He wasn't like Radar, stuffing his face. He stood there and gazed off into space, thinking deep medical thoughts and chewing slowly. He reached in and took a second donut. If he stood there long enough the whole box of donuts would disappear.
"You like donuts?" I asked, disrupting his reverie.
"Huh?" He looked down at his hand. "Donuts?" He blinked little round eyes and pushed his glasses into place leaving a smudge of chocolate icing on his nose. Wisps of thinning hair floated around his head. He studied the donut, turning it from side to side. "These are very bad for you," he pronounced gravely, setting the donut back in the box. He wandered away, studiously reading his Blackberry.
My mouth dropped open in disbelief. Brenda grinned. "He does that all the time."
"Eats donuts?" His half-eaten one sat on top of untouched ones.
"Leaves food around. Takes food from one place or another. Some of the patients get awfully upset with him."
I could imagine. For a guy complaining about the lack of healthy features of donuts, how exactly did he think he got that round bulge around his middle? Or maybe he didn't notice that either.
Dr. Staple chose that moment to come around the corner. "I need a cup of coffee."
I ignored him. Dr. Staple acted like we were all internal organs that he had removed and as the surgeon, he could now poke at, order around or discard us at will. He stood there reading patient notes while waiting for coffee. Brenda either chose to ignore him too or more likely hadn't heard the request in her rush to go complete her chores before the doctor began his rounds. There was no one else around to play fetch; too bad. I wasn't going to do it.
I headed away to start my morning chores, but moving drew the attention of the hunter, turning me into prey. Dr. Staple said, "Hey, you're new around here, aren't you? I remember you from the other day."
Surprised at the friendliness in his voice, I stopped. "Uh, yeah."
"What was your name?" He stretched out a hand. "I'm Dr. Staple."
I actually stuttered, I was so taken off-guard. "Se…Sedona. I'm a volunteer. I went on rounds with you the other day."
"That's what I thought. Do you clean offices?" He stroked the cleft in his chin with a happy smile.
"Offices?"
"We could use some volunteer help over at The Pavilion."
"You're asking me to volunteer to do cleaning work?" Who in their right mind would volunteer to clean? I mean, as a volunteer here, my cover story was that I was considering a related profession. Volunteering in a hospital setting was required by several nursing and doctor programs. Why would anyone offer to clean a doctor's offices for free?
"What's the difference?" he asked. "You shovel shit here, you shovel shit there. I guarantee you, the mess isn't nearly as bad at our private offices. My nurses keep things in tiptop shape. But we could use some extra help with filing and cleaning the bathrooms at night."
"Don't you have a cleaning service? And a file clerk," I amended in case he didn't realize that the two jobs might be considered separate by most people.
He shrugged. "The cleaning service tried to raise their rates again. What do they think we're made of, money? All we're talking about is removing some garbage and wiping things down. How the hell they can charge the prices they do for an unskilled job is beyond me."
"You think such a service should be free?" Apparently he did or he wouldn't have asked me to volunteer.
"Okay, fine," he groused, his pale blue eyes snapping with irritation. "I can see paying you minimum wage. But if you're willing to volunteer here, why not there? What's the difference?"
Just because I wasn't a legitimate student didn't mean I didn't empathize with those who were. "The idea, Dr. Staple, is that by working here, I get experience with patients. I actually have the opportunity to learn things such as first aid and CPR." A moron could have inferred that cleaning his office wouldn't provide any of those opportunities. Leaving him no time to respond, I stalked off to make beds or throw bedpans or have a fit of some kind. Geez, he was a real piece of arrogance.
I was halfway through making a bed when Brenda snuck in the room. "You okay?" she whispered. "You gotta be careful, Sedona. He can make your life miserable."
My mouth dropped open. "By doing what? I'm kind of at the bottom of the food chain here. I change bedpans, for crying out loud! And I'm not getting paid to do it!" Huntington’s side salary didn’t count because he was paying me for something else entirely.
Brenda shrugged. "You don't want to work for him, even if he does pay you. I know he's good-looking and all that, but that's the third or fourth cleaning service that has quit over there. He has a hard time keeping nurses working in his office too. The other doctors at The Pavilion don't have problems, but he goes through personnel like water."
I had already figured out that working for Staple was not a helpful career move. "Yeah, okay. Thanks."
She zipped away. I appreciated her effort to save me. It made it easier to ignore the little voice in the back of my head that noted how working at The Pavilion would readily provide access to all kinds of doctor records. I could check out five different doctors in great detail or let Radar in a back door to do so.
I grabbed some sheets and took them down the hall. It was best that Huntington not find out about Dr. Staple's offer. He'd probably demand I take the "job."
To make up for my lax dedication on the case, I decided to visit Dr. Dan during my lunch break. I had intended to wait until after Christmas, but if following up with him on Christmas Eve wasn't showing my commitment to the case, I didn't know what was. Besides, I was nervous about hoarding stolen x-rays. As crimes went, it had to be right up there with mugging a little old lady, pitiful and desperate.
I drove carefully so that I didn't get pulled over with the stolen goods.
