H is for HOMICIDE

by Sue Grafton

  We parked in one of the visitors’ lots and crossed to the main entrance, passing under an arch. A fountain lined with blue-green tile splashed noisily in the center of a brick-paved court. Beyond the fountain was a bronze bust of Irene Dunne, the first lady of St. John’s. The place was massive, cream-colored blocks that had probably once been a fairly straightforward chunk of concrete. Now a portico jutted out in front, two wings flanked the building on either side, with a multistory addition looming up in the rear. It looked like most of the available land had been devoured by new construction, surrounding properties annexed as the space needs of the hospital grew. The rest of the neighborhood was a modest assortment of single-family dwellings, 1950s style. An ambulance passed us, emitting an occasional short howl. Its yellow lights were flashing, sirens off, as it headed for the emergency entrance.

  Wheelchair ramps swept up to the front on either side of the main entrance with a central staircase. We moved up the center steps and into the lobby with its muted maroon carpet and the spicy scent of carnations. To the left, an entire wall was devoted to listing the names of those who’d made significant financial contributions to St. John’s, the range extending from benefactors, to patrons, to fellows, to donors too miserly for categorization. On the far side of the wall, Admitting was dominated by a large oil painting of a curly-haired person looking heavenward in torment.

  Raymond inquired at the Patient Information desk for the whereabouts of ICU. I comforted myself that she must have been conscious when they brought her in or the cops never would have found out who she was. As far as I could tell, she’d had no identification with her.

  Behind me, I overheard a fragment of conversation. A woman said, “… so I says to this chick at the sheriff’s department, ‘What business-is it of yours? If he ain’t been charged with nothing, how come you’re talkin’ to his probation officer about it?’ That’s like a violation of his civil rights or something, isn’t it?…”

  Two wires connected in my brain, completing a circuit. I made the kind of “oh” sound that escapes your lips when you spill ice water down your front. I knew who Dr. Howard’s daughter was, the bride in the photograph. She was the civilian clerk who’d given me such a hard time at the S.T. County Sheriff’s Department when I was trying to get Bibianna’s address. Oh, hell, I had to get to a telephone. No wonder Dolan thought he had a leak!

  Raymond marched us to the elevator, which we took up to the second floor. When the doors opened, we turned right, passing the maternity ward, where a recently delivered mother, in robe and slippers, proceeded at half speed, touching the wall gingerly as she walked. Raymond was on his best behavior, moving quickly, his gaze front and center. I could see Luis’s eyes flick into an occasional empty room. I did likewise, unable to resist, though there wasn’t that much to see. The air already smelled of lunch.

  The wing designated 2-South housed Intensive Care, Coronary Care, the Cardiac Surgery Unit, and Intermediate Care behind closed double doors. A sign said AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY, with a wall-mounted telephone nearby. Apparently, you had to call in and get permission to enter the department itself. Four women sat in the adjacent waiting room, variously conversing and reading magazines. I could see a public pay phone, a magazine rack, a color television set. In the hallway, there were a water fountain and, in a niche, a statue of a male saint supporting baby Jesus by his bare bottom. The floor was made up of polished marble chips in squares with thin metal seams between.

  Luis took a seat on a beige leather bench, his knee jumping. A lab tech walked by with a fat tube of dark red blood. Luis got up and moved to the wall, where he studied three lines about the visiting hours. It was the first time I’d seen the two of them in a situation they couldn’t handle with machismo.

  Like Luis, Raymond was apparently one of those people made uneasy by illness. He was subdued, respectful. The ticcing had started up, the head jerk reminding me of the sort of startle reaction I sometimes experience when I’m on the verge of sleep. Hospital staff, catching sight of him, seemed to diagnose him in passing, thinking no more about it than I did at this point. From Raymond’s manner, I had to guess he’d been hospitalized as a child, subjected to medical processes that had left him edgy and alert. Almost imperceptibly, he slowed, shoving his hands in his pockets while he decided what to do next.

  He was just picking up the telephone when the double doors opened and a nurse emerged. She was a redhead, in her thirties, white pants suit, thick-soled white shoes, wearing a nursing school pin but no cap. “Can I help you?”

