EQMM, May 2008

by Dell Magazine Authors

  * * * *

  In Northmont, we'd felt the effects of the war from the beginning, through the lives of our half-dozen brave local boys who'd died in combat (Dr. Sam Hawthorne was telling his visitor as he poured a small libation for them both), but it was in October of ‘forty-four that the war really came home to our town, in a strange way that's been kept secret for all these years.

  It started for me when I was visited at my office one gloomy October Monday by a well-dressed young man with chiseled features who introduced himself as Robert Barnovich. He was probably in his thirties and I wondered why he wasn't in the service. “What seems to be your problem?” I asked. He didn't look or dress like a local and my first thought was that he'd been stricken ill while on the road.

  "No health problem, Dr. Hawthorne.” He flipped open a card case and showed me a badge and photo ID. “Special Agent Barnovich of the FBI."

  "Well!” was all I could think to say.

  He smiled. “Don't worry, you're not under arrest. I've been sent to discuss a situation that will be arising here in two days’ time. You understand this is top secret. The hospital administration knows, of course, and I'm telling you because your office is here at Pilgrim Memorial and you're likely to be consulted on the case. Also, you've been cleared through a background check. We're bringing in a secret patient from overseas. He's had certain injuries that are not believed to be life-threatening. He'll arrive here with his head and face bandaged, partly because of the injuries but also to keep his identity secret."

  "Is it Hitler?” I asked with a smile.

  The FBI man's face remained grim. “It is not Hitler, but that's all I can say. He'll be well guarded during his stay, but not a word of this is to leak out. Is that understood?"

  "I suppose so. But why in heaven's name are you bringing him to Pilgrim Memorial rather than one of the big government hospitals?"

  "The decision was made after careful study. The government wanted an East Coast hospital that was easier to reach from Europe. And they wanted a first-rate small-town hospital where a secret patient wasn't likely to attract the attention of the media. I'm told the Surgeon General considered the attributes of ten small East Coast hospitals before settling on Pilgrim Memorial."

  "I suppose we should be honored at that. Tell me one thing. Does this patient speak and understand English?"

  "To some extent, yes. That's all I can say."

  "And he'll arrive on Wednesday the eighteenth?"

  "That's correct."

  "Will you be here?"

  He gave a brief nod. “I'll be here with my men as long as he is."

  * * * *

  That night over dinner I told Annabel about it. Samantha was three months old now and Annabel was back to work at the Ark a few hours a day, taking our daughter with her. Soon she hoped to be back full time, and we'd need someone to take care of Samantha. But not yet.

  "What does it mean, Sam? A captured Nazi that they're flying over here?"

  "I don't know. It's someone important, with the FBI involved."

  "I'm glad to know you passed the background check. They probably don't know you tell your wife everything."

  "You needed to know,” I answered defensively. “I might have to work overtime some nights."

  The war news that weekend had reported the death of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel three months after his supposed injury in an auto accident. We'd known for some time that his head injuries were actually caused by Allied planes strafing his staff car in July. Rommel had been friendly with the generals behind the failed plot to assassinate Hitler, and some rumors even had him taking command of the country if the plot had succeeded. But now, with his death, a state funeral was planned.

  "Would it have made any difference if Hitler had been killed?” Annabel had wondered back in July when the news broke.

  "Germany might have surrendered rather than fight to the death as they're doing now.” With the conspirators dead and a half-crazed Hitler still in control, the inevitable Allied victory stretched further into the future.

  Tuesday morning was a quiet day at the hospital, but from my office wing I could detect preparations being made for the new arrival. Lincoln Jones, the black doctor who'd delivered our baby, stopped by the office to ask how Samantha was doing. After I told him all was well and Samantha was even accompanying my wife to work a few hours each day, Lincoln asked, “What's going on at the hospital? They've closed off several rooms at the end of the south corridor and are moving in some equipment."

  "It's all very hush-hush,” I confirmed. “Some sort of secret patient is arriving tomorrow. The FBI's in charge."

