More Deaths Than One

by Pat Bertram

He felt the itchiness between his shoulder blades. It was as if an ant had crawled under his skin and was now trying to find its way out.

  “I don’t know.” He released the knob. “Let’s find a telephone.”

  They passed three phones. By the time they reached the fourth one, a few blocks away from the bar, the itchiness had abated somewhat.

  A female with a young-sounding voice answered the call. Bob asked to speak to Hamburger Dan.

  A minute later Hamburger Dan picked up the phone. “Yes?”

  “This is—” Bob paused, trying to remember the name he’d given in the bar.

  “I know who you are,” Hamburger Dan said. “We missed you yesterday. Jim Keating has been speaking of you. But just you.”

  “I understand.” Bob kept his voice even. “We’re taking the train to the gulf, maybe stay at Bangphra for a few days. I wanted to let you know I talked to Harrison’s lawyer. He told me Kalia and Dave have the use of the brownstone while they’re going to school. Harrison left the place to me, but I have no interest in it. They can stay as long as they wish.”

  “That’s good of you. I’ll let them know.” A significant pause. “Take care.”

  “I will. And thanks.”

  “Why are you thanking him?” Kerry asked when he hung up. “You’re the one giving away a fortune in real estate.”

  “Lending, not giving. And I thanked him for the warning.”

  “Warning?” Her voice rose. “What warning?”

  “A guy I know told those men with the cop’s eyes that I’m here, but at least he didn’t mention you.”

  “So we’re not going to the gulf? You said that for the benefit of the people who tapped his phone?”

  “Exactly.” Bob looked around for a cab. “As soon as we get a taxi, we’ll be heading for the airport to catch a plane to Manila, then back to Colorado before they figure out where we are.”

  At that moment, it started to rain.

  ***

  The monsoon delayed their flight. It was still raining when they finally landed in Manila six hours later.

  The taxi inched its way through the crowds of people spilling over into the narrow muddy street in a part of Manila tourists generally did not see. Bob stared out the window at the makeshift shacks. The stench burned the lining of his nose.

  Hearing Kerry gag, he turned his head toward her. She had a hand to her mouth, and she breathed shallowly.

  “How can people live like this?” she said.

  “Maybe they have no choice.”

  “Isn’t this the country where the first lady had five thousand pairs of shoes?”

  “Yes.”

  “I guess all countries are alike. The public servants are better off than the public they serve.”

  Smothering another gag, she clamped her mouth shut and held it shut until the taxi pulled up in front of a long, low building that seemed well built. In the rain it looked as gray and as dreary as its surroundings.

  After Bob paid the fare, he held out three fifty-dollar bills.

  A look of longing crossed the cabdriver’s face.

  “They’re yours if you wait for us,” Bob said.

  The man snatched at the bills, but Bob held them out of reach.

  “One now, the other two when we’re finished.”

  The cabdriver nodded eagerly, never taking his eyes off the money.

  Bob handed him one bill, then folded the other two and put them in his shirt pocket. “These are for later.”

  “How long I wait?”

  “Thirty minutes. No longer than an hour.”

  “Okay.”

  Bob climbed out of the cab, opened an umbrella, and offered Kerry a hand. He slammed the door shut. The cab driver pulled away.

  “Hey,” Kerry yelled.

  The cabdriver waved an index finger. “I come back one hour.”

  Huddling under the umbrella, Kerry asked in a small voice, “Do you think he’ll come back?”

  “Yes,” Bob responded, hoping he sounded more certain than he felt.

  To his surprise, she laughed. “You don’t lie very well, do you? At least not to me. I like that in a man.” She linked arms with him. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

  ***

  Dr. Brewer looked about fifty. He had a sallow, heavily lined face and wiry gray hair. Dark-framed eyeglasses kept sliding down his ski-slope nose. He didn’t act friendly, but once he got to talking, he was open and effusive about his work.

