Remains Silent mm-1

by Michael Baden

  She threw up her hands. “Innocent!”

  “The segmental analysis revealed that Skeletons Two and Three had been getting mescaline for months,” Hans continued, oblivious to the byplay. “But Skeleton Four only started receiving it within the last few weeks of her life. She must have been given massive doses.”

  Manny shuddered. “Poor, poor woman. I’m calling Patrice. She’s got to let me go on with the investigation.”

  “If she doesn’t agree, we have enough to go after them ourselves.”

  “You have more,” Hans said. “In Skeleton One: osteomyelitis in the hand bone.”

  “Bone infection,” Jake said.

  “The DNA obtainable from the osteomyelitic cavity is from bacteria, Serratia marcescens, but a very virulent type of Serratia, one I’ve never seen before.”

  “Holy shit!” Jake’s eyes were wide.

  “Explain,” Manny said.

  “It’s a natural bacterium. Scientists like to play with it in the laboratory, because it’s red when it grows in the laboratory and you can easily distinguish it from other bacteria.”

  There was no pleasure left in Hans’s demeanor. “The American government played with Serratia bacteria during the forties and fifties to see if it could be used as a weapon. Sprayed it secretly over areas of San Francisco, painted it on doorknobs and banisters. Spraying didn’t work because too little was inhaled by people on the ground-”

  “One of the reasons the anthrax scare is overblown,” Jake interrupted.

  “- but over the years it’s sickened some people who inhaled it. One even died. It’s much more prevalent now than it was before the spray.”

  “It was Serratia that infected the flu vaccine at the Chiron plant in England in 2004,” Jake pointed out. “They had to destroy the stockpile and couldn’t send any over here. Hence our shortage.”

  “Some people think the Chiron contamination was part of another experiment,” Hans said, “but that’s conjecture. What we do know is that Serratia marcescens, the type in Skeleton One, is far more aggressive than the strain used in San Francisco. It’s a superbug, Jake, enhanced by humans, the kind that’s not supposed to exist. But it does. I saw it yesterday in my petri dish. My guess is the government was using Turner as a lab, with humans for rats. And they sometimes slipped up- hence the bones.”

  The enormity of what she was hearing set off explosions in Manny’s brain. She vowed revenge- legal revenge.

  “And it wasn’t just at Turner,” Hans continued. “The man who oversaw future testing, Sidney Gottlieb, testified about other tests- in secret and under a pseudonym- before the U.S. Senate’s Church Committee in 1975. A lot of doctors were involved, including many of the best-known psychiatrists of the day. The top New York State Health Department doctor approved the mind-control experiments, some done in conjunction with other countries. We know of at least two people who died as a result of these experiments: a CIA agent who had been given surreptitious doses of LSD and jumped to his death from a hotel window, and a tennis pro who was given huge doses of mescaline after checking himself into a hospital for depression. Doctors’ notes show he never consented to anything. He was clearly being experimented on against his will.”

  “I remember the case!” Manny said. “The family sued the government, claiming it withheld the information that their son had died because of what they’d done to him.”

  “Who won?” Jake asked.

  “Guess. But damn it, if I’d been the lawyer, there’d have been a different verdict.”

  “I found the same army mescaline, EA-1298, developed at the Edgewood Arsenal Military Base that allegedly killed that tennis pro in your skeletons,” Hans said. “It and other variations are delineated by code numbers that mean not to be used on humans. Ha! The world hasn’t changed, only the level of the cover-ups.”

  “Didn’t President Nixon order all chemical and bacteriological weapons destroyed?”

  Galt’s eyes shone. “Glad you asked.” He produced a copy of a memo regarding CIA activities at Fort Detrick in Maryland, signed by Donald F. Chamberlain, Inspector General of the United States, and read it aloud: “On 25 November 1969, President Nixon ordered the Department of Defense to recommend plans for the disposal of existing stocks of bacteriological weapons. On 14 November 1970, he included all toxic weapons. It is our understanding that these materials were destroyed in compliance with President Nixon’s directives. We cannot, however, locate the records that establish this fact.”