  "Why here?"

  "They wanted a good small hospital on the East Coast. I suppose we should consider it a compliment."

  "Are you involved, Sam?"

  "I was told they might call on me."

  "Who do you think it is?"

  "I've a hunch it might be some top Nazi prisoner, but the FBI assured me it's not Hitler."

  Lincoln Jones gave a familiar grunt. “And what will your job be? To cure him or kill him?"

  * * * *

  It was Dr. Dwight Pryor, the hospital administrator, who came to my office on Wednesday morning. He was a gaunt, well-dressed man with glasses and a moustache, who rarely wore the white jacket that was the uniform of other staff physicians. I barely knew the man, and his only other visit to my office had come when he first took over as administrator and visited all the doctors with offices in the building.

  "Dr. Pryor,” I said, rising to shake his hand. “You're a rare visitor to our wing of the building."

  He sat down without being asked. “You and Dr. Jones have your own practices; you're not part of the hospital's staff. But with this new situation I thought I should speak with you. I understand Special Agent Barnovich has already filled you in on the basics."

  "Somewhat. I know we're receiving some sort of secret patient today."

  "Correct, and that's about all I know, too. He's going to be under close supervision during his stay here, which I understand will be only a matter of a few days. If his health is satisfactory he'll be transferred elsewhere."

  "Is there anything I can do to help?"

  "Dr. Francis will be examining him, and he will call on you if needed. While the patient is at Pilgrim Memorial he will be known as Mr. Fuchs."

  "A German name."

  "Yes, but that means nothing."

  After he left I called my nurse April into my office and told her what little I knew. With her husband still away in the service, she was anxious to help in any way she could. “I just want to get André back home in one piece,” she told me. “Do you think this might be some important Nazi who will reveal information?"

  "I have no idea,” I answered honestly. “But while he's here I want you to be able to reach me at all times. Whenever I'm out of the office you'll have a phone number where I can be contacted."

  She glanced out my window. “It looks as if the mystery man is arriving now."

  Sure enough, an ambulance had pulled up to the hospital's emergency entrance and a patient on a stretcher was being removed. I could see his bandaged head, and a couple of men in suits accompanying him. I recognized one as Agent Barnovich. “I'd better go out to greet them,” I said.

  Dr. Pryor was there too, and Judd Francis, the primary physician on the case. I knew him socially, and he'd treated a couple of my patients with head injuries, his specialty. “What's up, Judd?” I asked him. “Your mysterious patient arriving?"

  "Hello, Sam. Yeah, he's here. I'll probably be calling on you to check his vital signs. I'll be examining his head injury to see how it's healing."

  "I've got some free time now if you want to get started."

  He nodded. “Let's do it. The faster we give him a clean bill the sooner he'll be out of here, along with his keepers.” He nodded toward the FBI agents.

  "Any idea who he is?"

  He shook his head. “He's just a patient. I don't ask questio
ns. Come in with me while we take off the bandages. Then you'll know as much as I do."

  Special Agent Barnovich and his team were careful to search everyone entering the patient's room and to check all food, water, and medication. It seemed they feared someone might try to kill him. After we'd passed inspection, I stood by the bed while the patient had his head bandages carefully removed by Dr. Francis. One of the FBI men was at the door, his back to us. The face that came into view was that of a ruggedly handsome man in his fifties with his head shaved for treatment of wounds. The man opened his eyes and Judd Francis asked, “Do you understand English?"

  "Some,” the man answered, shifting slightly in his bed. “Where am I?"

  "You're in America, in a place called Northmont. They brought you here for a medical checkup before you move on."

  "I see,” he muttered and closed his eyes. I wondered if he'd been drugged.

  "I'm Dr. Francis and this is Dr. Hawthorne. We'll be examining you for the next few days. My nurse, Marcia O'Toole, will be looking after you, too. What can you tell me about these head wounds, Mr. Fuchs?” It was the first time he'd used the patient's supposed name.

