Tail Spin ft-12

by Catherine Coulter

  “Timothy,” Savich said, studying him even as he took his hand. “Are you all right?”

  “I’m in fine fettle.” MacLean grinned maniacally. “What with all the excitement, I’m ready for some fast music so I can do a victory dance with Louise here. Hot damn, can she ever move. You should have seen her, Savich. Runs in and BAM! Shoots the guy in the arm.”

  “Which arm, Timothy?” Savich asked.

  “Hmmm, now, which was it? The right, that’s it; it was his right arm. He dropped the needle.”

  “You’re Agent Savich? I’m chief of security, William Hayward. I called you.”

  Savich quickly shook his hand. “Thank you for calling me.” Hayward was a small fine-boned older man with a good build, nicely pressed pants, and smart eyes. Savich pegged him as a retired cop. “Hell of a business,” the chief said, shaking his head. “I’m thinking I should check into the nurses’ training curriculum—can you believe one of our nurses shot the guy?”

  Savich then turned to MacLean. He heard Sherlock introduce herself to Hayward, heard his quiet voice telling her what they were doing.

  Savich said, “Tell me what happened, Timothy.”

  “Well, the thing is, I was asleep. Then there was a sliver of light, right in my eyes. The door had opened, and the light was from the hallway. This guy walks in, a guy I’ve never seen before. He just strolls in like he belongs, smiles at me when he sees I’m awake, says he’s sorry to disturb me, but he’s a neurosurgeon and my doctor asked him to see me, and sure enough, he’s all dressed in green scrubs, a mask over his face, a stethoscope around his neck, those paper booties on his feet. I’ll admit, at first I simply accepted what he said, so many white coats and green scrubs all over, in and out of here, like Grand Central.

  “He comes toward me, talking all the time, telling me everything again, like I’m not a doctor and don’t already know everything he’s talking about, and even repeated how my doctor wanted him to check me out, and he’s sorry it’s so late but he just came out of an emergency surgery, didn’t even have time to change, and I say, ‘Why do I need a neurosurgeon? And what’s with the mask?’

  “And the guy stops cold in his tracks and I swear to you, he hisses, just like a snake. He pulls out a needle and I see it’s capped, and right away I know there’s something hinky in that needle, something real nasty bad for me in there. I yell out for Agent Tomlin, but there’s no answer. The man tells me I’m one lucky son of a bitch, but enough is enough. And he hisses again, amazing—like nothing I’ve ever heard before.

  “I hear Louise’s voice outside the door, and then the door slams open and there’s Louise, a gun in her hand, and this guy whirls toward her, and bless her heart, she doesn’t hesitate, she shoots him. The guy hisses again, drops the needle, grabs his arm, yells at me that I am a dead man, and bolts to the door. He knocks Louise flat on her ass. I yell after him to stop, and Louise raises the gun again to shoot him, but she hits the bathroom door.”

  “Yeah, she did,” Hayward said. “A fine shot. That door’s not moving.”

  MacLean said, smiling, “That wasn’t bad, Chief.”

  “I’ve got the needle,” Hayward said. He handed the needle, still capped and carefully wrapped up in his own handkerchief, to Sherlock.

  Savich asked, “Did you recognize his voice, Timothy?”

  “Well, no, he had that mask on. It muffled his voice.”

  “It was a man?”

  MacLean looked at Sherlock. “I don’t think it was a woman, but it all happened so fast—no, I’d have to say it was a man.”

  “Young? Old?”

  MacLean looked at Sherlock. “Again, he had that mask over his face, mouth included. I don’t know.”

  “All right, that’s good, Timothy,” Savich said. “Tell us again what happened then. Slow down.”

  Sherlock saw MacLean was beginning to come off his adrenaline high, and she began to stroke his forearm.

  “I’ll tell you, it was wild. Louise was yelling, ‘Code blue! Get security!’ And then Louise was in here with me. She was panting, looking hard at me, and she was shaking all over like she’d had the life nearly scared out of her. Then she folded her arms over her chest, stared at Agent Tomlin’s gun, which was still in her right hand, and she started laughing and crying at the same time. I watched her lay the gun very carefully on the table.

