Near Death

by Glenn Cooper

  “Miguel! I wasn’t expecting you.”

  “Well, my friend, it’s the time of year when people traditionally exchange presents. Here.”

  Alex accepted the package and said, “You’re embarrassing me. I’ve got nothing for you.”

  “Oh, I think you do. Ten thousand dollars.”

  Alex tore at the paper, muttering, “Christ, you’re joking! I’d no idea you’d finished.”

  Nestled inside a cardboard box was a screw-capped bottle, three-quarters filled with fine, snowy-white crystals.

  “Just over nine grams,” Cifuentes said proudly.

  “My God!” Alex said. “That’s a huge amount!”

  “I’m a very good chemist, Alex. And I’ve been working my butt off. I’ve got a method that produces excellent yields. I made the most stable of the possible isomeric forms, one with alternating cis and trans moieties. Here’s the structure.” He fished out a folded three-by-five card from his pocket.

  Alex was overcome. “Unbelievable. This is really unbelievable. I can’t thank you enough, Miguel.” He blinked away some tears and added, “You’re a lifesaver, know that, mate?”

  “Sure I am.” Cifuentes chuckled. “So listen, I’ve got to run. My wife’s going to kill me. I was in the lab all night doing the last purification step.”

  Alex told him to wait for a second, hurried into his office and pulled open the desk drawer to retrieve his checkbook. The letter opener was there, shiny enough to reflect his dark eyes.

  He gently touched the edge of the blade and asked his father to wait.

  Less than a mile away, Cyrus was at a coffee shop on Brookline Avenue nervously checking his watch with the anticipation of a teenager. He had a nice warm table away from the entrance and was nursing a dark roast. Emily was only a few minutes late but he couldn’t help wondering if he was being stood up.

  When she arrived she was bundled against the cold, her face half hidden in a scarf. She unwrapped it on the way to his table, exposing frosted cheeks. Sliding into the booth, she said hello and told him she’d need to keep her coat on till she warmed up.

  “It’s brutal out there,” Cyrus agreed.

  “I’m always cold,” she said. “It’s my southern blood.”

  By the time her cappuccino arrived, she’d peeled off her gloves and removed her coat. They were done talking about the weather.

  “I’m glad we could get together,” Cyrus said.

  “I’m sorry it took a while to arrange. One of the doctors on my service broke her leg. It’s been hectic covering for her.”

  He watched her sip at her coffee and suppressed a smile when it made a foamy moustache. “So, listen,” he began. “I want to apologize.”

  “For what?”

  “For unloading on you the first time we met. It wasn’t cool.”

  “You don’t have to apologize, Mister O’Malley.”

  “No, I do. It was a knee-jerk reaction.”

  “But perfectly understandable.”

  “You think so?”

  “There’s nothing harder than having a sick child—nothing. The rules of civility can be legitimately suspended.”

  He smiled at that. “For how long?”

  “Well, not indefinitely.” She laughed. “But seriously, I’m sure it would have been better if both you and your ex-wife had participated in the decision to have me consult on Tara’s case. You were blindsided.”

  “I was.”

  “How’s she doing?” she asked.

  He rubbed his hands together, a nervous habit he’d recently picked up, but he stopped doing it out of self-consciousness when she noticed the gesture. “Every day she fades a little, sort of like an old photograph left in the sun. We’re losing her.”

  He didn’t want to cry but his eyes began to sting. She responded by reaching out and touching his hand. It was a momentary gesture but feeling three cool fingertips against his skin was strangely calming.

  Her blue eyes were damp too. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “She’s such a sweet child. It tears your heart out.”

  She’s not putting it on, he thought. She loves my little girl too. “I don’t want to let her go,” he whispered.

  “I know you don’t.”

  He looked away, focusing on a bus passing outside. He filled his lungs with a stuttering inhalation and said, “This thou perceiv’st, which makes thy love more strong, To love that well, which thou must leave ere long.”

  She looked at him quizzically and said, “That’s beautiful. What is it?”

  “Shakespeare. Sonnet Seventy-three, if memory serves.”