Luckily, Dr. Dan was at home. Rabbit and Pooh were thrilled to see me, despite the holidays and lack of treats. "Hiya fellas," I crooned, giving the toy poodles an enthusiastic greeting. The little dogs had a yapping contest and didn't quiet down until Amy lured them into the kitchen with dog biscuits.
I followed Dan to his home office where he looked over the x-rays and then searched the patient folders. "This one is missing the radiologist report. I assume this is the whole folder?"
We had taken the entire sleeves because I didn't want anything to get mixed up. Unlike Radar, I hadn’t even tried to cover up patient names or data. These files had to go back, intact. "That was it. I didn't take anything out."
He frowned. "The x-rays are real, no doubt about it. These two are a tad light, but very readable. This one looks like a typical barium enema shot. This other is a barium swallow for the ulcer patient. Maybe the missing radiologist report for the first one ended up with the internist. He might have asked for it before doing the colonoscopy because it looks like the patient was going to need one." He held the x-rays up to the light again. "There were some obvious polyps on these so they would have to be removed.
"I wonder…" Dr. Dan stared off into space. "Didn't the bills for these patients have an overnight visit?"
I nodded.
"There's no obvious reason these patients had to stay in overnight," he said. "Not right after the BE because it takes a while for the barium to clear the system before either a colonoscopy or surgery is done. I could follow up on that."
Uh-oh. "I wouldn't go around asking questions."
"Why? Don't want an old man interfering in your fun?"
I shook my head. "No, I don't want you asking the guilty party the wrong question."
"How about I talk to the chief of staff? Henry--Dr. Johnson and I have been friends for years. We went through our residency together. He is one of the best surgeons I know, and he knows the work of almost every person in that hospital."
I waved my hands. "No, no, that's the point. We don't know who is benefiting from all of this. What if the chief of staff has told five people to try and get the hospital extra business? Run up charges, we can use the
profit?"
Dr. Dan shook his head vehemently. "I trust Dr. Johnson as much as my own Amy! The only reason I didn't go to him with this mess is because he would be extremely hurt by it. This hospital is his baby, it's his life."
I didn't mention that people with "babies" really, really wanted them to be a success, so I took another tack. "What if the chief of staff isn't guilty but he mentions it to his wife? And she tells a friend? And the friend knows the radiologist?"
He tilted his head. "That could happen, I suppose."
"Even if the radiologist wasn't guilty, it could still have some nasty consequences. We certainly don't want people getting all bent out of shape unnecessarily. That's the reason Huntington doesn't like to tell me things. See, I'm over here talking to you. And if you talk to a source, before you know it, the entire hospital knows who I am, and why I'm there, and we have a real mess."
He looked at me with his serious doctor gaze, not at all softened by his gray hair or fluffy beard. "You sound like this has happened before."
"It did, once." I didn't mention it had been Huntington's fault.
He indicated the x-rays. "Can I keep these for a couple of days? I assume whatever work was going to be done to remove the polyps has been done, and they won't be needed by anyone."
"I guess so." I didn't like it, but none of the patients were currently in the hospital. If Dr. Dan didn't think anyone was going to want them, he could study them indefinitely or at least until I was done volunteering.
I didn't have any spare time left by the time I got back to work, but I went to see Radar anyway. I raced to the basement and barely remembered to make sure he hadn't locked the door before barging in. "Glad you didn't fly home yet," I panted.
"I leave tonight," he replied. "What's up?"
I sat down and took a couple of quick breaths. "Just an update. I went to see Dr. Dan and showed him the x-rays from the patients in question."
"Where did--" He stopped. "I don't want to know where you got the x-rays, do I?"
"They were in storage," I claimed innocently. I proceeded to tell him what Dr. Dan said.
"So the x-rays prove the patients were in the hospital on those dates."
"I think so, but the radiologist report was missing, and I thought it might be a good idea to pursue all the angles."
He sat down and did some typing. "We already know the admitting doctor wasn't the same for each of the patients and neither is the radiologist. " He ran his finger an inch in front of the monitor. "One radiologist was Carter," he said. "The other was Dr. Burns."
"Dr. Burns is an internist, not a radiologist." I thought about what Holly had told me. "But I think that the doctor looks at the x-rays too. Maybe the records are mixed up."
"Lot of mix-ups and unexplained people where they don't belong on the records, huh?"
"That reminds me. I wanted to ask you, who from x-ray was working last night?"
He slanted his eyes at me. "What makes you think I can get that information?"
I pointed at the computer. "It's part of the hospital computer system. If it were at The Pavilion or elsewhere it might be hard to get, but since it's here, it will take you, what? Less than a second to get it?"
He grinned, wiggled his fingers and then asked, "What time?"
"Around midnight. Sometime after midnight."
"Heh-heh-heh."
I ignored his glee.
After more typing, he came back with. "No one."
"What do you mean, no one?"
His finger traced up and down the screen. "Nope. No one is scheduled that late." More typing. "And according to this, no one was called in." Before I could protest, he held up his eureka finger. "Sometimes it takes a while for a called-in employee to get entered into the database. I have to cross-check payroll and time sheets to be certain."
"Is nothing sacred?"
"Not really." He seemed very smug about it too.
