Death Rounds (48 page)

I rewound the microfilm, sending the pages of Carl and Phyllis Miller’s epitaph whirling backward in a blur. Looking through their record hadn’t entirely been a waste, I thought, depressed by the misery conveyed in those pages. It had certainly increased my sympathy for Harold.

Minutes later I’d returned the film to its slot and was out the door going down the corridor when my cellular rang. Surprised, I flipped it open, only to hear Williams yell, “Garnet! He’s infected a nurse after she’d been put into isolation.”

“What!”

“I’m in with her now. It’s not pneumonia; it’s a cellulitis of her hand. We got enough pus for a Gram stain; it’s staph.”

I could hear a woman shrieking in the background.

“Who the hell’s that?” I asked him.

“It’s her,” he answered. “We’re trying a cocktail of antibiotics, but I’m not optimistic. She’s just heard from the surgeons what has to be done. The cellulitis is in her right hand. The redness and swelling were present locally around her nails when she got up this morning—she noticed it when she went to change gloves—but she’s a nail-biter and has irritated them before, so she didn’t think much of it. It still didn’t bother her too much during the day, but she woke half an hour ago with high fever, marked swelling locally, and lymphangitis present halfway up her arm.”

Lymphangitis—blood poisoning they used to call it—is in fact an inflamed lymph duct, or channel, carrying a clear fluid full of white cells, called lymph. The condition is recognizable as a red line that starts at the site of a local skin infection and then extends along the course of the underlying lymph duct, usually proximally, or in this case up the infected limb. You died, lore had it, when the poison reached your heart, which was presumed to be shortly after the red line reached your trunk.

Today we know that people die when the organisms and their tissue-destroying toxins flood from the original site of infection into the bloodstream and seed themselves everywhere throughout the body. Yet we still use the red line as a marker of how the infection is proceeding and as an indication of how it’s responding to antibiotics. Prior to the discovery of penicillin, however, doctors used the progress of the line to determine when and where to amputate.

The screaming and sobbing in the background became words.

“...I knew he’d get me! I told Garnet he’d get me! And now you’re going to cut off my fucking arm!”

It was Brown.

Chapter 23

“Don’t come up here,” Williams insisted. “You’re the last person she wants to see.”

“How do you know she was infected after being quarantined?”

“We’re pretty certain. It’s around thirty-six hours since she was screened on arrival, and there’s absolutely no growth in her cultures. Somehow he’s infected her since then.” The screaming started to crescendo in the background. “I’ve got to go,” he snapped, and the connection went dead.

Despite Williams’s warning, I was determined to go upstairs and talk to Brown, no matter how much it upset her. The ordeal she faced was ghastly, but with so much at stake and with so few leads, she had to answer my questions.

I continued to hurry through the oppressive passageways, following a set of turns which I was used to by now, and was completely lost in speculation about how Brown had been infected. Cam couldn’t have done it by going on the ward in person, I thought as I rounded a corner and headed down a particularly musty section of hallway. His six-foot-five-inch frame would have been too easy to spot. Maybe he’d contaminated the ward—left colonies of staph where people would touch them during the times they wouldn’t be wearing gloves, such as when they were showering. There was an article in the
MMB
once, I recalled, that documented an incident in which an MRSA outbreak was traced to a soap dispenser in an OR. And I’d check with Miller, I decided, to find out if there was any way that Cam could have tampered with the specimen after Brown’s screening.

I was somewhat startled by the sound of a door slamming somewhere around the next corner. Instinctively I slowed. Down here it didn’t take much to crank me up into a full panic. Echoes of that hideous laugh raced through my mind and fed my sudden fear that the lights would go out again.

