Silent Treatment

by Michael Palmer

  “I understand, Doug,” he said. “But I haven’t done anything wrong, so I just can’t go down without a fight.”

  “In that case, give ’em hell, Harry.” Atwater grinned.

  Sam Rennick reviewed the ground rules that had been agreed upon by him and Mel Wetstone.

  Witnesses would give a statement and answer questions from first Rennick, then Wetstone. Harry would be permitted to speak after each witness, but only to respond to questions from his lawyer, not to address any of the witnesses directly. When the hearing was concluded, the joint hospital and medical staff executive committees would vote by secret ballot whether to suspend Harry’s admitting privileges or not.

  “Before you begin, Mr. Rennick,” Doug Atwater said, “I would like it to go on record that the Manhattan Health Cooperative will abide by the ruling of this hearing.” He looked over at Harry. “Dr. Corbett’s status as a physician provider for MHC will remain intact so long as he has admitting privileges at this hospital.”

  Considering that the health plan was bound only by its own laws in picking and removing physician providers, Atwater’s statement amounted to an endorsement. His company could have made the results of this hearing essentially moot by simply cutting Harry from its rolls. It was a move Harry had feared they might make. He was doubly glad, now, that he had held his temper with Doug.

  The head nurse from Alexander 9 started things off by reading affidavits from both of the nurses who had been on duty the night of Evie’s death. There was no question in either of their minds that, except for Maura Hughes, Harry was the last one to see his wife before the lethal rupture of her aneurysm. Sue Jilson recounted in some detail Harry’s request to leave the floor for a milk shake and then return. The hospital attorney used his questions to pin down the nurse about the security setup on the floor. Then he homed in on the clinical condition of Maura Hughes.

  “She was about the most classic case of the DTs I’ve ever seen,” the woman said. “She was restless and combative, sweating profusely, and disoriented most of the time. When she wasn’t accusing the staff of ignoring her, she was swatting at insects that weren’t there. She was medicated almost the entire time she was on our service, and despite that, she was still one of the most disruptive patients we’ve had in a long time.”

  Harry and Mel Wetstone exchanged glances. The hospital attorney knew Maura’s sketch was about to be presented, and was effectively destroying its credibility by painting such an unappealing picture of her. It was the reason Harry had argued against having Maura attend the hearing to present her drawing herself. Mel had warned him what she might hear.

  Wetstone cleared his throat, took a slow swallow of water, and favored the nurse with an icy smile.

  “I’m sorry Ms. Hughes was so disruptive to your neurosurgical floor,” he said.

  “Thank you,” the nurse replied, completely missing Wetstone’s sarcasm.

  “You don’t have very warm feelings toward alcoholics, do you?”

  “Does anyone?”

  Wetstone allowed half a minute for the response to sink in around the room.

  “As a matter of fact, yes. Some people do,” he said softly. “The American Medical Association has formally classified alcoholism as a disease. The American Psychiatric Association has also. I hope you’re not prejudiced against too many other diseases as well. I have no further questions of you.”

  The head nurse, beet red, folded her notes and stared off at a spot that would keep her from eye contact with anyone. If the impact of her testimony hadn’t been neutralized entirely, it had certainly been diminished. Wetstone turned to Harry.

  “Dr. Corbett, have you been in touch with Maura Hughes since her discharge?”

  “I have.”

  “And how’s she doing?”

  “Quite well, actually. She hasn’t had a drink since her surgery, and she’s starting back on her painting.”

  The white lie was one they had agreed upon the previous day.

  “Oh, yes, she’s an accomplished and well-regarded artist, isn’t she? You have a drawing of hers here with you?”

  “A copy of it, yes. Miss Hughes had trouble recalling some of the details of the man’s face, so we went to see a hypnotist.”

  “That would be Dr. Pavel Nemec?”

  The murmur around the room suggested that The Hungarian was known to most of those present.

  “I’m not sure he’s a doctor,” Harry said. “But yes. He had no trouble helping her reconnect with her memories. One session, about fifteen or twenty minutes, was all it took.”

