“I was simply taking advantage of their prejudices. What’s wrong with that? It got me what I wanted, didn’t it?”
“But at what price? You confirmed every stereotype of us there is. What are they going to think of the next blind person who walks into that store?”
“So you’re saying the end can never justify the means? I was trying to get at the truth, to help Charlie,” I said. What I had thought of as a brilliant ploy earlier in the day now seemed shameful in the face of Alice’s disapproval. “OK. So maybe I went a tad overboard.”
Alice reached over and took my hand. Hers was soft in mine and I raised it to my lips in a conciliatory gesture. “Will you be able to forgive me?” I said.
“I understand what you were doing. I just wish you could have gotten the information some other way. Did you like lying like that?”
“A little,” I conceded. “It was like . . . I was turning the tables on them. I felt in control, something I don’t get to experience much lately.”
“You underestimate how much in control you really are. Of course I’ll forgive you. Anyway, the real villain here is Nate, isn’t it? How could he fail to come forward about the affair? Didn’t he think it was significant?”
“It was only significant if he had something more serious to hide.” I told her my theory that Nate was the murderer. “He had the right knowledge. Pressure on the carotid arteries here and here”—I showed Alice how it could be done—“would put Shannon under in thirty seconds or less, and then all he had to do was slip a scalpel under her rib cage. A quick thrust upward to pierce the cardiac sac and he was finished. It would only have taken a few minutes. I’m not saying only a doctor could have done it, but it’s not possible Charlie would have known how to kill so cleanly.”
Alice shifted disquietly next to me. “That’s . . . so horrible. I can understand a murder committed in the heat of passion, but to lay in wait for someone like that. How could anyone live with that on their conscience? And if you’re right about the baby being his, why wasn’t he worried about discovery?”
“I think he was counting on Shannon’s murder being seen as just another one of the Surgeon killings. If Charlie hadn’t shown up accidentally, he might have gotten away with it.”
“That’s what I really can’t forgive. Allowing his own son to take the blame. I never had children of my own, but I think of my clients at the center in much the same way as a parent. I could never allow harm to come to them just to fulfill a selfish need of my own. What he did was monstrous.”
I wondered again how I was ever going to tell her about Jack.
“What are you planning to do? Have you told the police yet?” Alice asked.
“No. I’m still trying to nail down a few more facts. If Nate’s as cold-blooded as I think he is, he’s not going to roll over just because I ask him to. If only I could get my hands on that diary.”
“Which diary?” Alice asked, puzzled.
“Something Shannon’s roommate told me about. A notebook she wrote in every day. I’m sure Nate figured prominently in it, along with anyone else who ever crossed her.”
“Do you know where she kept it?”
“No, but it’s probably packed up with the rest of her things in her apartment. Her sister gave me permission to go through them, but I don’t know if the offer is still open.”
“You’re not thinking of going there by yourself?” Alice said, with amusement.
I laughed. “And risk getting you sore at me again? Besides, even if I did I wouldn’t know where to look or how to read a diary if I found it. As you know, scanners aren’t much help with handwriting.”
“Nor, am I, sadly. You should have picked a better accomplice.”
“I don’t know about that,” I said, pulling her in for a kiss. “If you didn’t have so many scruples you’d make a fine coconspirator.”
After dinner I gave Alice a tour of my place. She was delighted when I placed her hand over mine and showed her how to do “walk the dog” with one of my yo-yos.
“When you’ve got it right, you can feel it tug on the string a certain way.”
“I think I see,” Alice said. “This is fun.”
“Watch out. If you’re not careful I’ll feel encouraged to bring out my Batttleship board next,” I said.
“I believe I had another sort of game in mind.”
“Oh?”
“Something closer to Twister.”
I gladly obliged and we spent the rest of the evening engaged in decidedly adult pursuits.
