“We’re looking for Charles North. Is he here?”
“He don’t live here.”
“I’m sorry to bother you then, but we have this as his address,” Karen said. “Do you have any idea where we might find him?”
The woman stamped her foot. “That asshole, he ain’t supposed to give this as his address. He’s just one of our renters—go knock on the side door. Goddamned son of a bitch.” Her cursing trailed off as she turned away and slammed the door on us.
“One of their renters,” I said, as we walked around the house. “How many people do you think live in this pit?”
“You don’t want to know,” Karen replied. “Looks like this is the side door.”
The stairs here were even worse than in the front of the house, but we made it up safely and I knocked. No answer, so I tried again, louder.
“All right, damn you. I’m coming, I’m coming.”
The door was opened by a tall thin man with unfocused brown eyes. He looked us up and down with evident hostility. “What do you want? You look like some kinda fuckin’ cops.”
Karen showed her badge. “I’m with the FBI, but there’s no problem. We just need to ask you a couple of questions. Are you Charles North?”
“What if I am? Is it any business of yours?”
“Look, we can either do this the easy way or the hard way. Easy is you identify yourself and answer a couple of questions. Hard way is we make a trip to the local cop house and question you there. Your choice.”
“All right, I’m Charles North.” He pronounced it Chahles Nawth with a thick Maine accent.
“Emily Weston’s brother?”
“Ayup.” A glimpse of interest showed in his eyes. “Why, the old cow leave me some money when she croaked?”
“We don’t know about her will,” Karen said. “But we’re wondering if you visited her in the hospital the day she passed away?”
He spat to the side of my foot. “Ain’t seen that sorry bitch in years. You want anything else?”
We made our way back to the car without falling through the stairs. “Well, that was fun,” I said. “Great place to visit.”
Karen shrugged. “I’ve been in worse places. At least we learned what we needed to know.”
“Yes, he’s a tall Mainer. Not a short Russian.”
“Yep.” She pulled out her phone. “Hang on a minute, I’ve got a text from my colleague in LA.” She paused for a moment. “Okay, that’s clear enough. The cousin is in a nursing home with Alzheimer’s. He couldn’t have called the hospital if he wanted to, with or without a Russian accent.”
“So neither of the calls or visits were legitimate. From either Emily Weston’s brother or Fred Reed’s cousin.”
“Correct. I think we can presume that both were from the short guy you saw in the hospital parking lot. And that he has a Russian accent.”
“Meaning there’s some sort of mystery man who’s checking on Carolyn’s sick patients?”
Karen nodded. “And I’ll bet he’s the one who followed you to Carolyn’s house from the hospital, staked it out, and took the picture.”
“As well as being the asshole who sabotaged Carolyn’s freezer. But all we know is that he’s short and has a Russian accent. How do we find the prick?”
My phone buzzed with the ring of an incoming call before Karen could answer. It was Carolyn. “Brad, I’m at the hospital. Mr. Reed is awake and he just told me something important about his medication. He thinks he may have made a mistake with the dose. I think you should talk to him, too.”
“I’m in Sanford; be there as soon as I can. Maybe half an hour.”
My heart started beating faster. Could this be the explanation? I filled Karen in as we headed to York Hospital.
28
There was a different woman at the front desk than the one I’d talked to on my previous visits. But she was equally pleasant and promptly phoned the doctor to come and get us. It was only a few minutes before a tall, youngish man in a white coat and a navy-blue tie came into the lobby.
“Dr. Ashland’s off today,” he explained. “I’m Dr. Dworkin. Please come with me.”
We started to follow him, but he stopped when he saw Karen. “I’m sorry, just Dr. Parker, if you don’t mind. I don’t want too many people crowding my patient.”
Karen took out her badge. “I’m with the FBI. Special Agent Richmond. This is part of an active investigation, and I need to hear what your patient has to say. Directly from him.”
Dworkin scowled and looked as if he were going to object, but Karen’s expression apparently changed his mind. He grunted in acquiescence and led us to the ICU. I’d guess he was one of those men who didn’t like women in positions of authority.
Carolyn was sitting next to the patient’s bed. He was awake, but still hooked up to oxygen, an IV, and monitors that beeped irregularly in the background. Overall, I didn’t think he looked much better than he had the day before. Although maybe just being awake was a good sign.
Karen and I went over to stand next to Carolyn. She took the patient’s hand. “Mr. Reed, this is Dr. Parker. He’s the director of my institute. Can you tell him what you told me before about your medicine?”
He turned his head laboriously in my direction and looked at me with eyes that were half glazed over. “I…I may have taken two pills. Made myself sick.”
“I’m so sorry you’re ill, sir. But it’s going to be all right. Everyone’s working to make you better.” I wished I believed my own words. He looked like he was barely hanging on, not at all like he was going to be all right. “Why do you think you took a double dose?”
He managed a weak smile. “My memory’s not always so good, so I have a system. I turn the bottle every night so that the label is on the left. Then the next day when I take the pill, I turn it to put the label on the right. That way I know I’ve taken it for the day. I don’t forget.”
