by Robin Cook
“Thank you for talking to me,” Samira said, keeping her voice low over the babble of the others. “I know I wasn’t supposed to tell about your father, but this seemed different. Durell told me our emigrating depended on it. I was also promised your problem would be taken care of and you’d be free, and so would your family.”
“My family has been shamed,” Veena said. “Irreversibly shamed.”
Samira didn’t say anything. She knew that Veena initially would be absorbed in thinking about her extended family and its reputation instead of rejoicing in her newly gained freedom and that of her sisters from a horrid father. But she expected her to promptly see the light. More than ever, Samira wanted to escape what she thought were the cultural shackles of current-day India. She couldn’t wait for Nurses International to help her emigrate.
With the shift changing, the elevator stopped on every floor.
“I’m not going directly back to the bungalow,” Veena said, keeping her eyes glued to the floor indicator. “I’m going to stop in and see Shrimati Kashmira Varini.”
“What on earth for?” Samira questioned in a whisper.
“The granddaughter of my victim came to see me this afternoon, and I found it very uncomfortable having to speak with her. Cal never suggested I’d have to do anything like that. She scares me. She told me she’s not happy about her grandmother’s death and she’s looking into it. I don’t like it.”
The elevator came to a bumpy stop at the lobby level and disgorged its full load of passengers. After only a few steps, Veena came to a halt. Samira did the same.
“Maybe it would be best if you didn’t do anything until we talk with Cal and Durell,” Samira said after making certain no one was listening.
“I want to find out where she is staying in case Cal wants to know. I’m sure the case manager knows.”
“I imagine she does.”
“The granddaughter mentioned your victim as well.”
“In what regard?” Samira asked with increasing alarm.
“She wondered if the same person who’d found Mrs. Hernandez also found Mr. Benfatti.”
“Why would she care?”
“I don’t know.”
“Now you have me concerned,” Samira said.
“I’ll wait for you here,” Samira said, as Veena turned and headed toward the information desk. She merely waved acknowledgment over her shoulder. Rounding the desk, Veena peered beyond Kashmira Varini’s open door. She was hoping the case manager would be alone, and she was.
“Excuse me,” Veena called out, and bowed as Kashmira looked up. “May I ask you a question?”
“Of course,” Kashmira replied, returning the greeting.
Veena advanced to the desk. “I spoke with Mrs. Hernandez’s granddaughter, Jennifer, this afternoon.”
“Yes, so Nurse Kumar informed me when she called to let me know she was here. Sit down!” Kashmira pointed with her chin toward one of the free chairs in her office.
Although Veena was planning on staying only for a few moments, she sat down.
“I’m interested in your reaction to her. We are finding her difficult to deal with.”
“In what regard?” Veena asked, feeling progressively more unsettled toward the American.
“In most every regard. We need her simply to stipulate what she wants us to do with her grandmother’s body and be done with it so we can dispose of the body. But she refuses. I’m afraid she has some paranoid notion this tragedy was either a medical error or intentional. She’d even arranged that several American forensic pathologists are coming for heaven knows what. I’ve repeatedly made it clear there is to be no autopsy.”
Veena had reflexively sucked in a bit of air when she’d heard Kashmira say “intentional” and hoped it hadn’t been apparent. Her sense that Jennifer Hernandez was potential trouble had ratcheted up several notches.
“Are you alright?” Kashmira asked, leaning toward Veena.
“Yes, I’m fine. It’s been a long day is all.”
“Do you need a drink of water or anything?”
“I’m fine. Why I stopped in was to find out where Jennifer Hernandez is staying, because I was thinking of calling her. I want to be certain I’ve answered all her questions. When she was here I was very busy, and Nurse Kumar had to interrupt to get me back to my patient.”
“She’s at the Amal,” Kashmira said. “During the time you were talking with her, how did she seem? Was she hostile at all? With me she goes back and forth. I don’t know if it is because she is exhausted or angry.”