  “An FBI agent who quotes Shakespeare?”

  “I was a literature major in college—well, before I dropped out of college.”

  “You’re an interesting man, Mister O’Malley.”

  “Is if okay if you call me Cyrus?”

  “Yes, if you call me Emily.”

  “Deal.” He waited for several moments before asking, “Can I see you again?”

  She smiled but shook her head. “I don’t think so, Cyrus.”

  “Are you seeing someone?”

  “I’m seeing your daughter! She’s my patient.”

  “I’m not up on the rules of engagement here,” he confessed. “Would a date violate some kind of ethical canon?”

  “Yes,” she said softly.

  “Well, I wouldn’t want to do that. What if you just agreed to have another coffee with me in the new year? Would that be okay?”

  Her eyes sparkled when she said, “That would be delightful.”

  He called for the check. “Do you know a neurologist named Alex Weller?” he asked suddenly.

  She nodded. “Sure I do. He’s on staff at Children’s. I’ve seen his name in Tara’s chart. He saw her for her seizures. Why do you ask?”

  “Just curious. What do you know about him as a person?”

  “Not very much. We’re not close. He seems very professional. I’ve only seen him a single time in a social setting.”

  “When was that?”

  “He invited me to his house a couple of years ago after he heard me give a talk on modern perspectives on Kübler-Ross’s On Death and Dying. Apparently, he’s had a long-running salon.”

  “The Uroboros Society.”

  She furrowed her brow. “You’ve heard of it.”

  “What was your take on it?”

  “I didn’t completely love it, to be honest. I found it a little creepy, a little too fringe for my taste; kind of a hippie-ish approach to the subject of death. They didn’t do anything when I was there, but I think they’ve used drugs to get into group altered states. Not for me!”

  “Do you think a guy like that should be seeing kids?”

  She got up and put on her coat. “I wouldn’t begin to judge him by one glimpse of his extracurricular activities. He’s got a sterling reputation around the hospital. Why the interest?”

  “Just asking,” Cyrus said. “He’s kind of on my radar screen.”

  “What is it?” Jessie asked.

  “Guess,” Alex replied.

  He’d surprised her by coming home early. She’d been vacuuming the rugs when he snuck up and pulled the plug from the wall, countering her fright with a bear hug that turned her screams into squeals.

  He led her to the kitchen table, unfolded a small square of the red wrapping paper and revealed a tiny mound of white crystals. One sneeze and the crystals would be gone.

  “Is it your Uroboros chemical?”

  “It is.”

  “Oh my God, Alex,” she said with wonderment. “Have you tried it yet?”

  “No yet.”

  “When?”

  “Now, if you’ll be my guardian angel.”

  “Of course I will. How much are you going to take?”

  “It’s a bit of a shot in the dark, so many damned variables; but my best calculation is that half a milligram ought to be equivalent to the liquid dose.”

  “Is there enough for me when you’re done
?” she asked expectantly.

  He took another red square from his breast pocket. “Would I leave my sweetheart out in the cold?”

  She kissed him and with the taste of her lip gloss on his tongue he licked the mound of crystals off of the paper and led her by the hand to the bedroom.

  Eighteen

  His heart leaped. Everything was the same: the floating, the tunnel, the light, the pale green terrain, the gurgling sound of the river of light.

  Then, there he was—Dickie Weller with his red cap waving him on as before, every bit as beckoning.

  Alex’s joy was overwhelming as he took his first step onto the smooth river stone. Over the sounds of turbulent flow, he heard his father egging him on in that boisterous voice of his. At the midway point, Alex looked beyond Dickie, searching for the presence on the horizon. There was a hint of the otherness, not as powerful as he’d remembered, but something definitely was out there—something amazing, something divine. He’d have to get closer.

  Yet, despite his father’s plaintive exhortations and his own irresistible urge to reach the other bank, his feet became rooted at the halfway point. There was nothing he could do. No amount of physical or mental strain would allow him to lift his leg off the stepping-stone onto another.

