Skeleton 03 - The Constantine Codex (42 page)

Just then he heard the long, grinding sound of a huge garbage truck outside the back windows of Jon’s office. “And, oh yes, the codex.” Al-Ghazali picked up the tome, went to the back window of Jon’s office, broke out the screen, and heaved the codex directly into the compacting maw of the garbage truck. “There! Your precious codex is exactly where it belongs, thanks to Waste Management. Live a good life, Jon!”

Al-Ghazali hurried out of the office, relieved that Marylou Kaiser had apparently gone to lunch. He would be over the Atlantic before Jon could even control his tongue. It would also be a one-way trip for Osman since he had planned to flee the U.S. for the past several weeks, suspecting that the discovery of his true role in Jon’s circle was only a matter of time.

Several hours later, he was aboard EgyptAir Flight 986 to Cairo. He gazed out the window, a low smile forming on his lips. Suddenly, though, they formed a pout instead.
What utter
fools
those Turks were,
he mused,
trying to get a
ransom
for the codex when I had told them simply to destroy it.
Well, he had corrected their wretched mistake. Allah would be more than merciful.

Marylou Kaiser came back from lunch, walked into Jon’s office, and screamed. Jon was sitting at his desk, motionless, glassy-eyed, and unresponsive. In a frenzy, she dialed 911. When the paramedics arrived, they quickly suspected a stroke of some kind—not poisoning: this was Harvard, after all. One of them, however, saw Jon’s half-empty coffee mug and tasted it. Then he spat it out and grumbled, “Irish coffee. Evidently these Harvard sages start drinking early and often.”

They strapped Jon onto a stretcher and carried him downstairs and out into an ambulance that had invaded the sacred turf of the Yard. Although nearly comatose, he started mumbling things like “Kowbage,” “Gowbage,” “Tuck,” and finally “Truck.” But no one understood him. Sirens wailing, the ambulance sped eastward on Massachusetts Avenue, crossed the Charles River bridge, and delivered him to ER at Mass General Hospital.

Marylou had, of course, accompanied Jon in the ambulance, and Shannon soon arrived from Weston, pale and shaken. The only one with some context for Jon’s situation, Marylou finally started interpreting his mumbles. “Police,” she translated from “powice,” “garbage” from “cowbage,” and “poison” from “pawzun.” None of it made sense, except for
poison
and
police
, and the latter were summoned immediately.

The ER at Mass General was crowded with patients on the road either to death or to recovery assisted by vast arrays of high-tech equipment. In one of the curtained cubicles surrounding its central core, Jon was starting to fight with his restraints. One of the supervisory nurses saw it and quickly injected a sedative. Marylou had the presence of mind to object. “No,” she said, “I wish you hadn’t done that. He’s trying to regain control. What he needs, I think, is the
opposite
of a sedative.”

“No, madam,” the nurse sniffed. “We know what we’re doing.”

Still unnerved from Jon’s ordeal—and now a bit peeved by the nurse’s attitude—Shannon happened to notice the slip of paper in Jon’s shirt pocket. Something prompted her to take it out and read it. “Anyone know what
chloral hydrate
means?” she asked.

“You bet!” said an intern on duty, who sprang into action, asking, “You’re his wife, I understand? Was he taking any sleep medications?”

“No. Jon sleeps like a baby,” Shannon replied.

“I hate to ask this, but . . . did he seem depressed recently? Did he have any suicidal inclinations?”

Shannon shook her head emphatically. “He’d be the very last person on earth to try anything like that.”

The intern was joined by Jason Hopkins, MD, the chief internist at Massachusetts General Hospital. Apparently, word had traveled quickly regarding a certain Harvard celebrity in the ER. For once, Shannon was grateful for her husband’s celebrity status.

Hopkins read the slip proffered by the intern and checked Jon’s vital signs while dictating to an attending nurse: “Blood pressure low: 80 over 50. Pulse rapid: 120 beats per . . . Breathing shallow, apparent hypothermia. . . . Pupils pinpointed. Patient comatose. . . .”

And indeed, Jon had lapsed back into deep sleep.

Shannon and Marylou exchanged a glance. At Shannon’s nod, Marylou informed the doctor about the sedative the nurse had administered.

“What?”
he bellowed. “How come it’s not on the record? Which nurse? That one?”

Marylou nodded.

“We’ll discuss this later, ma’am!” he said, glaring at the nurse. “Now get me five hundred milligrams of caffeine sodium benzoate for injection—
immediately
.”

All the excitement was doing little for Shannon’s nerves. “What’s the situation, Doctor?” she asked, blinking back tears.