  “She started examining me then, feeling me up, that’s what I told her, and then she stopped and cocked her head toward the door. We saw all these hospital people working on Agent Tomlin. It sounded like pandemonium to me. I asked her to call you, Agent Savich, and she told me she’d tell Chief Hayward and he’d do it, that was better.

  “Bless her heart, she was so upset, so excited, so relieved that I was okay. She hugged me, real hard, hurt my ribs, but I just hugged her back. She did really good. She saved my life.”

  “She certainly did,” Sherlock agreed.

  FORTY-THREE

  Nurse Louise Wingo said from the doorway, “I’ve never been so scared in my life.” She looked down at her watch. “It’s after one o’clock in the morning, Dr. MacLean. You need to rest.”

  “Rest? For what reason, I ask you? Please don’t tell me it’ll improve my quality of life. You can come here if you want to, Louise, and you can hug me some more. You should have seen her, Savich. She came running in, brought the gun up, and shot the guy, no muss, no fuss. No, Louise, don’t bother telling me I need to rest. My brain’s working at a great clip, and I’m fine.” He beamed a happy face at everyone. “I haven’t had this great an adrenaline kick in a very long time.”

  Louise said to them, “Mine is probably higher than his.” She fanned herself, and grinned. “Wow, was that ever incredible! No way my husband’s going to believe it. He thinks the night shift is boring. Wait’ll he hears this.

  “Thank God you’re okay, Dr. MacLean. I’m so relieved Mrs. MacLean wasn’t here. She left about eleven.”

  “You’re right about that,” MacLean said. “Molly would have jumped on him, and he might have hurt her. I’m thanking you for her, too, Louise.”

  Sherlock said, “Jack told us that Molly looks after her own. If she saw anyone trying to hurt anybody in her family, she’d go nuts.”

  MacLean said, “That’s the truth. Usually I’m the one on her bad side. Louise, she’s going to bring you chocolate chip cookies for a year. Be prepared.”

  Louise said to them, “Actually, Mrs. MacLean already brought us homemade goodies. She crochets afghans while she sits with Dr. MacLean. We let her stay as long as she wants to.”

  MacLean said, “Molly fusses and nags, she’s always asking me how I’m feeling, what I’m thinking, as if she can stop the dementia from getting worse that way. I finally talked her into going home. She agreed, said I was someone else’s pain until tomorrow, and she kissed me good-bye.” MacLean closed his eyes, swallowed. “If she’d been here, that bastard wouldn’t have hesitated to kill her, too.” He looked over at Louise. “Thank you, Louise. Any of those yahoo doctors give you grief, you just give me a holler. I’ll take care of them for you.”

  Sherlock said, “I’ll call Molly first thing in the morning, tell her you’re okay. No sense in worrying her tonight.”

  “Careful, Dr. MacLean,” Louise said, “you’ve nearly dislodged the IV line.” Sherlock saw that her hands were steady as she worked on the line. She straightened, lightly ran her hand over his forearm. “You’re good to go now. Please, try to calm down.”

  MacLean said, “Yeah, yeah, I’ll have enough time to be calm when I’m dead. How’s poor Agent Tomlin?”

  “I heard one of the doctors say it was probably a load of sedative punched in his neck, but since he’s already beginning to come out of it, it either wasn’t much or he jerked away so not all of it went in. He’s stable, still really drowsy. He should be okay, just out for a while. That’s all we have so far.”

  Sherlock saw Dillon speaking to Chief Hayward. He looked up and said to her, “Chief Haywar
d’s got all the hospital security searching the building and grounds, but he could use more people. I’m going to give Ben Raven a call, wake him up. He’ll get more cops down here to help the security people.”

  They wouldn’t find the man, Sherlock thought, and she hated that she was so certain. This was well planned, he knew how to get in and out. But maybe— “What about video?”

  Chief Hayward said, “I called down to set it up.”

  Sherlock leaned down and whispered next to MacLean’s ear, “All in all, none of us can complain.”

  “Poor Agent Tomlin can,” MacLean said.

  Ten minutes later, Savich and Sherlock went inside the small hospital security room near the front entrance. There were twelve video screens, ten of them running live feeds from cameras at locations inside the hospital.

