Authors: Rex Burns
“You want to go by Matheney’s clinic. That it?”
“Hey, the night is young and we’re so beautiful. Besides, like I told you, it’ll be a walk-through.”
It might have been except for the banks of glaring lights that surrounded the building and left no shadow for an avenue of approach to its doors and windows.
“Well, he didn’t have the damn things on during the day, did he?”
“Bunch, anybody looking out a window from one of these apartments will see us. The place looks like a goddamn car lot.”
“Guy’s electric bill must be a bitch. Why you think he spends that much on lights?”
“Because he doesn’t want people like you and me breaking in.”
Medical offices were favorite targets for dopeheads; many doctors were careless with drug storage. They found safes to be too cumbersome for the day’s business and relied on building security to protect their medicines and samples.
“Let’s try the alley. There’s bound to be a way.”
We cruised down the crowded, narrow lane that ran behind the office and neighboring apartments. A high board fence blocked off the rear of Matheney’s building from access, but a latched door led from the trash bin through the fence. Bunch coasted out the other end of the alley and turned onto a side street and parked. “We go in the back door.”
“There’s an apartment with two hundred windows looking right down on it.”
“It’s the only way. Besides, I got a gimmick.”
I followed him down the shadowy side of the alley and he opened the gate. We stepped through, pressing ourselves against the half-lit boards of the fence. In front of us, a pool of glaring light spotted the rear door like center stage on opening night. Bunch pulled the dart pistol from his shirt and aimed carefully aloft.
“What are you doing?”
“Shhhh.”
The long barrel made its soft, muffled pop. A metallic clatter bounced from the hood protecting the bulb.
“See how quiet that is? Nothing to worry about.”
“I’d be less worried if you were a better shot.”
He aimed again, and the pop was followed by a louder pop and the tinkle of sprayed glass, first against the metal hood and then on the asphalt below. The bright circle of light on the back door faded to gray.
“Let’s give it a couple minutes,” said Bunch.
We listened for footsteps coming to investigate. The only sounds were traffic passing on surrounding streets and the distant, fading wail of an emergency vehicle headed for Warner Memorial. Bunch told me to wait, and he strolled toward the dimness and paused a moment at the corner where the telephone line dropped from a pole and snaked down the wall into the building. Then he bent over the brass lock in the door, both hands busy. I scanned the alley and the windows of the tall apartment building behind the clinic. Finally Bunch whispered, “Okay,” and stepped inside.
Beyond the small delivery and storage area, the hallway led past a series of doors, most of which were open. The light reflecting through uncurtained windows was enough so we didn’t have to use the penlights; Bunch opened one of the shut doors and hissed for me.
It was a treatment room, complete with operating table, lights, anesthesia tanks, equipment trays, monitors. A small compressor in the corner of the room ran with a steady, muffled shudder.
“Matheney’s a surgeon,” I said. “Maybe he does the small stuff here.”
“Looks like a MASH unit to me.”
“Come on, Bunch—his office is down this way.”
The color-coded hallway led around a couple bends to Matheney’s dark waiting room. The pale ghosts of my hands, gloved in latex, pressed open the office door. I closed the blinds across the outside window. Bunch began rifling through the filing cabinets beside the nurse’s desk. I started on the drawers of Matheney’s desk.
They held what desks should hold: papers and forms of various kinds, clips and rubber bands and stickers, notepads, memo pads, stamps, the usual paraphernalia of offices everywhere. In the side drawers I found a few thin folders with his personal correspondence and flipped through the typed sheets: letters about professional meetings, unanswered inquiries from young doctors wanting positions, copies of letters from Matheney to other physicians about patients. A second, thinner file held correspondence with Cryogenic Biological Laboratories and dealt with technical descriptions of blood and tissue types and the physical environment necessary to transport them. The third file simply said “Personal” and held letters to friends.
Using the small Nikon Tele-Touch, I photographed any files that seemed even remotely promising, then turned to the remaining drawers. They held drug samples and fliers from pharmaceutical companies touting their wares and—in much smaller print—outlining risk factors. The pictures showed smiling doctors administering dosages to even happier patients—usually young and pretty women, or blue-eyed children who smacked their lips over the latest wonder drug. In prints of striking color, stern sentences warned against substituting cheaper generic drugs. Patients, the reader was assured, appreciated the best of care and the best of pharmacology. In one drawer was a ready supply of tongue depressors, cotton, pads, and tape. The bottom drawer held a lint brush, a shoeshine rag, and a wad of dust.
