Bruce Wagner - I'll Let You Go

The nurse walked off with the documents, but Lani stopped her and said the driver’s license would have to stay.

Lani assumed the bitch had been talking about Detective Dowling, and tried not to get angry at him for having left her in the dark. Though someone might have at least phoned the CASA office; he was probably just overwhelmed, like everybody else. But these were matters of life or death, and it would have been nice to have gotten a call.

Some moments later, the nurse returned Lani’s papers and told her the doctor would see her, but only for a moment, as he was “about to lead group.”

The psychiatrist then appeared. He was around fifty and looked as if he’d been napping. He wore tennis shoes, Dockers and a faded madras sport shirt.

“I’m Dr. Fishman. What can I do for you?”

“Dr. Fishman, I’m Lani Mott. I just met with one of your patients, Amaryllis Kornfeld—”

“Are you a relative?”

“No, I am not. And she looked like hell . What have you been giving her?”

The psychiatrist actually laughed in her face. She felt a mote of his spittle cool on her cheek but made no move to acknowledge it.

“That’s confidential information. If you’re not a relative, I can’t even talk to you.”

“Is that right?”

“That’s right. That’s a state law.”

“Are you going to tell me about the law?”

“Listen, I don’t know who you are, but—”

“The nurse didn’t tell you?”

“If you’re not a relative, you’re wasting your time. Even if you were a relative, there is certain information I can’t even legally share with a parent.”

“Let me tell you something about the law, all right, Doctor? Are you listening? I am a Court Appointed Special Advocate! Do you think I’m playing a game here? You may be playing a game, but I’m too old for that. You’ve never run into someone like me, have you? Now, I’m not accusing you of anything, Doctor, but that girl could barely speak! She was drooling, OK? Now, I want to know what she’s on and the reason she’s on it, OK?”

“When she was admitted,” he said, like a child about to tear the wing off a bug, “she was dysphoric and circumlocutory. Do you know what that means, Miss—”

“It’s Mrs . And I’m not here for a DSM symposium. I need you to tell me some things, Doctor. You can tell me now or you can tell me in the morning, when a marshal comes down to make an official demand. The judge will want to know why you were uncooperative — do you really want to be under that kind of scrutiny? Maybe you’d like to read this.” She thrust the order at him while reciting from memory. “ ‘WIC section 106: Upon presentation of this order, the CASA shall be permitted to inspect and copy any records of any agency, hospital, school, organization, division or department of the state, physician and surgeon, nurse, other health care provider, psychologist, psychiatrist [italics hers], police department or mental health clinic relating to the child in the above matter without the consent of the child or the child’s parent.’ Do you think they could have made it any clearer, Dr. Fishbein?”

“Fishman,” he said with a dyspeptic grin, while giving the papers a cursory glance. “I’ll have to go find the records.”

“I’ll need a copy.”

“If I can find them, I’ll make you one.”

“We’ll do this however you’d like.”

“Is this 60 Minutes ?” He smirked again, but less convincingly.

“Joke all you like, Doctor. But if I don’t leave with a copy of those records, it won’t be a joke, I assure you. I hope for your sake they reflect a full physical examination of that child before she was given whatever drugs you so ‘confidentially’ prescribed. I hope for your sake you didn’t phone those drugs in from a steakhouse. And I hope when I come back tomorrow, she’s in better shape than she’s in now.”

“I’ll need half an hour.”

“Good. Because half an hour’s all I’ve got.”

Twenty minutes later, back in the Volvo with records in hand, Lani’s body shook uncontrollably. She called Gilles on her purple Nokia and gave a mighty war whoop when he answered — then chattered like a fool all the way home. She told him she felt like Erin Brockovich.

They went to a neighborhood cucina to celebrate her empowerment. After a few drinks, she solemnly confessed her shame at having once abdicated her responsibilities to the girl, and how the jailed man, whom she considered the child’s real caretaker, had been correct in upbraiding her and that she had grown to admire and respect him immeasurably for that. There are consequences to our actions, she kept saying. There are repercussions … Emboldened by alcohol, she passionately suggested that William, for whatever reason, was being railroaded —and her husband was glad to see her back in good form and good rant, diatribing against injustices wrought upon innocents, spinning Chomskyesque conspiracies of politics and the media. He loved her more than ever.

Quiet and introspective until now, Gilles spoke up. Slowly swirling the wine in his glass, he said he had failed to give his friend the benefit of the doubt regarding any “untoward activities” with the girl — and for that, he felt bad. But something else was troubling him that he was compelled to share. Gilles said that after their Sunday call he had spoken with the detective again, who had told him that an ascot belonging to William — identified as such by Amaryllis herself — had been found stuffed in the victim’s throat. How to explain?

Lani swallowed her drink and closed her eyes like a mystic in mourning for the folly of the whole race of man. Smiling, she set the glass down and seamlessly uttered the words that finally vanquished all his remaining doubts:

“We are going to save that little girl.”

At the arraignment, the letter was passed to aka William’s lawyers, who forwarded it to Twin Towers. Various official eyes had been already upon it by the time it reached the prisoner’s:

Dear William,

They would not let me visit, so I am writing this to you. Lani and I feel so awful that you are in that place, and would like to help in any way we can. Lani is trying to aid Amarillys, just as you wanted us to from the very beginning. But she is in “the System” now and believe me it doesn’t make things any easier. We know there is trouble regarding a woman who passed away, but we do not know anything about it and hope you were not involved, and if you were, that perhaps the reason was that you were not in your “right mind” or maybe even that you were protecting the girl. Because we have heard terrible things about that woman. (Who I believe to be— was —Amarillys’s mother.) We will visit you as soon as is allowed. I was at the arraignment and once I learned that only a relation would be able to visit, I gave this to Detective S. Dowling (who I believe you know) to pass on. We even tried sending croissants and pastries, not so good as yours I’m afraid, but they said it was forbidden. You have all our best wishes.

Gilles and Lani,

Your “amis” at Frenchie’s

He read the missive twice more, and, after a baffled interlude, began to assemble the pieces.

Amarillys … the girl! They were speaking of the girl , his angel … — Lani and Gilles — those kind, gentle people — the Frankish baker who had given him work, honest work, and paid him an honest wage. His wife— Lani , he read again — who’d merely done what she felt was right by the child and for which aka Topsy aka William Morris Marcus (here, he pounded his fist on the wall of the cell, for he knew not even his own name) had wantonly berated her. And what had this clot of aliases done in the first place but drop the pitiful orphan off in the early-morning hours beside a trash bin and shove her toward his benefactor — what nobility!