  “So for all we know, bacteriological experiments are still going on,” Jake said.

  “But why?” Manny asked. “Our government’s not monstrous, at least not most of the time. And even if they were, how could they recruit the scientists to do it?”

  “Self-preservation,” Hans said. “Enemies were doing mind-control experiments to get our secrets. We had to know how to counteract them. Again, it’s nothing new. In the seventeen hundreds, Lord Jeffrey Amherst gave American Indians blankets soaked in smallpox. You might argue that it led to a cure for the disease.”

  “Or that it killed many Indians.” Manny was at her boiling point. She stood. “Come on, Jake. Time to go to work.”

  “I don’t have to go in. Pederson’s concerned that since the mob missed me at home, they’ll try again at the office. He’s given me a few days off until they figure out what to do with me.”

  “We have our own corpses to worry about. We’ll work on our investigation.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “First, though, home. I’m not going out again without makeup. Thank you, Mr. Galt. I haven’t had this much education since the autopsy.”

  THEY BOUGHT CHINOS and a sweatshirt for Jake on the way home, then slept for three hours, made love, showered, dressed, and emerged into blazing sunlight. My idea of a perfect morning, Manny thought.

  “Wouldn’t Pete be appalled if he knew the story behind the bones,” Jake said. “He took it hard that there was a young woman’s skeleton. Imagine how much worse if he’d realized she was poisoned.”

  They were on the steps of the public library. Manny wanted to see if they could find anything in the Church Committee hearings that would lead back to Turner Psychiatric.

  The librarian in the subbasement microfiche room told them she was required to log in any documents they reviewed or copied. “Courtesy of the Patriot Act,” she said. “In case you two are terrorists, the government can hunt you down.”

  “The army sanctioned the mescaline and LSD experiments Hans told us about as early as 1952,” Jake said, reading through a file on the period. “Listen to this: “There is ample evidence in the reports of innumerable interrogations that the Communists were using drugs, physical duress, electric shock and possibly hypnosis against their enemies. With such evidence, it is difficult not to keep from becoming rabid about our apparent laxity. We are forced by this mounting evidence to assume a more aggressive role in the development of these techniques, but must be cautious to maintain strict inviolable control because of the havoc that could be wrought by such techniques in unscrupulous hands.

  “Jesus, the guy was a physician. Hadn’t he heard of the Hippocratic oath?”

  “They put LSD in cigarettes with a tuberculin needle and syringe,” Manny exclaimed, looking at the same disc over his shoulder. “Also in ice cream. They even specified the flavor: chocolate.”

  “To hide the taste of the LSD,” Jake said.

  Manny remembered the historical information she’d read at the Academie. “Turner had an ice cream parlor and a dairy farm. Do you think-?”

  “Could be a coincidence,” Jake said. “We need more.”

  They opened documents at random. Much of the information had been redacted with swipes of a black Magic Marker.

  “Imagine what we’d find if we could see everything,” Manny commented. “Too bad the Freedom of Information Act doesn’t mean what it says.” She looked at Jake. He was frowning, preoccupied. “What is it?”

  “I’m remembering Pete. He testifie
d for the army in the case of a doctor accused of using curare on his patients, five of whom died. Harrigan was called by the prosecution. But under cross examination by the defense, he surprisingly said he didn’t think the curare caused the deaths. He later told me something I consider gospel: ‘Science doesn’t take sides.’ The doctor was acquitted. It says here that curare was one of the drugs the government used in experiments.

  “No matter how angry you are, no matter how much it looks like there were secret experiments performed at Turner, we still need scientific evidence.”

  She curtsied. “Yes, your lordship.”

  They worked through the afternoon, Jake leaving only for a while, to make a brief visit to Sam. They found nothing that directly related to Turner. Jake’s cell phone rang. Manny couldn’t overhear the conversation, but Jake seemed pleased. He stood. “Commissioner Melody said I could go back home later today. There’s a mason coming to fix the wall at five. It won’t be habitable, but I’ll get some fresh clothes and pick you up for dinner around seven-thirty. Okay?”

