Charlatans

by Robin Cook

  “I wonder what the hell motivated him to hire a damn PI?” George said.

  “No clue,” Keyon said. “He’s a loose cannon. And the longer we wait, the more trouble he’s likely to cause. At this point he’s got to be neutralized ASAP.”

  “I think we should let the higher-ups know how we feel. Maybe they just don’t get it, having us dick around for a week like they have.”

  “I think they finally get it,” Keyon said. “It’s the only explanation for why they’re willing to spend the money having the Citation Jet wait for us. They want us back in Boston tonight. Otherwise, they would have had us go back commercial in the morning.”

  “How long do you think this job should take?”

  “Unless something goes wrong, it shouldn’t take us long, maybe an hour at most.”

  “We’re coming up to the Ring Road Two Eighty-nine,” George said. “We’re supposed to head west, correct?”

  “Yup,” Keyon said, looking at his Google Maps on his phone. “And then a right on Route Sixty-two and we’re almost there.”

  35

  WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 16, 9:00 A.M.

  Cocooned in the familiar on-call room and feeling safe, Noah slept like a baby. The previous evening he’d remained in the room and avoided the lounge area for fear of running into surgical residents who would invariably question what he was doing there. He was certain they’d be sympathetic and would not blow the whistle, yet it would invariably start gossip that would go around the hospital like an influenza outbreak, eventually alerting the powers that be. Hunger had finally driven him to make a quick visit to the cafeteria after 11:00 P.M. when he thought it would be mostly deserted. As luck would have it, Dr. Bert Shriver, the on-call chief resident, was also there, having a late supper after being caught in surgery all evening.

  Bert was aware of Noah’s suspension and had immediately voiced the hope that Noah would be reinstated following the Surgical Residency Advisory Board meeting. Since Noah knew that Bert sat on the board, he had taken the opportunity to clarify the details, which Bert had been unaware of because Dr. Mason had been the source of the gossip. Bert had been under the mistaken impression that it was an established fact that Noah had fabricated all the data for his thesis. When Bert had learned the truth from Noah, he promised to clue in the other resident board members.

  When asked why he was in the hospital cafeteria so late, Noah admitted he was staying the night in the on-call room because of a break-in at his apartment. Since Bert was also a Beacon Hill resident in a similar absentee-landlord building with a number of student tenants, he understood immediately why Noah would feel vulnerable.

  Although Noah had asked Bert to keep Noah’s presence in the on-call room a secret, Noah knew that it was just a matter of time before word got out. As a consequence, the first thing he did that morning when he awoke was call his landlord, demanding his apartment door be replaced and the woman above be warned about giving out front-door keys.

  By 9:30 A.M. Noah was ready to try his luck at getting to the hospital cafeteria without being noticed. As he was about to leave his hideout, his mobile phone began to ring. It was an unknown number, yet he recognized the 806 area code as the same as Roberta Hinkle’s. Thinking it might be her, he answered.

  “Is this Dr. Noah Rothauser?”

  “It is,” Noah answered. Without knowing why, he immediately felt on edge.

  “This is Detective Jonathan Moore of the Persons Crimes Section of the Lubbock, Texas, Police Department. I have a few questions as part of an investigation. Is this a convenient time to talk?”

  “I guess,” Noah said. Instinctively, he knew he was not going to be happy about this unexpected telephone call. Coming from the police, there was no way it could be good news.

  “First and foremost, I would like to ascertain that you retained Roberta Hinkle for investigative services?”

  “Why are you asking?” Noah said hesitantly. This was not the confidentiality he had expected.

  “Your phone number was found on Roberta Hinkle’s phone record,” Detective Moore said. “We are calling all her clients. You are the only one from out of town.”

  “Yes, I did retain Ms. Hinkle,” Noah said reluctantly. He had no idea what this was about. His immediate worry was that it had something to do with the hospital, his suspension, and the hacking of his computer. Whoever had hacked his computer would have been privy to his email exchange with the private investigator.

  “Was your interest in Roberta Hinkle’s services because of a marital or domestic issue of some kind?” Detective Moore asked.

  “Absolutely not,” Noah said quickly. He was caught off guard by such a question coming out of the blue. “Is she all right?”

  “Usually I am the one who asks the questions,” Detective Moore said emphatically. “Would you be willing to tell me what kind of investigative work Roberta Hinkle was doing for you? But before you answer, let me remind you that you could be subpoenaed to do so, meaning that it would save time and effort if you are cooperative. Otherwise, you might be forced to come here to Lubbock.”

  “It was merely an employment background check,” Noah said with equal rapidity. His sense was that this unexpected call had nothing to do with BMH.

  “Did you know that Roberta Hinkle’s main specialty was domestic or marital issues?”

  “I did not,” Noah said. “Her website said she did background checks, which is what was needed. It also said she had graduated from Brazos University, which seemed convenient. The employee she was investigating attended the same university.”

  “You found Roberta Hinkle online?”

  “I did,” Noah said. “And we communicated first by email and then several phone calls.”

  “Did you ever meet Roberta Hinkle in person?”

  “I did not,” Noah said.