He removed his stethoscope and asked, “Was he taking medications of any kind, especially barbiturates?”

“Nothing. Other than an occasional vitamin.”

“Well, all the symptoms are quite consistent with chloral hydrate overdosage—or even poisoning. The slip in his pocket seems accurate in that respect. Strange that it should even have been there.”

“But what are his chances?”

Dr. Hopkins seemed to ignore her as he took Jon’s blood pressure again. “Nurse!” he barked. “It’s only 66 over—what? Can’t even tell. We could be losing him.” He called out, “Gastric lavage! Possible Code Blue! And where’s that caffeine? Oh . . . thank you, nurse.” He now injected the caffeine into Jon’s arm.

Then he turned to Shannon. “Sorry, Mrs. Weber, first things first. I just ordered a stomach pump that will replace the contents of your husband’s stomach with sterile water. That’s to clear out any remaining toxins.”

“But he will . . . he will pull through, won’t he?” She heard her voice break with apprehension.

“It all depends on how much toxin he ingested. I understand that one of the paramedics thinks it was in his coffee. Does he use cups or mugs?”

“Mugs,” Marylou interjected.

Hopkins frowned as he made the obvious comment, “They hold more.”

A tube was inserted into Jon’s mouth and down his esophagus. The dual procedure began: infusion and evacuation, much as a dentist treats the mouths of his patients. Jon stirred a bit during the process, which all interpreted as a positive sign.

When the procedure was completed, Dr. Hopkins said, “Now it all depends on his blood pressure, Mrs. Weber.” Again they cuffed Jon’s left arm and pumped.

The pressure released in a welcome hiss. “Good,” Hopkins said. “We’re at 92 over 64. Better than the last. If he keeps this up, he should soon be out of the woods.”

Shannon slumped down onto the couch where Marylou was already seated.

The older woman put a comforting arm around her, and Shannon finally surrendered to her tears.

Jon slowly felt himself coming to. He’d been only vaguely aware of being whisked to the hospital, but there was no doubt now that’s exactly where he was. He shook his head and tried hard to focus on those around him. “Shannon, sweetheart,” he said thickly. “I’ll be okay, I think.”

She threw her arms about him.

Eventually Jon’s mind was clear enough to relate the full story to all present, including a detail from the Boston police who had stood in the background until the medical procedures were completed. The Hub’s finest sprang into action at once. They radioed colleagues at Logan to arrest Osman al-Ghazali but learned that he was long gone. They had only slightly better luck with Waste Management, Inc., of Somerville, which supposedly handled refuse from Cambridge. The dispatcher there wanted to get the details from Jon, particularly the time and place of the garbage pickup, so the police officer handed the phone to Jon, and he was able to respond with reasonable clarity.

“And exactly
what
is it that you’re looking for?” the man asked.

“A valuable codex . . . that’s an ancient book of manuscript pages sewn together.”

“Oh. Sorry. That’d be impossible to retrieve, Professor, because Harvard tries to show the world how to recycle—green’s their favorite color, not crimson—but you know that. So your book is probably being recycled, even as we speak.”

A stab of despair hit Jon as he handed the phone back to the officer. Both his hands turned into fists, and if Osman al-Ghazali had been within range, he personally would have throttled the traitor for manuscript murder. “It’s destroyed,” he told the women. “This precious, precious treasure is now being
recycled
, if you can believe it! Into what? Maybe toilet paper . . .”

Obviously in despair, Shannon and Marylou appeared to search for appropriate words but found none.

The phone rang. It was the dispatcher again, and he wanted to talk to Jon.

“I had it wrong, Professor,” he said. “Turns out that the recycling plant is shut down for repairs, so as of a couple days ago, they’re trucking all waste to the North Andover landfill so that it doesn’t pile up.”

“That’s wonderful news!” Jon said.

“Well, I’m not sure why. . . . I really hate to tell you this, but our chances of actually
finding
that thing in the landfill are next to impossible. A needle in a haystack would be easier.”

“Please, please,” Jon said, “I really beg of you. You
must
try to save one of the most important documents in the history of Western civilization.”

“We’ll do our best, Professor, but I’m afraid . . . Well, we’ll really try.”

They wanted to keep Jon at Mass General that night, but he would have none of it. His wits had now returned and fury was burning through his brain, yet he was still rational enough to let Shannon take the wheel on the drive back to Weston.

Early the next morning, Waste Management phoned again. “It was truck number 68, Professor Weber, that picked up the waste from Harvard Yard about noon yesterday. Driver was Jim Peabody—a good reliable fellow from Bar Harbor, Maine. That’s pronounced ‘Bah Habah’ up there!”