“You find anything?”
Bunch, a looming shadow vaguely lit by the tiny light, sighed. “Nothing that we’re looking for.” He turned off the computer screen with its menu of files and started thumbing through the manila folders in another cabinet. “He’s got a decent practice, but nothing big.”
“Charges twice as much to make up the difference.” I went to the nurse’s desk. On it were displayed a series of children’s pictures and an awkwardly fashioned clay mug for pencils with “To Mom with Love” baked into the enamel. The drawers held a larger number of forms, a wider variety of medical supplies, the lists of often-called telephone numbers, and no drug samples. I shot a couple pictures of the telephone numbers, the white flash of the tiny strobe followed by the whine of the camera’s automatic advance.
“Can I use that?” asked Bunch.
“Got something?”
“Calamaro’s jacket.” He bent over the open folder and the flash winked once. “It’s not much.”
I looked over his shoulder. The printout, a single cryptic sheet, listed a history of services rendered: periodic health tests and dates, and, more recently, stitches and a reference to Warner for the blood panel. It was marked paid. Felix Frentanes had a file too; it listed two years’ worth of routine health tests only. Felix’s wife didn’t have a file, nor did de Silva.
“We’d better split.” Bunch glanced through the blinds. “The door rattlers will be coming by soon.”
“Private security? You didn’t tell me anything about private security!”
“Didn’t want you to worry.” He led the way back and we glanced quickly into each of the closed rooms as we went. Desks and examining tables, an occasional coffee room. Workroom with copy machines and storage shelves. Supplies of a variety of items ranging from surgical masks to stainless steel operating tools. Small laboratory crammed with electronic analyzers that my partner lingered over.
“Come on, Bunch.”
Finally, the back entrance.
A row of waist-high cylinders stood darkly against a shadowed wall, and Bunch ran his penlight across their barrels. Oxygen, liquid nitrogen, nitrous oxide. “The oxygen for operations, the nitrous oxide for anesthetics. What would he use the liquid nitrogen for?”
“Freezing tissue, probably—a local anesthetic. Warts, small incisions, biopsies.”
Bunch counted the tanks and rapped them with his knuckles. “Three tanks of liquid nitrogen, two of them empty. That’s a hell of a lot of warts. Whoa … . I almost forgot.” He turned and trotted down the hall. I heard drawers carelessly flung open and the flutter of a mess being made. A few seconds later, he came back with a dangling plastic bag. “Drug samples—the phone lines are cut and they’ll know someone broke in. Might as well let them think it was for this crap.”
We threw the pills into a garbage can down the next alley, and Bunch guided the van slowly toward my house as we compared notes on what little we’d found. It was obvious that the files, if they ever existed, had been dumped. The folders on Nestor and Felix were there only because other records tied the men to Matheney.
“Maybe he’s telling the truth, Dev. What reason would he have for seeing Felicidad?”
“She was pregnant.”
“She needed a doctor to tell her that?”
“And we both think he was lying about something.”
“Yeah.” He pulled the van to the curb in front of my duplex. Mrs. Ottoboni had left her porch light on as always. “There is that. What time is it?”
“A little after three.”
From the back of the vehicle came a scuffling, snorting sound and the low growl of the pit bull.
“Sid’s coming out if it,” said Bunch. “Right on schedule.”
“Sounds like he has a hangover.”
Bunch rubbed his chewed leg. “No sympathy from me. See you in the morning, Dev.”
“Make it the afternoon.”
It was midafternoon before I reached the office. I don’t like those tossing, dream-plagued times when you try to force sleep long past its usual reveille. I always feel wearier, perhaps, than if I’d stayed awake and started the new day without going to bed at all. A long workout helped, and a gentle pummeling in the Jacuzzi at the fitness center, so that when I finally reached the office and its unopened mail, I felt nearly human.