  In the clinic’s business office, Bob and Kerry sat on a faded red couch. Springs and wisps of horsehair protruded from a fist-sized hole between them. Bob heard a rustle in the hole, and he expected to see a rodent head come popping out at any moment.

  Kerry seemed unaware of the sound; she was still struggling to breathe. The overpowering stench of industrial-strength disinfectant made the air inside worse than the air outside.

  Bob tried to look interested as Dr. Brewer droned on about the success of the clinic and his plans for expansion.

  When the doctor paused, Bob said, “You’re doing a wonderful thing here, but to be honest, we wish to speak about your work at the private trauma hospital operating outside of Quezon City during the Vietnam War.”

  Dr. Brewer stared at him for a long time as if taking his measure. Finally, he sighed.

  “You’re the second person to ask me about that in the past few months.”

  “Who else asked?” When Dr. Brewer didn’t respond, Bob asked, “Was it William Harrison, the writer?”

  “Why, yes. How did you know?”

  “He passed away, and I’ve been hired by the estate to finish his last book, which touches on the works of that hospital.”

  “I’m sorry to hear he’s dead—he was a personable fellow—but I would just as soon his project died with him.”

  “Why?” Kerry demanded. “Don’t people have the right to know about the human experimentation you did?”

  “Human experimentation?” Dr. Brewer took off his glasses, polished them with a corner of his handkerchief, then put them back on. “Trauma care, especially during war time, does tend to be cutting edge—I suppose some may call it experimental—but I assure you, every single procedure was safe and precedented.”

  “How did you get a job at the hospital?” Bob asked. “You must have been very young.”

  “I was young. I had finished my residency at Boston Memorial when I received an invitation to apply for a position at a new hospital associated with the military but neither owned nor controlled by it. The successful applicants would have all the benefits of being a military doctor, meaning a lifetime of experience in a few short years, together with all the benefits of working in a well-equipped civilian hospital. Also, pay would be generous, and for every year of service, a large chunk of our student loans would be paid off.

  “It sounded like a dream come true. Most of the doctors I had gone to school with started out idealistic, wanting to help humanity, but by the time they got to their internships, they were so sick of being poor, they wanted as much money as they could get their hands on.”

  Dr. Brewer laughed, gesturing to his shabby office. “As you can see, poverty doesn’t bother me, but being in debt does. Also, I never lost my desire to help people. I was thrilled when Dr. Rutledge hired me to work at his hospital.”

  He looked from Bob to Kerry, his brown eyes serious. “No matter what else ISI might have done, they did one very good thing. They brought me here. This is where I was always meant to be—these people need me.

  “By the time the Americans pulled out of Vietnam, making that private hospital redundant, my school loans had been paid off, and I had saved enough to get this clinic started. Dr. Rutledge arranged for a grant from ISI to keep it going. Also, before he shipped the hospital’s equipment back to the States, he let me have my pick. So you can see why I don’t believe those people did anything unethical.”

  “I understand,” Bob said noncommittally. “What happened to the hospital?”


  “ISI had leased a sugar plantation for the duration of the war. We used the house for the hospital. It reverted to its owners after the peace accords were signed.”

  “This Dr. Rutledge you keep talking about,” Bob said. “Is his name Jeremy by any chance?”

  “Yes. Do you know him?”

  “I’ve heard of him.”

  “He’s a great man. A visionary.”

  “What about Cerberus?” Kerry burst out.

  Dr. Brewer pushed up his glasses with an index finger. “Cerberus?”

  “That’s the codename for the project concerned with eradicating phantom pains.”

  Dr. Brewer’s brows arched above his glasses. “Is it? I didn’t know that. Of course, by the time I got involved, it was an established procedure, well beyond the codename stage.”

  Kerry’s mouth dropped open. “You don’t deny there was such a project?”

  “No. Why should I? Saving patients years of agony is a great advancement in medicine.”

  “A great advancement? How can you say that?”

  “Look, Miss—what did you say your name was? Alice Baker?”

  Kerry nodded.