Eighteen
I slept dreamlessly and when I woke the next day Alice was gone. She’d left a message on my cell phone apologizing for having to be at an early-morning meeting. I brewed a cup of Constant Comment and listened to the weather forecast and the morning headlines. Peace talks in the Middle East had stalled, another mayoral aide had been indicted for bid-rigging, the economy was dragging like a wet sail. Change the date and it could have been last week’s news, or the following month’s. The only cheery item was that the Mets had taken the first in a three-game series against the Cubs, prompting resurrection of an old joke. Question: “What did Jesus say to the Cubs?” Answer: “Wait ’til I come back.” After I’d chuckled over that one a bit I put on padded shorts and a jersey and clipped onto my bike. I was feeling slack around the middle, so I did a series of intense intervals for an hour, pushing my heart rate up until the sweat was pooling in my eyelids and my quads were groaning. Then I showered and dressed in a suit, chased a frozen waffle with some orange juice, and went over to my office to see what Yelena had been able to dig up for me.
An hour or so later found me stepping off the elevator into the waiting area of the Cardiac and Thoracic Surgery Group. I’d been there once before and remembered it as a large, open space reminiscent of a coral reef. Furniture groupings in bleached wood rose from a deep blue carpet beneath pastel artworks with splashy themes. My mental map of the room was pretty good and I would have negotiated it smoothly had it not been for a palm tree that materialized out of nowhere, whipping me in the face with its fronds. I swore and detoured past it, wishing that for once Rentokil would live up to its name. At the reception desk, I waited while a pleasant-sounding woman finished chatting with a patient about his forthcoming angiogram.
“You’re in the wrong place,” she said to me when she was through. “Ophthalmology is one floor down, on nine.”
“Eight, actually,” I said, rubbing my cheek to ease the sting from the tree. “I’m one of their better customers.”
“So I guessed. I’m sorry about that plant. I should ask the service to trim it. Can I help you with something?”
“It depends. Is there a doctor in the house?”
“One or two,” she said. “Do you have a heart problem?”
“Only when I wear it on my sleeve.”
She chuckled. “Don’t tell me—a sensitive type.”
“Goes with the territory.” I had decided in advance to flirt with her—assuming she was, in fact, a she—thinking it might help my chances of getting in to see Nate. “Tell me, are you as beautiful as you sound?”
She chuckled again, mirthfully. “Honey,” she said, “I’m fifty-four years old. I’ve got more gray in my hair than McDonald’s has trans fats and an ass you couldn’t lift out of this chair with a back hoe. Still, it’s nice of you to try.”
“To me the only thing that matters is what’s on the inside.”
“What is this, the Hallmark channel?”
I could worship this woman. “What’s your name?”
“Denise. Did you know you have a scratch on your face?” I took the tissue she offered me. “It’s over more to the left. Now down a little. There, you’ve got it now.”
I showed Denise my hospital ID and told her whom I wanted to talk to. “It’s a personal matter. I don’t have an appointment, but he’ll know what it’s about.”
Denise punched a few buttons and spoke to a functionary on the other end of the line, w
ho put her on hold. I waited, shifting from foot to foot. Since following Nate wasn’t exactly an option, I wasn’t sure what I was going to do if he refused to see me. A few seconds later, the answer came back. I was buzzed through a security door and Denise came around and nudged me down the corridor to an office at its far end. “Thanks,” I said as we came up to the closed door. “I’ve always relied on the kindness of strangers.” Denise straightened my lapel and gave me a friendly pat on the arm. “Come back and see us again some time,” she said. “We could use more gentlemen callers like you.”
I paused a moment before knocking, going over once more what I planned to say.