  "Fuchs?” the man repeated with a half chuckle. “Is that the name they gave me?"

  "Yes."

  "It is as good as any, I suppose. The head wounds came about three months ago when my car was strafed by an enemy plane."

  "I see. They seem to have healed well."

  "I still have frequent headaches."

  "How frequent?"

  "A few times a week."

  "That's probably normal, but we'll X-ray you. I'm the head man around here.” It was a line he loved to use. “Dr. Hawthorne will handle the rest of your body."

  The jokes were lost on Fuchs, who remained silent. It was a good time for me to escape. “I'll be in to see you later,” I promised the patient.

  On the way out I stopped to see Marcia O'Toole, the nurse who'd been assigned to him. She was an attractive young woman in her mid twenties who'd lost an older brother to the war in North Africa. I didn't know her well, but we'd chatted a few times. “I understand you'll be helping with our new patient,” I said.

  "That's what I hear. I've already got that G-man Barnovich breathing down my neck."

  "Don't mind him. He's just doing his job."

  She laughed. “He's doing more than his job. He asked me for a date."

  * * * *

  That night at home Annabel quizzed me about Fuchs. “Who is he?” she wanted to know. “A German prisoner?"

  "Perhaps. He spoke his few words of English with a German accent. They must think he has important information if the FBI is guarding him so carefully."

  "You said Judd Francis is the attending physician?"

  I nodded. “Because of the head injury, which is pretty well healed now. Judd did a thorough examination of his head and neck. At first I was only going to be on call if they needed me, but somehow I've gotten the job of giving him a complete physical."

  My wife smiled. “The FBI checked you out and decided you were trustworthy."

  "That may be the answer. I'll be examining him in the morning and maybe I'll learn something."

  I stopped at my office the following morning to tell April I'd be in the hospital examining Mr. Fuchs for the next few hours. When I entered his room Marcia O'Toole was washing him and brushing his teeth. “He's still weak but he's coming along, aren't you, Mr. Fuchs?"

  "Ah ... yes,” he managed between brushings, still a bit dazed from his medication.

  "The sun's out today. Maybe later I can wheel you outside for a bit,” Nurse O'Toole said, flipping her brown hair as she spoke, almost as if she was flirting with him. But I'd seen her do the same thing with doctors and other patients.

  When she'd finished the clean-up I took over, checking his pulse and temperature and blood pressure, asking him all the routine questions about his health. He told me his age was fifty-two, that he'd be fifty-three the following month. We talked a bit, and though he admitted to being German he said nothing about the circumstances that had brought him here under FBI guard. Once he asked me, “What day is this?"

  "Thursday, October nineteenth,” I replied.

  "Is that all? It seems it should be so much later.” The more he spoke the easier it was for me to understand his accent.

  "You seem in pretty good shape. I think we'll be able to send you on your way soon."

  "To where?"

  "That's not for me to say."

  The following day, when we were alone, he engaged me in further conversation. “How long will I be here?” he asked after I'd checked his temperature and the usual vital signs.

  "Perhaps only another day. Dr. Pryor, the hospital administrator, is anxious to get things back to normal."

  "I am disrupting your routine?"

  "Not you, but the FBI certainly is."

  "For that I regret."

  "You're an important person. They must guard you well."

  "I am not important,” he said quietly. “I am dead."

  Before I could ask him what he meant, we were interrupted by Barnovich, the FBI man. “You about done in there, Doc? I have to speak with Mr. Fuchs."

  "Just finishing up,” I said, and retreated from the room.

  Dr. Pryor visited my office after lunch to see how things were going. “Have you completed your examinations, Sam?"

  "All but the blood tests. I'll have those results in the morning."

  "Good! Judd Francis has cleared him as far as the head wounds are concerned."

  "Where will he be going next?"

  Pryor lowered his voice. “The rumor is that he'll be taken to Shangri-La to meet with the President."

