No Cure for Murder (31 page)
“Don’t be sorry. If we can help, we want to.”
“Nothing can help, Jacob. It’s too late.”
“You don’t talk much about your personal life, Zoe. I respect that, but Byron...he’s quite convincing. Lola and I believe him when he denies having an affair.”
“It’s not your problem, Jacob. You’ve said it yourself a thousand times: Nobody knows what goes on between a couple in the privacy of their home.”
“Dismiss me if you will, but find somebody to help you two out.”
“I’m not dismissing you...God, no. I’d never do that. But there are things...too many things...”
“I’ve offered Lola’s services before, Zoe. Talk with her or have her make a referral. Lola’s good at what she does. I know she can help.”
“I’m sorry, Jacob. I’m just not that big on psychotherapists. Too much of it is a waste of time.”
“I don’t know what kind of shrinks you’ve dealt with before but I assure Lola is unique. Think about it.”
Later that same afternoon, Margaret Cohen knocked on Jacob’s door. “It’s Bruce Bryant’s office. He’s having a meeting at 5:30 this afternoon. Can you make it?”
“Of course.”
Jacob walked in light drizzle to Brier and entered the administration offices through the ornate portico. When he reached Bryant’s office, the door was closed.
His secretary turned to Jacob. “Have a seat, Dr. Weizman. Mr. Bryant will be just a moment.”
After five minutes, the door opened and Bruce appeared. “Dr. Weizman. Please join us.”
It surprised Jacob to see Warren Davidson, Mark Whitson, Sharon Brickman, Ira Green, Jack Byrnes, and a young woman.
“I don’t know if you know Ira Green, he’s chief of the Berkeley P.D., and this is his investigator, Shelly Kahn.”
“I know Ira like nobody does, I delivered him.” Jacob turned to Warren. “What’s going on?”
Bruce pointed to the chair next to Mark Whitson. “Have a seat, Doctor. You need to hear this.”
“What is it, Mark?” Jacob asked.
Mark clutched a manila folder. “We have the autopsy results from the exhumation of Shannon Hogan and P.J. Manning. Both were murdered!”
“Murdered? That’s insane,” cried Jacob grabbing the arms of his chair to steady himself.
Warren leaned forward. “Are you all right?”
“I’m okay...I...I can’t believe what I’m hearing. Are you sure, Mark?”
“You think I like telling you this? Your patients were killed. Murdered. Shannon Hogan with the muscle blocker acetylcholine, and P.J. Manning with insulin.”
Jacob paled. “Oh my God. Shannon and P.J., I just can’t believe it. What son-of-a bitch would do such a thing?”
“Jacob. Jacob. Think for a moment. It can’t be coincidental that five of seven cases in your care were victims. Somebody is unhappy with you, and your patients are paying the price.”
“Paying the price?” Jacob whispered. “Who hates me so much that they kill the innocent?”
“That’s the million-dollar question,” said Ira Green. “We need your help to find the answer.”
When Marion Krupp returned home from work, it surprised her to see the family room empty.
“Abby,” she called. “Mommy’s home.”
With no response, Marion rushed up the stairs to Abby’s room where she found her asleep. She sat next to her daughter, placed her hand on the child’s head and reflexly removed it.
She’s on fire!
She shook her daughter. The little girl moaned, then gradually opened her eyes and smiled. “Mommy, you’re home.”
“What are you doing in bed, sweetheart?”
“I don’t feel good, Mommy. I feel hot and my head hurts.”
Marion, like most health professionals, mentally ran through a list of diagnoses, starting with the gravest first. Maybe it’s meningitis or encephalitis. She called her pediatrician, Michael Butler, reported Abby’s symptoms and fever of 102 degrees, and answered each question with a ‘no’.
“It sounds like a virus, Marion. We’re seeing a lot of it around. Let’s watch her for a day or so. It’s likely to pass.”
Marion remained tense, but felt reassured. Two days passed and Abby wasn’t any better.
