I barely touched the steps as I flew down, the wheeep, wheeep, wheeep was sharp and piercing, apparently the carbon monoxide detector that was causing such a racket was down there somewhere.
After two false starts— one in the laundry room, one in a roughed-in bathroom— I found Emily unconscious in the furnace room, her heart beating with the same furious rhythm I'd felt in Lauren's chest. I said. "She's alive," and lifted her eighty-pound body into my arms as though she weighed no more than a pile of clean laundry. Behind me. I heard Sam's footsteps. My heart breaking. I said. "We'll need oxygen for her. Sam. Right away."
"Don't worry:" he reassured me, and preceded me up the stairs.
I carried my dog to the ambulance at the curb. Sam took her body from me. Calmly, he said. "I'll get her oxygen from the firefighters. You go find Lauren, she needs you."
Lauren was already inside the ambulance, her face shrouded by an oxygen mask, an IV running into a vein in her right forearm, the paramedics were busy drawing tube after tube of blood from her other arm, and they ignored me as I climbed inside the ambulance and stepped up to the left side of the stretcher. I took Lauren's left hand and lowered my face to hers and kissed her lightly on her cool lips. I thought I heard a tiny moan and felt some tension in her fingers. I told myself that was great news and fingered her short black hair. I whispered. "I love you."
Behind me, someone poked his head into tha ambulance and said. "ETA eight minutes at Columbia Cemetery. Get ready to fly."
"What?" I asked. "Where's she going?"
"Hyperbaric chamber in Denver. PSL, we need to superoxygenate her right away."
"She has MS. You should know that, they need to know that."
"What?"
"She has multiple sclerosis. Relapsing-remitting. Tell them that, okav? Thev should know."
"What medicines is she on?"
I told them as best I could, trying to remember the list, stressing that she took interferon injections weekly.
"Any other pertinent history?"
"No."
"Out then, please, sir, we have to go."
Without hesitating, I said. "Take my dog, too, Please."
"What?"
"My dog is unconscious, she was poisoned, too. Take her, please, she'll die if she doesn't get help."
One of the two paramedics said. "I'm sorry; we don't do animals." He looked up at me quickly, then away. "But I know how you feel. I have dogs, too."
The other one, the woman, said. "What's the harm?" She gestured at Lauren. "It may help her recover to hava her dog in there with her, the chamber's big as a bus— there's plenty of room in there for a dog, too."
"The chopper's gonna refuse to carry a dog."
"Maybe Christopher's flying today. I can handle Christopher, there's no time to argue, we need to roll, now."
"Can I go with you to the helicopter? Can I go with her to Denver?" My words were a naked plea.
"Follow us to the cemetery. I don't know how much room there is on board the chopper."
I called for Sam to bring Emily to the ambulance and explained that she and Lauren were heading to Denver on Flight for Life.
I jumped in my Land Cruiser and drove the few blocks to the old cemetery, at first it seemed we'd arrived at the wTong location, within a minute, though. I began to hear the rhythmic thunder of big blades cutting through the air, the orange Flight for Life chopper approached from the southeast and landed smoothly in a dusty clearing on the south side of the cemetery. I watched the paramedics efficiently transfer first my wife and then my dog to the care of the Flight for Life nurses, within a minute they were transferred into the cabin. Seconds later, the doors were pulled shut and the orange helicopter lifted off, a hundred feet above the ground the tail rose.
the nose edged down, and the chopper accelerated back toward the southeast, the flight to Denver wouldn't take long.
The paramedics shook my hand, said they were sorry, packed up their stretcher and their equipment, and drove away, that was that.
• • •
I thought I was as alone in that graveyard as I'd ever been in my life, a breeze rustled the leaves of nearby ash trees and carried the aroma of a Saturday afternoon barbecue my way.
A headstone right in front of me was inscribed "Tobias Shunt ‘846-’902. Rancher Elder Man of God." Beside him, an identical stone was inscribed simply "Wife."
At that moment. I despised Tobias Shunt and hoped he'd had a painful death.
I felt hands caress my shoulders from behind and smelled Sawyer's perfume.