I had been counting on Yelena’s flare for duplicity, and she hadn’t let me down. Claiming to be Nate’s assistant, she had spent the morning calling the hotels on my list and telling them the story I’d cooked up about a flooded basement and a skeptical IRS auditor. Hostility toward the taxman being what it is, most of them had been glad to help out by e-mailing duplicate expense statements. When I got to my office, the PDFs were waiting in a stack on my desk, neatly clipped together. Yelena had read them to me one by one. In each case, Nate had been traveling with a woman identified as Mrs. Dickerson and had squandered impressive sums on spa appointments and room service, including midnight deliveries of sevruga and Veuve Clicquot. It was a sure bet he hadn’t shared them with Judith.
But that wasn’t all. Acting on my instructions, Yelena had also confirmed Nate’s ownership of a white Jaguar. According to the Ukrainian garage attendant Yelena had befriended with promises of helping him secure a chauffeur’s license, Nate had driven the Jaguar until January, when he had traded it in for a new silver Mercedes CL Class. Warming to her task, Yelena had even secured a further piece of information that I hadn’t thought to ask about. When she finished I gave her a bear hug and said, “Ty moyo solnyshko!” She shoved me away like I had just stepped out of the reactor chamber at Chernobyl. “Your sunshine? Some compliment coming from you,” she said. “And your accent stinks.” But she was obviously pleased.
None of what I had was proof positive that Nate had murdered Shannon. But it was enough to confront him with. Or so I believed.
I knocked and entered Nate’s office.
“I probably shouldn’t be talking to you,” Nate said immediately, lumbering up from his chair. “My lawyers said not to. What are you doing here? If it’s about getting permission to see Charlie, you can forget it. We’ve had more than enough of your quack remedies.”
“I have some information that could help your son. I thought you might like to hear it.”
“I can’t imagine what it might be,” Nate said.
“May I sit down?” I asked.
Nate came around his desk and led me to a seating arrangement near a window. He towered over me like an ancient redwood. I wondered if there were photographs of Charlie nearby, and if so, how Nate could stand to look at them. The chair he showed me to was low-slung and covered in the sort of antique leather that felt like it had once been tossed around by the Gipper. I misjudged the seat height going down and landed with a creaky plop. “If you’re trying to make me feel sorry for you, it won’t work,” Nate said, planting himself opposite me.
I wished I could see something more than the vague mountain a few feet away. “There’s nothing to feel sorry about—except what’s happening to Charlie,” I said.
“For which I hold you fully responsible. I should have listened to Judith. She said you weren’t fit to take someone’s temperature.”
“I’m surprised you can say that with a straight face.”
“The facts don’t lie.”
“Which facts are those?” I said.
“The DNA test, to start with. That woman was sleeping with my son as sure as I’m sitting here.”
“She was sleeping with someone.”
“What’s that supposed to be, some kind of joke? I’ve checked into you, you know. I hear you regard yourself as a wit. But clever talk isn’t going to help you with the State Board.”
“Let’s skip it, then. You and I both know Charlie wasn’t the father of that baby.”
“Really? Where did you go to medical school—Grenada?”
“There was ivy on the walls, if that’s important to you.”
“Well, I’m surprised. I would have thought they’d taught you a course or two in genetics. But maybe you were sleeping in class. It wouldn’t surprise me.”
“Save the ad hominem attacks. My credentials aren’t at issue here.”
“Then what is?”
“Some information I intend to make available to Detective O’Leary. Want to hear it, or shall we just go on with all the back-thumping?”
“Go ahead, if you think it will change anything.”
“It changes everything. I know about your affair—with Shannon.”
I had been expecting hasty denials and protestations of innocence. But Nate didn’t jump up and gasp in surprise. He didn’t weep or beg for understanding. He simply went quiet and stayed that way for several long minutes. His silence put me at a disadvantage. I tried to maintain a steady gaze in his direction while I waited for a response.
“So you found out,” he said tonelessly after a while. He didn’t seem all that concerned.
“It wasn’t very hard,” I said. Oddly, it angered me even more that he wasn’t denying it.
“Don’t congratulate yourself. I’m just curious about how much snooping you’ve been doing.”
