“It’s odd that Guidry questioned you about when you saw some other woman crossing the street.”
We rode along for a while and I said, “You’re positive it wasn’t Laura?”
“I wasn’t up close, if that’s what you mean. I thought it was her, but I guess it wasn’t.”
“Did she see you?”
“She didn’t wave if she did. It was so early, she probably didn’t think anybody else was out.”
The first time I’d met Laura, she’d gone running after nine o’clock. I’d got the impression that she always ran around that time, but I could have been wrong. Lots of runners get up as early as I do and get their exercising done before the sun is up.
After we passed through the tollbooths on the way to St. Petersburg, Pete’s brow furrowed and his eyebrows began to climb even higher, and I knew the reality of what we were doing had hit him the same way it did me. We both knew there was no absolute guarantee that Hal had been able to get all the necessary permissions for Mazie to go to Jeffrey’s hospital room. Jeffrey was a child. He had just had brain surgery. Mazie was a dog. Some people would think her presence in his room so soon after surgery could be a health risk.
Besides that apprehension, I had other reasons to be tense, reasons that increased the closer we got to the golden girders of the Skyway Bridge. It’s silly, I know, but I don’t like leaving solid ground. I especially don’t like the gigantic roller-coaster feel of the Skyway. By the time we got there and the Bronco’s nose began to point toward the sky, I gripped the wheel with both hands. Call it phobia, call it my need to control, but if that sucker collapsed, cars would drop like boulders.
Once we left the Skyway behind and my breath was even, I began watching for the exit that would take us to I-175. Pete watched too, his eyebrows waggling like writhing caterpillars. We found I-175, and after a while took the Sixth Street South exit. The closer we got to the hospital, the higher and twitchier Pete’s eyebrows got.
He contained himself until we were turning into the hospital parking lot.
He said, “You didn’t really get permission, did you?”
I looked at him the way a mouse coming out of its hole would look at a watching cat.
“Hal promised to clear it with the doctor and the hospital.”
Pete said, “I’m like that too. I always operate on the theory that it’s better to ask forgiveness than permission.”
I said, “I could go in first and talk to the charge nurse.”
“I’m afraid they’ll say no, Dixie.”
“I didn’t mean I’d ask if we could bring Mazie in. I’ll just talk. You know, as in distract-her-attention-from-the-man-going-down-the-hall-with-a-dog.”
“Okay, that’s good.”
I wasn’t sure if it was good or not. But right or wrong, that seemed to be what we were doing.
Pete directed me to a side lot near an unmarked entrance. “This is the wing where Jeffrey’s room is. He’s on the fifth floor. There’s an elevator near the side door that’s not as busy as the main one. I’ve seen people taking therapy dogs up that elevator. I don’t think anybody will stop Mazie.”
Okay, that sounded good. At least for a moment. Therapy dogs and service dogs go into hospitals all the time, and Mazie was a service dog. But therapy dogs go in with therapists who have been vetted and authorized by the hospital, and service dogs go in as authorized companions of a person visiting a patient. Mazie was a service dog, but she was a companion to Jeffrey, not Pete. The bald truth was that Mazie was going in the hospital simply as a four-legged visitor to see a patient. If the hospital rules didn’t allow dogs to visit patients, we were sunk.
I said, “Give me time to go around to the front entrance before you go in.”
I don’t know why I thought that was a good idea, but it seemed necessary at the time. It must have sounded good to Pete too, because he looked at his watch the way bank robbers coordinate time before they make a big heist.
I parked and nipped around the lot to the front entrance where streams of somber-looking people were leaving and arriving. Inside the lobby, I realized I hadn’t asked Hal or Pete for Jeffrey’s room number. Feeling as if somebody at the other end of a surveillance camera was probably watching me and calling security, I stopped at a welcome desk.
A grandmotherly volunteer checked Jeffrey’s name on her computer. “He’s in the Neurology Center on the fifth floor. Room five-sixteen.”
I followed arrows to a hall to the Neurology Center, then joined a gaggle of people waiting for an elevator. My palms were sweaty. As the elevator descended, red numbers above the door told us what floor it was on—now seven, now six, now five—moving, moving, moving. We stared up at the numbers as if our lives depended on knowing when it would get to one. When the number two flashed, we all tensed like cattle about to stampede.