  She smiled to hide a spasm of alarm. I’ll be alone. Everyone I pass, everyone I talk to, will seem threatening now. “I’d like to meet you there instead. See that they put your house back right. We’ll eat dinner in your neighborhood then go back to my place.”

  I like her place, Jake thought. “Sounds good.”

  ***

  It’s as if nothing ever happened here, thought Manny, walking up the steps to the brownstone. The hole had been bricked in, the damaged cars had been removed, the air was clear of smoke, the street was quiet.

  Jake opened the door before she had a chance to knock. “Looking for me out the window?” she asked.

  “As a matter of fact, I was looking for anyone who might be looking for you. Melody released my building as a crime scene and removed the guards. This place is unprotected.”

  She fought back an impulse to turn and run. “Then come home with me. My building has a doorman. We’ll be safer there.”

  “Give me half an hour.”

  “Why? Aren’t you scared?”

  “We’ll be safe in the cellar.”

  “The cellar?”

  “When I saw Sam today- by the way, he’s okay and will be out of Lenox Hill in a day or two- he told me he made the sheriff wait outside for a few extra minutes before removing Harrigan’s items. As he was on the phone with me, he saw a box that caught his eye. Pete had written my name on it, so he figured it contained things he wanted me to have- mementos from our days together. So he put the box next to the safe, under the autopsy aprons. I want to go through it before we leave.”

  Sometimes he can be infuriating. We’re in danger, and he wants to go through mementos? “Can’t it wait?”

  “Maybe it isn’t just mementos. There may be something in it we need, some clue as to what Pete wanted to share with me before he died.”

  “Why not take the box with us?”

  “Too dangerous. Someone could be watching us even now. Besides, you want to walk into a restaurant carrying specimen jars?”

  Stubborn but cute. “Okay, let’s get it over with.”

  ***

  The light in the cellar was harsh, reminding Manny of the autopsy room at Baxter Community Hospital. Jake put on a pair of gloves, pried open the box, and lifted out an opaque plastic container. Manny leaned in to read the label:

  Specimen 2005, Adam Gardiner. ALCOHOLISM. TUBERCULOSIS. HIV/AIDS. Skin from anterior right thigh. Male, age 41. Date of autopsy 1-29-2005.

  “Strange,” Jake said. “This is the name of someone who died decades ago, a case Pete and I were discussing when I last saw him alive.” He screwed open the top.

  Manny jumped back. “What’s that smell? And what are those little creatures floating in the fluid?”

  He reverted to professor mode. “The smell’s formaldehyde, and the creatures are maggots. Most people hate them, but God must like them- he made so many. Forensic scientists love them because they tell us a lot about decedents: what they were eating, time of death, what drugs they were taking, even their DNA. It’s pretty simple- you can grind them up in any kitchen blender and then do any laboratory tests needed.”

  “I think that’s disgusting.” The hands that touched me last night touched maggots? I have to get over that? “Why aren’t they dead if they’ve been in formaldehyde?”

  “For one thing, formaldehyde kills the bacteria that would normally kill maggots. That’s the reason it’s such a good preservative. For years, many brands of women’s nail polish contained formaldehyde.”

  Manny looked at her once perfectly manicured fingers. Formaldehyde? “Charming picture, maggots in a blender. Remind me to bring my own Waring over if ever I should cook here in the future- now that I know what you do with yours.”

  “Still,” Jake said, “it’s a peculiar thing for him to leave for me. Unless-”

  His hands are trembling. Manny, about to make some wisecrack, changed her mind. “Unless what?”

  “Unless he was hiding something he wanted me, and only me, to find after he died.”

  “So he picked a place so disgusting no one else would look in it?”

  “Precisely.”

  “He was right. Only people named Jake or Damien would want to put a hand in there, even though gloved.” Jake’s gloved hand was already in. Manny turned away.

  “I’ve got it!” His dripping hand emerged from the container holding a waterproof bag with an envelope inside it.

  “Is it alive?” Manny asked, her head still averted.