"Someone was called in," I muttered. "Do you think someone from ER might retrieve records from storage?"
He shrugged. "How would I know?"
It didn't seem likely. Wouldn't old records wait for the attending physician? It hadn't been a doctor down there. The only female physician at the hospital was Dr. Evans, and she was not blond by any stretch. "Look up Crissa...Sheldon, I think her last name is. She is the only other person I know with blond hair likely to be down there."
He did some typing. "Nope. Looks like she's on days all the time."
Knowing he couldn't look up time sheets according to "who is blond and works at night," I gave up on that angle. "We've got incomplete medical files, overnight visits that don't make a lot of sense and messed up entries in some records." It could really be simple incompetence. It was hard to imagine anything else. Doctors, the ones who stood the most to gain by adding charges, were busy enough already. They put in long hours and had lives to save.
Then again, not all engineers applied their talent to positive uses. Radar was talented, but his specialty hadn't always been turned in an admirable direction. He was able to do something that ninety-eight percent of the population couldn't do and luckily, because of Huntington, he was applying his skills to a worthwhile cause. But not every hacker would get hired by a Huntington. And maybe not all doctors were completely dedicated to saving lives either.
Chapter 17
Friday morning before heading into the hospital, I called my parents to wish them a Merry Christmas. My brother, Dean, answered.
We chatted for forty seconds. He wasn't sure when he was coming up to visit me. He hemmed and hawed and acted evasive, but brothers were strange creatures anyway.
Mom was chirpy and happy, but since Dean was standing right there, she couldn't gossip about his "guest."
Dad was Dad; he thanked me for the garden gadgets I had sent and seemed especially happy with the bat guano. "You know it's a better fertilizer than anything else I've tried," he told me for the fiftieth time. "Plants grow like crazy in the stuff!"
Dad viewed guano as manna from heaven. "Hoard it," I advised. "It's hard to find." I didn't mention that it was also extremely expensive. He probably knew anyway.
"I only use it to start seeds or on troubled plants," he said. "I hear that elephant dung works almost as well. I can't wait to try some. It has to be easier to buy. Think about it! One elephant, and I'd be in business!"
"Uhm," I hadn't a clue about where to find a willing elephant to give to the cause. "I guess so."
I hung up and drove into work. Attila had scheduled a team building event that was supposed to be a "Christmas gift" for our health. Since it was snowing, I figured her "gift" would be canceled. A postponement would leave my lunch break open so I could attend Christmas Mass. It certainly didn't make sense to walk around the frozen pond outside the hospital in the bad weather.
What was I thinking?
Attila gathered us downstairs in shifts starting at eleven. "Today we are not only going to team build, we are going to make progress on being healthier and losing weight! My team will be in great shape, setting an example for everyone else." She looked as if she might beat anyone who didn't participate.
Did she have to be such a fanatic? "Is Attila a weight-lifter or something?" I whispered to Brenda.
Brenda asked, "Who is Attila?"
"I mean Sally."
Brenda didn't have a very well-rounded sense of humor. She was also a lot more respectful of other people than I was. She sniffed and looked down her nose at me. "Sedona!" When I didn't respond she added, "Yes, Sally lifts weights. She even does those competitions. You know, the body building contests where they pose in a bikini."
I grinned. I couldn't wait to tell Radar. He would be soooo pleased. "But why do we have to get dragged along on her get-in-shape hobby?"
"We get paid fifty cents for every pound we lose," Brenda explained, even though I had heard the lame explanation at the pep rally.
"It's cold out," I complained.
"I know, but we have to team build a
nd trust me, it's a lot better than the last idea they had."
How could that be? We didn't even have umbrellas and a slushy sleet drizzled in our faces. "I doubt it."
Brenda said, "No, really. The last director of nurses--see, Sally is just temporarily assigned to the job--anyway the old director, her name was Martha, picked the last team building exercise. She's on leave at the moment while they investigate." Brenda leaned close to my ear. "She suggested a séance in the morgue downstairs, to you know, build morale."
My eyes goggled. "What?"
Brenda nodded. "Truly. She had us all go down there one afternoon. It was supposed to be one of those hold hands, get real close and comfortable with the people you work with. But unfortunately, that day the mayor's mother-in-law had died. Martha, the director, didn't realize there were reporters in the hospital."
I groaned. "You guys didn't actually get caught in the act? Why didn't anyone protest?"
"I wasn't too keen on the idea, I can tell you that."
I wasn't too keen on walking in drizzling snow either. It wasn't making me feel close to other employees nor was it likely to make anyone skinnier. At least two people walking ahead of us were eating Oreos out of their coat pockets. "So what happened?"
"Well, when Martha ordered us down there, three of us claimed we had to go to the bathroom. Not that we knew about the reporters. We thought we'd be able to think of a good excuse if we put our heads together, but in the end, we all went. We got down to the morgue, and there was Martha with a big black hood over her head. The reporters had followed us, thinking something was going on, but not really knowing what. Then Martha lit candles and started chanting. The reporters took pictures and ran."
"What did the mayor say?"
"Oh, that made it even worse. Now the mayor is in a big divorce battle."
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