  “Look, Miss Baker. I don’t have to justify a damn thing. Have you ever seen a man driven crazy because of an itch he couldn’t scratch? Have you ever heard a man scream in agony because he has a cramp in a muscle that no longer exists? I have. The relief of such pain is justification enough.”

  “Did you perform the procedure?” Bob asked.

  “No. I created the pain by removing rotting body parts and limbs mangled beyond repair. I’m glad someone could keep them from suffering another horror on top of that one.”

  “But they didn’t give their consent,” Kerry protested.

  “Did they give their consent to get drafted? Did they give their consent to get blown up?”

  Kerry raised her chin a notch, but her voice sounded subdued. “I guess not.”

  Dr. Brewer made a sweeping gesture over the file-laden desk. “As you can see, my day doesn’t end when the clinic closes.”

  “I understand. Thank you for your time.” Bob rose.

  “One more thing,” the doctor said.

  Bob settled back on the couch. “Yes?”

  “When you write Harrison’s book, I’d appreciate it if you left off any mention of the man in the locked room.”

  Chapter 24

  The man in the locked room?

  “Why don’t you want us to mention him?” Bob asked, hiding his lack of knowledge behind a bland tone.

  Dr. Brewer took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I was pleased when Harrison told me he planned to write about what we accomplished back then, but toward the end of the interview all his questions centered on that particular patient. I was afraid he would make that patient the focus of the book. I’m proud of the work we did and proud of the direction my life has taken. I’d hate to see all that overshadowed by a mystery figure when in truth there was no mystery, just a lot of rumors and myths and fanciful stories.”

  Bob sat straight and tried to act as if he knew what the doctor meant. “How fanciful were these stories?”

  Dr. Brewer scowled at the eyeglasses in his hand, then repositioned them on his nose. “Oh, the foolishness of gossip. They called him the Freak, the Switcher . . . no, not the Switcher. The Sweeper? The Sweeper, that’s right. They also called him The Human Chameleon, as if he were a comic book hero. It always happens. Whenever access to a patient or a room is restricted, the rumors fly.”

  Kerry’s eyes were bright. “The Sweeper lived!”

  “This may not be the same sweeper,” Bob pointed out.

  “Of course it is. How many people with chameleon-like abilities can there be?”

  “At any rate,” Dr. Brewer said, “he didn’t live long. The doctors at the hospital in Vietnam patched him up, but he was in critical condition when I saw him.”

  “Do you know his name?” Kerry asked.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t remember.” He sighed. “We treated so many . . .”

  After a moment he gave himself a shake. “Not only had the poor man been severely wounded, but his ordeal had been so great he was completely spent. He was awake a lot of the time, he might even have been aware of his surroundings, but he was non-responsive.

  “I’m sure you’ve heard people say, ‘I was wearied to death,’ when all they meant was they were tired, but that patient truly was wearied to death. It seemed that any exertion, no matter how trivial, would drive him right over the edge.

  “Eventually his physical wounds healed, but not his mental ones. I recommended sending him to a stateside psychiatric hospital, but Dr. Rutledge disagreed. He said the man was a prisoner of his memories. Once the memories of his ordeal were gone, he would be restored to mental health. So I did as Rutledge instructed and transferred the patient to him in the psychiatric ward.”

  Dr. Brewer fell silent.

  “What happened to The Sweeper?” Kerry asked.

  “He died. Harrison didn’t want to believe it, but it’s true. I signed the death certificate myself.”

  “How did he die?”

  “He slipped away during the night. It happens.”

  Bob frowned. “Why did you sign the death certificate? Why not Dr. Rutledge?”

  Dr. Brewer shook his head reprovingly. “You’re like Harrison, looking for mysteries where none exist. I was the doctor of record, that’s all.”

  Kerry narrowed her eyes at him. “Did you actually see his dead body?”

  He gave a snort of unamused laughter. “Now you sound like my wife. In case you’re wondering why I remember him after all these years, it’s because my wife and I spent half our married life arguing about him. To answer your question—no, I did not see the body. I did not need to. My boss, a great doctor, a man I respect, told me the patient died and asked me to fill out the death certificate.

