Extreme Measures (1991)

by Michael Palmer

  "Yes?" Eric felt ill.

  "You said it was a boarded-up empty store that had been turned into some sort of voodoo temple."

  "That's right."

  "Well, Doctor, I don't know how to tell you this, but there're no boarded-up stores on that whole street. On the first floor of the building three doors down is a candle shop."

  "Are you sure you were on Sproul Court?"

  Eric could tell now by the way the two officers were looking at him that they felt certain he was quite mad.

  "Oh, we were on Sproul all right," Medeiros said. "Were you?"

  "Of course I was. Officer, contrary to what you're thinking, I'm not crazy. Everything happened exactly the way I said it did. Did you go inside the candle shop?"

  "No. After what we encountered down the street, we weren't too excited about trying to get someone to let us in. But there's a whole window filled with candles and a bunch of other little knickknacks, and we could see inside perfectly well. Not a headless chicken in sight, Doc. Not one."

  Eric sank back in his chair, desperately trying to sort out what he was hearing.

  "This is insane," he said.

  "Now there we're in agreement."

  "What about the woman?"

  "What about her?"

  "Officer Medeiros, you've got to believe me. I met Anna Delacroix in the Countway Medical Library. She's a grad student at B.U. She asked me to meet her on Sproul Court, and we were abducted by two men at knife point and poisoned in a very frightening ritual."

  "You know what we think, Doc? We think you were pledging some sort of fraternity or club and the whole thing got carried away."

  "That's ridiculous."

  "You take any drugs tonight?"

  "Only the one that was put on my skin. There's a toxicologist in there right now. After you hear what he has to say, maybe you'll believe me."

  As if on cue, the door to the laboratory slammed open, and Ivor Blunt stalked into the room, his expression a strange mix of anger and bemusement.

  "Talcum powder," he said.

  The two officers exchanged smiles. Eric could not even speak.

  "Plus a little dirt, a little lint, and a smidgen of oil of some sort," Blunt went on. "Maybe olive oil. Dr. Najarian, you are one crazy son of a bitch, and at this moment I wish you nothing but ill."

  "Don't you see," Eric pleaded, looking from one of the men to the next, "the whole thing was a setup to discredit me--to make you all think exactly what you're thinking. I'm telling you, it all happened just like I said it did."

  "I'm going home," Blunt said. "If you get poisoned again, please don't call."

  He stormed back into his lab.

  "I don't think he believes you," Officer Medeiros said in pointed understatement. "Dr. Najarian, you've caused a lot of people a lot of trouble tonight."

  Eric couldn't remember the last time he had broken down and cried, but he knew that if he tried to speak, that was precisely what would happen. He had been had--maneuvered step by step by Anna Delacroix into an abyss of humiliation and discreditation from which he would never recover. He bit at his swollen lower lip and slowed his breathing until it seemed safe to stand and confront the policemen.

  "Listen," he said, "my lip, these cuts on my wrist--I'm not making these up."

  "Hey, split lips and slashed wrists we see all the time. We don't doubt for a moment that you've gotten yourself messed up in something tonight. But we're just as certain that something isn't what you've been telling us."

  "Then what?"

  Medeiros shrugged. "Drugs, women, some other kind of sex. Doc, look, we're really not bad guys, and we do have feelings. But we're also cops. We listened to you, we checked your story out, and we found nothing. Nothing. Believe me, you are far from the first M.D. we've dealt with who got himself into a jam. Shit, just a few months ago there was that guy from your emergency room who got arrested for--"

  "I know, I know. But this is not like that. Believe me it isn't."

  "Doc, the people upstairs in the E.R. tell me you're a damn good doctor--one of the best, they say. But they also tell me you've been pushing yourself real hard lately. Now, I don't know you, but until something comes along to convince me otherwise, I have to think you got big problems, and that maybe you ought to get some help before you get hurt any worse than you already are."

  "I don't need any help except to find someone who can recognize the truth when he hears it."

  "Hey, suit yourself. You want a ride home?"

  "No, thank you. I can manage--oh, shit."

