Robin Cook - Death Benefit

The reception area showed every bit of its fifty years. It was dark and somewhat dingy with a worn dark brown leather couch and a few other worn, mismatched chairs. The linoleum floor was cracked and scarred. On a low coffee table were some dog-eared magazines with the address labels torn off the covers. There was a crowd of people sprinkled on the furniture and some leaning against the wall. Soon it became apparent they were all together, members of a grieving African-American family with at least three generations represented. Two teenaged girls were hugging in a corner, crying softly.

“Excuse me,” Pia said, approaching the receptionist. A security guard sat at another table off to the side next to a set of glass doors. The receptionist, carefully dressed and pleasantly plump, was wearing a name tag that read “Marlene.” She looked up. She had a friendly smile.

“Yes, honey.”

“Hi. I’m a medical student and I’d very much like to talk to one of the medical examiners.”

“Are you here to find out about teaching opportunities at the OCME, like the elective for medical students?”

“Maybe,” Pia said, wanting to keep her options open.

“Maybe?” Marlene questioned, with a smile. “What is it exactly you want to talk to the medical examiner about?”

Pia hesitated.

“Actually, I’d like to discuss a specific case. Two cases, to be more precise.”

“Are they relatives of yours?”

“No.”

“Perhaps it’s best if you talk to the department of public relations if it’s information about a specific case you want, seeing as you’re not a relative.”

Pia saw she was losing ground. The last thing she wanted was to be shunted off to the public relations department, where she surely wouldn’t get access to Rothman’s corpse. Fearing she might be turned away, Pia studied the receptionist’s face, trying to think of an approach. Marlene seemed to be a congenial person and for a brief moment Pia toyed with the idea of telling at least a partial truth. Quickly she decided against it. Any way she explained the reason she was there that approached the truth would sound too bizarre.

“Actually, I also want to talk about the teaching opportunities here. The two cases I mentioned are teaching cases that I’ve heard about. I’ve come all the way down from Columbia.” Pia smiled to try to cover up any potential inconsistencies. “I’ve become interested in forensics. Very interested.”

Marlene was confused-what did this girl really want? She was also impressed that she had come all the way from Columbia Medical Center way up in Washington Heights. That took some effort, especially late on a Friday afternoon. Marlene didn’t have the heart to send her away without talking to someone. Besides, she was a pretty thing, and Marlene knew exactly who would be more than happy to speak with her.

“Okay then. I’ll call Dr. McGovern.”

“Is he a medical examiner?”

“He’s a medical examiner and he also happens to be the coordinator for teaching at OCME.”

“Thank you.” Pia was delighted.

Marlene put in a call to Chet McGovern and motioned for Pia to take a seat. Pia stepped away from the receptionist’s desk. She didn’t sit down as there were no chairs available. It was close to five o’clock, so she had to make a quick impression on this McGovern guy. A moment later the glass doors opened and a heavyset woman in a lab coat appeared, holding a clipboard. She introduced herself to the grieving family as Rebecca Marshall, an ID coordinator, and asked them to follow her. Dutifully the entire clan disappeared through a door marked ID ROOM.

Pia took one of the newly vacated seats and tried to be patient. While she waited she tried to decide what approach to take with the medical examiner. Should she be aggressive or coy? Eventually she decided she’d have to wait and see what kind of man Dr. McGovern turned out to be. She was hoping for someone on the youngish side, someone she could flirt with to a degree. Over the years she’d learned she had an effect on most men, and she thought that this was one of those situations where it could work to her advantage. Usually it was the opposite.

A few minutes later her prayers were answered when a youngish man came through the inner doors in a long white lab coat with the confident air of a doctor. When he took one look at Pia, who was the only person in the waiting room, his face lit up. Pia recognized the reaction. She’d seen it too many times not to. He appeared to be in his forties, early fifties at most. He was blond and good-looking in a masculine, all-American way, somewhat like George, and Pia could tell he was in good shape.

He came right over to Pia like a bee to honey and introduced himself. Pia did the same, avoiding his stare. She recognized the type immediately: an irrepressible Lothario who undoubtedly saw every attractive single woman younger than him as a challenge. She was encouraged.

After the introductions, which included him repeating proudly that he was indeed the current coordinator for teaching at the OCME, he said, “Let’s go up to my office and see if we can’t help you out. Thanks, Marlene.”

McGovern winked at Marlene behind Pia’s back, and Marlene rolled her eyes.

As McGovern escorted Pia to his third-floor office he peppered her with questions about where she was at medical school, what year, and what she thought she might like to specialize in. He mentioned how interesting medical forensics was and offered up his credentials.

Pia played along, answering McGovern’s questions, acting as if she were interested in his life story and achievements. They entered McGovern’s small office and sat on either side of McGovern’s untidy desk.

“Sorry about the mess. So what can I do for you, Miss, er . . .” McGovern’s eyes shone with the struggle he was having remembering her name.

“Grazdani. Thank you for seeing me with so little warning.”

“My pleasure, I’m sure.”

“I want to know about autopsies that were performed here on Dr. Tobias Rothman and Dr. Junichi Yamamoto from Columbia University Medical Center. They died the morning of March twenty-fourth-yesterday-of typhoid fever.” Pia was all business, taking McGovern aback. “I’m assuming autopsies have already been done,” she said.

“Er, well, er, I wasn’t involved in either one, and I haven’t heard much scuttlebutt around the office other than one of them was the famous Nobel-winning researcher. All I heard was that he died of an extremely aggressive infection. But let me check what we have.”

McGovern keenly wanted to be helpful. He looked at Pia, and she half smiled back at him. Using the computer on his desk, McGovern looked up the names to get the OCME accession numbers and then brought up the individual cases.

“Here we are. Yes, it says the autopsies were performed the afternoon of the twenty-fourth, so that was, er, yesterday. The day they died.” McGovern scrolled through one file, then the other.

“They certainly were both serious infectious cases with severe erosion of the gut, both small intestine and large. Wow! Anyway they’re considered OSHA cases, which was the main reason they were autopsied.”

“OSHA cases?” Pia questioned. She’d heard the acronym but couldn’t remember what it was for.

McGovern looked up. “The Occupational Safety and Health Administration. It’s a government agency that gets involved when there are deaths in the workplace involving public safety issues. The autopsy results will be reported to OSHA as the OCME is required to do by law.”

McGovern looked back at his screen.

“Okay. Both cases were done by Dr. Jack Stapleton. He’s our super-doc who does more cases than anyone else. He’s never satisfied, always pushing for more, works hard like he doesn’t have a life.