Джеймс Паттерсон - The Midwife Murders

“Well, of course you had to call. That’s exactly what I told you to do,” I say.

“No. You specifically said not …” And then he smiles. “You are a lying bitch. Always have been. Always will be.”

“No, buddy. It’s just my compulsion to always be right,” I say. And we hug again.

The medic makes one more attempt with me. “You really should be checked by a doctor, miss.”

“Doctor?” I say. “I’ve seen all the doctors I wanna see today. I’ve got doctors on the ceilings and the floors.”

I look around the crazy, noisy nursery. Pediatric nurses and doctors, probably from the nearest hospitals, are spreading out among the cribs. Infants are being disengaged from tubes and monitors and wires. Infants are being handed from one medical person to another. Some are being rushed out of the room, presumably to emergency stations. Other babies are simply held and patted and soothed and fed and changed.

It’s a mess, but as my mother used to say every Christmas and Thanksgiving, surrounded by her noisy, sloppy relatives, “Yes, it’s a mess. But it’s a joyful mess.”

Then I see Blumenthal approaching me. He’s barking into his cell phone. He’s shooting orders at police officers. He looks stern as he comes near me. But in only a moment I can tell that his anger is all pretend. He tries hard not to melt into someone gentle. But he manages to keep the angry face.

“You did everything wrong. You did exactly what I told you not to do.”

“Yes, that’s true. I guess I’m sorry, but I’m not really sorry,” I say. Then, full of arrogance and sarcasm and peace, I add, “Listen, Detective. You had the right town. Unfortunately, you had the wrong state. But you came close. I just had to step in.”

Then he says, “And everything turned out all right. Thank you. Thank you, Lucy.”

With that, we throw our arms around each other and hug. And it is then that I begin sobbing. Loud. Relentless. Uncontrollable.

“Goddamnit,” I say. “I’m the biggest baby in the room.”

“No, you’re not. You’re the smartest grown-up in this room. And you’re the best person I’ve ever met.”

Blumenthal tilts his head back and looks at me. He shakes his head back and forth. He holds my shoulders. We hug again, and then, after a few moments, he says, “We’ve figured out a lot in the last half hour, Lucy.” And he explains—in that concise, brief, logical way of his. He explains that Dr. Barrett Katz was framed, set up by Sarkar. Sarkar falsified records and invoices. Sarkar thought the Katz scandal would be a distraction from the kidnapping scandal. Katz’s insistence that he was innocent was absolutely true.

“I guess I should be happy that Katz isn’t going to prison for thirty years,” I say.

“Yes, you should be. Katz is a good man.”

“Okay, I’ll try to be happy about it. But I’m not predicting my success at that. Once an asshole al—” I begin. But my voice is drowned out. Sirens and shouting and screaming babies.

A few seconds later, above the din, I hear a woman’s voice.

“Leon,” the voice calls. “Leon.” The voice shows up with a very pretty woman attached to it. “Detective, I’m going down to the Harrison police station. Then I’m heading to Newark’s Children’s Hospital. Most of the babies are being taken there. Then …”

The woman looks at me, and with genuine warmth and enthusiasm in her voice says, “Oh, my God. It’s you. It’s Lucy. You’re the hero of the year. God bless you.”

Blumenthal says, “Lucy, this is Barbara Holt.”

Of course! This is the flashy woman with the fancy shoes who spoke to me so casually, so intimately about “Leon.” I didn’t recognize her without a floral sundress and nine-hundreddollar Louboutin heels. Barbara Holt. The girlfriend.

“Barbara is a new UC. UC means—”

“I know, Detective,” I say. “UC means undercover.”

What I don’t know is where she gets the money to buy those shoes.

“Sorry,” he says. “I just wanted to introduce the two of you.”

Barbara and I look at each other and smile a smile that says, I know what you’re thinking . Then we laugh.

She walks quickly toward the door. And I survey the room. It is still a noisy madhouse. The room seems twice as crowded as it did fifteen minutes ago. What I’m guessing are media helicopters can be heard hovering outside, invading like a sloppy army. The babies who have not been rushed off to medical facilities seem to have turned up their volume to a deafening decibel. A few well-dressed politicians are being allowed into what must be considered a crime scene. Mr. Mayor. Ms. Police Commissioner. A woman introduces herself to me and Blumenthal as the “lieutenant governor.” More officers. More doctors. The sirens don’t stop.

Yes, Mom. I know. A joyful mess.

CHAPTER 76

FORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER, a new group of four NYPD police cars pulls into the dirt parking lot of the pharma facility. Blumenthal and Troy and I watch them from an office window. Men and women pour out of the cars and rush toward the building.

“It’s the mothers, the fathers!” Troy shouts. “I recognize some of ’em.”

I do, too. I see Katra. I see Katra’s father. Bella and Marco Morabito are rushing closer as well. A blur of familiar faces and not-so-familiar faces.

“This is wonderful,” says Troy. I agree.

“Wonderful for some,” says Blumenthal, who has been reading the screen of his iPhone. “We’re allowing in only the parents of the babies who made it through alive. Other moms and dads will have their hearts broken.”

Silence. Then we take a collective deep breath and go to meet the parents. The lucky ones.

EPILOGUE

DR. KATZ AGREED TO my taking a one-month leave of absence with salary.

He’s such a softie.

When I first asked for four weeks he responded, “Does it really have to be quite so long, Ms. Ryuan?” Then he rushed to add, “Well, I suppose you deserve it.”

And I, of course, responded, “ Suppose? You suppose I deserve it?”

So I can’t say that Dr. Barrett Katz is a changed man, but like so many of us at GUH, once he absorbed the enormity of the horror that had happened, things seemed much better. We will never forget the nightmare, but somehow the air seems clearer, the mood seems happier, more peaceful.

One hopeful sign of change in Katz is that he told the GUH staff, “Please don’t call me Barrett anymore. It’s too formal. Call me Barry.”

Okay, Barry, what a loosey-goosey guy you’ve become.

In that one month of paid leave, I spent a lot of good time with Willie, The Duke, Sabryna, Devan, and the baby. Sabryna is now calling the infant Olivia. Why? “Because it is a beautiful name,” she says. “Why should she only have one name when so many people love her?”

Oh, okay, whatever. It makes sense, if you don’t think too hard about it.

The fact is, no matter what Sabryna calls the baby, she is just about the cutest little being I ever delivered, and that’s saying a lot. We know that one of these days her mother, Valerina, will be ready to take her home, but until that day arrives, we are joyful to have little Anna Tyonna Olivia Gomez with us. Almost as joyful as the Kovacs, and all the other families whose babies were recovered.

I also spent some of my time off with Leon Blumenthal and the ADA assigned to the case follow-up.

Yes, I know, Leon. ADA stands for “assistant district attorney.”

We recorded any details we remembered from the case—the cemetery, the lucky arrest of Orlov in Queens, and of course the events that led to the discovery and death of Rudra Sarkar and his laboratory of terror.