  “What hospital are you with?”

  “The Boston Memorial,” Noah said. “I am a surgical chief resident.” He purposely did not let on that he was currently suspended from active duty.

  “Okay,” Detective Moore said. “Thank you for your time and cooperation. And one piece of advice. You’d better find yourself another local private investigator for your background check.”

  “Why?” Noah asked.

  “She was a homicide victim last night,” Detective Moore said. “We believe it involved the spouse of one of her marital discord clients. She had standing restraining orders pertaining to several that we know of.”

  36

  WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 16, 9:21 A.M.

  Very slowly Noah put his phone down on the utilitarian Formica desk and stared at it as if it were responsible for the shocking news. Any thought of hunger completely vanished. The idea of the private investigator he had retained only the day before being murdered seemed like too much of a coincidence. At the same time, he recognized that he was suffering from a certain amount of understandable paranoia due to what was happening in his own life, which would tend to make him think this new development somehow involved him.

  After orienting himself to time, place, and person by taking a few deep breaths, Noah got up from the desk and stumbled into the small bathroom to splash cold water on his face. Then he stared at himself in the mirror while holding on to the edge of the sink for support. What was reverberating in his mind was the idea that whoever had broken into his apartment and bugged his computer would have known he’d hired Roberta Hinkle. Could this individual be responsible for her untimely death? If that were the case, then Noah himself was at least indirectly responsible.

  Noah visibly shuddered and looked away from his own image. The idea was horrifying, and he knew he had to get a grip on himself. Such thoughts had to be wild, paranoid conjecture. He understood ever since the awful day in Dr. Hernandez’s office, his mind had been in overdrive, and now it was at its worst, like a runaway train.

  Looking back at himself
in the mirror, he used his fingers to rearrange his hair and straighten his tie as a way of organizing his thoughts. Returning to the bedroom, he sat back down in the desk chair. He even picked up his phone with the sudden idea of calling back Detective Moore to voice his fear about his possible involvement, but then he caught himself. Such a self-implicating statement would have pulled him into the vortex of a murder investigation without a shred of actual evidence. Such a situation would have serious, unknown effects on his own life, which wasn’t going that well. With the upcoming Advisory Board meeting to determine if his ethics suspension would be reversed, the last thing he needed was to be involved with a homicide in any capacity.

  Quickly, Noah abandoned the phone by tossing it back onto the desk as if it had suddenly become too hot to hold. Yet the shock of realizing how close he had come to causing himself great harm had the unexpected effect of calming him and allowing him to think more clearly. Surely Roberta Hinkle’s death had to be due to her marital investigative work as the Lubbock detective believed, especially with there being restraining orders already on file. Finding the murderer would just be a matter of time.

  With his mind under a semblance of control, Noah went back to puzzling over his apartment being broken into, not for burglary but apparently to bug his computer. Why and who could have been responsible? It was far-fetched to think it could have been the hospital. And why was he being followed? And why and how was the FBI involved?

  The only thing that would incorporate all these disparate aspects, especially if the murder of Roberta Hinkle was thrown in, would be the involvement of organized crime. Ridiculous as the idea might seem, it was in a far-fetched way supported by Ava’s moonlighting lobbying job with the Nutritional Supplement Council. Noah had often joked over the years with resident colleagues that organized crime and the nutritional-supplement industry shared some similarities, both operating more or less in the open and making a ton of money robbing the public while thumbing their noses at the authorities. The only difference was that organized crime robbed the public literally while the nutritional-supplement industry did it figuratively.

  As was his wont on occasion when deep in thought, Noah got up and paced back and forth in the small room. What he was mulling over was his acknowledged belief the nutritional-supplement industry had to think of Dr. Ava London as a gift from heaven. For her lobbying efforts, she couldn’t be better qualified. Considering her credentials, smarts, attractiveness, and outgoing personality, she had enormous and possibly unmatched credibility and effectiveness. In Noah’s mind, there was no wonder that they paid her as well as they apparently did.

  Suddenly, Noah stopped in the middle of the room as the corollary idea occurred to him that the NSC would understandably be ferociously protective of Ava’s well-being and reputation, and they might even do it behind her back. Could his questioning her competence have been the source of all this hullabaloo? If it were the case, it certainly was a major overreaction since Noah truly thought of her as a terrific anesthesiologist. There had been only those few misgivings . . .

  Resuming his pacing, Noah’s mind veered off in another direction. If what he was thinking was true, maybe it wasn’t an overreaction on NSC’s part but rather indicative that there was some potential problem with Ava’s training. He couldn’t imagine what it could be that wouldn’t have come out when the BMH Anesthesia Department had done their due diligence before hiring her. Yet it made a certain amount of sense.

  Noah stopped again as the idea of hiring another Lubbock private investigator occurred to him. Why not? he thought. It could possibly serve the purpose of ruling out something that the NSC was worried about but was inconsequential. After all, Ava had more than proved herself by handling all the anesthesia cases she had without incident before the three recent unfortunate episodes.