The repository was located in its own region of this netherworld, away from the archives, so it wasn’t any of Levitz’s group or the ID physicians who’d been working there. I heard another door close— this time the sound seemed closer—and I thought I could hear approaching footsteps. It could be one of Riley’s men doing another search, I thought, but I’d nearly had my head split open twice now, and I wasn’t going to take any chances. Tiptoeing, I backtracked, hoping to make it to the repository where the door had a bolt. Whoever had come after me in the human resources department had had a key, perhaps even passkeys. I kept watching the corner as I retreated from it, moving along with my back to the wall. Another door closed, and the footsteps came closer still. I wasn’t going to make it to the next turn in the corridor and out of sight before whoever it was saw me. Reaching behind my back I tried one of the doors I was passing. It was locked. I moved more quickly now, less conscious of noise, only concerned about getting away. I tried another door. It opened. I backed inside, found myself in a small room full of boxes, and quickly locked myself in. I stood in the dark and tried to control my breathing as the steps and the sound of doors opening and closing came nearer. Was he looking for me again? Was it merely one of Riley’s men after all? I heard the rattle of a nearby handle that was tried and didn’t open. The steps then continued, coming nearer, nearer. I was next.

I leaned my weight against the door and held my breath. I heard the knob turn, feeling the movement transmitted through the ancient wood as I pressed on it with my shoulder. The possibility he could probably kick it to splinters if he knew I was in here flashed through my mind. He gave the handle two more hard twists, then walked away.

I let out my breath, hardly able to believe he’d passed me by. My first impulse was to let him get out of earshot and then call Riley on my cellular. Let the police nail him, I figured. Then I thought, what if the police don’t get here quickly and quietly enough, and we lose him again? I heard more doors opening and closing, the sound receding each time. I quickly recovered my nerve, took a breath, and as silently as I could, released the lock to open the door a crack.

He was thirty yards away, just rounding the next corner and passing out of sight. But this time he was close enough I could tell immediately who it was, even from the brief glimpse I’d gotten of him. Gary Rossit was prowling the subbasement of University Hospital.

* * * *

I felt as if an earthquake had rumbled through my head, toppling all my ideas and suspicions about Cam’s being the killer. Dashed as well was Janet’s theory—that the Phantom was some unknown figure who’d framed Cam. The sight of Rossit resurrected the notions I’d had about him in the first place—that he was involved in a brutal plan to sabotage University Hospital. The possibility I could have been right all along was almost as big an upheaval to me as seeing him there. But how had he gotten in?

I didn’t have time to stand around and try to answer that question. I could hear him making his way down the next corridor as he continued to open and close doors. I decided I’d call Riley as soon as I learned what Rossit was doing or where he was headed and ran on my toes to where he’d disappeared into the next corridor. There I peeked just in time to see him pass from sight into yet another passageway.

I continued after him, wondering if he were after me. Possibly, except he wasn’t using much stealth. In fact, all the noise he was making made it an easy matter to follow him. I thought again about calling Riley. But what would the detective grab him for, slamming doors? All at once I had to backpedal in my thinking. Even his being here wouldn’t give the police reason to arrest him. For all I knew he might have walked through the front door and signed in. As the chief of the infectious disease department at St. Paul’s, he’d certainly have a joint appointment at this hospital, the way I had. Now that I thought about it, given the circumstances, especially with Cam’s disappearance, it was perfectly natural he might come in, offer to look around, and see what he could see. When I peered into the next passage, I saw he was past the repository and crossing the far intersection, heading straight into a part of the subbasement I’d never entered before.

Better tag along, I thought.

But I had to wait a while to let him get farther ahead of me in this next section—it stretched into the distance as far as I could see—until I could safely follow from a long way behind and use recessed doorways to hide in. I’d no idea where we were headed, and the manner in which he kept poking around, sticking his head into every room he could, I began to wonder if he had any specific destination in mind. He seemed instead to be searching for something.

Luckily for me the overhead lights were dim and spaced far apart, so I had lots of shadow to cover my moves while I skirted along the wall from doorway to doorway. Here and there rows of boxes were stacked to the ceiling, affording further cover when I needed it.

