Do No Harm (2002)

by Gregg Hurwitz

  The sun began its slow fade beneath the horizon. The air was just tainting gray as David entered the familiar neighborhood. He parked in the designated spot, beneath the cone of light in front of Healton's. The other vehicles had disappeared in the last few blocks, as was planned.

  He got out of the car and immediately felt a sense of isolation. The neighborhood was quite still. He moved up the first street, his white coat baggy over the wound on his side. He passed the abandoned lot on his right. The scorched car, his final destination, was empty. A homeless man sat bundled against the fence, the front of his worn jacket stained with what smelled like egg. Face ruddy and textured, a thick mustache bristling. Eyes anomalistically clear. Blake. David stared at him a beat too long. Blake raised his eyebrows in a show of impatience. David had another checkpoint to pass down the block in a minute and a half. "Hey, pal, spare a cigarette?"

  His voice spurred David to movement. He continued along the path that Yale had detailed for him, away from the lot, past the front of the Pearson Home. He thought he saw a rifle scope flash in one of the apartment windows across the street, but wasn't sure if he'd imagined it since he knew snipers were stationed up there. The thought that Clyde might be here somewhere, in or near the area, quickened his heart. Maybe Clyde was watching him now.

  The next intersection was busy and highly visible. Across the street, Bronner was pretending to make a call in the phone booth, wearing a flannel and a Dodgers cap. He did not look over at David, but he touched his shoulder casually with his fingertips, their agreed-upon signal that everything was clear.

  David headed down the sidewalk. His path would loop him around past Clyde's former apartment building before returning him to the empty lot. A boisterous group of men exited a bar. David's eyes blurred momentarily, and he saw the faces as a smeared conglomeration--some coming at him, some moving past on either side--and he knew the situation was now beyond his control. His fate was in the hands of the undercover police officers in the area. The wound in his side began to throb, as if in warning. The group went on. Clyde was not hiding in their midst.

  David turned left on Brecken Street. Patches of browning grass broke up the sidewalks; the curbs were lined with battered cars and trucks. The sky darkened a bit, discernibly, which he hoped was not a bad omen. He started down the street, with its many alleys and doorways and dark spaces between vehicles. The fact that someone had scouted the area before his arrival provided little reassurance. A chill tangled around his spine when he heard the clicking of footsteps ahead of him, but then he realized it was merely the echo of his own, amplified off the surrounding buildings. He no longer felt any pain in his side; it had gone numb.

  He tried to calm himself by focusing on Peter's familiar voice, transmitted to him from the repeater over five miles away. Peter was sending his office manager home. Then, the ding of the elevator, followed by another, rapid ding. A one-floor ride.

  In front of David, a form shifted in a doorway and stumbled down the stairs. David took a quick step back, glancing up the street for backup, but none arrived. The man swept by him, drunk and fat, and staggered up the street, murmuring to himself.

  David tried to slow his heart. A flash on the roof across the street as a sniper lowered his rifle and sank again out of view. They were here protecting him, omnipresent and out of sight.

  David wasn't getting anything through the earpiece aside from a whistling--the fabric of Peter's pants moving across the transmitter? He'd detected a similar sound earlier when Peter had walked from his car to the office. Then, the noise of a key in a lock. Peter must've gone upstairs, to continue setting things in order in the new procedure suite.

  David turned down an alley and ducked through the gap in the fence that led to the abandoned lot. No sign of Clyde. Wrapped in layers of clothes, Blake shifted, a formless mass slumped against the base of the fence.

  David walked slowly to the middle of the lot, glass popping beneath his shoes. He opened the door to the scorched car and sat down, resting his hands on the steering wheel.

  The loop had been unsuccessful.

  David tilted his head down and murmured into his mike, "Nothing." He raised his shirt and checked his bandage. It had blotted up some fluid from the wound, but was still firmly in place. In his right ear, he heard the clink of equipment. Peter rattling the surgery clamps? Testing the cauterizer? David stared through the cracked windshield at the Pearson Home. Layla's skewed silhouette moved against the curtains of the second-floor window. The same room where Clyde had once dangled boys by their necks to watch them gasp and tremble.