Abby coughed repeatedly. “Mommy, my head hurts a lot and I have ringing in my ears.”
A fine red rash had appeared on her abdomen, chest and her arm pits.
Must be that damn virus, Marion thought. Mike must be right.
On the third day, Abby became worse. Fever continued and was accompanied by chills and sweating that soaked her sheets. When Marion saw a black spot develop on one of Abby’s fingers, she was at Mike Butler’s office at once.
Mike Butler took one look at the child. “I don’t like the looks of this, Marion. I’m going to admit her to the hospital.”
Marion sat by Abby’s bed. She grilled each physician for answers. Each ‘we don’t know’ made her more desperate and more angry.
After two days in the hospital and an extensive workup, Abby’s condition deteriorated. She developed more dark spots on her fingers, and she became confused and finally lapsed into a coma.
They called an infectious disease specialist, a dermatologist, and Jack Byrnes, director of the ICU.
“Let’s call for an emergency Grand Rounds,” said Jack. “Maybe somebody on the staff will have an idea.”
Brier’s main auditorium, seating two hundred, was full with standing room only. Mike Butler presented the case in exquisite detail. Jacob sat in the rear, listening and making notes to himself about things he needed to do later that day. While Mike presented the clinical findings, Jacob lifted his head from his pad.
Dozens of hands flew up for questions and suggestions. The staff suggested diagnoses from Anthrax to Toxic Shock Syndrome. Nothing fit. As the number of raised hands declined, Jacob stood.
“Any ideas, Jacob?” said Jack Byrnes.
“Tell me more about the rash. Does it involve her face?”
“No,” said Mike.
“Does it involve her palms or soles?”
“No,” said a more anxious Mike. “Jacob, please, if you have any idea…”
“You said she had a fever of 102.6, and pulse of 70, and signs of early gangrene.”
All eyes remained on Jacob. He stood and looked around the room. “It’s typhus, gentlemen. Epidemic or sporadic typhus. She needs to be on Tetracycline and Chloramphenicol, yesterday.”
“Are you sure, Jacob?”
“Age has its advantages. I’ve seen most everything in sixty plus years of practice, but typhus and I go back to Auschwitz where it killed thousands. Mike, I know typhus. I know typhus too damn well. And, yes, I’m sure.”
Mike Butler walked away from the podium and up to Abby’s bedside where Marion was waiting. “It’s typhus, Marion. I’m starting antibiotics immediately. She’s young and has a great chance.”
Abby’s fever dropped in the first eight hours of treatment. By the second day, she opened her eyes, looked at her mother’s drawn appearance and bloodshot eyes. “Are you okay, Mommy?”
Marion wept.
Mike Butler handed her this morning’s laboratory results. “In case you have any questions about the diagnosis, look at the result I circled.”
Marion looked at the sheet and saw, Antibodies to typhus greater than 1:2560, strongly positive!
Chapter Fifty-Six
Carleton Dix sat in his darkened den staring at the wall.
There’s a name for someone who does the same thing repeatedly and expects different results: crazy...or just stupid. I’ve had it hard enough in the ultra-liberal Berkeley, but now I have Kelly Cowan, and someone digging into my past.
He turned on his computer and when he got to Google’s web page, he typed in the name, Terrence Wilcox. Among the hundreds of hits, he found one entitled Berkeley Police Detective Terrence Wilcox Drug Bust. He opened the link to an article in the Oakland Tribune dated March 6, 1989. He skimmed the article about bogus triplicate prescription pads for narcotics stolen from the office of a Berkeley physician, Jacob Weizman.
Weizman...Weizman? Of course. I should have known. He’s managed to transform our disagreements into a vicious vendetta against me. The manipulative bastard is trying to ruin me. If Weizman ever discovers what I’ve been doing, a change of address won’t be enough this time. I can’t let that happen.
Lola’s mind focused on finishing the notes from her last patient, so she didn’t hear the soft tapping on her door. When the tap became a knock, she said, “Yes. Come in already.”
