some coffee. Then she took the first chart and began extracting it, as she had done with Nancy Greenly’s.

  When D’Ambrosio returned to the medical school dorm, he had no particular plan in mind. His usual method of operation was to improvise, after having observed his quarry for a period of time. He already knew quite a bit about Susan Wheeler. He knew that she rarely went out, once back in her room. He was quite sure she would be there now. What he couldn’t be sure of was whether Susan had told the authorities about his initial visit. He decided there was a fifty-fifty chance. If she had told them, there was only a ten percent chance that they would take her seriously or at least that had been D’Ambrosio’s experience. And even if they did take her seriously, there was probably only a one percent chance that they would put her under guard. The risk factor was well within D’Ambrosio’s normal range. He decided that he would return to her room.

  From a telephone in the corner drugstore D’Ambrosio rang Susan’s room. No answer. He knew that did not mean anything. She could be there but just not answering. D’Ambrosio could handle the lock on the door; he had determined that in the afternoon. But the bolt; she’d probably have the bolt thrown, and that would be noisy. D’Ambrosio knew he’d have to get her out of her room somehow.