  David looked at the apartment buildings rimming the empty lot--crumbling brick, rain-beaten wood, the occasional shattered window. So many places for Clyde to hide, to spy. From the house, David heard the wavering, uneven voices of some of the residents singing "Happy Birthday."

  Blake rolled over uneasily when David got out of the car and slammed the door. David walked boldly to the front of the Pearson Home. He spoke down into his mike with minimal movement of his lips. "I'm going to the porch."

  He knew that somewhere, hidden within the surrounding few blocks, Yale was growing enraged--he had specifically told David to stay off the Pearson Home grounds, in line with Rhonda Decker's directive. But David's walk hadn't yielded anything, and he wanted to take a position that Clyde, if he was in fact watching, would find more provocative and galling. Sitting on the porch of Clyde's sacred, coveted childhood sanctuary, in a position of power and smug presumption, was the most taunting action David had at his current disposal. It was like throwing darts at Clyde's most vulnerable spot.

  A rickety wooden chair with a coarsely woven straw seat stood crooked by the front door. David pulled it across the porch and sat, his white coat hanging to his sides like the hem of a skirt. His Mercedes, toplit like a showcase car in the otherwise empty Healton's lot, was visible for blocks. David's new post was also clearly discernible.

  Aware that somewhere the cops were complaining and scrambling and reassessing, David leaned back, rested his feet on the railing, and waited for Clyde to appear.

  Chapter 74

  THE fluorescent lights illuminating the new procedure suite were giving Peter a headache, so he turned them off and worked by the light of a desk lamp. It cast a glow on the desktop and around his hands, a small ball of light in the darkness, which he liked, for it made him feel like a medieval craftsman. The blinds remained closed on the window behind him. The desk itself faced the two procedure tables, and beyond them, the door; Peter sometimes had to sit between lengthy procedures to take the weight off his legs. A firmly anchored metal knob, about the size of a fist, protruded from the desktop to aid Peter in sitting and rising. The stun gun lay next to it, where Peter had tossed it after David had left the room yesterday.

  Peter lined the cystoscopes side by side, a series of thin stainless steel snakes trailing across the desk and dangling from the edge. They were expensive tools, running about $18,000 apiece with lenses, and he cared for them as though they were museum artifacts. Each one of the scopes had been used countless times to peer into countless bladders; gazing down at them, Peter was filled with a vague sense of wonder at all they had accomplished in their brief material lives. He jotted a note to his technician that they were to be sterilized again.

  His left brace had been digging into his ankle all day, and he paused to pull up his pant leg, remove his shoe, and rub the reddish indentation the metal had left in his skin. A rustle at the door caught his attention, and he squinted up into the darkness.

  "Yes, can I help you? Hello? Can I help you?"

  The form shifted, breathing heavily. The sound of a large person advancing.

  Panic stirred and began to sharpen its claws inside Peter. Given his braces, it would take him nearly a minute to rise and shuffle to the light switch on the wall.

  Clyde's sallow face pulled into the small ring of light, seeming to float as his body remained lost in shadows. He drew closer, resolving from the da
rkness. Held limply at his side was a pistol.

  Peter's mouth went dry.

  The arm holding the gun raised stiffly and mechanically, like a railroad crossing gate, and Peter was looking directly down the length of the Beretta. "We're gonna have some fun, you and me," Clyde said.

  Moths clustered around the porch light, making a soft, leathery sound. David scanned the street, his eyes picking over the windows in the apartments facing him.

  He expected Clyde to charge the porch.

  He expected Yale to pull up and call off the stakeout.

  He expected Rhonda Decker to appear on the porch and reprimand him.

  The only thing he did not expect was Clyde's voice to cut in over the hum of the unit in his right ear.

  He stood, forgetting to favor his wounded side, and leapt over the porch stairs, wincing when his feet struck ground. "He's got Peter Alexander!" David yelled down into his mike. "They're at Peter's procedure suite. Corner of Westwood and Le Conte."

