Spritz unetched his smile. 'It's not mine. The fuckin' hospital owns it. Except for the defibrillator van-that stays with me. Shit, who do you think started the cardiac defib program around here? I probably shocked more hearts into normal rhythm than anyone in the city's history.'
'Who's on the committee these days?'
'Foster-that chairman wimp; Coughlin, across town; the prick next door … ' He motioned toward Tanarkle's office. 'And Bugles-at least he was.' Spritz's eyes had turned to pinpoints of fire.
David deliberated. Our administrator, their Chief of Staff. Sounds logical. But why our pathologist? What's he doing on the committee?
'Well, no sense crying over you-know-what,' Spritz said. He checked his watch. On his right wrist, David noticed. 'I've got to get going. Sure hope you make your catch.' He returned to his outer office and began packing another carton.
David watched for a moment and wondered whether most southpaws wore their watches on their right wrist. 'See you around, Vic,' he said.
In Dr. Ted Tanarkle's reception room, he stared at the secretary's wrists without saying a word.
'David, you're back.'
He tried to finish his thoughts without delaying a response. Everyone wearing watches on right wrists? What difference does it make anyway-wasn't the imposter a male? Christ, what are you supposed to do-go through life checking people's wrists?
'David?'
'Marsh, I'm coming right out and asking you a direct question.'
'Sure, but …'
'Are you right-handed or left?'
'Right. Why?'
'Curious, that's all.' He stood at her desk and looked vacantly at the diplomas, citations and group pictures on the wall behind her. 'Then why wear your watch on your right wrist?'
Marsha looked puzzled but spread out her left hand. 'See, just to balance these.'
'Nice rings,' he said. There were four of them. He ground his teeth.
'David, are you all right?'
'What? Yeah, I'm all right. Just mulling over some things. Is Ted in?'
'Yes, but he's on the phone with Dr. Coughlin. He called him on some slides. I'll go put a note on his desk.' She opened Tanarkle's office door. 'Oh, you're off. Dr. Brook's here to see you.'
'I'll see him.' David heard the words run together, closer then usual-and feebler. Dr. Theodore J. Tanarkle had been Holling's chief pathologist for over three decades. Best known visually for an engaging gap between his two upper front teeth and professionally for his clinical acumen without ever seeing the patient, staff doctors would feed him signs and symptoms which invariably initiated, 'Have you thought of'? He had married late, to a woman a generation younger. Soft-spoken, his sentences were, nonetheless, blurted not spoken, as if he had to get rid of them.
David thanked Marsha and walked in. It was one of those offices that swallowed you up, that made its nine- by-twelve Oriental carpet look puny, its ceiling-to-floor bookstacks of no great account.
He saw Tanarkle standing, arms locked on his desk, his head a tomato covered with dew. When he straightened, David measured his height by noting he could see directly over the head of the pathologist.
Dr. Tanarkle sat clumsily and, running his hands through the last vestiges of hair at his temples, said, 'The son-of-a-bitch threatened me!'
'Coughlin? What did he say?'
'That the patient on the table yesterday should have been me, but that he'd settle one way or another.'
David knew the background: fiery Dr. Everett Coughlin, the mover and shaker pathologist at Bowie Hospital; Ted Tanarkle, his counterpart at Hollings; the bitter battles over which hospital should be granted state certification for the city's first organ transplantation program; the late Charles Bugles and his dollar-splendored petitions at the state capitol.
'Keep it cool, Ted, you know Coughlin.'
'Yes, that's the problem. He still can't accept the transplant decision.' Tanarkle shook open a neatly folded handkerchief and wiped his brow and the back of his neck with his right hand. 'And another thing, David-stranger than hell. He wanted to know if you're still on the case.'
'Did he say it like that?
Tanarlde stroked his forehead. 'You know, I can't remember. He meant the murders. Is it important how he said it?'
'It could be. What was your answer?'
'I simply said, `As far as I know.' Jesus, my head is hot. Do I look like a beet?'
'No, a tomato. A tomato in a gray lab coat.' Tanarlde seemed to loosen up.
'Ted, I realize you're miffed and probably in hypertensive crisis, but do you mind if I ask you a question or two?'
'Ahh … no, that's fine.'
'I could come back later.'
'No, go ahead, it's okay.'
From a table submerged in medical journals, manuscipts, trays of specimen slides and boxes of projection slides, David pulled out and sat on the only chair not itself submerged. He opened his notepad.
'For starters, do you know of anyone who might want to knock off Bugles?'
'Charlie? Plenty of guys. He got things done over twenty years, I guess, but you've got to admit, he was a detestable sort. Even when you were here with me, you must have seen how he barged in and threw his weight around.'
'You willing to name some names?'
'Sure. Coughlin hated his guts probably more than mine. Marsha out there couldn't stand him. Foster upstairs-even some of his associate administrators. By the way, you know that Charlie put Foster into that job, don't you?'
'No, but I'm not surprised.'
'Sure. And he manipulated every one of his strings. Foster resented it. Probably would have been long gone except for his wife. Nora likes it around here for some reason.
'How about you?'
'Me what? Killing Charlie Bugles? Depends on what you mean. Did I want to kill him sometimes? Absolutely. Could I or did I? No.'
'Are you or the medical examiner doing the post?' 'I am, at one o'clock. He asked me if I would and I agreed.'
'Cortez, too?'
'After Bugles.'
'Mind if I drop by?'
'No, be my guest.'
'Hold on a sec.' David backtracked on what he had written thus far and made a few notations in the margins. 'Okay, now, about the blood. There were stains on the floor leading from Cortez's body to the lab here. At least to the alley door entrance. Matter of fact, there was one at the bottom of that door. Any idea why?'
Tanarkle sat mute, his face a mannequin's.
'Please understand, Ted, I'm not implying anything. But the blood did trail here, and I think you'd agree you'd ask the same question if our roles were reversed.'
'Yes, yes, of course. I know of the trail, but I guess it was just shocking to have it mentioned in the form of a question like that.' He sighed. 'And, no, I have no idea why.'
'Good enough. Well, not good, but … well … let's let it go at that.'
'I wish I could be more helpful, David.'
'You're doing fine. And finally-you and I go back a long way and you don't have to answer this if you don't want to …'