  "What?"

  "Whoever did this to me took my keys, my wallet, everything. I can't even get into my own place."

  "Anyone else got a set?"

  "No. Well, yes, but I don't know where she is. In fact, if you want to know the truth, with everything that's happened to me, I'm getting damn concerned about her. I may need your help in finding her, but I can't do a thing until I get into my apartment."

  Medeiros looked at his partner. "Do you think we should help him out?"

  The other man shrugged and then nodded.

  "We don't like people to know this, but we got ways of getting into places," Medeiros said. "Come on. And as for your girl," he added, "unless you have evidence of foul play, we'd suggest you wait forty-eight hours before filing a report. In your case, better make that seventy-two hours."

  He put his hand on Eric's shoulder and guided him through the door. In the hallway five reporters crowded up to them. One of them, begging Eric to wait until her camera crew arrived, shoved the microphone of a portable recorder in his face. All of them were firing questions.

  "Doc, tell us about the voodoo priest." "Are you dying?" "How does it feel?" "Who is this mystery woman? Why isn't she registered as a student at B.U.?" "What did the analysis of the poison show?" "Are you going to be hospitalized?"

  "Do you want to talk to them?" Medeiros whispered.

  Eric shook his head.

  "Out of the way," the policeman ordered. "Brian, run interference."

  "Hey, be fair," someone yelled. "Doc, tell us about the missing body--the one who got autopsied alive."

  "What is it with this hospital anyhow?" another reporter asked. "First that weirdo doc dealing drugs for sex, now this."

  With Eric between them, the two officers pushed past the pack and hurried down the corridor. A minute later Eric was in the back seat of their cruiser.

  "I can get into the building," he said. "My downstairs neighbor keeps a set of keys hidden in back for his various women to use."

  "We love hearing that sort of thing," the officer named Brian said.

  "Listen, thanks for doing this for me."

  "It seemed like you were having a bad night," Medeiros responded.

  Eric almost managed a smile. He knew that his career--at least at White Memorial--was, to all intents and purposes, over. And if, as he suspected, his near-arrest was reported to the Board of Registration and Discipline in Medicine, his career as a physician might be in jeopardy as well. Anna Delacroix had certainly served her masters--whoever they were--with distinction.

  They entered Eric's building from the alley and went up the back stairs. Officer Tony Medeiros knelt by the door, examining the lock.

  "This should be nothing more than a credit card job," he said.

  He tested the knob, which turned easily.

  "It appears you forgot to lock up, Doc," he said, pushing the door open. "McGruff the crime dog would be very upset with--"

  Instantly, the three of them tensed. Through the doorway they could see that the apartment was in shambles. Medeiros and his partner loosened the holster guards of their service revolvers as they stepped inside. Drawers had been pulled out and thrown on the floor; book cartons were spilled open, papers strewn about; a lamp was smashed. They made their way through the place, checking Eric's closets, which had been treated as rudely as the rest of the apartment.

  Then, in the kitchen sink, they found Verdi. The parrot was dead, it
s neck apparently snapped. At the sight of the bird, Eric moaned and sank onto a chair, his face buried in his hands. He was now beyond tears.

  "Any idea who might have done this?" Medeiros asked. "Or why? Or, for that matter, how they got in? There's no sign of a break-in anyplace."

  "They took my keys. I told you that," Eric said without lifting his face.

  "Hey, Tony," the other officer called out just then, "I'm down here in the bathroom. You ought to come down here. I think I may have just found an explanation for everything."

  With Eric close behind, the policeman hurried down the hall.

  Brian stood to one side of the bathroom, his arms folded. Covering the sink was Eric's oval bedroom wall mirror. On top of it were a razor blade, straw, and tiny spoon. Several thin lines of white powder were laid out in a row, and there was the suggestion that several more in the row had been already used. On the toilet seat was a plastic bag containing what Eric suspected was at least a thousand dollars' worth of cocaine.

  If he felt any shock at that moment, it was at the realization that he was not the least surprised. Whoever had pulled Anna Delacroix's strings did not want him dead--they wanted him publicly and personally destroyed.

