Рита Браун - Pawing Through The Past

"You saw them grow up?" Rick stated as much as he asked.

"I did."

"And you would therefore have an assessment of their characters?"

"I think so, yes." Larry leaned back in his chair. "Are you asking for same?"

"Yes. I took the long way around." Rick laughed at himself.

"Charlie was a brilliant boy. Truly brilliant. He covered it up as any good Southern gentleman would do, of course. His success in the stock market didn't surprise me as it did others. He was upright in his business dealings. Even as a child he was inter-ested in business, and honest. As you know, his downfall was women. He was like most men who were spoiled and coddled by a mother. They go through the rest of their life expecting this treatment and what amazes me is there is always a large pool of women willing to be used. But if you separated Charlie from the woman thing, he was a decent man."

"What about Leo?" Coop asked.

"Strong. Even as a child, quite physically strong. A pleasing boy. You had to like him. Another good-looking kid, not as dramatically handsome as Charlie but good-looking. I saw little of him after he left for college and then moved to Richmond."

"Did these two have anything in common that you could see?"

"No."

"What about medically? Was there anything they both suffered from? Depression or something?"

"No. Not as far as I know. After all, I stopped being Leo's doctor after high school. Both boys had the usual round of strep throat, flu, chicken pox. But nothing out of the ordinary."

"Could either man have infected sex partners with venereal diseases?" Rick was zeroing in on the area he sensed would be most fruitful.

Larry put his hands behind his head, leaning back. He glanced at the ceiling, then back at the two before him. "As you know, the relationship with a patient is confidential."

"We know, but both patients are dead and I hope and pray these murders are at an end. But Larry, what if? I've got to find out everything I can. Everything."

Larry's voice dropped as he brought his hands back on his desk. "Rick, the two men don't have anything in common medically. Again, I haven't seen Leo Burkey as a patient since he graduated from college, which had to be, well, 1984 or 1985, I guess."

Cynthia checked her notes. "Right. 1984."

"So there are no illegitimate children from high-school days? No follies?"

"Not for Leo. Again, not under my care. Charlie, as you would imagine, was quite a different matter."

"Yes," Rick said. "Tiffany said you'd know everything."

"She did, did she?" Larry shook his head. "Life is too short to be so unforgiving. Of all Charlie's ex-wives and ex-flames she's the one who hates the most. It will destroy her in the end."

"Could you be more specific?" Cynthia tried to hide her impatience.

"He fathered a child after graduating from high school. The child was put up for adoption. The rumor always was that he fathered the child in high school but it was during his college days. That was the beginning of a career of sexual irresponsibility that rivals that of any rock star. He refused to use any form of birth control. He believed if a woman went to bed with him that was her responsibility. He used to say, 'If she's dumb enough to want the baby, she should have it.' That sort of thing. He slept with so many people he contracted genital herpes, which he happily passed along. I treated him for gonorrhea eight times in his lifetime. Curiously, he never contracted syphilis."

"What about AIDS?"

Larry leveled his gaze. "Yes. At the time of his death he was HIV-positive but showing no signs. He had resources and could afford every new drug that came down the pike, plus, apart from the sexual risks he took, he kept himself in good shape."

"He could have infected others?" Cynthia was scribbling as fast as she could.

"Could and did."

"Will you give us their names?" Rick knew he wouldn't.

"I can't do that."

"Any of them married?"

"Yes."

"Brother." Rick sighed.

"The husband doesn't know and I suppose he won't know until he discovers he's infected or his wife shows symptoms. People can be HIV-positive for years and not know it. This virus mutates, it alters its protein shell. In a strange fashion it's an intelligent virus. Every day we learn more but it's not enough."

"Charlie slept with woman A. Did she become positive immediately?"

"I don't honestly know. Yes, I can't give you a hard and fast answer. We do know of cases where an uninfected person has repeated contact with an infected person, sexually, and does not contract the disease. There's a famous case of two female cousins, African-American, who are prostitutes. They have been repeatedly exposed to AIDS, yet remain immune. The other oddity is that different people show clinical signs of infection at different times. A fifteen-year-old boy may show signs quite soon after becoming positive whereas a thirty-five-year-old man might not show any for years. It's puzzling, infuriating, and ultimately-terrifying."

Rick and Cynthia sat silent.

Cynthia finally spoke. "Does the woman know she's HIV-positive?"

"Yes. One is in denial. I see that quite often when a person learns they have a disease for which there is no cure. Flat denial." He folded his arms across his chest, glanced at the ceiling. "The other woman died last year. There were two. There may be more but I've only treated two. I'm not the only doctor in town."

"I see." Rick clasped and unclasped his hands.

"People are capable of great evil-even nice people. Life has taught me that. Korea opened my eyes and then general practice did the rest." He paused. "Having said that, I think I'm a good judge of character. The woman still alive would not kill Charlie Ashcraft. I really believe that. I don't think Leo Burkey is even in the picture on this one."

"Would Charlie Ashcraft ever sleep with men?" Cynthia surprised both men by asking what to her was obvious: Charlie and Leo could have been lovers.

A considered moment followed. Larry cleared his throat. "Under the right circumstances, yes. Charlie was driven-and I mean driven-by sex. He was irrational and irrationality is always dangerous. We tend to laugh off sexual dysfunction in men, especially if it's of the aggressive variety, satyriasis."

"Beg pardon?"

"The male version of nymphomania," Larry answered Cynthia.

"Oh."

"We laugh and tell jokes about what a stud he is but in fact he's sick. In Charlie's case he was sick in body as well as in mind."

"Did Tiffany know about the AIDS?" Rick inquired.

"He was not infected when they were divorced, which was three years ago. Charlie became HIV-positive shortly thereafter and displayed no signs of the disease. In other words, he was HIV-positive but he had not yet developed full-blown AIDS. I don't know if Tiffany knew about it. She would, of course, know about the genital herpes and she no doubt suspected there were unclaimed children along the way."

"More than the one?" Cynthia was surprised, although on second thought she wondered why.