  Then all at once, he had the sickening, helpless feeling of being peeled backward, away from the river, away from the greenness, back into the tunnel and back onto his bed—where he awoke, his chest heaving.

  “Alex!” Jessie exclaimed. “It’s over. You’re back!” She was holding him. He felt her hot breath against his face.

  He started to cry, succumbing to a perfect blend of joy and sorrow. “Everything was the same,” he sputtered. “My father was there … the river … but …”

  “But what?”

  “It was amazing, Jessie, I won’t say it wasn’t … but I couldn’t get as close to the other side. I didn’t feel the intensity of that presence beyond the horizon. It was all the same but dialed down a few notches. Christ, though, don’t get me wrong, it was great, insanely great.”

  He downed a mug of cold water in a series of violent gulps and let the spillage drip down his chin onto his chest.

  “Are you hungry?” she asked.

  He shook his head.

  “Is it okay if I take mine now?”

  He kissed her forehead. “You want to see your grandmother, don’t you?”

  “Desperately.”

  He pushed himself off the bed. “Give me a minute to get myself together. Then it’s your turn.”

  He was stroking her arm when her eyes fluttered closed and he maintained tactile contact during her entire trip. Her face was a window. Through it, he could glean what she was experiencing: the exhilaration of hurtling through the tunnel, the pleasure of emerging into the other realm, the ecstasy of the river, the comfort of seeing her grandmother and, finally, the shock of being pulled all the way back to their bed. She was out for just under thirty minutes. While he was under the influence, his own perception of time had been hopelessly confused. He wouldn’t have been surprised if his trip had lasted a second or a week.

  He could see her eyelids start to lift and wanted to make sure his face was there for her to see. He smiled at her first recognition and lightly kissed her lips. “Hey, you,” he said.

  “Hey.”

  “You okay?”

  She nodded. “The same thing happened to me, Alex. I couldn’t get as close. She wanted me to come but I couldn’t get there.”

  “I know.”

  “It was unbelievable but not like the last time. The last time was better but it was still great.”

  She began to weep. He held her tightly, giving her comfort and said, “Don’t worry, baby, you’re home now.”

  She closed her eyes and regretfully replied, “But I’m not, Alex. This isn’t my home. That was.”

  The first solid break in the case came from grunt work. Cyrus’s idea was simple enough: they knew the probable dates on which the murders took place. Though he wasn’t a suspect—the evidence was far too thin—Alex Weller was nevertheless a person of interest. He’d been conveniently logged into the security desk of his lab on each of these nights. Yet what if he’d been able to sneak out of the complex, pick up hookers in the South End, kill them and dump them? He didn’t do these things on foot. He had to be using a car.

  Inside Avakian’s office was a tripod with a map of Boston. Likely routes from the Longwood medical area to the South End were lined in red and the location of public or private closed-circuit TV cameras were marked with black pins. An assistant U.S. attorney in Boston obtained subpoenas from each CCTV operator covering the relevant nights and the result was a Mount Everest of digital data.

  There weren’t any shortcuts. He checked with DMV about the possible vehicle: human eyes had to scan hundreds of hours of CCTV output looking for a white Honda sedan, Alex Weller’s car. And if they found any likely matches, there needed to be a screen grab that captured Weller’s license plate.

  Cyrus got Minot to sign off on a requisition to bring in a couple of retired special agents for contract work. So, for a modest per diem, two former Boston bureau agents, Harriet Hillman and Timothy Bell, sat in a darkened room drinking coffee and watching mind-numbing black-and-white footage of nocturnal streets.

  Two days after Christmas, Hillman was staring at a feed from a camera atop one of the parking garages at the Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital. She pushed the Pause button to put a few drops of Visine into her dry eyes. When she blotted away the excess with a Kleenex she noticed half of a white car in the frame. She punched the Slow-Motion button and hit Pause again when the rear end of the car came into view.

  “Tim!” she screamed. Her video partner almost detached himself from his chair but soon he was agreeing with her that it was a Honda Accord and that three of the license plate numbers were clearly visible. This was Weller’s car. The date was 23 October. The time was 1:18 A.M. Carla Goslinga had been murdered that night.