  "Drugs can make people do some pretty bad, pretty weird things," Tony Medeiros mused, as if he were speaking to a nine-year-old. "Even if those people happen to be doctors. Believe me, you shoulda just said no."

  He reached back and pulled his handcuffs from his belt.

  Without a word, Eric turned and put his hands behind his back.

  "Do you really think I trashed my apartment, killed my own pet, and left this stuff here? Then came back with two cops?" he asked when the manacles were in place. There was a numb calm in his voice.

  "Doc," Tony Medeiros said, "the minute we see something like this, all we get to do is act. Someone else gets to do the thinkin'. Brian, call this in, will you? The doc and I will wait in what's left of the living room."

  As he sat on his couch, surveying the wreckage of what had once been the simplest, most focused of lives, Eric felt a strange, surreal peacefulness settle in. Whoever had done this to him was frightened and threatened--either by something Eric was about to discover or something he already knew. Well, they had beaten him and broken him down; they had terrorized and discredited him. But they hadn't killed him. And that, they were going to find, was their mistake.

  From far in the back of his mind, a melody began to sound. At first Eric could tell only that it was there, but soon he was nodding the tempo to himself and softly humming along. He was still immersed in the tune when they led him down the stairs and into the squad car.

  It was the chorus from Kris Kristofferson's "Me and Bobby McGee."

  Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose....

  You know, Mr. Najarian, the two of you are needing to be getting your acts together. First you call and leave a message that you called and that you are all right; then she calls and leaves a message that she called, and that she's all right. Then you both do the same thing all over again. But neither of you leaves a number. Get it what I am saying?"

  "Yeah," Eric said, picturing the Iranian desk clerk slithering along behind the Hotel Carlisle desk. "I get it."

  "So, you would like to leave a number, yes?"

  Eric looked across the corridor of the Station Four jail at the officer who was waiting to take him to court for his arraignment on charges of possession of a Class B controlled substance, and possession with intent to sell.

  "No," he said. "Just tell her I called, and that I'm all right. I'll call later."

  He hung up and then allowed his hands, which had been cuffed in front of him, once again to be secured behind his back. He winced at the now-familiar electric pain that shot up from his wrists, and wondered how Jennifer Farrell's suture lines were holding up. He also wondered for perhaps the hundreth time where Laura was, and why she hadn't stayed in her room that night.

  According to the Carlisle desk clerk, the last call from her had come in about 6:00 A.M. Now, it was nearly eleven. Eric gave silent thanks that at least she had not chosen to sleep at his place, and hoped that wherever she was, she had spent the intervening hours more pleasantly than he had.

  Still, the more he thought about things, the more certain he became that something had happened to frighten her, or at least alert her to potential danger. She had made a point of leaving the message at the Carlisle that she was all right, but still, she would not leave a phone number. Possibly she recognized the desk clerk as one who would, at any given moment, be the devoted servant of the highest bidder. As it was, the man had sounded pretty damn eager to put together some information.

  Perhaps, Eric speculated, somebody had gotten to him already. Perhaps Laura had seen one of the men from the docks watching the Carlisle, or been accosted by someone and escaped. Now, she was probably registered in another hotel, wondering where he was. Eric cursed himself for not being available to her.

  "You got a jacket?" Eric's guard asked as they approached the front doors of the station.

  "No. But it looks pretty nice out. I don't think I'll need one."

  "Suit yourself. I just asked because some of 'em like to have jackets to pull over their heads."

  "Pull over their--?"

  Eric never had the chance or the necessity to finish his question. Two more officers joined them as they pushed through the doors into a mass of bodies, microphones, and clicking cameras--a group at least five times larger than the one at the hospital, and many times more rude. Eric shielded his eyes from the flashbulb assault and tried to ignore the barrage of questions, the kindest of which were in thoughtless bad taste. Suddenly, over the din, a hoarse, high-pitched voice called out rapidly to the crowd.