“I heard about the necklace Shannon was wearing and traced it back to you. You were sleeping with her last September when you and Judith came to see me with Charlie. Judith must have known subconsciously what was going on. When you saw how close she was to guessing the truth, you decided to break things off.”
Nate laughed, a savage throaty sound. His next statement caught me off guard. “Have you ever been married?”
I told him just to keep him talking. “Once.”
“Divorced?”
I nodded.
He turned reflective then. “You’re fortunate. I was never able to break free, myself. As you probably suspect, Judith isn’t an easy person to live with. You wonder why I stay with her.”
“The thought had crossed my mind. Is it because of Charlie?”
“Oh, nothing quite that simple. I always knew about her insecurities, her fears. It’s what attracted me to her in the beginning, that she needed my protection. And the money played a role too, I won’t deny it. When I met her I was young and ambitious. Judith had social connections it would have taken me years to establish. I never stopped to consider what it would be like living with her day in and day out, the constant drama and near hysteria. And then we had Charlie and she couldn’t forgive herself for making him the way he is. She grew even worse. After a time I couldn’t stand being home, but I didn’t think I could walk out on her and not have it ruin my reputation. And she would have fallen to pieces without me. That’s the irony—I stayed for her, not for him.”
“So you started having affairs,” I said.
“Yes. It’s funny isn’t it? How much easier it is to face being a liar and a cheat than desert someone you once cared about. Shannon wasn’t the first. I met her at the center one day when I was picking up Charlie. She was very attractive and came on to me right away. I knew it was risky but I couldn’t help myself.”
“How long had it been going on when you and Judith came to see me?”
“A little over seven months. That’s why I thought Judith’s fears were ridiculous. I knew Shannon didn’t have any interest in Charlie. By that time I’d figured out what she was—a cold little thing and an expert manipulator. You’re right. When I saw how spiteful Judith had become toward her I thought I’d just be asking for trouble if I let the relationship continue. So I told Shannon I couldn’t see her anymore.”
“When was this?”
“Late October.”
“How did she react?”
“In a way I’d never anticipated. I thou
ght Shannon understood it wasn’t serious. But she apparently thought I was in love with her. She became enraged, all red-faced and spitting, spouted the most theatrical nonsense. I laughed when I heard it. She’d even entertained notions of us getting married and starting a family. I knew then what a mistake it had been.”
“Did Judith ever find out?”
“No, and I made sure she wouldn’t. It wasn’t so much that I was afraid of exposure—Judith would never have the guts to leave me. The uproar would be too much for her. I just didn’t want to live with all the recriminations. And after Charlie was arrested, telling her would only have upset her more.”
“And you didn’t think about telling anyone else—the police, for instance?”
“What was the point? All it would have done is bring down suspicion on me.”
So there was the proof of Nate’s towering indifference toward his son. A voice at the back of my head reminded me of all the things I hadn’t done to save Jack. But I was only a murderer in my own estimation.
I said, “And the DNA evidence coming to light—that didn’t change your mind either?”
“I admit I was enraged when I learned, but it was more anger about how Shannon had used Charlie. She came to me, you know, not long before she died, claiming the baby was mine. She thought it would be enough to make me divorce Judith—my last chance to have a ‘normal’ family was how she explained it to me. Stupid girl. It apparently hadn’t occurred to her that any offspring of Charlie’s would have a 50–50 chance of inheriting Fragile X from his father. If I had known then what she was up to, I probably would have killed her.”
Something in his answer was off. But I was so sure his words amounted to a confession that I pressed ahead. “So you admit you did it?”
“Did what?”
“Murdered Shannon,” I said.
Nate seemed startled for a fraction of a second, then recovered and chuckled nastily. “That’s your theory, is it? I should have guessed. And now you’ve come here to trade.”
I wanted to reach out and throttle him. Did Nate really think I’d strike a bargain with him, cover up a murder in exchange for having the charges against me dropped? That my license was more important to me than Charlie’s well-being?
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