An Eye For Murder: A Medical Thriller

by Martin Sherwood

  I needed to get to Grandma. And fast. I had no idea what time it was or how long I’d spent inside the laundry cart. Now it was vital for me to get out of the cart and hope he wasn’t waiting for me next door.

  I thought fast, trying to analyze my options. There was only one left.

  I started shaking the cart from side to side, going wild, kicking in every direction, trying to tear a hole in the material. But it didn’t work.

  What next?

  I kept jitterbugging and finally felt a shift. The cart wasn’t fastened to the wall. I squeezed all the linen into one side and sat over it, stirring wildly until the wheel hinges creaked.

  Finally, it happened.

  The wagon tilted and fell on its side, spilling me out along with the rest of its contents. I wriggled out of the stinking mess, pushed the door with my leg, and was relieved to discover that the room was dark and empty, at least up to the edge of the curtain. I worked my way across the floor like a larva. Without my glasses, there was no way I could distinguish fine details.

  As I tried to straighten up, my forehead knocked against the bottom edge of the gurney. Blood oozed over my eyebrow and further blurred my dominant right field of vision.

  I kept inching toward the corner of the treatment room. Maybe there I could sit up without hitting something else. If I couldn’t release my bonds, I would hop into the hallway or bang on the door until someone came—hopefully not the Irishman. I knew I’d need to create a lot of noise if I were to attract attention, because the wing I was in was furthest from the nurses’ station and we were separated by a deserted labyrinth of empty rooms.

  “Grandma,” I mumbled into the towel that muffled my cry. “Grandma… Grandma…” I had to reach her immediately.

  I crawled on my belly to the other corner of the treatment room, pulled the bottom of the curtain back with my chin, and noticed the time on the wall clock: almost nine.

  The rattling of keys made my heart skip a beat. Then the treatment door opened and there stood Gibbons. I felt a warm dampness in my groin. By my side, near the sterile equipment cabinet, stood a heavy oxygen canister. I kicked it with both my feet, but the cylinder refused to budge.

  I raised my eyes, wide open, to Gibbons and muttered into the towel and bandaging. “Grandma, Grandma…” I waited for his smirk, but he just stood in the doorframe, swaying drunkenly. There was no smirk, even not a hint of a smile.

  It took Gibbons a while to cross the threshold, like someone learning to walk again, but then he took big strides into the room, as if pushed from behind. His eyes seemed dull. The angles of his mouth became crooked and twitched in automatic mastication movements, but he wasn’t chewing anything.

  As he advanced toward me, the door slammed behind him as if propelled by a gust of air. When he came within six inches of my face the Irishman started to yawn. He fought to maintain a stable posture, but one knee betrayed him. He keeled over, grabbing the folded sheet.

  The tray fell and all the equipment on it—tweezers, eye speculum, needle-holders, scissors, and an especially sharp and shining scalpel—scattered across the floor.

  Somebody was prepared for a double enucleation of the eyes.

  Gibbons reached out and tried to grip my neck, but I slipped out of his reach with an abrupt tilt. I started to squirm away, then I realized there was no longer a need to escape. His next move was awkward, like in slow motion, accompanied by a snort that could have awakened the dead.

  Gibbons lay at my feet. I dared not move until I was sure his chest was frozen in a whimper. I moved closer, until my nose met his abdomen.

  His shirt was unbuttoned, and I saw the delicate hole below the ribcage, the circular elevation of the surrounding skin.

  Fresh signs of an injection.

  58

  After what seemed like an eternity, I managed to free my hands and feet, then darted through the corridor and pushed open the door of Grandma’s room.

  The duty doctor was hovering over my grandmother, his back to me. The tails of the doctor’s white coat were flapping in the incident flow of air from the door opening so abruptly, but his gloved hand tightened its grip on her wrist.

  Grandma’s face was hidden behind an oxygen mask. Mist escaped and sailed over her macerated cheeks, but I eyed the rubber tube tied tightly around her arm, blocking the venous flow.