His voice was becoming weaker and he stopped talking to concentrate on taking in some oxygen. Dr. Dworkin started over, presumably to stop us, but Karen held up her hand.
“That’s a good system,” I said. “But why do you think you took two in one day?”
He breathed in deeply and rallied. “It was the day before I started getting sick. I came home in the afternoon and went to take my pill, as usual. But the label was on the right, as if I’d already taken it for the day. I was confused. I usually take them in the afternoon, and I didn’t think I’d taken one that morning. So I figured that I’d probably forgotten to turn the label to the left the night before. I didn’t want to miss a dose, so I took another one. But now I think maybe I messed up and I really had taken one that morning.” His breathing was labored and he stopped talking to concentrate on his oxygen.
“I think that’s enough,” Dworkin said, and started to motion us out. But Karen stopped him again.
“Just one more thing,” she said. “Mr. Reed, do you mind if we go to your house and check out the pills? We can tell if you took too many by counting how many are left in the bottle.”
He managed a weak “Okay.” Then his eyes closed and his head rolled to the side. I noticed another clump of hair had fallen onto his pillow as Dr. Dworkin swooped in and chased us out of the room.
***
Like Charles North, Fred Reed lived in a rental unit in a multifamily. But the similarity ended there. Reed lived in an attractive neighborhood in York, just a few minutes from the hospital. When we reached his address, we found a freshly painted two-story Colonial right across the street from the beach. We parked on the street and walked up a flagstone path to the front door, which had a directory identifying Mr. Reed’s unit.
Karen had gotten the key from one of the attendants at the hospital, so we let ourselves in without difficulty. The apartment was comfortably furnished with gleaming hardwood floors and a blue-and-white patterned area rug in the living room. There were two bedrooms, one of which apparently doubled as an office and a guest room. The bottle of pills was
next to the sink in the single bathroom.
“The label’s on the left,” Karen immediately noted. “I think we can take that to mean he didn’t take one yesterday before he got sick and went to the hospital.”
“I agree. In which case, his last dose would have been Thursday, when he thinks he may have taken two.”
She picked up the bottle and examined the label. “Looks like this was filled on the twelfth. With a total of thirty tablets.”
“Okay, today’s the twenty-fifth, which makes Thursday the twenty-third. Let’s assume he took his first pill from the bottle the day after he got it, which would be the thirteenth.” I used my fingers to count the days. “That would mean he should have taken eleven.”
Karen repeated my count. “Okay, I get the same number. So, there should be nineteen left, right?” She emptied the bottle and started counting. When she finished she frowned. “Wait, I want to check it again.” After the recount, she looked up and shook her head. “Nineteen it is. He didn’t take a double dose.”
I wasn’t so sure. “If our assumptions are correct, that is. What if he had an old pill left and didn’t start this bottle until the fourteenth?”
“Yes, that would screw things up,” Karen agreed. “And be consistent with his having taken two when he got sick. Unfortunately, I don’t know how we’re going to figure that out.”
“About the only thing I can think of doing is asking him and hoping that he’ll remember. Carolyn’s probably still at the hospital, should I ask her to do it?”
Karen nodded. “I’m not sure we’ll be able to trust his memory of ten days ago. But sure, give it a try.”
It took four rings for Carolyn to answer her phone. When she did, she explained that she was on her way home and had to pull off the highway to take my call. Her husband had gotten angry at her absence and insisted that she come home to give the kids their lunch. But she planned to go back to the hospital later that afternoon and would try to ask Mr. Reed then.
I disconnected and gave Karen the news. In the meantime, she’d put the pills back in their bottle.
“So, we’re done here?” I asked.
“Yeah, let’s go get some lunch ourselves.” She picked up the pills and put them in her pocket.
“What are you doing with those?” I asked.
“I’m going to send them to the lab and have them tested.”
Tested. I was puzzled. “Why? What are you looking for?”
“I don’t know; just call it a cop’s intuition. We’re wondering if the patient accidentally gave himself an overdose. Why not also make sure there’s not some mistake in the pills themselves? Maybe the pharmacy made them up at the wrong dose. That could explain both of the patients getting sick, right?”
I smiled appreciatively. “Good idea, it wouldn’t be the first time cancer patients have gotten accidental overdoses. I remember back in the nineties, two patients got a huge overdose of chemo at one of the major hospitals in Boston. One of them died and it was a big mess. Do you want me to have the pills checked out at the MTRI pharmacy lab?”
“Sure, go ahead. But I’m going to send some to the Bureau’s lab as well. Just in case somebody at MTRI might try to cover up their mistake.”
29
The call came as a surprise. The second patient was in the hospital. Maybe not dead yet, but sick enough to be in the ICU. So what now?
“We’ve got a problem,” the boss said. “That damned Parker and his FBI girlfriend. They picked up the remaining pills from the bottle you doctored and they’re having them analyzed to be sure they’re the right formulation.”