Inside the elevator, I tried not to think about why the other people were there. Children shouldn’t get sick. Childhood should be a golden time of laughter and play, it should not include pain and weakness.
At the fifth floor, I left the elevator and walked briskly down a long hall toward a nurse’s station. The sound of crying babies and toddlers floated on the air, and several nurses wearing bunny-printed smocks hurried past me, their rubber-soled shoes not making a sound. From one of the rooms, a woman in a dark leather recliner lifted a hand to wave at me as I passed. A hospital crib was hidden behind a drawn curtain, and I got the feeling the woman had been keeping lonely vigil for a long time.
More bunny-printed smocks were at the nurse’s station, every person serious and intent. It looked as if five or six corridors met at the station, and from their vantage point, they could see down every one to the elevator at the end. More than likely, some of their computer monitors showed every person who got off those elevators. They were people who saved kids’ lives, good people who shouldn’t be tricked.
A man with calm eyes and a metal patient record tucked under his arm watched me approach the stand. I figured he could see right through my skin into my brain.
I said, “Look, here’s the thing. I’m here to see Jeffrey Richards, and my friend is coming up the elevator in a minute with Jeffrey’s seizure-assistance dog. Her name is Mazie, and she hasn’t left Jeffrey’s side since they’ve been together. Jeffrey had surgery three days ago, and he and Mazie miss each other desperately. So we brought Mazie to see him.” For emphasis, I said, “She’s his best friend!”
He looked over my shoulder and smiled. “Would that man be your friend?”
I turned to see Pete and Mazie coming toward us. Pete seemed to be pretending to be blind. Even Mazie seemed in on the act, walking in front of him as if she were leading.
“That’s Pete Madeira and Mazie. Pete’s a clown.”
“Come on, I’ll take you to Jeffrey’s room.”
I motioned to Pete, whose strained face broke into a smile when he realized we seemed to have permission. We followed the man down the hall to a closed door. With a light tap, the man pushed the door open, and we all filed in.
Standing beside Jeffrey’s bedside, Gillis looked frazzled and exhausted, but ten years younger than she had four days ago. Knowing Jeffrey had come through the surgery and was back to consciousness must have been a tonic for her. When she saw us, she blinked in momentary surprise, then gave a choked sob. Hal wasn’t there. He must not have told Gillis that we were coming.
With his head swathed in thick bandages and his tiny body in a miniature hospital gown, Jeffrey looked like a pale alien child. The top sheet on his bed had been folded down, so his little bare legs stuck out from his hospital gown. I had a quick flash memory of Christy’s lifeless body and jerked my mind away.
Hal had told me that Jeffrey slept a lot, and he was asleep now, but frowning and fretful.
Mazie broke free of Pete’s hold and in one bound was on the bed beside Jeffrey. Gillis put out a protective hand, but she needn’t have worried. Mazie stepped with exquisite care to look down into Jeffrey�
��s slack face. Then, turning cautiously, she stretched out on the bed close to Jeffrey’s legs.
Jeffrey smiled, and as one person we all exhaled the breaths we’d been holding. Jeffrey’s eyes were still closed, but he no longer frowned or whimpered. The man with the patient record under his arm stepped forward and touched fingers to one of Jeffrey’s wrists. He had a kind face.
To Mazie, he said, “Good job, Mazie.”
Gillis said, “Dixie and Pete, this is Dr. Travis, Jeffrey’s surgeon. But I guess you know that since you got permission from him to bring Mazie in.”
Pete and I avoided each other’s eyes.
Dr. Travis grinned. “Hal talked to me. Maybe it would be better if you wait in the visitors’ lounge and let Mazie and Jeffrey be alone for a while.”
By alone, he meant with Gillis, who could not have been dislodged from Jeffrey’s side with a crowbar. Pete and I trailed out into the hall and found the visitors’ lounge, where we each took one of the leather recliners lined up along the wall and stared straight ahead. Pete’s eyes were blood-rimmed, and my own felt as if the inside of my lids had been scraped with emery boards.