  I could see the shiny alcohol reflecting off the skin—the blood vessel that swelled in the elbow had been carefully sterilized. This time the doctor was alone in the room. Apparently the doctor had told the attendants he had no need for them at the moment, since the patient had stabilized. He would manage on his own.

  I darted in and pushed the white-coated figure away from Grandma with one arm. With my other, I plucked the tube off from her arm.

  Blood trickled onto the sheet and then to the floor. I took an alcohol-soaked swab and pressed on the bleeding wound. “What’s going on here? What’s happening to my grandmother? Why the IV and all these devices in her room? I know she’s not sick.”

  The light went out in the room.

  “I…I know what you’re doing! I’ve already told the police. They are on their way. I know what happened to Rebecca, to Belle. I’m just back from Joseph-Arthur’s funeral. It’s all over. Where is Mrs. Hertz? It’s all over! Leave my grandmother alone.”

  The wings of the white coat flapped next to me. Even before I saw her, I recognized the perfume that always made me crazy.

  “Johanna,” I whispered in disbelief. “You’re alive!”

  I completely lost it, and tears flickered in my eyes. For a moment my brain converted into a carousel of feelings. In the background I saw Grandma’s face floating in clouds of steam.

  In front of me, within breathing distance, I saw the smooth, beautiful face of the woman who had pleasured me like no one had before. Her perfume aroused me. I wanted, yearned to tell her so many things. There had not been a moment since we parted that she had not been on my mind; I had fallen madly in love with her, and she was constantly in my dreams. I wanted to tell her about the horrible pain I’d felt when I’d believed she was killed.

  I was so overwhelmed that it took me a while to say anything. I wanted to hug her, to revisit her taste, to smell her wonderful body. After all, she’d had to run for her life during this horrendous weekend, too.

  But now the nightmare was over, and we could pick up where we’d left off.

  “You can stop doing what they’ve been forcing you to do.”

  In the weak light I saw her forehead pucker; she gazed at me as if amazed. A small smile played on her lips, hesitant at first—as if asking for permission—and then widening, exposing her white teeth. The mole under her nostril was pronounced.

  “In the industrial park they found a woman with a mole under her nose.”

  She giggled and grinned. “Looked believable, didn’t it? I inked it myself. Beautiful artwork, huh?” A tattoo.

  She reached out and touched my cheek, just under the nose, pressing the cartilage. The cushions of her fingertips seemed to stir every cell in my body. An uncontrollable shudder passed through my torso and limbs.

  “I came back to you. You see? I’m completely alive. From now on it’s only you and me.” Her facial muscles tensed. “Luckily I was here to see the psycho snatch you from the corridor. I waited for him outside. We’d better check on him.”

  “Not necessary.”

  “Are you sure?” she wondered, but her doubt was short-lived. She shrugged. “Maybe I got the dose wrong.”

  Her reaction caused me unease. “What did you give him?” My unrest grew when she failed to reply and turned into a wave of suspicion that penetrated my muscles. “What exactly are you doing here?”

  Johanna searched my eyes in the darkness. “Nobody is going to disturb us from being together, ja?” She waited for my response. “Nobody, ja?” she repea
ted.

  “Nobody,” I echoed, my brain gradually decelerating.

  She followed my eyes, which were darting from her to Grandma. Something was very wrong. Any prolonged presence in my grandmother’s room inevitably caused her to awaken. Grandma was a light sleeper, an insomniac—a condition that deteriorated with the years. Now she lay there, almost motionless. In the strip of light that penetrated the window I saw her scrawny chest rise and fall, her intercostal muscles slowly stretching and relaxing under the sheet. The movements were too slow.

  “Why is it so dark in here?” I said and hurried to the light switch.

  But before I reached the lamp, I felt a delicate sting in my thigh. “What… what was that? What’s happening to me?”

  Within seconds a weakness overcame me. My legs became heavy. Everything was spinning around, and thick saliva accumulated in the corners of my mouth. My lips twisted involuntarily. The white coat doubled. My grandmother’s silhouette swam in vapor. The light in the window scattered to dust like a swarm of fireflies. I tried to hang on to the wall but slid into a crouch on the cold floor.