Milt Custer said. "I'm sorry, alan."
Sam asked. "They wouldn't let you go with them?"
Without turning around to face them. I said. "There was an extra doc on board the helicopter, some training thing, the pilot told me it was either me or Emily. I told them to take good care of Emily." Finally, I shuffled my feet until I was facing Sawyer, her face was pale, her lips tight, and her eyes betrayed sadness and some intense fear that I couldn't comprehend.
"What's going to happen to them. Sawyer?" I asked.
"They're doing all the right things, they got her on oxygen right away: drew the right labs, they're taking them to Denver to put them in a hyperbaric chamber that will—"
"I know that part. What's going to happen to them? I mean, what happens to someone after she breathes too much carbon monoxide?"
She moved close to me and held both my hands together in front of my chest, she adopted a cushioned tone, a compassionate doctor's voice, one I've often used myself when giving bad news to family members of my patients. "They've both had serious exposure, alan, they could recover, there's a chance of that, depending on the level and duration of poisoning. Pray for that, okay? But.., there is also a chance that they may both have suffered brain damage from hypoxia, the damage could be permanent, the fact that they vomited, that they were unconscious, it's not a good sign, the carbon monoxide replaces the oxygen in the bloodstream and starves the brain of the oxygen it needs. It all depends on how much carbon monoxide they were exposed to and for how long, the window of tolerable exposure is not long."
I looked down at the scraggly grass and glanced at Tobias Shunt's final resting place. My eyes drifted to endless gravestones around his. I asked. "Could they die?" I didn't feel I could form the words and wasn't sure they sounded right as I managed to get them out of my mouth.
Sawyer burst into tears and covered her face with her hands. "Yes," she said, "they could die."
The moment seemed to be monumental, a freeze-frame in time that would change my world forever.
I fixed my eyes on Mrs. Shunt's gravestone.
Wife.
I kicked the dust on her husband's grave and asked Sam to drive me back to the house.
"No,” he said. "But I'll drive you to Denver to see Lauren. Milt will take care of your house. Milt?"
"Of course."
"I appreciate it. Sam, but I want you here to make sure that they find out how this happened. How he did it. Don't let them miss it."
"Lucv's on her wav over, she's on it, and she won't let it slip, alan, she'll goose the fire department investigators until they have it figured out." Lucy was Sam's partner.
Sawyer had moved to the front end of my car and was sitting on the bumper, she was still crying, hugging herself across her chest.
THIRTY-ONE
The rest of the day passed.
I decided to drive myself to Presbyterian/St. Luke's Hospital in Denver. Sam followed right behind. For the first couple of hours I waited fitfully outside the white hyperbaric facility., an L-shaped chamber about eight feet in diameter, with its portholes and gauges I thought it resembled a deep-sea exploring vessel. Lauren lay inside one of the airlocks, she was covered by a pale blue woven-cotton blanket, her hair was still matted in places by her own vomit.
The doctor on duty explained that she had regained consciousness briefly in the helicopter, they had put tiny holes in her eardrums so her ears could tolerate the pressure in
the chamber and were in the middle of a second "oxygen period" now, the hood around her head was providing pure oxygen, he said. If she didn't begin to look more lucid soon, he'd order a third oxygen period, he explained the rationale to me twice, but I still couldn't concentrate enough to understand what he meant.
He said that Emily had regained consciousness during the flight and had been transferred to a veterinary hospital nearby. "Maybe your wife will do just as well, we have people come in here who look just as bad as her, or worse, and who walk out the next day."
"What about damage?" I asked. "Neurological damage?"
"No way to know yet, she's controlling her airway. Consciousness is returning slowly, we'll assess her as soon as we can."
"Are there long-term effects?"
"Possibly, sure, we may see some damage when she's conscious, and there may be delayed neurological sequelae, we're getting ahead of ourselves, though."
Sam tried to talk with me a few times, but I was too insulated by my grief and wouldn't let him reach out to me. Finally, I asked him to go home. I wanted to be alone. For most of an hour he ignored my pleas. But just before dinnertime he left. I didn't even have the grace to thank him. I spent my long minutes staring at Lauren through a porthole. Twice she stirred, moved her head, and opened her eyes. Each time I waved maniacally.