Guilt was once again wrapping its slimy body around my neck. I had been so preoccupied with Laura’s murder that I’d failed to pay attention to my job. Even if nobody else had thought of it, I should have known to bring Mazie to see Jeffrey the minute he’d been put in a floor bed. I was a pet sitter, not a detective, and I should have put all my energy into making sure Mazie’s needs were being met instead of running around asking questions that were Guidry’s job.
Pete said, “Ever since I met that kid, I’ve been afraid something would go wrong with his surgery. I wish I hadn’t done that. All that fear probably made Mazie afraid.”
I guess guilt always tries to come along for the ride with everybody.
I said, “Mazie would have been worried and stressed no matter what you were thinking.”
I remembered Pete telling me once that his own daughter had died. I didn’t know how old she’d been, but the loss of a child at any age is devastating, and I felt a new kinship to him. Every parent who’s ever lost a child has a link of sadness that nobody else can ever understand.
The room was quiet, the only sounds a distant ping of elevator doors and the hushed voice of a woman speaking on the hospital’s PA system.
I leaned my head against the recliner and closed my eyes. The next thing I knew, Hal Richards was kneeling beside me and saying my name.
Like Gillis, he looked haggard with fatigue, but younger. “Thank you for bringing Mazie. I’m sorry I wasn’t here when you came. Gillis and I are taking turns sleeping, and I was at the hotel. It was a brilliant idea to bring Mazie, I don’t know why I didn’t think of it.”
Pete said, “Mazie needed to see her boy. She didn’t know what had happened to him.”
Hal nodded somberly. “Jeffrey needed Mazie too.”
I looked at my watch and saw that two hours had passed since we’d left Mazie in Jeffrey’s room.
I said, “We should go now.”
With creaking sounds from the chair and his knees, Pete got to his feet and headed toward Jeffrey’s room. I followed, with Hal walking beside me. Pete opened the door and we all stopped to look at Mazie and Jeffrey. He was sleeping soundly, and she had moved so she covered both his legs like a blanket. When she saw us, she lifted her head as if she knew her time with Jeffrey had ended.
Hal said, “Hi, girl.”
Mazie’s tail wagged, and Hal went over to stroke her head. Meeting his wife’s eyes over Mazie’s head, Hal said, “Pete and Dixie are going to take Mazie home now.”
Pete said, “If it’s okay, I could bring her back tomorrow.”
Gillis gave him a radiant smile. “That would be great, Pete.”
Hal lifted Mazie and set her on the floor. Pete took her leash, and we all said awkward goodbyes. Silently, Pete and I went down the hall with Mazie walking between us. At the elevator, Mazie whined and strained against the leash when Pete led her inside.
He said, “She wants to stay here.”
As the elevator descended, Pete and I met each other’s eyes. Something about this visit hadn’t gone right, and we both knew it.
We made it all the way to the parking lot before Mazie jerked away and tore back to the hospital.
28
Streaking to the side door where we’d come out, Mazie ran full out and determined. She had her mind set on going back to Jeffrey, and she wasn’t waiting for any human to go with her. Pete and I ran to catch up. At the door, we met Hal.
He said, “Jeffrey’s crying again. Worse than before.”
Pete and I met each other’s eyes, both of us afraid the seizures had returned.
At Jeffrey’s floor, Mazie scrambled forward the minute the elevator doors opened, moving ahead so strongly that Hal had to run while he vainly tried to slow her to a walk. Jeffrey’s door was open, and we could hear him crying before we got there. It was the same droning sound I’d heard him make before, the same sound Mazie was accustomed to hearing when he was on the verge of a seizure. Jeffrey’s legs were kicking, and his face was grimly twisted like an old man’s. Dr. Travis was beside the bed, and the room seemed to contain a lot of other people wearing bunny smocks and anxious looks.
Mazie jerked away from Hal and leaped onto Jeffrey’s bed and settled her body against his side. Abruptly, the crying stopped, Jeffrey’s legs went still, his eyes closed and his face became calm. Everybody in the room smiled.
The only one who didn’t seem happy was Mazie. Pulling herself up on her elbows, she cocked her head and stared into Jeffrey’s passive face with an odd fierceness.