  The next day, Cyrus and Avakian showed up without warning at Alex’s lab. If he wasn’t there, they’d try his home address in Cambridge. Cyrus wanted an element of surprise to catch him off guard.

  Frank Sacco had been washing glassware at one of the sinks and had a towel in his hand when he answered the door. He audibly grunted at their presence and told them to wait. His boss, he told them, was in the back.

  Three men filled up Weller’s stuffy office and seemed to suck the oxygen out of it. Cyrus and his partner stood while Alex remained behind his desk, staring at them with wary suspiciousness. Avakian moved to shut the door but Alex told him he didn’t mind it open. With Sacco nearby, Avakian shrugged and left the door ajar.

  “We want to talk about the night of October twenty-third,” Cyrus began.

  “What about it?”

  “You told us you were working all night in this lab.”

  “If that’s what I told you. I’d have to check my calendar again. I don’t have a photographic memory of these things.”

  “Go ahead and check,” Avakian urged.

  Alex sighed and opened the calendar on his desktop computer. A few clicks and he said impassively, “Yes, I worked that night.”

  “All night?” Cyrus asked. “Without leaving the lab once?”

  “All night. I had an experiment running.”

  “Then how do you explain this?” Cyrus produced a timestamped photo of Weller’s car at the corner of Brookline Ave and Francis Street.

  Alex studied it and as he did, Cyrus observed the man’s face. Aside from a furrowed brow, he gave nothing away.

  Finally, Alex said, “I’m afraid I don’t have an explanation.”

  “Is that your car?” Avakian demanded.

  “It appears to be, yes.”

  “And you park it in the faculty lot on Longwood Ave?”

  Alex nodded.

  “Was the car there the next day when you clocked out?” Avakian continued to press.

  “I suppose
it was,” Alex answered somewhat wearily. “I have no recollection of it being otherwise.”

  Cyrus leaned over the desk and took the sheet from Weller’s hand. “Then let me ask you again, how do you explain this?” He was beginning to feel triumphant. He was one step away from having probable cause to seize the car for a full forensic romp.

  Alex took a deep breath and seemed as though he were about to repeat his befuddlement when Sacco poked his head in. “I’m sorry for listening,” he said in his heavy townie accent. “I couldn’t help hearing what you were saying. Don’t you remember, Alex? That was the night I picked your car up and took it back to Revere to do the brakes for you.”

  Alex brightened. “Yes! I remember now. Thank you for eavesdropping—ordinarily, not a virtue, but under the circumstances, quite useful.”

  “What are you, a mechanic or a lab tech?” Avakian sounded fed up.

  “I know my way around cars,” Frank replied with a toothy smile. “I make a few bucks on the side.”

  “And you can verify this?” Cyrus asked.

  Frank shrugged. “I think I’ve got the Honda’s original calipers and rotors in my garage. Want them?”

  “Yeah, we want them,” Cyrus said bitterly.

  When the FBI agents were gone Alex summoned Frank back into his office. “Thank you,” he said.

  “No problem.”

  “Why did you do that for me? You fixed my brakes in September.”

  “You’ve done a lot for me, Alex. Forget about it.”

  “These guys have been up my butt over something.”

  Frank waved him off. “You don’t have to tell me anything.”

  “I owe you for this,” Alex said. “I owe you big time, mate.”

  Frank half smiled. “I’m sure you’ll find a way to pay me back.”

  Nineteen

  New Year’s Eve was harshly cold. It started to snow in the evening, a few fat flakes progressing to flurries, the thin outer bands of a proper nor’easter. As the wind picked up into the night, so did the snowfall until there was a good accumulation with much more to come. Throughout the city, nocturnal plans were being scuttled. There was a general hunkering down to see in the New Year at home.

  Avakian pulled off the quintessential suburban swap that evening. He sent his fourteen-year-old daughter to baby-sit at his neighbor’s house and had the couple over to drink martinis and watch a DVD.