  Blake rolled over onto his feet, looking ineffective and Falstaffian in his bundle of grimy clothes. David passed him in a sprint, straining to make out what was being transmitted in his right ear. Jenkins spilled out of an alley behind him, shouting something David could not make out.

  David reached his car, slid behind the wheel, and peeled out.

  Peter struggled to keep his voice even. "I'm going to--"

  Saliva flew from Clyde's lips as he spoke. "Don't you talk! Don't you talk to me. You're weak. You're what weakness is. I'm in charge here. I'm in charge of you."

  Clyde took a step forward and swept the desk with his arm. Scopes, pens, and papers fell to the floor. The lamp dangled off the side of the desk from its cord, throwing light erratically around the room as it spun.

  Peter felt along the desktop for something to grab--a pen, a letter opener--but there was nothing within reach. His eyes flicked across the desktop. The stun gun had caught beside the metal knob. Peter couldn't reach for it; it would be too obvious.

  "What do you want?" Peter asked.

  Clyde pulled a phone from the wall-mounted unit and punched in a number. Peter took advantage of Clyde's distraction to rest his hand over the stun gun and slide it slowly off the desktop into his lap.

  The cord uncoiling across his chest, Clyde pushed the phone at Peter. "Here. You tell David Spier I'm gonna kill you right now. You tell him I know he's in with the cops to get me, so he better come down here alone if he wants to stop me."

  Peter took the phone with his left hand, holding the stun gun in his lap with his right. Clyde leaned in close, pistol pointed at Peter's head. If Peter raised the stun gun from its hiding place, Clyde could shoot him instantly. Peter wouldn't even have a chance to aim.

  Peter offered the phone back to Clyde. "It's the answering machine."

  "We're gonna leave him a special message, then," Clyde said, pushing the phone back in Peter's face.

  Peter felt the cold barrel pressed hard against his forehead.

  "Make some noise," Clyde said. "Into the phone."

  Peter's lips started to tremble, but he pressed them together, not wanting to show Clyde his fright.

  Clyde cocked the pistol.

  "All right," Peter said. His tone was hard, colored with more anger than fear. "Let me stand up. I'm not going to die sitting down."

  "I'm gonna hurt you hard. And David Spier's gonna hear it all when he gets home."

  Peter held the phone away from his head. "I'll leave your . . . noises in a minute." He turned his head and looked up past the pistol into Clyde's dead eyes, tightening his grip on the stun gun. He spoke slowly and adamantly. "But you let me stand up first."

  Clyde studied him, then his chin dipped slightly. "You make one bad move, you won't have time to leave your farewell message." Clyde stepped closer, standing almost on top of him.

  Peter pushed his chair out from the desk, but Clyde kept the pistol planted on his forehead. Still no opportunity to wield the stun gun. He couldn't move it much past his crotch without Clyde noticing and probably shooting him.

  Pulling a lever beneath the seat cushion, Peter locked the wheels so the chair wouldn't roll out from under him. He leaned over and locked first his left brace, then his right, so they would support his weight. With a slight groan, he fisted the metal knob on the desktop and pulled himself up out of the chair and onto his reinforced legs. His left pant leg was still hiked up high over the knee from when he'd rubbed his ankle.

  He released the knob, standing on his own. The gun barrel slid a bit on his sweat-moist forehead. He felt breathless, as though he'd had the wind knocked out of him. He leaned slightly to his left, bringing the metal of his ankle into contact with Clyde's thin scrub bottoms. He eased his calf over until he felt the press of Clyde's leg. Clyde did not pull away.

  Peter turned into the pistol, looking past it again into the slick, depthless eyes. With excruciating slowness, he moved the stun gun over and touched it to the inside of the metal thigh band of his left brace. His thumb hovering over the power switch, he braced himself for the pain and prepared to duck.

  "All right," Peter said brusquely. "I'm ready now."