  “Mr. Rennick,” Wetstone said. “Here is a notarised affidavit from Pavel Nemec attesting to his Certainty that the drawing you are about to see represents the face remembered by Maura Hughes—the man who came into room nine twenty-eight after Dr. Corbett left to get his wife a milk shake.” He waited until everyone that mattered had a copy before he continued. “Dr. Corbett, have you ever seen the man depicted in Ms. Hughes’s drawing?”

  “I have. He was dressed as a hospital maintenance man, buffing the floors outside room nine twenty-eight when I arrived. When I left for the milk shakes, he was still there. When I came back with them he was gone.”

  “You’re sure of this?”

  “Positive. It’s an extremely good likeness of him. Maura Hughes has an incredible eye for detail. She says she suspects that the tie was a clip-on because the knot was just too perfect.”

  Several people laughed out loud.

  “This is ridiculous,” Caspar Sidonis muttered, though loudly enough for everyone to hear.

  “So what you’re telling us, Dr. Corbett,” Wetstone said, “is that this man—” He waved the drawing for emphasis. “This man waited for an opportune moment, put on a doctor’s clinic coat taken from within the casing of his floor buffer, walked boldly into room nine twenty-eight, and injected your wife with a killing dose of Aramine,”

  “I believe that is exactly what he did.”

  Many of the faces around the room were expressionless. But Harry’s unofficial visual poll said that the majority still had strong doubts about him.

  Without comment, Wetstone motioned that he was done. Since the burden of proof was, in theory at least, on the hospital, Harry would not be cross-examined by the hospital attorney. It was one of several procedural points Wetstone had won.

  Sam Rennick next introduced the man in the ill-fitting blue suit, Willard McDevitt, the head of maintenance for the hospital. McDevitt, in his fifties with a ruddy complexion and a nose that appeared to have been broken more than once or twice, spoke with the force of one convinced he was incapable of being wrong about anything. He reminded Harry of Bumpy Giannetti, the hulking bully who had stalked him after school and beaten him up with biologic regularity from grades seven through ten. He wondered in passing if Bumpy would respect him now that he was the chief suspect in two murders.

  “Mr. McDevitt, is the man in that drawing anyone you recognize?” Rennick asked, after establishing the man’s credentials.

  “Absolutely not. I never saw him before in my life.” He looked haughtily over at Harry.

  “And what about that industrial floor buffer—the one Dr. Corbett claims the killer used that night?”

  “Well, first of all let me say that if there was a buffer on Alexander Nine that night, it was one of mine. And if it was one of mine, one of my men was runnin’ it.”

  “Could someone have brought one into the hospital?”

  “Anything’s possible. But those babies weigh close to a quarter ton and are bigger ’n a clothes dryer. It’s hard to imagine someone sneakin’ one into the hospital without being noticed.”

  “Could they have stolen one from your department?”

  “Not unless it was at gunpoint. We have a sign-out system I designed myself to prevent any unauthorized person from usin’ any of our equipment. Even a wrench has to be accounted for. I don’t think we’d exactly misplace a five-hundred-pound buffer.”

  “Thank you,
Mr. McDevitt.”

  Rennick nodded toward Wetstone without actually looking at him. Harry saw the gesture and reflected cynically on the foolishness of a profession in which sub-rosa byplay was an accepted, even rehearsed, part of the practice. Then he noticed Caspar Sidonis exchanging whispered comments with the trustee seated next to him, motioning toward Harry at the same time. The byplay in medicine might be more subtle than in law, but it was no less nasty.

  “Mr. McDevitt,” Mel began, “where are these floor buffers kept?”

  “Locked in a room in the subbasement—double locked as a matter of fact. Only me an’ Gus Gustavson, my head of floor maintenance, have the key. Every one of them buffers that’s taken from that room has to be signed out by him or me.”

  “I understand. Mr. McDevitt, I’d like to ask you again whether you believe there is any way a man who was not in your employ could get at one of those buffers?”

  “Absolutely none.”