My shock was finally abating, and anger— no, rage— was erupting within me with the heat and force of a volcano. Occasionally I would stand and peer into the porthole and see my sleeping wife and I would feel soma peace for a moment because I was in such proximity to my family, then the rage would explode inside me again and I would feel awesome strength, as though I were powerful enough to destroy any adversary. Just as quickly that omnipotence would pass, and I would feel totally powerless because I didn't know whom to tear asunder.
The doctors told me little.
These first few hours were crucial, they said, in terms of survival, then a day at a time, assessing for evidence of damage. I knew they meant brain damage, a young doctor, a woman with bright eyes and brand-new Adidas, went out of her way to warn me that pets and small children seem to have less tolerance for carbon monoxide than adults do. I could tell she was a dog person and didn't want me to harbor great hopes for Emily's full recovery. I could also tell that it hurt her greatly to tell me that.
Between the lines. I could read how bleak it all looked, there wasn't a single doctor who was encouraging me. None of them told me that directly, though, they hinted and obfuscated and told me stories about patients who had done well. I was sure that I looked too fragile, and too explosive, to be told what looked like the truth.
I phoned Lauren's sister. Teresa, and explained the danger her big sister was in, she agreed with me that wa shouldn't tell their parents, who were both in ill health, just yet, she would make arrangements to get to Denver the next day.
After the third oxygen period. Lauren was removed from the chamber and moved to the ICU, she had regained consciousness, they said, but was sleeping, a kind nurse suggested I go home and get some rest, too, she said she had a feeling I would need my energy for the next day. I resisted for an hour but finally concurred. I contemplated checking into a hotel in Denver instead but felt a stronger need for the familiar than for the convenient.
The drive into Boulder seemed to snap by in an instant, and before I gave my destination more than half a thought. I found myself edging down the gravel lane to our half-demolished house in Spanish Hills, the cruddy rollaway trash bin was my first clue that my autopilot had failed and I'd driven to the wrong domicile.
I got out of the car anyway, paused, and glanced toward Adrienne's big house, the whole structure was dark; I remembered she and Jonas were at a conference in Florida or somewhere, the sky above was invisible to me, shrouded by a blanket of clouds that insulated the Front Range, the temperature was balmy; more like mid-August than early October. To the west. Boulder's lights danced through a misty haze.
Deep in my bones, even in the nuclei of my individual cells. I could feel how alone I was at that moment in that valley, the emptiness I felt was total. I was a parched canteen in an endless desert.
I pulled a flashlight from my car and unlocked the front door of the house, a buzzer sounded, and for a moment I thought I'd tripped a wire for a bomb. Reality finally set in. I used up almost the entire allotted forty-five seconds trying to remember the code to disarm our new burglar alarm. Finally, I got it right.
The house, of course, didn't look much different from that morning. Darker, sure.
I made my way across what had once been the living room and parked myself on top of a huge stack of Sheetrock that rested in front of one of the picture windows. I cried silently. I cried, first, for Sheldon Salgado and his wife and his daughter. I cried for Eleanor Ward and Lorna Pope. I cried for Sawyer.
Finally I cried for Lauren and Emily.
I tried to imagine my life without them and I couldn't, and so I cried for myself.
When my eyes were dry and sore I pulled a construction tarp over myself and rested my head on a bag of grout, the Sheetrock made a better bed than the grout made a pillow.
I was totally disoriented when I awakened the next morning. I heard heavy clomps, like footsteps, and tried to imagine what they were. But I couldn't even remember where I was. I sat up, startled, and below me saw Boulder beginning to illuminate for the day. Next I noticed the exposed studs of the construction morass all around me. In seconds. I felt the bone-jarring ache of having slept for six hours on Sheetrock and a grout bag.
The clomping stopped. My pulse jumped as I remembered the carbon monoxide poisoning and the maniac who was trying to kill me, and the terror of the footsteps approaching zapped through me like an electrical shock. I spun around, expecting to come face to face with the asshole for the first time.