  “Yeah, uhm, I got a… my fianc��e was brought in last night. She was in this automobile accident? The cops said she was here. It’s Diaz, the last name… I was just wondering, you know, if I could see her.”

  She smiled pleasantly. “Just a minute, I’ll check.” She moved on to the waiting room, where she stuck her head in, beckoning to one of the visitors. The woman set her magazine aside and followed the nurse back through the double doors. I took the liberty of peering through the glass, but all I could see was an extension of the corridor and, at the far end of the hall, a glass-enclosed room furnished with monitoring equipment. The patient was barely visible and there was no way of knowing if it was Bibianna or not.

  Luis was shifting from foot to foot, fingers snapping softly. “Oh, man, I hate this. I’m going down to the lobby. You can pick me up on the way out. Maybe I’ll find the coffee shop and get me something to eat.”

  “Do it,” Raymond said.

  Luis crossed his arms and hugged himself casually. “You want me to get you some coffee, something like that?”

  “Just get outta here, Luis. I don’t give a shit.”

  “Maybe I’ll come back in a while,” he said. He glanced at me and then walked backward for a few steps, waiting to see if Raymond had any serious objections. Raymond seemed to be fighting his own inclination to bolt. Luis turned and headed toward the elevators.

  As soon as he was out of sight, I touched Raymond’s arm. “I think I’ll look for a ladies’ room, okay?”

  The nurse returned. “It’ll be a few minutes. The neurologist just left, but I think he’s still in the hospital. Would you like to have him paged?”

  “Uh, yeah. Could you do that?”

  “Of course. You can have a seat, if you like,” she said, indicating the waiting room.

  “She going to be okay?”

  “I really couldn’t say,” the nurse said. “I can have Dr. Cherbak talk to you about her condition as soon as he gets here. Your name is?”

  “Raymond. I’ll just wait. I don’t want to interrupt nobody…”

  “There’s a vending machine if you want to have some coffee.”

  “Can you tell me where the restrooms are?” I asked. God, couldn’t I think of any more imaginative way of getting away from these guys?

  The nurse pointed toward the corridor. “First door.”

  I went into the waiting room with Raymond. As soon as he sat down on the couch, I said, “I’ll be right back.”

  He could hardly pay attention, he was so uneasy by then. I walked away from him, trying to control myself, trying not to break into a run. I passed the restroom and kept going, looking for a place I could have a little privacy and the use of a telephone.

  Two-South segued back into 2-Main without any noticeable shift in floor covering or the wall colors, which were pale blue and pale beige, with a pattern of cattails or full-foliage trees in silhouette. I became aware that I had moved from near death to near birth, the signs on the wall pointing to Labor, Delivery, the Newborn Nursery, and the Fathers’ Waiting Room. I was looking for a pay phone, fumbling aside the gun in my bag for loose change, feeling panic mount as the seconds ticked away. Once I got the relevant information back to Dolan, I was out of there.

  I passed the desk on 2-Main. There was a counter to my left with wall-mounted monitors that showed green lines I assumed were vital signs.

  A black nurse coming out of a room marked “Staff Lounge�
�� nearly bumped into me. She was wearing an ankle-length white gown that tied in the back, a mask pushed up on the middle of her forehead like a pale green hump. She was in her forties, slim, with dark eyes and a clear, unlined face. “Can I help you?”

  “I sincerely hope so,” I said. ‘This is my situation and you just have to trust me on this. I’m a private investigator from Santa Teresa. I’m working undercover on an auto insurance fraud case and I’m here in the company of a thug who’s going to start looking for me any minute. I have to get a call through to Lieutenant Dolan up in Santa Teresa. Do you have a telephone I could use? I swear it won’t take long and it could save my life.”

  She looked at me with the blank contemplation of somebody assessing information. It must have been something in the tone I used, pure desperation overlaid with “earnest.”

  It certainly wasn’t anything in the way I looked. For once, I was telling the truth, using every cell in my being to convey my sincerity. She listened, brown eyes intent on my face as I spoke. It’s possible the tale I told was so preposterous she just didn’t think me capable of making it up. Without a word, she pointed toward a telephone on the desk behind the counter.