  That look again. Harry met the man’s gaze in a way he had never faced up to Bumpy Giannetti, held it, and even managed a weak smile. Had Mel Wetstone shared with him the next part of his strategy, his smile would have been much broader. Wetstone stood, walked to the door, opened it, and stepped back. A curious silence held for several seconds, then was shattered by a machinery hum. A tall blond man dressed in a tan MMC maintenance jumpsuit entered the room. He wore a standard hospital photo identification badge and was polishing the tile surrounding the plush Oriental rug with an industrial buffer. PROPERTY OF MMC was stenciled in red on the side.

  “What in the hell?” Willard McDevitt exclaimed.

  Wetstone nodded toward the buffer man and the machine was shut off.

  “Mr. McDevitt, do you know this man?”

  “I do not.”

  “Mr. Crawford, do you work for this hospital?”

  “I do not.”

  “Mr. Crawford, where did you get that contraption?”

  “From the room marked Floor Maintenance in the subbasement.”

  “And was it difficult for you to get?”

  The blond man grinned.

  “Piece of cake,” he said. “I’ll return it now if that’s okay.”

  He spun the machine around and wheeled it out. Instantly, it seemed as if everyone was talking and gesturing at once. Harry noticed that several members of the medical staff were laughing. Willard McDevitt looked as if he was going to charge Mel Wetstone. Instead, he listened to some whispered words from the hospital attorney, shoved his chair back, and stalked out. For his part, Wetstone carefully avoided appearing smug, or even pleased. He sat placidly, allowing his theatrics to hold sway. For the first time, Harry felt that the emotion in the room might be turning in his favor. If Rennick and his witness could be so wrong about the floor buffer, people had to be thinking, maybe they could be wrong about other things as well.

  “Now just a minute. Just one damn minute!”

  Caspar Sidonis had clearly taken as much as he could. He stood and strode to the head of the table. Owen Erdman, the hospital president, moved his chair aside for him.

  “This man is a huckster,” Sidonis said, motioning toward Wetstone. “A snake oil salesman. He’s using misdirection and tricks to keep you from focusing on the important points in this case. And Sam, I’m afraid all you’ve done is make it that much easier for him. This isn’t a courtroom, it’s a hospital. We’re not here to debate fine points of law. We’re here to see to it that our thousands and thousands of patients—patients who could take their business to any number of facilities—have the confidence in the Manhattan Medical Center to continue coming here. We’re meeting here today to prevent our hospital from becoming the laughingstock of the city. We’re here to ensure that the medical school graduates, with every hospital in the country to choose from, think enough of this place to apply for residency here.”

  The man was good, damn good, Harry acknowledged. This was revenge for Evie and payback for the humiliation of the amphitheater all rolled into one. And most important, his force and effectiveness sprang from his hatred of Harry and his consuming belief in Harry’s guilt. Harry took another silent poll of the room. Already things didn’t look as promising as they had. Mel Wetstone seemed on the point of rising to object to Sidonis’s tirade, but he thought better of it and sank back in his chair. Trying to stop the powerful chief of cardiac surgery from expressing his opinion could only hurt them.

  “I am not embarrassed to say that Evie DellaRosa and I were in love,” Sidonis went on. “For years, she and Harry Corbett had had a marriage in name only. The night before she entered this hospital, the night before she was murdered, she told him about us. I know that for a fact. That gives him a motive. A two-hundred-and-fifty-thousand-dollar insurance policy gives him another. The nurses have already testified to his opportunity. And certainly the method chosen was one only a physician would know. Now, it’s remotely possible that Dr. Corbett is as innocent as he claims. It’s remotely possible that every crazy alternative explanation he has come up with actually happened. But even his innocence does not change the fact that two of our patient’s with strong connections to him are dead. The newspapers are having a field day at our hospital’s expense. The public confidence we have worked so hard to build is plummeting.

  “Harry Corbett owes this hospital the respect and consideration to remove himself from the staff until this whole matter is resolved one way or the other. Since he has refused to honor that responsibility, this group must take action. I promise you here and now, I will not continue to practice at an institution without the gumption to stand up for itself and do what is right for its staff and patients. Thank you.”