  Chief Hayward said, “We’ve got a camera at the entrance to the hospital, one camera on each floor. I asked Fritz to pull up two tapes of where the assailant would have had to walk to get to Dr. Mac-Lean’s room.”

  Fritz said, “I couldn’t locate the assailant coming into the hospital. I will have to look earlier. This tape is from Dr. MacLean’s floor.”

  They all watched the screen. Chief Hayward said, “Stop. Look, that must be him, the guy in surgical scrubs, a mask over his face, and a cap on his head. If it was during the day, someone would have wondered who the hell he was since no one wears a mask in the hallway. There’s no reason for that. He’s also wearing surgical gloves, so no fingerprints. Sorry about the quality of the film, but we should be able to make him out okay.”

  They watched the man walk toward the camera. He turned a corner just past the nurses’ station and disappeared.

  “Okay,” Chief Hayward said. “Fast-forward, Fritz.”

  “Stop, there he is,” Savich said a couple of seconds later.

  Fritz froze the screen.

  Sherlock said, “Okay, three minutes have elapsed and here he comes. And she thought, It took so little time. In three minutes Timothy could have been killed. She said, “He’s walking really fast, and he’s holding his arm. There’s blood seeping through his fingers. He’s got his head down. About all I can say so far is he isn’t fat.”

  “He’s still got the mask and cap on,” Fritz said. “Bummer.”

  They watched him until he disappeared.

  Chief Hayward said, “Okay, let’s see if he leaves through the front. Roll the other tape, Fritz.” The film sped up, then slowly, Fritz brought it back to real time.

  Chief Hayward said, “Stop, Fritz, you got him. I think that’s him—the timing’s about right, five minutes have passed. He looks about the same size, same build, and the loose clothes.”

  The manonthefilmwaswearingawatchcappulledlowonhis forehead, touching the rims of dark sunglasses. He was wearing loose blue jeans, a large pale blue shirt that hung outside his pants, a baggy off-white linen jacket, and moccasins. For an instant, they were looking directly at his face, only they couldn’t see him clearly.

  Chief Hayward said, “He’s still walking slowly and you can tell he’s favoring his arm. It’s gotta hurt like a bear. One of my men found a couple drops of blood on the floor of Dr. MacLean’s corridor and marked the spot for you. It doesn’t necessarily have to be our guy, but it’s likely.”

  Savich said, “His blood will nail him when we catch him. He took a big chance, walking right up to Agent Tomlin, shoving that needle in his neck, knowing the nurses’ station wasn’t more than thirty feet away. I’d say he’s really motivated, determined, maybe really angry.”

  They watched him walk out of the front entrance of the hospital. Chief Hayward said, “We didn’t catch the guy coming into the hospital. He must have scoped out the camera locations, learned the hospital layout, all the particulars. He’s not stupid. He came late, the optimum time. Sorry, but we don’t have any outdoor cameras.”

  “It’s something,” Sherlock said. “Thank you, Chief. I’d say someone is more than motivated, more than just angry. I’d say they’re obsessed.”

  Savich said, “We’ll get you some photos of all the players we know of so your people can show them around. We might get lucky.”

  Chief Hayward nodded, but he didn’t look hopeful. “This guy is careful. But maybe someone saw him near the OR. All I can say with any certainty is that he’s about average height, average build, and wears really loose clothes.”

  Sherlock nodded. “Fritz, can you rewind it again?”

  When he did, she said, “Okay, now watch. I’m thinking he looks young, too. Watch him walk, the way he moves.”

  “Freeze that frame, Fritz,” Chief Hayward said. “Look, he’s sort of slouching, bent over. Sure, he’s hurting, his arm must feel like it’s burning off, but I’m not as sure as you are.”

  “If he is a young man,” Savich said, “he’s probably hired.”

  Sherlock was shaking her head. “That doesn’t sound right. From what Timothy said, it sounded like it was up close and personal to me, not like an impersonal hired gun.”

  “You’re right,” Savich said, and plowed his fingers through his hair, making it stand on end. “My brain’s on default mode.” He looked down at his Mickey Mouse watch. It was nearly three A.M.

  Savich looked at Sherlock and said, “Let’s check on Agent Tomlin, then go home.”

  FORTY-FOUR

  Washington, D.C.

