Sara Paretsky - Sisters on the Case

Dr. Gerstein wasn’t listening. She was heading to emergency like a horse to a barn. Angie claimed the psychiatrist had an internal magnet for people in trouble.

‘‘A guy refusing to marry somebody is no reason to do what they did,’’ Carver argued.

‘‘He’d already had three other babies by different mamas. He bragged about that. Said Zhivago was the second son he’s had this year, but the other baby was born at Jackson and his mama had to get her prenatal care at a clinic, because Anthony hadn’t met Dr. McQuirter yet.’’

‘‘Not a nice person.’’ Carver finally accepted my assessment.

We stepped through the swinging doors into chaos. Somebody had ripped magazines and flung them on the floor, overturned the newspaper box, and broken the glass front of the candy machine. The telephone from the desk decorated a silk ficus in one corner. Housekeeping staff were putting the room to rights while patients and their families huddled on the far side with frightened eyes. From one examining room came curses and shouts. ‘‘… lawyer… police!’’

Dr. Gerstein trotted in that direction. Angie gave me a wave of dismissal. ‘‘There’s nothing you can do here. Go on upstairs and start your rounds.’’

I backed up and stepped on Carver. His eyes were fixed on the examining room curtain while he pressed one hand below his belt. ‘‘Who’d do such a thing to such a nice man?’’

‘‘You know him?’’ I asked.

‘‘Not personally, but I heard it was Lyle Bradford.’’

Lyle Bradford was a big man in town. Important architect. Sat on the Orange Bowl committee. Gave money every year so Jackson Hospital could have Santa Claus for sick kids. He was even a personal friend of the governor.

‘‘Not like that second guy who got taken to Jackson,’’ Carver added in a voice rough with feeling. ‘‘Him, now-’’ He turned and headed out. ‘‘He’s the one who really got what he deserved.’’

I caught up and trotted beside him toward the lobby. ‘‘You knew him?’’

‘‘No, but he was part of a gang that raped a girl in my daughter’s high school. The other guys were nineteen and they went to jail, but because he was seventeen, he only did a few months at juvey. My daughter and her friends were terrified when he got out. They claim he’s been messing with girls all his life and threatening to hurt their brothers and sisters if they told. Well, he ain’t gonna be messing with any more little girls.’’ Carver spoke with a quiet satisfaction that made me uneasy.

‘‘I’ll catch the elevator here and go on up to my office. See you later.’’ I stepped in and pushed the button.

My usual routine was to pick up our department’s peach index cards on new patients and head out to welcome them. Instead I picked up the phone and called a former high school classmate who worked in the admissions office at Jackson. ‘‘We have one of those castrated men here,’’ I reported. ‘‘I heard it was Lyle Bradford, but I don’t know for sure.’’

From her squeal, I deduced I’d given her a top banana for their staff gossip tree. She owed me. ‘‘What do you know about the men who turned up at your place?’’

She snickered. ‘‘They are singing soprano.’’

‘‘Seriously. I’ve read what the papers said-that they went into a bar and didn’t remember anything after that-but is that all you know?’’

‘‘Well’’-her voice dropped a register-‘‘I had to take admissions information from the first one, and he said he remembered talking in the bar with a woman who looked like the Virgin Mary, but he couldn’t remember which bar. He wondered if she’d put something in his drink.’’

‘‘Sounds more like Bloody Mary. How did he get to your emergency room? Nobody saw anyone bring him?’’

‘‘No, he was left in a wheelchair outside. One of the ambulances found him sitting there at three a.m. in a johnny gown with a blanket tucked around his legs. It was a pretty night, so at first they thought he was a patient who had gone outside for a smoke or something and fallen asleep. They mentioned him to a nurse and she wheeled him back in, figuring she’d return him to his room. Then she discovered he didn’t have an ID bracelet. About that time he woke up and started yelling. That’s when they realized he’d had what we were instructed the next morning to call ’unauthorized surgery.’ ’’

‘‘Who was his doctor?’’

‘‘He didn’t have one. Said he’d never been sick. The residents checked him out and said the surgery looked like a professional job, so they let him recuperate a few days and sent him home. Don’t tell anybody I told you this, okay? He’s threatening to sue us, so we aren’t supposed to talk about it.’’

‘‘Of course not.’’

We both knew there is no place more gossipy than a hospital except a police station.

‘‘How did the second one get in? Looks like you’d have been watching the doors pretty carefully after that.’’

‘‘We were. The police got a call that he was down in Biscayne Park. They found him sitting on a park bench dressed in loose sweats and carrying on so loud, they thought he was drunk at first. He didn’t remember anything, either, except sitting at a bar talking to a woman he claimed was ‘a gorgeous blonde with legs up to her throat.’ ’’

‘‘Not my image of the Virgin Mary.’’

‘‘Mine, either. He at least could remember the name of the bar, but they were real busy that night after a baseball game and didn’t remember him. How did yours get in?’’

‘‘Full moon night.’’ I didn’t have to say more. Anybody who works in a hospital knows a full moon brings babies, death, and all sorts of craziness. ‘‘He was found sleeping in a corner of the emergency room.’’

‘‘It gives me the creeps. I’ve never been so glad to be a woman.’’

‘‘Me, neither. See you later.’’

I hung up and checked my watch. I’d give Lyle Bradford a couple of hours to get up to his room; then no matter what Angie said (she was bound to tell me, ‘‘I’ll take care of this one,’’ since he was, in a sense, a celebrity), I’d go welcome him. I was dying to hear his story.

The NO VISITORS sign didn’t deter me. I was hospital administration.

Mr. Bradford lay on his back watching a soap opera. He glowered as I came in. ‘‘Who the hell are you?’’

‘‘A patient counselor. I came to see if you have everything you need.’’

His glower deepened.

‘‘I mean, is there something I can get you?’’

He started up in anger, then sank back with a groan. ‘‘Yeah, there’s a couple of things you could get me if you have a spare pair. Look, I’m not a freak show, okay? I’ve already had another one of you in here.’’

‘‘That would be my boss. I didn’t know she had visited you, so I came to say if there is anything we can do to make your stay easier, just ask. Our job is to welcome patients and handle requests or complaints.’’

His language blistered my ears and singed my back hair. Cleaned up considerably, what he said was, ‘‘I got a complaint, all right. Some pirate tied me up and took my crown jewels.’’ He fingered a scrap of peach index card and squinted at something scrawled on it. ‘‘You ever hear of a guy named Randall McQuirter?’’

‘‘Sure. He’s one of our ob-gyns.’’

He laughed, but it was not a pleasant sound. ‘‘You’re kidding. He’s a women’s doc?’’

‘‘Yessir.’’

What was the matter with my tongue? Angie was always telling me that middle-aged men don’t like young women calling them sir.

Lyle Bradford didn’t seem to notice. He gave that rude laugh again. ‘‘Well, from what somebody told me, that’s not all he is. If you see the bastard, tell him I want to see him pronto. Okay?’’