  "Where?"

  "It's a secret camp somewhere in the Maryland hills where FDR goes to get away from Washington."

  "He's that important a person?"

  "Apparently."

  "I'll have the blood results in the morning,” I assured him.

  Saturday morning was my last opportunity to speak with the patient, and I took advantage of it. Barnovich was on duty at the door, but he seemed more interested in flirting with Nurse O'Toole than in paying attention to what we were talking about.

  "Tell me what happened to you,” I urged my patient. “You'll probably be gone by the end of the day and we'll never see each other again. The rumor is that you're on your way to meet our President."

  Fuchs gazed at me sadly. “You are a good doctor. You treat me well. What is today? Saturday? I will tell you what happened. They came to my house a week ago today, men whom I thought to be my friends. After the unsuccessful plot to kill the Fuhrer in July, many of us were suspect. Because of my wounds they left me alone for a time, but then last week they came. I was never part of the plot, but I did know about it in advance. That was enough to condemn me. I was given a choice—a tiny cyanide capsule that would kill me in three seconds, or a trial for treason that would ruin my family. The cyanide was my only true choice. I went off with them in a car to the place where I would swallow the capsule. All left me except one man who had been my friend. I held the tiny capsule in my hand."

  "But how did you—?"

  "Escape? If that is what this is. The man was still my friend. He drove me over a dirt road to a field where a small unmarked plane was waiting. What he did may have cost him his life, but I am eternally grateful. Of course the government could not report my defection to the Allied side. They announced that I had finally died from my accident injuries, and a state funeral was planned.” He smiled sadly. “A funeral without a corpse."

  "Tell me who you are."

  He shook his head. “Call me Fuchs. My real name is unimportant."

  I held out my hand to shake his. “Good luck, wherever they take you."

  "I will remember your kindness, Dr. Hawthorne. We are all on this earth together. It is only politics that sometimes makes enemies of us."

  Those were the last words our secret patient ever spoke to me. I was awakened
during the night with news that he was dead.

  * * * *

  It was not yet dawn when I reached the hospital, but already Sheriff Lens was on the scene. I hadn't been told the cause of death, and his presence alarmed me. “Are you here about the death of a man named Fuchs?” I asked.

  "Guess so, Doc. The boss, Dr. Pryor, reported it as a possible poisoning."

  "I can't imagine that. He was being guarded by a team of FBI agents."

  "We'll see."

  The first person we encountered inside the hospital was Agent Barnovich, looking flustered and frightened. “It couldn't have happened,” he told us. “No one could have poisoned him. We tested every bit of food and drink that went into that room."

  "We'll want to talk with Dr. Pryor first,” Sheriff Lens told him.

  We found the hospital administrator breathless in the corridor outside the room occupied by Fuchs. “What happened?” I asked.

  "We don't know. Dr. Francis was in the emergency room with an accident victim a little after three o'clock. He decided to stop in and see if Fuchs was sleeping well. Barnovich was outside by the door and they checked him together. They found him dead. There was an odor of bitter almonds—"

  "Cyanide?"

  "We're doing an immediate autopsy. That's what we suspect."

  Sheriff Lens turned to me. “What do you think, Doc?"

  I turned to Agent Barnovich. “Were you on duty here all night?"

  "I was."

  "Did you keep a log of everyone who entered the patient's room?"

  "Of course."

  "We'd better take a look at that."

  Dr. Pryor interrupted. “I want it known that no cyanide in any form is kept at Pilgrim Memorial. We have no medical need for it here. If someone killed Fuchs, he brought the poison in with him."

  "Let's go in your office and talk this over,” I suggested. Pryor led the way to his office with Barnovich, the sheriff, and me following.

  Within minutes Judd Francis joined us. “I can't believe this could happen,” he said as he took a chair in the administrator's office. “Who even knew he was here?"

  "We're working on that,” Sheriff Lens told him. “First I'd better know the identity of this mystery patient."