Faye Kellerman - Prayers for the Dead

No one spoke.

Decker said, “Obviously, you’ve overcome the mishaps.”

“After pleading and begging, yes, I was allowed to retake my exams. And I passed. But no hospital would permit me to attend because of my black eye. They didn’t come right out and say that my cheating was the reason for denying attendance privileges. But after applying to fifty-plus institutions, you see the writing on the wall. If you’re a surgeon, Lieutenant, you need hospitals.”

“What did you do?”

“I worked as a general practitioner for a while. Lebanon, Indiana. Did quite well.”

“But you were frustrated.”

“That is an understatement, sir. I was miserable. In my eyes, not only was I a failure, but a dishonest one at that.”

“So along comes your old friend Azor Sparks, a man with a renowned international reputation, who took a chance.”

“And we all lived happily ever after.”

Again, no one spoke.

Decker said, “You must have been very grateful.”

“I just about wept at his feet, I was so thankful.” Berger blew air into his hands, rubbed them together. “My first assignment was assisting him. Like any other resident surgeon. I’d been out of practice for a while…”

He tapped his hands on the desk.

“The next time out, he handed me the scalpel. A routine bypass that evolved into a complex situation. I was sweating buckets. I kept waiting for Azor to step in. But he didn’t. Yes, he watched, but never said a word. The upshot? I handled it masterfully.”

“Congratulations.”

Berger smiled. “Thank you. And that was it. We’ve been working together ever since. As colleagues, side by side. Having said that…I always knew his position. And I always knew mine. Yes, occasionally, I suffered a bruised ego. But better a bruised ego than none at all.”

Decker wrote as he spoke. “Let me ask you this, Dr. Berger. If you applied to other programs and institutions now, how do you think you’d be received?”

“After working with Azor for twenty-five years, I could write my own ticket.”

“So your past wouldn’t follow you?”

“Perhaps…if the position was a very big one like the head of NIH or the dean of Harvard Medical School…it might come out that I took my boards twice. But I strongly doubt the reason would be exposed. Unless someone was determined to unbury this oddity in order to ruin me.”

“Who would that be?”

“No one,” Berger snapped. “Even Reggie Decameron doesn’t hold that kind of animosity toward me. It would only come up if someone purposely launched an extensive probe.” He looked pointedly at Decker. “Someone like the police.”

Decker kept his expression neutral, wondering why the doctor spilled so easily if his past had truly been that well interred. Maybe Berger confessed to cheating in order to hide something more nefarious. Decker said, “Well, not much point in my looking into your past now.”

“Which is the reason why I told you. Better to head you off at the pass, so to speak.”

“So few people know about your ordeal.”

“The generation that knew my plight way back when has practically died out.”

“A theoretical question,” Decker said. “What would happen to you if your past was suddenly made public?”

Berger’s eyes turned stony. “I can’t answer that because it wouldn’t happen. The only one of my current colleagues who was aware of it was Azor. And he never said anything to anyone.”

“As far as you know.”

“I do know.” Berger glanced at the clock on his wall and stood. “I really must tend to my business. We have very sick people here who have just lost their doctor…a person they view as saving their lives. They’re distressed. They need care. They need comfort. Please?”

“Of course.” Decker got up. “Some other time, maybe we can talk about Curedon.”

“I’d be happy to except…” He tapped his watch. “I’m swamped at the moment.”

“Thank you for your time, Dr. Berger.”

“I can’t say that I enjoyed it. But I have been completely honest with you. I shouldn’t have to say this, but I’ll say it anyway. I expect complete confidentiality with my thirty-year-old secret. It’s nobody’s business but mine.”

Decker nodded. His secret wasn’t anyone’s business.

Unless it became a reason for murder.

Oliver tightened his grip on the wheel of an unmarked Matador. “If I see one more shopping mall, I’m gonna throw up.”

Marge sipped coffee from a thermos, stared out the window at an endless stretch of freeway. The asphalt bisected hillocks covered with untrimmed crabgrass, California orange poppies, mustard wildflowers, and royal purple statice. “Not much to do here. Shop, eat, sleep. Maybe have an affair.”

“Last option sounds like a winner, especially if I was female. Doesn’t cost anything and it burns off calories.”

Marge glanced at him, then returned her eyes to the front windshield. Oliver drummed his fingers on the wheel. “What’s the contact’s name again?”

“Gordon Shockley.”

“Dr. Shockley, right?”

“Right.”

Silence except for the staccatoed communications between the radio dispatchers and the patrol officers. Oliver started to whistle-tuneless, formless. Marge was about to say something, but changed her mind. The tweetie noises were annoying, but so was the quiet.

Forty-five minutes into the ride, and Marge was going nuts. Probably, Scott wasn’t doing much better. The first twenty minutes had been passable because they had talked shop, gossiped a little. Now they had run out of small talk. Desperation time, because neither wanted to open the door marked personal.

Oliver said, “Mind-numbing out here.” He paused. “Not that I do so much at home…”

“But you have the option,” Marge filled in.

“Yeah. Exactly.”

A long pause.

“Any more coffee?” Oliver asked.

“Sure.” Marge handed him the thermos. “You want me to take a shift, Scott?”

“Nah, I’m fine.” He swigged some java. “I’m not looking forward to this.”

“Why?”

“I hate talking to these kinds of guys. Especially because we have to ask technical questions. Which means we’ll get technical answers. Makes me feel like I should have stayed longer in college.”

“You and me both.”

“How many years did you go?”

“BA in sociology.” Marge laughed. “Like that’s really going to help.”

“You finished, then.”

Marge looked at him, smiled. “Are you impressed?”

“Yeah, kinda.”

“It’s only State.”

“But you’re still a college grad. Me? I majored in pool and beer.”

“Bet you got straight As in that.”

“You’d better believe it, sister, I’m a card-carrying member of the Sigma Beta Tau. We threw the best parties west of the Mississippi, east of the Ohio, and anywhere else in between.”

“That’s everywhere.”

“That’s right! No one gave parties like Sigma Beta Tau.”

The car grew silent as Oliver fell into a blue funk. Finally, he said, “Yeah, we had parties. Unfortunately, chucking your cookies in rhythm to ‘Stayin’ Alive’ didn’t turn out to be a marketable skill.”

Marge smiled. “Did you actually attend any classes?”

“A few.” Oliver ran tapered fingers through thick, black hair. “I think I even took a sociology course. Something like Group Thinking.”

“That sounds like sociology.”

“Yeah, I thought it was.”

“I think I had the same course,” Marge said. “Only we called it Group Analysis. At the onset, the class was given a number of questions and asked to find solutions. First, we were told to solve the problems by ourselves. Then we divided up into teams, and were told to seek resolutions to the same problems.”