  Chapter 23

  *

  I went through the hospital operator, placing a person-to-person call to Dolan at the number he’d given me. While I waited for the call to be patched through, I read the bulletin board, which seemed devoted in equal parts to medical cartoons, notices of classes coming up, and menus for neighborhood fast-food restaurants offering free delivery. I was starving to death.

  When I heard Dolan’s voice, I closed my eyes and put a hand on my chest, patting myself with relief. “Lieutenant Dolan, this is Kinsey Millhone. I’m calling from St. John’s Hospital and I don’t have long.”

  “What’s up?”

  I started talking, my mind racing ahead, trying to organize the information as I spoke. “First of all, Bibianna Diaz is in ICU down here. She was run off the road last night ���”

  “I heard,” Dolan interjected.

  “You know about that?”

  “One of Santos’s men called me the minute the report came through. Hospital has orders to be polite to Raymond without letting him get anywhere near her hospital bed. They know what to do.”

  “Well, thank God for that.” I filled him in quickly on the situation to date, including the file I’d seen at Buddy’s Auto Body Shop. “I think I’ve figured out who the leak is up there.” I told him about Dr. Howard, the chiropractor, and the photo of his daughter. I had no idea what her married name was, but I gave him an accurate (though acid) description of her. As a civilian clerk working for the county sheriff’s department, she was in a perfect position to funnel information to her father, and through him to Raymond. The minute Bibianna was first arrested in Santa Teresa, Raymond would have known her whereabouts. A sudden thought occurred to me. “Lieutenant, do you know anything about the gun Parnell was murdered with? Raymond’s got a thirty-caliber broomhandle Mauser. I saw it in his dresser drawer.”

  Dolan cut in. “Forget Parnell for now and do me a favor. I want you to hang up and get the hell out of there.”

  “Why, what’s happening?”

  “Tate’s probably already on the premises. Hospital notified him late last night and he took off, heading south. If Raymond finds out he’s there, they’ll have a showdown for sure.”

  “Oh, shit.”

  Behind me, a woman doctor came into the nurses’ station, wearing surgical greens. She pulled off her cap and shook her hair out wearily. She paused to study me, hair rumpled, lines of exhaustion weighting down her face. I couldn’t tell if she wanted the telephone or the chair.

  Dolan was saying, “I got somebody down there who can help you out. Hold on. I got a call coming in…”

  I saw Raymond pass the desk, heading toward the elevators, probably in search of me. I couldn’t wait for Dolan. “I gotta go,” I said into dead air, and hung up. Every brain cell in my head was screaming at me to get out, but I couldn’t leave Jimmy Tate here without backup. I left the nurses’ station and trotted down the hall behind Raymond, finally catching up with him.

  I tapped him on the shoulder. “Hi, where did you go?”

  He turned and looked at me irritably. “Where the hell have you been? I’m off lookin’ for you.”

  “I went over to the nursery to see the newborns,” I said.

  “What for?”

  “I like babies. I might want to have one of my own someday, you know? They’re really cute, all tiny and puckery. They look like Cornish game hens.”

  “We ain’t here for that,” he said gruffly, though he seemed mollified by my explanation. He grabbed my arm and turned me, walking us back down the corridor toward ICU.

  “Why don’t we take a break and get some coffee,” I said.

  “Forget that. I’m jumpy enough as it is.” We reached the ICU waiting room and Raymond sat down again. He took a magazine from a nearby stack and flipped through it with an air of distraction. The pages made little snapping sounds in the quiet of the room. Two women seated at the other end of the room stared at him, frankly curious about his tics.

  Raymond glanced up, catching them in the act, and stared back at them until they broke off eye contact. “Jesus, I hate it when people stare at me. They think I like doing this?” He gave me an exaggerated jerk, glaring darkly at the two women, who were stirring with selfconsciousness.

  I said, “How’s Bibianna doing? Has anybody said?”

  He shifted restlessly. “Doctor’s supposed to show up any minute and talk to us.”

  I had to get him out of there. A color television in the corner, sound off, was tuned to one of those nature films where they show half of one species being eaten by another.

  Raymond leaned forward. “Jeez, what’s taking them so long?”