  Drained, or apparently so, Sidonis used the backs of chairs to help him return to his seat. Mel Wetstone inhaled deeply, then let out a sigh. Harry felt flushed and self-conscious. Sidonis had threatened the hospital and the board of trustees with a massive blow to their two most vulnerable areas: reputation and pocketbook. World Famous Heart Surgeon Quits Hospital Over Handling of Doctor Doom. Harry could just see the headlines in the Daily News. He leaned over to his lawyer.

  There was a commotion outside the room. The doors burst open and Owen Erdman’s staid secretary rushed in.

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Erdman,” she said breathlessly. “I tried to explain to them, but they wouldn’t listen. Sandy’s called security. They’re on their way.”

  She stepped aside as a small mob marched into the room. Leading the way was Mary Tobin, and close behind her was Marv Lorello. Next came all the other members of the family medicine department, along with a number of Harry’s patients, some with their children in tow. Two dozen people in all, Harry guessed. No, closer to three. Among them he recognized Clayton Miller, the man whose severe pulmonary edema he and Steve Josephson had reversed by removing almost a unit of blood. The group crowded into one end of the conference room. Then several people moved aside and Harry’s patient Mabel Espinoza stepped forward. Two of her grandchildren clung to her skirt.

  “My name is Ms. Mabel Espinoza,” she said. Her Latino accent was dense, but no one ever had trouble understanding her. She faced the hearing with the stout dignity that had always made her one of Harry’s favorites. “I am eighty-one years old. Dr. Corbett has cared for me and my family for twenty years. I am alive today because he is such a wonderful doctor. Many others could say the same thing. When I am too sick, he comes to see me at my home. When someone cannot pay, he is patient. I have signed the petition. In less than one day, more than two hundred have signed. Thank you.”

  “This was your Mary’s idea,” Wetstone whispered to Harry. “I never thought she could pull anything like this, though.”

  Another woman stepped forward and introduced herself as Doris Cummings, an elementary-school teacher in a Harlem school. She read the petition, signed by 203 of Harry’s patients, enumerating the reasons Harry was essential to their well-being and that of their families.

  “… If Dr. Corbett is removed from the staff of the Manh
attan Medical Center without absolute just cause,” the petition concluded, “we the undersigned intend to take our health care to another hospital. If leaving the Manhattan Health HMO is necessary and possible, we intend to do that as well. This man has been an important part of our lives. We do not want to lose him.”

  Marv Lorello whispered in Cummings’s ear and motioned toward Owen Erdman. Cummings circled the table and set the petition in front of the hospital president. Across from Harry, a distinguished woman named Holden, who was a past president of the board of trustees, brushed aside a tear. Standing to her right, Mary Tobin was beaming like a mother at her child’s graduation.

  Next, Marv Lorello spoke on behalf of the department of family medicine, describing Harry as an invaluable friend and powerful example to those in the department, especially those newly in practice. He read a statement signed by every member of the department, in effect threatening to move their services to another facility if Harry should be removed from the hospital staff without absolute, legally binding proof of his misconduct. He set the document on top of the petition in front of Owen Erdman. Then the group trooped out of the hearing.

  There was no further discussion. The vote was a formality, although two of the twelve submitting ballots did endorse Harry’s removal from the staff. Caspar Sidonis left the room as soon as the result was read.

  “Dr. Corbett,” Erdman said coolly, “that was an impressive show of regard for you. It would be tragic to learn that such loyalty is not deserved. Have you anything further to say?”

  “Only that I’m grateful for the vote. I am innocent, and I intend to prove that, and to find this man. I would hope to begin by posting this likeness around the hospital.”

  “Absolutely not!” Erdman snapped. “My staff will discreetly distribute that sketch to our department heads. But we will not lay ourselves open to the public suggestion that a murderer could just waltz into our hospital, disguise himself behind one of our floor polishers, and murder one of our patients. I demand your promise of cooperation in this regard.”