“No, not hostile. In fact, the opposite. She acted sympathetic that her grandmother had been my first patient death since my graduation.”
“That seems out of character.”
“But she did specifically say she was unhappy about her grandmother’s death, whatever that meant, and that she was looking into it to a degree. She used those words but quite matter-offactly.”
“If you end up talking with her, please encourage her to decide about her grandmother’s body. It would be an enormous help.”
After promising to put in a good word if the opportunity presented itself about the cremation/embalming issue, Veena bid Shrimati Varini good night and hustled out into the lobby. She found Samira and guided her outside.
“What did you learn?” Samira asked, as they walked down the driveway.
“We have to talk with Cal about this Hernandez woman. She worries me. Even Kashmira Varini is having trouble with her. She said that she believes Jennifer Hernandez suspects the death of her grandmother was either medical error or somehow purposeful. In other words, not natural.”
Samira stopped, suddenly grabbing Veena by the elbow and pulling her up short. “You mean she thinks her grandmother might have been murdered.”
“In so many words,” Veena said.
“I think we better get back to the bungalow.”
“I couldn’t agree more.”
Despite the pre-rush hour traffic clogging the street, the women were lucky to find a free auto rickshaw. They climbed into the bench backseat, gave the driver the bungalow address, and then held on for dear life.
Chapter 18
OCTOBER 17, 2007
WEDNESDAY, 4:26 P.M.
NEW DELHI, INDIA
You got a sec?” Durell asked from the library door. Cal looked up from the spreadsheets of Nurses International expenses. The burn rate was impressive, but with things going so well at the moment, he was not as concerned as he’d been just two to three days before.
“Of course,” Cal said. He leaned back and stretched his arms over his head. He watched Durell saunter in and spread several maps on the library table that Cal used as a desk. There were also photos of a number of vehicles, which he carefully positioned with his large, powerful hands. Durell was dressed in one of his signature stretch black T-shirts, which molded over his muscles as if it had been sprayed on.
“Okay,” Durell said, standing straight and rubbing his hands together with relish. “Here’s what I’ve found.”
Before he could continue, the front door slammed shut in the distance hard enough not only to be heard but also to rattle Cal’s espresso cup in its saucer on his desk. The two men shared a look. “What the hell?” Cal questioned.
“Somebody wants us to know they are home,” Durell said. He looked at his watch. It was almost four-thirty. “Must be one of the nurses who have had a bad day.”
No sooner had the words escaped Durell’s lips than Veena and Samira came through the library door. Both started talking at once.
“Hey!” Cal called out, motioning with both hands for them to calm down. “One at a time, and this better be important. You’ve just interrupted Durell.”
Veena and Samira exchanged glances. Veena spoke. “There’s a possible problem at the Queen Victoria—”
“A possible problem?” Cal questioned, interrupting her.
Veena nodded excitedly.
“Then I think you should show some consideration. Durell
was speaking.”
“We can go over this later,” Durell said, gathering up the car photos.
Cal grabbed his wrist to restrain him and made eye contact. “No, continue! They can wait.”
“Are you sure?” Durell said, leaning over to speak directly in Cal’s ear. “I thought this escape stuff was privileged information.”
“It’s okay. If Armageddon arrives, I want them with us anyway. Let them hear. They could help.”
Durell flashed a thumbs-up sign and stood back up.
“Listen up,” Cal said. “Durell has been working on what is called a contingency plan for a worst-case scenario. But it’s privileged information. No telling the others.”
Their curiosity piqued, the women crowded in against the table, looking at the maps.
“I hope you realize that including them will add a new level of complexity to get us all hooked up if and when the plan is activated,” Durell told Cal.
“You can work that out at a later date,” Cal said. “Let’s hear the pitch!”
Durell went back to setting out the photos of the vehicles. While he did so, he explained to the women that he’d come up with an idea of how to get out of the country if the need arose.