  “You want some lunch? Why don’t we go down to the coffee shop and find Luis. I’m starving.”

  He hung his head, shaking it, and then looked over at me, his expression bleak. “What if she doesn’t make it?”

  I bit back a retort. I couldn’t think of an answer that didn’t seem quarrelsome. I revised my reaction. On reflection, it seemed perfectly in keeping with the depth of his denial that he’d now be worried sick about a woman he’d tried to have assassinated less than twenty-four hours before. If Raymond found out Jimmy Tate was here, he’d bring the whole place down.

  I said, “We’re both going to go crazy if we hang around here. It won’t take long. We can grab a quick lunch and come right back up. The doctor might not be back on the ward for an hour.”

  “You think?”

  “Come on. Get a cup of coffee, at least.”

  Raymond tossed the magazine aside and got up. We moved into the corridor and he slowed his step. “Maybe I should tell the nurse where we are in case he shows.”

  “Or I can do that if you like. Why don’t you go ahead and buzz the elevator for us?”

  Two Hispanic nurses approached from down the corridor.

  There was some activity in the hallway and both of us looked over. A doctor appeared from the Rehab wing, heading for ICU. He was wearing a calf-length white duster over a gray suit. He had his full name stitched above his pocket in blue script. A stethoscope coiled up out of his pocket like a length of narrow-gauge garden hose. He was in his fifties with closely clipped gray hair, rimless glasses, and a limp. His right foot was strapped into a walking cast that looked like a ski boot. He noticed my glance and smiled apologetically, though he offered no explanation. I pictured a sports-related mishap, which might have been his hope. He probably tripped on a sprinkler head while he was pinching suckers off his roses. “Can I help you folks?”

  Raymond said, “I’m here about Bibianna Diaz. Are you the doctor?”

  “Absolutely. Nice to meet you, Mr. Tate. I’m Dr. Cherbak.” He reached out to Raymond and the two of them shook hands. “Nurse said you were here. Sorry it took me so long…”

 
; Raymond’s smile slipped a notch. “The name is Raymond Maldonado. What’s Tate got to do with it?”

  Dr. Cherbak blinked with uncertainty and then checked Bibianna’s chart. “Sorry. She asked to have her husband notified, and naturally, I thought…”

  From where I stood, I could see the big pink notice reading PC, protective custody, affixed to the front. Raymond seemed to spot it about the same time I did.

  “Her husband?” he repeated. He stared at the doctor, who must have realized he’d committed an egregious error.

  I touched Raymond’s arm, murmuring, “Raymond, there’s been a misunderstanding, that’s all. Maybe she has a head injury. Who knows what she might have said? She might be hallucinating ���”

  Raymond jerked away from my touch. “Shut up!” he said. And then to the doctor: “She told you that? Jimmy Tate’s her husband! That’s bullshit. I’ll rip your fuckin’ face off, you say that.”

  The two nurses, in conversation, were suddenly attentive, watching the encounter as if it were a soap opera. I could feel the dread suffuse me like a fever. “Let’s come back later…”

  “How’s she doing?” Raymond asked. He was being pugnacious, jaw working with tension.

  “I’m not at liberty to ���”

  “I asked you how she’s doing. You want to answer me, you dick?”

  Dr. Cherbak stiffened. “I can see I’ve made a mistake,” he said. “If you’re not related to the patient, I’m limited in the amount of information I can give you…”

  Raymond gave him a push. “Fuckin’ A you made a mistake! I’m going to marry this woman, get it? Me. Raymond Maldonado. You got that straight?”

  Dr. Cherbak turned on his heel and moved toward ICU at a brisk clip, pushing through the double doors. I heard him on the other side. “Get Security up here…”

  Raymond banged through the doors after him and grabbed him from behind. “Where’s Bibianna?” he screamed. “Where is she?”

  The doctor stumbled off-balance and one of the duty nurses started to run. A second nurse picked up a phone to call Security. Raymond pulled out a gun and pointed it at her, his arm stiff, his intent murderous. She lowered the phone. He swung the gun back and forth as he made his way down the hall. I pulled out the SIG-Sauer, but the doctor was in my way. Hospital staff seemed to be everywhere.