Steve Martini - Guardian of Lies

“Do you know what her condition is?” I ask.

“She’s not critical, if that’s what you mean. She took a flesh wound in the leg. You can get the details from the doctor. According to the EMT, she suffered some shock, possible concussion, and a chance of some hearing damage from the explosive device.”

“Then you saw her?” I say.

“I carried her off the bus. Give me a second,” he says.

The agent steps away from us, pulls a cell phone from his pocket, and walks farther away as he presses buttons to dial the number. He stands twenty feet away, glancing at Harry and me as he talks on the phone and looks at my business card. Then he looks at me and motions for me to come over.

“Somebody wants to talk to you,” he says, and he hands me his cell phone.

“Hello.”

“Mr. Madriani, this is Jim Rhytag. Agent Swarz informs me that you’d like to be able to see your client.”

“That’s correct.”

“That will be up to the doctor, of course. But I want you to know that she will be well protected from here on out. We’ve made arrangements to have her moved to a private room upstairs in the hospital, outside the jail ward. She will be in the custody of the sheriff’s department but there will be two federal marshals assigned at all times while she’s there, providing backup, more if we think it’s necessary. We have reason to believe that the assault on the bus this morning may have been directed at Ms. Solaz.”

“Why don’t you tell me what this is about?” I say.

“I’ve told you all that I can. Just one more thing, we’ve kept her name off the admissions records at the hospital and my agents covered her with a blanket when they took her off the bus. Law enforcement has agreed not to give her name to the press as a survivor. Whoever tried to kill her may not know she’s alive. We’d like to keep it that way, at least for the time being. We’ve already advised the judge and court personnel. You need to know so you can avoid any questions from the press. It’s for your client’s own safety.”

“I understand. For how long?”

“We’re not sure. We’ll let you know. The rest you’ll have to get from her doctor. Sorry I can’t be more helpful.” The line went dead.

I hand the phone back to the agent. “Thanks.”

Harry and I have cooled our heels, pacing the lobby and sitting on hard wooden benches, for nearly two hours before one of the nurses comes out and tells us that the doctor will see us now. She leads us down a broad corridor and through a pair of wide electrically controlled double doors with the word EMERGENCY blazed across them in red paint.

She tells us to take a seat inside a small room. Before we can sit down, a young intern breezes into the room with a clipboard under his arm.

“Hi. I’m Dr. Johansson. I understand you’re here to see Ms. Solaz.”

We introduce ourselves.

“The good news is, she’s going to be okay. The bad news is, she’s undergone a tremendous amount of trauma. There are no broken bones, no internal injuries, the bullet wound in the leg is in soft tissue, some minor muscle damage. It should heal completely. It may take a few weeks. Her hearing loss, we believe, is temporary.”

“She can’t hear at all?” says Harry.

The doctor shakes his head. “Not at the moment, as far as we can tell. There was some minor bleeding from the nose and ears, the result of a concussion from the explosive pressure wave. Both eardrums were ruptured, but they should heal. That usually takes about two months.”

“Will she be able to communicate in the meantime?” I ask.

“That’s the real question,” says the doctor. “We don’t know. She’s clearly suffered some concussive brain injury, physical trauma in the form of shock waves to the central nervous system. Coupled with that is the psychological component, all the things she saw, the sheer terror of what happened, and the death of her friend-”

“What friend?” I say.

“She apparently had someone on the bus she was very close to, another woman who, according to the police, may have died in her arms. We don’t know. From what I understand, the other woman may have saved her life. Again, we’re not sure of all the details. Regardless, you can imagine the stress your client was under, physical and emotional. The problem is, it’s hard to separate the two, to determine how much of the damage is physical, resulting from the blast, and how much is psychological.

“The concussive effect of the blast alone on the nervous system can last anywhere from hours or days to weeks. It depends on the individual.”

“But she will recover?” I say.

“I think so. The damage usually isn’t permanent unless the source of the trauma becomes repetitive, shell shock from long-term combat, for example. In this case, the odds are she’ll recover.”

“But you can’t tell us how long that’s going to take?” says Harry.

“Not with any certainty or precision, no. She’s going to need a lot of rest and quiet. She won’t be going back to the jail anytime soon. I’d say she’s either going to be here or in a very quiet semiskilled nursing facility for a minimum of ten days to two weeks, perhaps longer.”

“So what you’re telling us,” I say, “is that Ms. Solaz is not going to be able to give us much help in preparing her defense on criminal charges during that period.”

“At the moment she’s unable to speak to anyone.”

“Because she can’t hear?” says Harry.

“No. She’s in a stupor, probably as a result of the shock. We’ll be doing an MRI and some other tests. There’s limited motor response. She doesn’t seem to react normally to stimuli. To the extent that anything depends on her participation or cooperation, she may not be able to comply. As I say, it’s probably only temporary, but at the moment it’s absolute. I can give you a letter if you need it.”

“If you don’t mind,” says Harry, “that would be helpful.”

The doctor makes a note on his clipboard. “Right now she’s not communicating with anyone. We haven’t been able to get a word out of her. The officers who brought her in said they were unable to communicate with her as well.”

“Can we see her?” I ask.

“Does she have any family in the area?”

“No,” says Harry. “We’re it. Her nearest family is in Costa Rica. They don’t have U.S. visas or the financial ability to travel up here.”

“That’s too bad. Sometimes family helps in a situation like this, reaching the patient, I mean. She is sedated, just mildly at the moment. We’re going to be moving her upstairs shortly. If you want to see her, you’ll have to keep it very quiet and brief. Try to stay fairly still, avoid a lot of movement. Two minutes, that’s all. And keep in mind that she’s not going to be able to hear you. She may recognize you.

“If you’ll come this way.” He leads us out of the room, down the hall past a number of curtained-off cubicles with hospital beds, some of them empty, others with patients.

There are three uniformed deputies milling around keeping an eye on the women in blue jail jumpsuits until they can get them upstairs into the jail ward.

“How many of the injured from the bus were delivered here?” says Harry.

“Eight.”

“How many did they route to other hospitals?” I ask.

“None. There were only eight survivors, seventeen dead, not counting the driver, the guard, or the gunmen. Absolute insanity,” says the doctor.

“Yes, it is,” I say.

A few feet farther on he puts his hand out like a traffic cop. “If you’ll wait here just a moment.” He steps away to confer with a man wearing gray slacks, a dress shirt and tie, and a worn blue blazer with wrinkle marks where it covers the padded holster on his belt.