Veena and Samira exchanged a nervous stare. This was a subject related to what they had come to talk about.
“First, these are a few potential vehicles to buy and store in that fortress garage we have on the property. The idea would be to have it fueled, packed, and ready to go. I believe it should be four-wheel drive because the roads on my proposed route are not in the best of shape.”
“What’s the route you are recommending?” Cal asked.
“We’d head southeast out of Delhi and use the main highway to Varanasi. From there we’d head northeast to cross the border into Nepal at the Raxaul-Birgunj border crossing.” Durell traced the route on the maps.
“Is that a good place to cross?”
“I think the best. Raxaul’s in India, and Birgunj is in Nepal. They apparently are both sprawling shithole cities only a few hundred meters apart, whose major industry, as far as I can tell, is the commercial sex trade for the two-thousand-plus truckers who use the crossing each day.”
“Sounds delightful.”
“For what we’re looking for, I think it sounds perfect. It’s such a backwater crossing, they don’t even require visas. It’s really just a customs stop.”
“Is this in the mountains?” Cal asked.
“No, it’s tropical and flat.”
“It does sound perfect. Then what, once we cross?”
“It’s a pretty straight drive up the Prethir Highway on the Nepalese side to Kathmandu and an international airport. At that point, we’d be home free.”
“There’ll be mountains in Nepal, I suppose?”
“Oh, yeah!”
“Then I recommend the Toyota Land Cruiser,” Cal said, picking up the photo and brandishing it. “We got our six seats plus four-wheel drive.”
“You got it,” Durell said, picking up the other photos. “It was my first choice, too.”
“Buy it, get it ready, and put it out in that garage. Have the groundspeople start it once a week. Also, let’s all pack an overnight bag.”
“If the car keys are going to be left out there, I’m not sure I recommend leaving our bags out there. The fence at the far rear of the property has fallen down in one section.”
“Let’s use that dungeon-like room below. The door that goes down to it locks, doesn’t it?”
“It’s got a big old key that looks like it belongs to a medieval castle.”
“That’s what we’ll do. We’ll each prepare a small suitcase and lock them in the dungeon.”
“What will we do with the key?” Durell asked. “We all should know where the key is. If a major problem happens like this plan is supposed to cope with, we all should know where the key is located. One hang-up could be a problem.”
Cal glanced around the library. Besides the sizable collection of antique books, there were many knickknacks on tables and shelves. Cal’s eyes soon came to rest on an antique Indian papier-mâché box sitting on the marble mantel. He got up and went over to it. It was intricately painted and glazed and certainly large enough. After a bit of a struggle, he got it open. It was conveniently empty. “The key will go in here. What do you say?” He held the box up so everyone could see.
Everyone nodded as Cal put the Indian craft box back in its original position. As he came back to his chair, he regarded the women. “Are you okay with all this? You can get a small bag together and get it to Durell? And I mean small, just for a couple of days.”
The women nodded again.
“It all sounds terrific, Durell,” Cal said, “especially since the chances of needing it are about zero, but it’s best to be prepared.” Cal thought but didn’t say that the stimulus had been Veena’s suicide gesture, which certainly had not been anticipated. He glanced at her, amazed at her apparent turnaround. Yet now knowing the story of abuse that she’d had to quietly suffer, he couldn’t help but wonder if she was as stable as he needed her to be.
“I’ll let Petra and Santana know the details,” Durell said to Cal, as he gathered up the maps. Then, to the women, he said he’d get back to them later about how they would all hook up in the unlikely case the emergency plan had to be activated.
Cal nodded to Durell, but his attention was now directed at Veena and Samira. “Okay,” he said. “It’s your turn. What’s this possible problem?”
Veena and Samira erupted together, stopped, and started again before Samira gestured that she’d give the floor to Veena. Veena described her meetings with Jennifer Hernandez and the Hernandez case manager.