  Late Saturday morning

  Pierre Barbeau answered the front door, eyed them with resignation, and stepped back. “Tommy called me from downstairs. What is it you want now?”

  “We’d like to speak to you and your wife, Mr. Barbeau,” Savich said, his eyes on Pierre’s right arm. He was wearing a ratty old blue velvet bathrobe, with thick, loose sleeves that could easily cover a bandage. He looked like he’d just gotten out of bed. He looked tired, defensive—shattered, and just maybe—afraid. But to Savich’s eye, taking all of him in, he simply didn’t look like he’d been shot in the arm.

  Pierre said, “I don’t know why. Listen, Estelle and I, we’re—we’re only trying to cope. We’ve told you everything. My wife won’t want to speak to you, either of you. I can tell you that, and believe me, she usually gets what she wants.”

  Sherlock wanted to tell him that she usually got what she wanted, as well, but she merely smiled at him as Dillon said, “We checked with your night doorman. He said both of you were out from about ten o’clock until two a.m. Where did you go?”

  “Why? Who cares?” He got two hard-as-nails looks and dead silence, and backed up a step. Then he gave them the French cop-out, a shrug that said nothing and everything. “Oh, I see, something else has happened, hasn’t it? You think we’re behind it, whatever it is, and it happened last night. Is that it?”

  “Please tell us where you were, Mr. Barbeau,” Sherlock said.

  “Very well. I don’t suppose it matters. My wife and I couldn’t stand looking at each other’s pain, and so we went out walking. It was nice, last night, the moon was nearly full, and so we walked in High Banks Park. Maybe an hour, give or take. We went into a gallery that was having a special showing and was open late. We stayed there until nearly midnight, then we stopped at a bar. We drank too much, but it didn’t help. We came back here. I didn’t check the time. We went to bed. I woke up when Tommy rang up a few minutes ago.”

  “The name of the gallery, Mr. Barbeau?” Sherlock asked, her pen poised above her small black notebook.

  “The Penyon Gallery on Wisconsin.”

  “What was the special showing?”

  “American artists, modern stuff, you know, all squiggles and blobs of thick paint, something Jean David did with great enthusiasm when he was three, only he didn’t use paints.” He gave a brief ghastly smile, his voice hitching on his son’s name. He raised his left arm to press his fingers briefly to his forehead. No bullet wound in that arm, for sure.

  Sherlock waited a beat, then asked, “The name of the bar?”

  “Who remembers the name of a bar? I certa
inly don’t. We’d never been there before. I remember it wasn’t very far from the gallery.”

  Sherlock leaned in close. “What did you and your wife talk about, Mr. Barbeau?”

  “Nothing, really. Nothing important. We are both too miserable to do anything but exist right now However, to be honest here, because we can’t seem to help ourselves, we occasionally speak about our son, and we did talk about Jean David while we walked in the park last night. We spoke about how much we loved him, how this shouldn’t have happened, how unfair it all is, how because of the threats from people like you, our son is dead.”

  Savich’s eyebrow shot up. “Threats?”

  Another shrug. “It would have come to threats if the authorities had gotten their hands on Jean David before he died. They would have threatened to deport us, freeze all our bank accounts, and send him to prison if he refused to sign a confession admitting to everything they could think of, even things he knew nothing about.”

  “You have quite an imagination, Mr. Barbeau,” Sherlock said easily. “But the fact is, none of that happened. Your son’s misdeeds died with him. I doubt the CIA will ever discover exactly what and how much your son passed on to the terrorists.”

  “He didn’t help the terrorists! Maybe some of it got to them, but the point is, he didn’t realize ... It was all that woman’s fault. She seduced him, twisted him up.” He stopped, shook his head. “Jean David was so young, so innocent until she got hold of him.”

  Jean David Barbeau was twenty-six when he drowned. Savich and Sherlock remained quiet.

  Pierre said, “At least it wasn’t raining last night. Dreadful weather here, simply dreadful.”

  “Your English is excellent, Mr. Barbeau,” Sherlock said.

  “It should be. My father was always traveling here to the States with me and my mother in tow. He consulted with Amtrak, you know, and we lived here for long stretches of time. I attended American private schools, attended Harvard for two years before going back to France to finish my education.”