Two notes from Bunch sat in my box. The first said that Sid Vicious hadn’t shown any rabies symptoms yet. The second said that Bunch was at the photo lab developing the pictures from last night. The mail was the usual and I did the usual with it. The phone recorder held a variety of voices. Allen Schute of Security Underwriters urged me to expedite the Taylor case. He didn’t say “or else”; it was in the tone of his voice. Bob Costello finally called to tell me he would not be needing the services of Kirk and Associates after all, thanks anyway, and he’d be in touch as soon as something else came up that we could help him with. You’re welcome, Bob. The Hally Corporation was inclined the same way, and I was beginning to suspect the unwelcome consequences of halitosis on career and social life. The stack of bills seemed to grow taller as I stared at them. Several blank spaces on the tape indicated callers who didn’t want to leave messages, and an unidentified voice said simply, “You can run, you son of a bitch, but you can’t hide.” I was mulling over that aphoristic bit of wisdom when Bunch came in and tossed a large envelope on the desk.
“Here’s a blowup of Calamaro’s sheet. The one we found in Matheney’s office.”
I tilted the glossy out onto the blotter. “Bob Costello called; he doesn’t need us.”
“Too bad.”
“Hally Corporation doesn’t either.”
“Uh-oh.”
“Allen Schute wants us, though. He wants us to do something on Taylor. Soon.”
“Do something? You want I should send him a picture of my dog bites?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea. But we’d better have more surveillance.”
“They’re looking for us.”
“You have anything better to offer?”
He shook his head and sighed, thinking of the cramped hours ahead. “No.” He tapped the photograph. “Take a look.”
It was a crisp color shot that made the file page starkly visible. I read with closer attention than I had been able to the night before, but aside from the factual information of Nestor’s physical description and blood type, there wasn’t much new.
Bunch, looking over my shoulder, rubbed a finger across the photographic print. “I hope that’s not a flaw in the glass.”
“What’s not?”
“That blurry spot—it looks like the camera lens has a scratch.”
I peered closely at the photograph. A trace of oil from Bunch’s finger dragged across the shiny surface where the letters on the form seemed hazy and ill-defined. “It doesn’t seem to be the photo. It looks like the paper was scraped—like somebody erased something.” Using a magnifying glass, I examined the section. “See? That’s not the photograph. It’s the paper itself.”
“Somebody changed his blood type?”
“That’s what it looks like.” Something had blurred the printed line to be filled in as well as the print on each side of the gap. Then a crisp new letter had been typed in over the careful erasure: “A.”
“You’re right, Dev—it’s a different typeface, even.” Bunch moved the magnifying glass back and forth over the rest of the photograph. “The other type’s one kind—look at this ‘A.’ Now, that’s a different typewriter.”
I dialed the records office at Warner Memorial and read from Nestor’s health insurance claim form. “This is Dr. Simpson. I understand you did a series of blood tests on a new patient of mine, Nestor Calamaro.” I cited his patient number, which gave my name all the authority it needed, and asked for his blood type. The woman’s voice asked if I would like to wait or if she should call me back. “I’ll wait.”
A minute or two later, her voice came back and she said with slight hesitancy, “It’s Rh null, doctor.”
“It’s what?”
“Yes sir. I’ve never heard of it, but he’s had a lot of blood work done and that’s what it says: Rh null.”
I thanked her and hung up.
“Why would Matheney want to change the man’s blood type?” asked Bunch.
I didn’t have an answer, but we did have a suspicious act. Also we had a question. And as one of my old profs who was fond of John Dewey used to say, the question entails the answer.
Bunch went out to the Ace Roofing construction site, driving a rental van and armed with the camcorder and a telephoto lens. We had no proof Taylor was working that job, but it was a place to start and I could call Schute and tell him with clear conscience that we were actively pursuing the case even while I spoke to him. That done, I tried to call Jerry Kagan, but his nurse said he wasn’t available and would I like to leave a message. I put it off until later that evening, and when I finally reached him, I offered a dinner for him and Judy by way of apology for bothering him again.
“It sounds good, Dev, but we’ll have to take a rain check; Judy and I are going to a medical conference in Hawaii.” The phone was silent for a moment, and I wondered why they never had conferences in places like East St. Louis or Detroit. “You know, I don’t understand why anyone would want to change the blood type on a chart. That could be damned dangerous.”