Cal raised a hand to stop her and then called out, “Durell, maybe you should listen to this!” Durell was on his way out the door, wrestling to get his maps folded. He turned around and came back. Cal summarized what the girls had already said, then motioned for Veena to continue.
Veena went on to tell how Jennifer was thwarting the hospital’s ability to deal with the Hernandez body and, more important, that she was actually investigating her grandmother’s death. Veena said that the case manager even used the words error and intentional to describe how Jennifer thought the death had been caused. “I’m afraid she doesn’t believe it was natural,” Veena summarized. “And you told me that that could not happen, that it was impossible for someone to even imagine such a thing. But this Jennifer Hernandez is doing just that, and it gives me a bad feeling about all this—”
“Okay, okay,” Cal said, raising his hand and gesturing for Veena to calm down. “You are getting yourself too worked up here.” Cal looked at Durell. “How the hell could this Hernandez girl be thinking the way she is?”
Durell shook his head. “Beats me, but I think we’d better find out. Could there be some aspect of this succinylcholine strategy we’re not taking into consideration?”
“I can’t imagine,” Cal said. “The anesthesiologist was very specific in our hypothetical case. He said the victim should have a history of some kind of a heart problem; exactly what it was didn’t matter. The person should have had general surgery within twelve hours, and the drug be given in an existing intravenous line. That was it, wasn’t it?”
“That’s what I remember,” Durell said.
“She’s a medical student,” Veena added. “She knows about this stuff.”
“That shouldn’t matter,” Cal said. “We got the plan from an anesthesiologist, and he said it was foolproof.”
“She has arranged for two medical examiners to come to India,” Samira said.
“That’s right,” Veena agreed. “It’s not just she we have to think about.”
“And she mentioned my patient, Benfatti, to Veena, meaning she already knew about him,” Samira added.
“Once the information has been on CNN, anyone can know about it,” Cal said. “That’s not an issue.”
“But aren’t you worried about the medical
examiners coming?” Veena asked. “They are forensic pathologists. It certainly worries me.”
“The medical examiners don’t worry me for two reasons: one, it sounds like from what you’ve said the Queen Victoria has no intention of allowing an autopsy to take place, and two, even if one was done and they found some evidence of succinylcholine, it would be attributed to the succinylcholine the patients are known to have been given as part of their anesthesia. The only thing that worries me to an extent is this Hernandez having a suspicion in the first place. What could have caused her to suspect anything?”
“Maybe it’s just paranoia on her part,” Durell suggested. “And the fact that there were two deaths back-to-back.”
“That’s an interesting idea,” Cal said. “You know, that could be it. Think about it. Out of the blue she finds out her grandmother is dead after surgery in India, of all places. She has to fly all the way here. Then the hospital pressures her to make a decision about what to do with the body before she’s ready. On top of that, there’s another, similar death. It’s enough to make anyone paranoid. Maybe the only lesson we should be learning here is not to do two in a row at the same hospital.”
“But Samira had a perfect patient,” Durell said, defending his girlfriend. “And she was eager. We have to reward that kind of initiative.”
“No doubt, and we did. You did a terrific job, Samira. It’s just from now on let’s not do the same hospital two nights in a row. We have to spread them out. After all, we have nurses in six hospitals. It doesn’t make sense to take any risks whatsoever.”
“Well, we’re not taking that kind of risk tonight,” Durell said.
“Is there another one tonight?” Veena asked apprehensively. “Don’t you think we should let things slide for a few days or a week, or at least until Jennifer Hernandez leaves?”
“It’s hard to stop with the success we’re seeing,” Cal said. “Last night in the States, all three networks picked up on CNN’s lead and ran segments about Asian medical tourism with the theme it might not be as safe as assumed. It was powerful.”
“It’s true,” Durell said. “The message is hitting home in a big way. Santana has heard from her CNN contact that they are already getting reports of medical tourism cancellations. You can’t argue with success, as my daddy always used to say.”