  Picking up his phone Noah had in mind again to google “Lubbock private investigators” to hire another one, but he hesitated. Thinking about his being under surveillance, possibly by the cyber-proficient FBI and not just some amateur putting Spyware and a Keylogger on his laptop, now he felt reluctant to use any electronic communication, even his phone. There was also the issue that if there was any validity whatsoever of his putting Roberta Hinkle in jeopardy, he didn’t want to repeat such a situation. And knowing what he did about the ability of authorities to ping phones and determine their location by triangulation from various cell towers, he removed the battery. He knew it wasn’t enough just to turn it off.

  So instead of hiring another PI, a new idea occurred to him that two minutes earlier he would never had suspected. Maybe he should secretly travel to Lubbock, as it would solve a lot of problems. He didn’t know how long he could get away with staying in the on-call room, so going to Texas would temporarily solve that issue. If he was still being followed and possibly threatened, leaving town had a definite appeal. And he thought he would be far better equipped to check up on Ava’s training than any PI. All he would need to do was walk into the Brazos Medical Center and chat up fellow residents, perhaps implying he was looking for a fellowship program. Using the residents as contacts, he was sure he could get to talk to faculty, particularly relatively young faculty. In any residency program, there were always a few who joined the staff, just as Noah planned to do at BMH. Noah imagined there was a very good chance he could even find someone who trained with Ava. As for specifics, he thought he’d start out in Brownsfield and look at the 2000 high school yearbook.

  With a new sense of purpose and direction, Noah repacked his backpack, leaving his white jacket and tablet in his locker. Then he headed to the hospital ATM, where he withdrew several thousand dollars. With cash in hand, he went down to the front entrance of the Stanhope Pavilion. Since he was reluctant to use his cell phone and had disabled it by removing its battery, he couldn’t take advantage of Uber or Lyft. He didn’t even want to use the taxi queue, which required waiting his turn standing outside the door. What he had in mind was to wait for a taxi to pull up to discharge a passenger, which he would commandeer by rushing out and jumping in. The taxi drivers waiting in line weren’t going to like it, nor were the doormen or the people waiting in line, but Noah didn’t care. He wanted to be sure not to be followed, and he thought the less exposure out in the open, the better. Although he hadn’t seen his tails since Monday, he didn’t want to take any chances.

  37

  WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 16, 9:58 A.M.

  “Hey! Wake up!” Keyon shouted, giving George a slap on the shoulder. Keyon had lost the coin toss to decide who had to take the first watch. He and George were in the Ford van, parked with the engine idling in a no parking zone across the street from the Boston Memorial Hospital’s main entrance. They had arrived back to the Bedford Airport just after 8:00 that morning and had driven directly to the BMH after a quick stop at their office in the Old City Hall Building. A moment after winning the coin toss, George had fallen asleep in the passenger seat. Although both had gotten a few hours of sleep on the plane, they were exhausted.

  “Did you see him?” George questioned while sitting up straight. He blinked in the bright morning sunlight, trying to focus on the hospital entrance. There was a lot of activity, with cars pulling up and people coming and going.

  “I’m not sure,” Keyon admitted, glancing in the rearview mirror to facilitate a U-turn. “I just got a quick glimpse. Whoever it was bolted out of the hospital entrance like they had just robbed a bank and jumped in that white taxi that just pulled away.”

  “Do you think one of us should stay here in case it wasn’t him?” George asked.

  “No!” Keyon said without hesitation. “It’s got to be him. Who else would leave the hospital like that?”

  “Good point,” George said. “Of course, it means he’s onto us.”

  “We already knew that was the case,” Keyon said. After making the U-turn, he accelerated after the taxi, which now was in the distance. He was hoping not to lose sight of i
t.

  “Has he used his cell?” George asked, raising the back of his seat.

  “He got an incoming call, but he hasn’t called out. And then I couldn’t even get a GPS ping, meaning he knows enough to take out the damn battery.”

  “That’s not a good sign,” George said. “If we lose him, it is going to be hard to find him without the help of his mobile.”

  “As if I didn’t know,” Keyon said.

  “Don’t get caught at this traffic light,” George said. Just ahead, the light had turned yellow.

  “What do you think, I was born yesterday?” Keyon said derisively. Instead of slowing, he accelerated. As they entered the intersection the light was red.

  With aggressive, Boston-style driving Keyon was able to close the gap to a degree, and seeing the direction the taxi was going, they could guess it was heading for the Callahan Tunnel to East Boston.

  “I don’t like this,” George said. “Do you think he’s going to Logan Airport? If he is, it’s ironic he’s fleeing town just when we get the okay to move on him.”

  “I’m afraid there’s not much else in East Boston,” Keyon said.

  By the time they exited from the Callahan Tunnel, Keyon had managed to get within four car lengths of the taxi in question. A few minutes later the taxi bore to the right, heading for the entrance to Logan Airport.

  “Shit,” George said. “This is becoming a worst-case scenario! Now we’ve got to find out where the hell he’s going, because there’s not much we can do to him here with all the security around.”

  “It’s going to be up to you,” Keyon said. He smiled inwardly. Earlier, he’d regretted losing the coin toss requiring him to take the first shift; now he was glad. George would have to do the legwork.