A girl, looking about fifteen, peered around the door. “Dr. Weizman? Can I speak with you for a moment?”
Girl-next-door type, Lola thought, but then noticed the multiple holes in her ears and one in her nose for body jewelry, now absent. She also noticed the characteristic discoloration over her right deltoid area...the telltale sign of tattoo removal.
“I’m sorry, young lady. Do you have an appointment?”
“No,” she said, tears streaming down her cheeks, “I just thought...”
Lola stood and guided her to the sofa. “Please. Nothing could be so bad. Come in child, have a seat.”
“Thank you, Doctor. I’m sorry. I’m not usually so rude. I’m Kelly Cowan.”
“The Kelly Cowan? Sarah’s friend?”
“Sarah talked about me? What did she say? We used to be so close...I mean as close as two friends can get.”
Lola put on her knowing smile to provoke her. “I understand exactly.”
“Exactly...what do you mean by exactly?” Kelly’s voice rose an octave.
“I’m sorry, Kelly, but what my patients tell me, I hold in strict confidence. That’s an unbreakable rule. Patients can tell me anything and know it will go no further.”
“You can’t say anything, even if it’s about me?”
“Especially, if it’s about you.” Lola looked at her watch. “What can I do for you, Kelly?”
“I need to talk with you,” she said crying again. “I need to talk with someone and all the girls say good things about you, Dr. Weizman.”
“Please call me Lola. I’m sorry, Kelly, but I’m late for a meeting. Maybe your parents can call me for an appointment.”
“God no, Lola. They can’t know anything about this.” She stood, walked to Lola’s window, then stared at the brick wall. “I need to talk with you before it’s too late...before anything else happens.”
“Before what happens?”
Kelly kept her eyes on the floor as she whispered, “I’m having thoughts, disturbing thoughts.”
“What kind of thoughts?”
“I’m feeling so bad...sometimes I don’t know if the whole thing is worth it.”
“You’ve thought about hurting yourself?”
Kelly, head still down, nodded.
Lola joined Kelly by the window. She turned Kelly around with both hands on her shoulders. “This is serious business, Ms. Cowan. If you’re trying to bullshit me, it’s not going to work.”
Kelly stared back at Lola with empty eyes and an expressionless face.
Lola shook her. “Do you want my help or not?”
Kelly’s lips parted, then she drifted to her right. Lola caught her head as she slipped to the floor.
Lola pushed the intercom. “I need an ambulance. I’m admitting a patient to the locked psychiatric ward at Brier Hospital.”
“It’s Lola for you, Jacob,” said Margaret Cohen.
Jacob picked up the phone. “What’s up doc?”
“I’m admitting Kelly Cowan to Brier Psych. I need someone to take a look at her medically.”
“Is this Sarah’s Kelly Cowan?”
“The one and only.”
“What’s wrong with her?”
“I’m not sure. It could be a reactive depression with suicidal ideation or she could be playing me.”
“Why in the world would she try to play you?”
“Something’s going on with this girl, and I’ll discover what it is, one way or the other.”
Pale green paint covered the walls of 2-West at Brier Hospital. A great choice for a psychiatry unit due to its calming, soothing effect, and if you believed it, for its healing powers.
Jacob joined Lola at the nursing station that same afternoon. “Medically, she looks fine to me. A bit catatonic, but I’ll leave that up to you. I ran some routine tests, endocrine function, and of course, a drug screen.”
“I don’t think we’re seeing the effects of drugs, Jacob.”
“I’ll leave her in your capable hands. See you tonight.”
“I’m so tired,” groaned Kelly Cowan in a monotone as Lola sat at her side. “I just want to sleep.”
The nurses had placed Kelly alone in their four-bed ward. The neatly made beds, the empty bedside tables and night stands lent an eerie hollowness to the place and a slight echo as they conversed.
“We need to talk, Kelly, but not today. I’m giving you something mild to help you sleep. We’ll get into this first thing in the morning.”
“Do I have to have visitors? My mom’s freaking and I don’t want to see certain people.”