Across the room, Sam Purdy was sitting on a sawhorse that was standing where our sofa used to be, he was wearing jeans and cowboy boots and a blue work shirt that wasn't tucked in. In a soft voice, he said, "You really should lock your doors, considering what's been going on and all."
My heart slowed enough so that I could think. I said, "Hey Sam."
He held up a brown bag. "I bought coffee and bagels from Moe's. No cream cheese for the bagels, no cream in the coffee. Su casa es mi casa, and my new diet is your new diet." He gazed around at the mess. "Where would somebody go to take a leak around here?"
"Chemical toilet. It's on the side of the house."
He didn't stand up to go pee, he said. "Any change last night?"
I shook my head. "Emily's groggy but awake. Lauren was conscious but was sleeping when I left. Just a sec." I punched in the hospital number. Lauren's nurse was too busy to talk, asked me to call back in a few minutes.
He said. "Sherry said to tell you she's praying, she'll get everybody at her Friends meeting on it this morning."
I managed to say: "Thanks." The adrenaline tide from Sam's intrusion was receding, and I was so chilled that I felt my marrow had thickened in my bones. I gestured toward the brown bag. "I'll take that coffee." He stood and handed it to me. For a while I just held it between my hands for warmth. "What day is it?"
"Sunday."
"How did you find me?"
"I'm a detective,” he explained. "Figured you wouldn't go back to the other house. So I guessed you'd be here."
I nodded. "You know, if I'd taken those lessons and had Lauren's Glock with me, you would be a dead man right now. I thought you were him— the murderer, and that's why I don't like handguns."
He appeared to find my attitude toward firearms amusing. But he was compassionate enough not to argue with me right then.
"News?" I asked.
"Heat exchanger in your furnace was cracked. Badly. I talked the department into opening a case file. Scott Malloy caught it and agreed to have the whole furnace removed as evidence."
"I thought you said Lucy caught it?"
"I just told you that to make you feel better.
Since I know how you feel about Scott."
Scott Malloy had once arrested my wife. I had forgiven him but was having a hard time forgetting.
"Scott's officially curious now, he says he found some scratches in the brass on the deadbolt on the back door, he's wondering whether there was an intruder, he's going to have a professional look for signs that somebody tampered with the furnace. Carbon monoxide detectors are a different story, though, that's troubling."
"Did you say 'detectors'? Plural?"
"Yeah, There were two. One was unplugged, which I find a little suspicious, right? The other one, a battery-operated thing, had fallen behind the furnace. It was the one that was blaring. You know anything about either of them?"
"Nothing, we just moved into the house. It had been a rental. Lauren probably knows something."
Sam didn't comment about Lauren's unavailability to answer questions. "The neighbors, of course, didn't see shit, and we're upping the patrols by the house, for all the good they seem to be doing." He paused. "Milt said your other lead didn't pan out? The other patient you wanted to find?"
"That's right, the guy looked real good on paper. But he died of an aneurysm back in ‘995."
"You're sure?"
I thought about it and considered it an odd question. "Not really. But that's what his widow said. Don't know why she'd lie to me."
Sam's face let me know he found my assertion naive. "What makes him look so good on paper?"
"Psychologically, he's a good match. Character is consistent. Has a history of resentment, he's about the right age, he has a background in security analysis, which would give him an experiential base, and he has motive."
"Tell me."
"He thinks we ruined his life."
"Did you?"
"Maybe. If the story his boss tells is true, though, we had a lot of help ruining his life. But by what we did, we certainly may have contributed to the decline, the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back, you know?"
"By doing what?"
"After he was transferred to the hospital from Rocky Flats he was talking kind of crazy about a conspiracy-type thing at work, the docs who saw him put him on a mental health hold and gave him a diagnosis that ended up hanging around his head like a ticking time bomb. Cost him his security clearance at Rocky Flats, which meant it eventually cost him his job, he filed a defamation lawsuit or something like that in the late eighties, went nowhere. Don't know what happened to him after that."
Manner of Death Page 27