  "Move aside. Move aside. We have no statement whatsoever to make at this time other than to affirm that this man is innocent of any wrongdoing and will be found so when all of the facts become clear. Now, please give us room and let us pass."

  Eric stared over at the source of the voice, a rumpled man in an ill-fitting suit, carrying a scuffed briefcase.

  "Who are you?" one of the reporters called out.

  "Who the hell do I look like, Gandhi?" the man said. "I'm Dr. Yossarian's lawyer."

  "Najarian," Eric whispered.

  "Connolly," the man said. "Felix Connolly. You okay?"

  "I'm okay. Why are you doing this?"

  "I owe a certain private detective a favor," Connolly whispered.

  "I understand," Eric said, remembering Laura's account of her meeting with Bernard Nelson, and knowing now where she was. Considering her description of the detective and his office, the appearance of the lawyer who owed him a favor was not that surprising. He could only hope the man knew what he was doing. "Laura's all right?" he asked.

  The attorney nodded. "Let's keep names to a minimum just in case," he said. "She had some problems yesterday, but she's okay now. Our mutual friend has her keeping a low profile. I'll tell you what I know when we're alone. You'll have to go over to the courthouse in the cruiser. I'll take my car and meet you there."

  He nodded at the battered Volkswagen Beetle parked directly behind the police car.

  "A Mercedes might inspire a bit more confidence," Eric said.

  "Don't worry," Felix Connolly said. "Looks can be deceiving. Believe it or not, from time to time I've gotten even bigger baddies than you off."

  With a surprising mix of charm, bombast, candor, and legal acumen, Felix Connolly cut a swath for Eric through the brier patch of a district court criminal arraignment. Along the way he succeeded in persuading the assistant district attorney to drop the charge of possession with intent to distribute, and the judge to lower, by 50 percent, the $10,000 bail recommended by the prosecution. Finally, after the date was set for a hearing to determine probable cause, and the case was remanded to the Suffolk County Superior Court, Connolly rushed Eric out of the building, past the screeching gaggle of reporters, and into his VW.

&
nbsp; "Nice going," Eric said as Connolly inched through the crowd and into the flow of traffic. "You're very good at what you do."

  Connolly acknowledged the compliment with a nod.

  "In case you don't know it," he said, "Bernard Nelson is too. Your friend is lucky she found him."

  "I still can't believe what she's been through."

  "You haven't done too badly in that department yourself."

  "I guess. Well, I think we're past the last of the damn reporters."

  "Don't bank on it," the lawyer said, reaching behind Eric's seat for a newspaper and handing it to him. "I suspect some of them are following us right now. You're big stuff. This is the early edition of the Herald. Take a look at it, and then I'll show you the extra they came out with a few hours ago."

  The early edition contained a four-inch, double column, bylined story on page 3, dealing essentially with the crusade of one brave doctor to locate the body and tissue specimens of a woman rumored to have been autopsied alive. Except for a brief bit of biographical material about Eric, the story consisted entirely of No comments and Absolutely untrues from hoispital officials and the medical examiner's office. A quote from Joe Silver denied the rumors about the living autopsy, and added: "Dr. Najarian has been at this hospital for five years, and knows better than to speak to the press about any hospital business, especially when he has none of the facts."

  As damaging as the early edition was to Eric's hope of a continued career at White Memorial, when compared to the extra it was a ringing endorsement.

  ZOMBI DOC CHASES THE UNDEAD

  The front-page article, complete with a picture of a dazed Eric being led from the pathology office by two policemen, would have been at least a nine on any ten-point scale of sensationalist journalism. Wherever the truth had eluded the reporter, or in certain spots where the facts had not jibed with the rest of the article, fabricated pieces had simply been thrown in. Interviews with Ivor Blunt, the Wayland police, and several staff members of the hospital painted the picture of a high-strung, overworked young man who had recently been turned down for a promotion to associate E.R. director and had turned to cocaine to keep himself going. His obsession with the poison tetrodotoxin, it was suggested by Blunt and others, was clearly the result of a cocaine-induced paranoia.