  Chapter 75

  DAVID flew up Lincoln, narrowly missing a collision with a banged-up Pontiac, and floored it, screeching right on Wilshire and heading toward Peter's office. He was shouting into the mike and trying to listen to the earpiece simultaneously, which made both efforts ineffective. A blast of noise erupted through the earpiece, causing him to jerk back his head, then the unit went dead. What could have done that to the digital transmitter?

  Concern did him little good, so he tried to think clearly and pragmatically. From what he had overheard, he knew Peter was in trouble, that Clyde had been planning on harming him to frighten David. The cops would arrive at Peter's building soon--maybe they even had by now--but David had to get there as quickly as possible. In the likely event of a standoff, he was certain Clyde would demand to talk to him.

  The carpet cleaning van caught up to him after a few blocks but fell back again, and he lost sight of it when he ran the red at Federal. He spoke continuously into his mike, updating the cops on his location.

  He careened through Westwood and pulled down an alley into the back lot of Peter's four-story building. Peter's car, a gray BMW with a hand brake sticking up near the wheel, was parked in its usual spot, but there were no police cars.

  David got out of his car and glanced up the empty street anxiously. "Where the hell are you guys?" he said, bending his neck so he could speak into the mike. "Why aren't there police cars here already?" He stepped back, glancing up the side of the building at the third floor. No movement or light. Clyde could be there right now, torturing Peter.

  David couldn't wait for the police to arrive. "I'm going in," he said to the mike and the empty parking lot.

  He searched his trunk for a weapon, but he had nothing, not even a tire jack. An old-style otoscope was tucked into his father's doctor's bag in the trunk, the weighty metal handle protruding. He grabbed it, and snapped off the plastic head used for ear exams. It would have to do.

  Tossing the Motorola and the dead earpiece into the trunk, he sidestepped a Dumpster and reached the building's back door, made of glass. The glass, evidently shatterproof, had been dented near the handle, but had remained intact. The lock had been gouged and scratched up with a tool of some sort. The door was slightly ajar, a Carl's Jr. Superstar wrapper wedged between it and the frame to prevent it from closing.

  David knew he should wait for the police to arrive, but the possibility that Clyde was torturing Peter was too much for him to bear. He pushed the door, and it drifted open easily, the wrapper falling to the floor. Stepping into the dark interior, he closed the door slowly behind him, leaving it unlocked.

  Not wanting to draw attention by using the elevator, David entered the dark stairwell and crept upstairs. He pushed the third-floor door open, peering up the hall, and immediately saw the triangular fall of light from the op
en door of Peter's procedure suite. He eased his way down the corridor, the thin carpet padding his footsteps. A deep wailing became audible. Mournful sobbing interspersed with violent breathing.

  David drew near to the open door, inching his way forward, his hand curling around the metal shaft of the otoscope. The crying continued, broken by fragmented mumbling and a slapping noise. Reaching the door frame, David pressed his face to the wood and rotated his head slightly so he could see into the room with one eye.

  It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the swinging lamp breaking the dimness. Clyde sat despondently against the far wall, holding a pistol limply between his legs. His face was red, his acne standing out in severe blotches. Sobbing and murmuring, he was rocking himself forward and banging his head back into the wall. He stopped only to rend his face with his hands, clawing at his cheeks, knocking the pistol against his crown.

  David's chest tightened when he saw the pair of inert legs protruding from behind the desk, the metal bands of the braces visible at the ankles. The rest of Peter's body was out of view. A stun gun lay on the floor in the corner, near Clyde.

  A humming in his ears. A tingling in his mouth. He wanted to run downstairs--either Yale or Jenkins should have arrived by now--but the possibility of Peter's needing immediate medical attention held him in place. David couldn't leave his unconscious body up here with Clyde.

  Clyde's face was lined with scratches from his nails, some of them beading with blood. He was facing the door--there was no way David could surprise him.

  Clyde directed his words at Peter's body. "You weren't supposed to do that." He scrambled to his feet and regarded Peter, like a problem he did not know how to solve. His face vacillated between agitation and confusion as he rocked back and forth. He scratched his head with the barrel of the pistol, then aimed it at Peter.