  Johanna leaned over me and unbuttoned her shirt. She took my hand and placed it on her right breast, the white skin smooth to the touch. I felt a quiver under my fingers as the areola became congested with circulating blood. Her fingers fluttered over my swollen cheek. She raised my chin with one hand and kissed me forcefully, her wet tongue cruising inside my mouth, between my teeth, demanding, deceiving.

  “So now it’s just the two of us.” She bit my earlobe lightly and pulled me back until I could detect the spark dancing inside her hollow pupils. Then she turned back to my ear and whispered, teasing, like a little girl, “Still want me?”

  When I slowly nodded, confused, she giggled. I noticed that her eyes went blank and her nose was running. “That night, there,” she said. I didn’t follow, but all I could do was listen. “In your bath. Wow! I didn’t realize you were so good.”

  I tried to get up, but she wouldn’t let me. She descended on her knees next to me, removed a glove, and ran her fingers through my hair, her scarlet nails raking back and forth. I sensed them slide down my nape, down my shoulder blades, gouging grooves in my skin.

  I tilted to the side, trying to rise, and then noticed the syringe in her hand. “What… what were you going to do to my… grandmother?”

  “Your grandmother?” For the first time I saw her eyes at a loss. “She’s your grandmother?”

  “Bertha Zucker is… my mother’s mother.”

  Complete silence ensued, to the extent that we heard the clock ticking on the wall and the gentle snores of the residents next door. Even the wind rustling in the park was audible through the window.

  I wondered where the night shift team was. Weren’t they supposed to take the next round of vitals? Why were they skipping Room 22?

  The room spun again. Johanna’s smile vanished, to be replaced by tears. I wondered if she was reliving a past experience.

  “Schade. Shame, this knack of yours for always getting in the way.”

  I looked down at my foot, but I could see nothing in the faint light. I bent further, to get a better look and saw neither a rift nor a tear in my pants. Strange, I thought as I palpated the painful area. Was it just a muscle spasm? Only on my second attempt, as I pushed my fingertip slowly under my pants, did I feel a little bump on my skin, like a tiny bite.

  “My grandmother,” I whispered through paralyzed lips. “Please, Johanna, help me up.”

  I offered my hand, but she fended me off with her high heel. I tried again to speak, but ants seemed to be crawling over my vocal cords. I swallowed something fizzy and sour. There was no pain now, but the bizarre lack of sensation was accompanied first by wooziness and then by extreme weakness.

  Gentle snoring came from the direction of the bed. With great effort I filled my chest with air and exhaled in a single blow. “Yes, this is my grandmother… my beloved Grandma!” My throat dried and my tongue seemed to grow thick. “You have the tube, don’t you? You ffound it in my kettle, and, an’ you tookit. You gave me ’notherrr…tube. You peeeed in it.” She just nodded and giggled. “So where ’zit? Where’s tube twelfff?”

  “In a safe place—not far from here, actually.”

  “So you gottit… all. What more d’you need? Leave my Grandma alone… d’you hear me? Just leafff…her a-lo-ne!”

  Johanna shrugged. “Sorry, I can’t.” She said it as if apologizing for a minor inconvenience. “She was the last to receive the drops.”

  My skull began to burn. Even a simple movement like lifting an arm and rubbing my temple became an impossible task. A lake of saliva formed under my tongue, as I was bent slightly to the right, and foam dripped on my chin.

  I could not move my hand even to clutch the towel beside me under the cart. My zygomatic bone ached, and I yawned extravagantly, rattling as if falling into deep sleep.

  I heard my respiratory muscles working. Actually heard them. Johanna pulled a fresh latex glove from the dispenser, donned it swiftly and checked how much solution remained in the syringe. Then she vanished from my field of vision only to emerge on the other side of my grandmother’s bed.

  “Leave my grandmother,” I moaned, spitting bubbles. “She hasn’t done you any harm.” God! Rebecca, Belle, Joseph-Arthur, all those names I’d seen on the list from the hospital in Tyrol—”Who gave you per… mis… sion to kill ‘em all?”