  “My wife worked for Rutledge as a psychiatric nurse. She never liked him, said he had a habit of touching the nurses inappropriately, so when she claimed The Chameleon didn’t die, that Rutledge kept him locked in a special room, I didn’t take it seriously.”

  Kerry sucked in a breath. “Your wife saw him after he had supposedly died?”

  Dr. Brewer looked at her in disgust. “No. She said she heard Rutledge talking about a man in a locked room, and somehow she got it into her head it was The Chameleon. Sally, the patient’s nurse, told my wife the patient was an amnesiac Dr. Rutledge kept in a drug-induced hypnotic state. Every day, for hours on end, they played tapes of what they knew about his life to help him remember.

  “It drove my wife nuts not knowing the truth. She said if I had double-checked to make certain he died, then she would have known for sure.”

  Kerry lifted her shoulders. “Why did it bother her so much?”

  “My wife was a romantic, enamored with the idea of a real-life human chameleon. I tried to explain to her it was physiologically impossible, but she always came back at me with that old adage about all things being possible. Then she’d add that we know so little about the human soul, how could we limit it to what is known.” He smiled. “My wife was a delightful woman, a truly inspired nurse, and I loved her dearly, but she had that one tiny loose screw.”

  “May we talk to her?” Kerry asked.

  “She’s gone. Died of malaria last year.”

  “I’m sorry,” Bob and Kerry said at the same time.

  Dr. Brewer bowed his head. “Yeah, me too. I’d give anything to have one more silly argument with her about the man in the locked room.”

  After a moment of silence, Bob leaned forward. “Can you give us Sally’s name and address?

  The doctor leafed through a small book at his desk, wrote on a piece of paper, and handed it to him. Sally Rutledge, it said.

  Bob snapped his head up to look at him.

  Dr. Brewer nodded. “Yep. Married the boss. My wife always claimed Sally blackmailed him into it, that Sally knew where all the bod
ies were buried, so to speak, and had demanded marriage in exchange for her silence. But that simply is not true. Rutledge fell madly in love with her the first time he laid eyes on her.” He rose. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have paperwork to do.”

  He ushered them out of the clinic.

  To Bob’s relief, the cabdriver was waiting.

  ***

  They spent the night in a hotel not far from the Manila airport. Bob watched the gentle rise and fall of Kerry’s chest as she slept. Then he too fell asleep.

  He dreamt.

  In his dream, he struggled to sit up.

  A nurse hurried over to him. “Lie still,” she said, smiling. “The doctor will be here any moment.”

  Bob looked around at the white room and the IV snaking into his arm. “Where am I?”

  “You had an accident. You’re in a hospital.”

  “I know, but where?”

  “The Philippines.”

  “Oh, I thought maybe I had been shipped state-side.” He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the doctor, a prematurely bald American with the face of a choirboy, peered down at him.

  The doctor smiled, showing large teeth. “Hi, Bob. I’m Dr. Johnson. How are you feeling?”

  “Fair.”

  “Do you know why you’ve been hospitalized?”

  “We hit a mine, I think.”

  “Very good,” Dr. Johnson said with a heartiness that made Bob wince. “You had a concussion, a minor head trauma, but I need to ask you some questions to make sure you’re okay. What’s your name?”

  “Robert Stark.”

  “Where were you born?”

  “Denver. When can I go home?”

  “Relax and take it easy. You’ll be back in Saigon soon enough.”

  “No, I mean when can I go back to Denver?” An agonizing pain shot through his skull. He clamped his lips together to keep from emitting a groan.

  “What’s the hurry?” the doctor asked. “Got a girlfriend waiting for you?”

  “No.”

  “What about family?”

  “No family. My father died when I was fifteen, my mother died of cancer three years later, and I haven’t seen my brother since her funeral.”

  “Considering all that, I can’t imagine why you want to go back to Denver.”