As we progressed in tandem through this lengthy tunnel, I kept looking beyond where Rossit was peeking into yet more rooms until eventually I could make out where the passageway ended—against a larger door than the rest which was illuminated by a solitary lamp hanging over its portal. Between it and where I was standing in one of the shadowy spots, there was very little light and many more piles of boxes, but if I didn’t want to be seen when he started back, I figured I’d better get into a hiding space now. Although Rossit was short, his torso and arms had always given me the impression of considerable strength, and I didn’t savor the idea of his finding me down here while I was spying on him. I even wondered if I hadn’t already had a taste of how powerful he was two nights ago when I’d had my own arms pinned, my gut slugged, and my head rammed into a door.

I found a dark area behind one of the nearby stacks of boxes and crouched down, still keeping an eye on Rossit making his way toward the end of the passage. When he arrived in front of that final door and reached for the handle, I figured he’d give a quick look, like he’d already done to a few hundred other rooms down here, and then return toward me. Watching him slowly push it open, I got ready to hunch over in the shadows. But instead of simply glancing in, he stood at the threshold a few seconds, then stepped inside, leaving the door open behind him. I waited for about a minute, watching, thinking he’d come out any second. He didn’t.

Overhead some pipes clanked. Otherwise the place was completely quiet. I began to feel cramped staying in one position and tried to shift my legs to make them more comfortable. As I waited, an ever so slight hint of something pungent and overripe penetrated my mask and invaded my nostrils. Probably a rat had died behind the boxes I was kneeling beside.

Suddenly from the room Rossit had gone into I heard a creaking noise, like rusty hinges. Then there was silence again. Was there another door out of there? I kept my breathing slow and shallow so I’d detect the slightest sound that might indicate he was still inside.

Nothing.

The pipes overhead clanged especially loudly, making me jump, then fell quiet again. I still couldn’t hear anything coming from the room. Fearing I’d lost him, I stood up and began creeping very stiffly along the right-hand wall toward where I’d be able to see by the half-open door. The odor I’d noticed before persisted despite my moving away from the boxes and began to cloy in the back of my throat. I was about ten feet from the entrance when I heard a soft noise. I froze in midstep.

It was a scraping sound, muffled, not anywhere near, but definitely coming from the other side of that door. It kept repeating, as if someone were pushing something. My first thought was that there might be containers somewhere in that room similar to the many boxes that lined the hallway and that Rossit was moving a bunch of them around for some reason. When the scraping continued, I crept another five feet until I could see partly through the doorway. A ceiling light inside revealed a medium-sized storage area filled with stacks of storm windows and more piles of boxes. In my line of sight against the far wall, though partially hidden behind yet more boxes, was a long table half covered with a white sheet that had been folded back on itself. Visible on the table was a large metal cube of some kind, about two feet square. Beside it I recognized racks of test tubes, bottles, and stacks of petri dishes. Parked in a corner of the room, also half hidden behind some containers, was a small supply cart.

My pulse rocketed into triple digits. Son of a bitch, he’s brought me to his lair! I tried to keep my breathing steady. The scraping continued to come from somewhere behind the door, and I could hear Rossit grunting now as he worked. But I couldn’t see him. Whatever he was dragging around in there, it was heavy. That odor still hung in the air, and though it wasn’t perceptibly stronger, its persistence began to make it repulsive. I stopped breathing through my nose but knew the scent was continuing to fill my mouth. It remained there a few seconds, nearly beyond the range of my sense of smell, but not completely. Soon I began to detect traces of it again as the aroma seeped up the back of my throat and floated into the posterior regions of my nostrils. Since my first anatomy lab nearly thirty years ago I was sensitized to even a hint of that distinctive stench, no matter how many flowers they put out in a funeral parlor or how high they turned up the vents at the autopsy lab.

It was time for the police. I readied myself to tiptoe down the dark hallway behind me. I’d phone Riley as soon as I was far enough away to be out of earshot, probably when I’d locked myself safely in the repository. The cops could then come and collect Rossit, the lab equipment, and, I knew, much worse. But I’d barely taken a few steps when the scraping noises from deep in the room abruptly stopped. In a flash I feared he’d heard me and was coming. Reflexively I ducked behind some of the nearby boxes. No sooner was I crouched down than the silence was ripped by loud retching noises, followed by the thudding of running feet.