  Johann released the bedrail lock. She spoke to me, but her eyes were fixed constantly on Grandma. Her voice was scornful. “Permission? For doing a favor, you need to get permission? Who from? Did you know how many times Frau Bertha escaped? You think she ran away because she was happy here? What do you really know about your grandma’s life? What do you know about life at the end of life?”

  Grandma had been right all along. Residents around her had disappeared quickly, and with her meager powers, she had tried to escape a similar fate. But I—Milbert, her stupid grandson—had not believed her. The only person in the whole world who was supposed to protect her had dismissed her allegations. I had been preoccupied with the spoiled chromatograph, the damn tube, and Johanna.

  God almighty! How I had disappointed my Grandma! And if anything was to happen to her now, it would be all my fault. What would I tell my parents? Leanira? And worst of all—how could I live with myself? If I survived, that is.

  I was having a panic attack. Johanna had injected the Irishman and me with something. Blue Meadows had a selection of anesthetics for surgical procedures and simple operations. Maybe she’d injected me with curare, a muscle-paralyzing snake venom that South American Indians dip their arrows in.

  I hated my analytical mind. If only I were less of an encyclopedia. What difference did it make that I could recite the twenty-eight symptoms of Waldenstrom’s macroglobulinemia if I was unable to protect my own grandmother?

  I tried to sit, but my body slid to the side. My physical pain was augmented by another kind of ache. It intensified. I waited for her to pay attention to me. “What ‘bout our rrr…relationship?”

  “Did you really think—?”

  A mischievous twinkle appeared in her eyes, like the one I’d seen in the foam bath. This time I didn’t find it attractive.

  “How naïve you are. How cute.”

  No, I wouldn’t let her. She couldn’t continue; I wouldn’t let her hurt my grandmother.

  I managed to get up on my knees, lifted an arm as heavy as a bag of cement, and wiped away the spittle. I used the other bedrail to stand up, but the effort was futile. I collapsed back to the floor, making the bed creak and roll from the wall.

  “You… you can’t touch my grandmother… I won’t…”

  The infusion rate accelerated.

  From my perch under the bed I saw her legs moving restlessly. She was anticipating something—the right moment. She was close to me. I
f I could get to the bed and fall over Grandma like a human shield, it might be enough.

  “Leave her alone. She didn’t escape three times, just to die! She’s… she’s a good grand…mother. Go kill… ‘nother old lady.”

  “Bertha Charlotte Zucker received collyrium number 12 with the active compound of the Frau Professor. She had bilateral two-plus nuclear cataracts, but today it is completely clear. No cataracts!”

  I realized the degree of temptation. My grandmother had had two large, mature cataracts, one of which had disappeared in the eye treated with Efron’s eyedrops. Absolutely amazing! It could be the tiebreaker, could alter the statistics to become the one case that made all the difference between FDA approval and the sudden end to extremely costly research.

  They wouldn’t sacrifice my Grandma’s eyes! No pharmaceutical company would miss a rare multimillion-dollar opportunity to discover what happened in human lens tissue, between grandma’s pupil and vitreous. No doubt Johanna had been promised a fat bonus.

  But that had to remain a dream. I wasn’t going to let them.

  I noticed a gentle tap-tapping and stretched my neck; the sound came from the defibrillator’s batteries. It had a pair of long spiral plus and minus cables, joystick handles, and two cymbals in the side pockets. These would all be called to duty when the time came, to shock and awaken Grandma from her impending cardiac arrest. And they would fail. In order to save time, the resuscitation cart was already in the room, ready for code.

  Johanna swung around and smoothed her coat. She’d already written me off as a risk. I was kaput. Her voice swirled in the darkness that was creeping upon me. I needed to yawn again.

  Then I heard a strange rustle, like a whiplash, and suddenly the room smelled strongly of burnt flesh.

  With extreme effort I opened my eyes and saw Johanna motionless on the far side of the bed. Her legs remained plugged to the ground. The wall clock ticked, followed by a horrible sound, as of cracking bones. The defibrillator cart slid forward.

  My eyes closed, but the shockwave vibrating from the floor soon made them reopen.