“Shit! Those are all poison. I substituted the whole bottle. Like you told me to, dammit!”
“I know, I know. Take it easy, you can fix it. The bottle’s in the MTRI pharmacy. Parker just dropped it off there late yesterday. They’re planning on doing the analysis tomorrow.”
“So you’re thinking I can go in and switch them back? How about I just grab the first plane back home and leave you holding the bag? This is your damned fault. I told you it was stupid to substitute the whole bottle.”
The boss’s voice turned to ice. “That would be a mistake on your part. Don’t forget that I have friends back home. Remember how I found you in the first place?”
Yes, he remembered. Through the chief of one of the most brutal gangs in the Russian Mafia. A man it wouldn’t do to cross.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean anything. You just caught me by surprise. Yes, I can get in and switch them back. I’ll let you know when it’s done.”
***
Security at MTRI had tightened after the bastard Parker took over as director. There was now a guard at the door after hours, so he decided against making another night raid. Instead he went to the institute in the late afternoon, waved to the security guard, and went up to his desk in the lab. He’d pretend to work for an hour or so until the pharmacy closed at five. Then he’d pay them a visit.
At five thirty he took the back stairs down to the first floor. The pharmacy was dark, and he used his master key to quietly slip in. Unnoticed by the guard sitting at the door reading a magazine.
He had to hunt around for several minutes before he found the bottle of pills. It was in an out-tray on the pharmacist’s desk with a note saying, “For analysis first thing Monday.” Clearly labeled as a prescription for Fred Reed from Dr. C. Gelman.
Finding the correct pills was easier. There was a stock bottle on the dispensary shelf labeled “C. Gelman, clinical trial.”
Good; now just to make the switch. He opened the bottle waiting to be tested. One look and his heart started beating rapidly. There were only ten pills in the bottle. Just two days ago, he’d filled it with twice that number.
He put the ten in his pocket for later disposal and replaced them with ten from the legitimate stock bottle. Then he returned both bottles to their original locations and left, waving again to the security guard on his way out. But the satisfaction of a job well done eluded him. Instead, he felt a mounting sense of danger.
Where the hell were the rest of the poison tablets?
***
It didn’t take the boss long to return his call after he left the message at the emergency number.
“Is it done?”
“Not quite. I’m afraid we have a problem.”
“What problem? Can’t you just get your job done right?”
He held the phone away from his face for a moment. He wasn’t going to let anybody talk to him like this. Like he was a child or an idiot. Powerful friends or not, he’d make the boss pay for this.
“The pills that Parker left at the pharmacy are gone, substituted with the real thing. There was no difficulty with the job. But there were only ten pills in the bottle. There should have been twice that number.”
The boss was silent for a moment. Then he said, “So you’re worried that Parker still has the rest? And will do something with them?”
“Yes, that’s my concern.”
“But if the analysis from the pharmacy comes back clean, what more would he do? I don’t think we need to worry about this.”
“I disagree. It’s a loose end, and I don’t like loose ends. Not when it’s my neck sticking out.”
Another pause on the line. Then, “Maybe you’re right. What do you propose?”
“You don’t need to know. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of Parker and his FBI girlfriend at no additional charge. The cleanup will be my pleasure.”
30
Monday passed slowly. First I heard from Carolyn. Mr. Reed had been asleep when she visited Saturday afternoon and again on Sunday. But she’d finally been able to catch him when he was awake this morning and ask if he remembered whether he’d started using his last batch of meds the day after he’d picked them up. His memory was clear. He’d taken the last pill in the previous bottle that afternoon and then had to rush to the pharmacy before it closed in order to get his refill for the next day. So yes, he was sure that he’d started the new
bottle the day after he picked it up. Which pretty much ruled out the possibility that he’d accidentally overdosed himself by taking two pills the day before he got sick.
That bit of bad news left me anxiously waiting to hear from the pharmacist, hoping that Karen had guessed right and there’d been an error in compounding the prescription. It was late afternoon before her email came in.
Per your request, I’ve analyzed Mr. Reed’s tablets by mass spectrometry. I’m pleased to report that their composition is precisely as ordered. We made no error in compounding the prescription.
Please let me know if I can be of any further service.
So much for my hopes that something was wrong with the pills. I couldn’t concentrate on anything else, so I packed up and went home. Maybe Karen’s day had been more productive.
***
She was on the deck, reading something on her Kindle, when I got there. I told her my news.
“Too bad,” she said. “I’m still waiting to hear from the Bureau’s lab, we’ll see if they get the same results. Actually, I’m surprised it’s taking them so long, especially if the pills are nothing other than what they’re supposed to be. Anyway, something else happened today that I wanted to ask you about. Did you know the gas man was coming for a service check?”
“No. What gas man?”
“You didn’t authorize a service visit? I took Rosie down to the beach an hour or so ago, and when we got back a guy was coming up from the basement. He apologized for surprising me, but said he thought we knew he was coming. When nobody was home, he used his key from the rental company to come in and do the annual inspection of our heating system. Everything was fine, he said.”
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