  “It’s a manila envelope. Look.”

  She turned back. Jake had opened the bag and withdrawn the envelope.

  “What’s in it?”

  “I’ll tell you in a minute.” Jake’s name was written on the envelope. “It was definitely meant for me. That’s Pete’s handwriting.”

  Manny wished she shared Jake’s excitement. It won’t relate to Turner. Probably has to do with a case they shared. “Open it.”

  Jake already had. Inside was a photograph and a folded piece of paper. He handed the picture to Manny and unfolded the paper. “There’s something stamped on the top.” He squinted. “PROPERTY OF THE PSYCHOANALYTIC ACADEMIE FOR THE BETTERMENT OF LIFE.”

  Now Manny’s hands were shaking. Excitement buzzed in her bloodstream like electricity. “Yes! Lorna told me I was the second person to visit the Academie. I didn’t think anything of it at the time. But Harrigan must have been the first.”

  “It’s a dental chart,” Jake said, his voice full of wonder, “signed by dental students from Columbia. Renko was right. They were apprentices. Timothy Iras and Martin Lowell.” He could barely breathe. “They performed four fillings at Turner: November and December, 1963. The patient’s name was Isabella de la Schallier, DOB 13 July 1945. Manny, the mandible showed four fillings. It can’t be a coincidence. This is her chart. The woman. Skeleton Four.”

  Shock hit Manny with the force of a bomb blast. Isabella de la Schallier. I d la S. The initials on the wall in the Solitude Room. Harrigan found her bones! “But if that’s true, it means-”

  Jake looked at her, his eyes dark with understanding. “Pete Harrigan knew the name of Skeleton Four but said nothing about it.” He shook his head, as though to rid it of demons. “What’s in the photograph?”

  Manny looked at it for the first time. “It’s a picture of a picnic at Turner from the Baxter County Daily Gazette. I saw one like it when I went through the files at the Academie. There seem to be doctors and patients out for a stroll. Why would Harrigan hide something like that?”

  “Let me see it.” Jake practically snatched the clipping from her hand to hold it under the light. His shoulders slumped and he covered his face with his hands. “I can’t believe it.”

  “What? Tell me!”

  Jake pointed to a young doctor walking by the side of a young woman. “That’s Pete in the picture. Pete was at Turner. He was there!”

  “And the patient,” Manny whispered, as
sure of this as she was of any hard evidence she had ever used in a trial, “is Isabella de la Schallier.”

  “WELL, Lorna Meissen knows who I am,” said Manny, standing with Jake in front of a thin middle-aged woman who was guarding the reception desk as if it contained gold. “I was here early last week looking at the archives of the Turner Psychiatric Hospital.”

  “I’m sorry, Ms. Manfreda, but without written approval from our director, Mr. Parklandius, no one is allowed access to our records.”

  “I went through this last time, ma’am, with Ms. Meissen. You are a designated governmental repository for public documents. I am entitled as a member of the public to see them.”

  “Not anymore, Ms. Manfreda, and Ms. Meissen is no longer in our employ.” Cruella DeVille. “We have a new directive, confirmed by our lawyers, that all patient records, no matter how old, are confidential. None can be released without an authorization from the patient or a ruling from the Privacy Board in Washington, D.C.”

  “But the records have been public a long time.”

  “That’s irrelevant. Archival records are now subject to privacy laws. As a lawyer, you should know that.”

  “I know nothing of the sort.” Don’t hit her.

  “Perhaps Mr. Parklandius can straighten this out,” Jake said benignly. “Is he here?”

  “I’m afraid not.” Her desk phone rang. She listened to the caller silently, then reddened. “It seems Mr. Parklandius is in. He’s expecting you in the reading room.”

  The ride up in the open elevator cage was as eerie to Manny as the last. She clutched the same Vuitton bag she had carried then as though it were a buoy. The papers she had borrowed were inside. “Wonder how he knew we were here,” she said. “And how they knew I was a lawyer.”

  Jake grinned. “Lawyers have a special odor, even you. I can smell one coming from fifty feet.”