A couple of nurses whispered to each other that she was checking him out to make sure he was okay, but I didn’t think so. Something else was going on in Mazie’s mind, but I wasn’t sure what it was. Hal and Gillis exchanged a look, and I knew they also thought Mazie had some perceptive knowledge the rest of us didn’t have. Whatever was causing Mazie’s determined study, it gave her the invigilating look of a scientist inspecting a new find.
My own body hairs suddenly stood upright with a realization. Seizure-alert dogs recognize a change in body odor that presages a seizure, but maybe people with seizure disorders always have a unique odor that only dogs can detect. If that were true, and if surgery had removed the cause of Jeffrey’s seizures, there would have been a subtle change in his normal odor. To Mazie, that would be extremely puzzling because it would mean Jeffrey was no longer the same Jeffrey she knew.
As if she had come to a firm conclusion, Mazie got to her feet and stood on the bed with her legs braced beside Jeffrey’s feet. Lowering her head, she put her nose to his toes and licked them.
Jerking his feet away, Jeffrey’s eyes flew open and he giggled. “Stop it, Mazie!”
Beside the bed, Gillis covered her face with both hands and sobbed quietly. Hal moved to put an arm around her shoulders, his own eyes wet. They didn’t need to say that they’d had secret fears that Jeffrey would never laugh in his old way again. It had taken Mazie to harmonize the Jeffrey who’d had seizures with the Jeffrey who didn’t.
With an ear-to-ear grin, Dr. Travis said, “I think Mazie should stay here with Jeffrey.”
I felt like telling him that it didn’t take a brain surgeon to figure that out. Instead, I almost gave myself whiplash from nodding.
Leaning to give Gillis a quick kiss, Hal said, “I’ll just walk to the elevator with Pete and Dixie.”
In the hall, Pete put a fatherly arm around Hal’s shoulders. “The boy’s going to be fine, just fine.”
I managed to make some squeaky sounds of agreement, but I was afraid I’d blubber if I tried to talk.
By the time we’d got to the elevator, we’d decided that Pete and I would go to a pet supply store, get the things Mazie would need, and bring them back to the hospital before we headed back to Siesta Key. For the rest of Jeffrey’s hospital stay, Mazie would spend part of her time in the ho
spital room and part of her time in the hotel with Hal or Gillis. When it was time for Jeffrey to come home, either Pete or I would go back and help transport Mazie.
Pete and I sort of floated out to the parking lot, grinning like idiots and wishing somebody would ask us why just so we could tell them that Jeffrey was okay.
I used my cell phone’s convenient locator service to find a pet supply store, and we were walking its aisles within fifteen minutes. We got a water bowl, a food bowl, a bag of kibble, some doggie treats, and a sleeping cushion. As we went down the aisle toward the checkout counter, we passed the store’s cat-food section, and I noticed a box of cat food like the one Laura had set out on her counter as a reminder. Something about that box of cat food set off little clanging bells in my head, but I didn’t know why.
The checker totaled up our purchases with a cheerful pinging sound, and I paid her and pocketed the receipt. Pete picked up the bags and we headed for the parking lot and the Bronco. At the hospital, I waited in the parking lot while Pete hustled in the doggie supplies to Hal. When he came out, he was almost bouncing.
“Jeffrey’s sitting up. Not in a chair, but they’ve got his bed cranked up and he’s talking. Mazie is lying next to him, and he’s got a grip on her like he’s afraid she’ll leave him. The doctor says he’ll send him some real food pretty soon. All he’s had so far is clear soup and Jell-O. They always give you Jell-O. The Jell-O company must make a mint off hospitals.”
I laughed. Pete laughed. We would have laughed at the Jell-O itself if we’d seen it. We were high on sheer happiness. We didn’t look ahead. All that mattered was that Jeffrey was alive and alert and that he was going to eat real food. Life is really very simple when you narrow it down to the things that really matter. I was so elated that I forgot to be nervous when we went over the Skyway Bridge.
After we’d passed the tollbooths, Pete turned in his seat and faced me.
Cat Sitter on a Hot Tin Roof: A Dixie Hemingway Mystery Page 20
