Murders at Hollings General

face. 'It's Belle from the Hole.'

'His nurse/secretary,' Kathy said, looking at Nick. 'She operates out of a cubbyhole they gave him downstairs in the basement. He's never dared call it an office.'

'A hole with no rent,' David said, punching in numbers. Contact was immediate.

'Everyone's looking for you,' Belle said at the other end.

'Who's everyone?'

'The world. But mainly the media. They already know you're investigating the murders. Isn't voice mail working on that pocket doohickey of yours? I've been trying to get you.'

'Preoccupied, my sweet. It's out about the murders?' 'Out? Since I know, then everyone must know. When are you going to let me in on what happened? You okay?' 'Frazzled, but yes. I'll go into it when I see you. Jasper's house call still on?'

'Yes, definitely. His office called four times already.'

'I'm on my way. Look, Belle, I'll go alone this time.'

'That's all right with me, but there go the books and here comes more insurance rigmarole. I still say you should carry some forms with you.'

'Come off it, Belle, what do I know about what line they should sign?' David signed off and placed the miniature unit back into its leather case on his belt.

Nick creased his forehead. 'House call? I thought they were obsolete.'

'And if I don't make it soon, Dr. Jasper will be furious. Probably is, in fact. Unless he's heard about the commotion here.'

'You're making a house call on a doctor?'

'No, not on him. For him. That's what I do now. I'll explain later. Bye. See you in about an hour.' He wheeled around and groaned, clutching his knee. 'Tough to get old,' he said.

'C'mon,' Nick replied, 'you're young enough to be my son.'

'If you diapered him when you were still in-let's see-high school senior year?' Kathy said.

'Close enough,' Nick said. 'And, tell me, Dr. Brooks, shouldn't those house calls be your first priority?'

David took it as a statement, not a question, and he pretended not to hear. As he limped by Sparky, he said, 'I can phone you later if you're not still here?'

'Sure.'

David paused, expecting a tag to the response, but there was none. He thought briefly about hanging around to see if he could learn anything from the police procedurals but, instead, pressed a door activator and breezed through the surgical booking and administrative wing, waving to several doctors and nurses before reaching the outer stairwell. He was certain the hues and cries from a small reception room were those of corralled news reporters. On the third floor, he crossed a ramp to the parking garage. The hospital had not yet reclaimed his private spot even though he had resigned from full-time employment there a year ago.

He exited to the garage and walked down a slight incline lined with cars parked at right angles on both sides. He paid little attention to a car revving up at the next higher level.

Suddenly, he heard a roar and screech and knew the car was bearing down in his direction. No time to look back. He locked his knees and, ignoring a twinge of pain, dove between two parked cars, somersaulting onto his haunches.

He smelled rubber as he twisted around to glance down the incline. But the car had rounded the lower corner and disappeared.

What the hell! David's first impulse was to give chase, but it was too late for that. He stayed down for a moment, embracing both knees, and although stunned, managed to give thanks that Belle had not come along for the house call. As his breathing normalized, he also gave thanks to all fight-or-flight stress reactions and to the exalted levels they could take one's body. Has there ever been a choreographed mini-second somersault?

He pulled himself up on a fender, dusted his trousers and, wobbly as a decelerating bicycle, headed for his car.

So, these are the stakes. Welcome to murder investigations, pal.

Chapter 2

David weaved his black SL500 Mercedes convertible along the backroads of his Connecticut birthplace, thoughts thrashing through his mind, having conceded that the light but swirly snow had nullified his option of lowering the top-even though he believed he was a better fit when exercising that option.

His stature was a genetic mutation, he theorized quantum leap from diminutive parents. They had operated a small corner store-Brooks Grocery-for thirty-five years before reluctantly folding six months earlier, another casualty of the supermarket blitzkrieg. Along the way, they had budgeted for their only child's college and medical school tuitions at Yale.

David wouldn't activate the heater until the engine had warmed up. Usually when he arrived where he was going. He wore a blue tweed jacket and charcoal trousers. No hat, no overcoat. Just his trademark black scarf and gloves. From December to March, he added t-shirts, his only other winter concession. He eschewed clip-on bow ties in favor of the real McCoy. He appeared top-heavy, with an upper-body contour of a less towering man, perhaps a boxer. Empty-hipped, his trouser legs broke clear to his toes, a sight not lost on most observers. He would offer a dismissive wave. 'Helps warm the tops of feet, you know.'

It was an effort but he forestalled a consideration of his brush with death. What's there to consider anyway? The killer used a dagger and then a scalpel. Why not a car?

Pondering what he would eventually say to Nick Medicore about the origin of his house call practice, he wondered how much detail he should offer. The bottom line was that he had soured on both private, office-based practice and full-time hospital practice. It was a question of freedom. Freedom from staggering stacks of paperwork, from the annoyances of dealing with insurance companies and Health Maintenance Organizations, and from other elements in the burgeoning Managed Care approach to medicine. Meanwhile, he had become increasingly intrigued by police detective work. He had, in fact, always considered himself a medical detective, deriving more pleasure from making a diagnosis than from treating a disease. Yet, he didn't want to abandon patient care altogether. The solution, then, in avoiding the issues that irked him and in fulfilling his investigative and patient contact interests would be to restrict his practice to afternoon house calls for other doctors and to reserve mornings for sleuthing. David preferred the word, 'snooping.'

He had been given a brief medical history about Megan Kelly, the patient he would soon examine and knew that a youngster with diabetes was as brittle as they come-that he might find her about to lapse into coma, or about to convulse from too much insulin, or anything else in between. But for the last half-mile to the Kelly apartment, he overrode the medical scenarios he had waded through many times before.

Sure you want sleuthing at this level? Why not? My hospital. My friends-gone. Friends? Cortez maybe. But Bugles? Now, one less Christmas card and no more aftershave stenches. And what's with what's-his-name, Medicore? Just feeling people out?

He told himself he wouldn't miss those mornings in the halls when he was between clinical meetings and the old industrialist strutted around, wearing his Board chairmanship on his sleeve, intolerable but for his money. That was Bugles. Nonetheless, he had been murdered now along with one of Surgery's pioneers.

David aggravated over the two deaths. He had never been so close to major crime before. Never heard the frantic cries of doctors who knew better, in a killing whose M.O. was unspeakable. Never seen a pearly dagger in the chest of a distinguished colleague. Never tasted fumes while brushed by a speeding tire.

But the surgery was brutal murder. A knifing in a sanctum sanctorum. And he was almost number three. Accept the challenge? Bring it on.

David had called on ten-year-old Megan once before, when he had found her on the verge of insulin shock because she had played a vigorous soccer game but had not reduced herinsulin dose beforehand. So, he had no trouble finding the third floor flat behind Hollings' newest strip mall. Small black bag in hand, he climbed the exposed stairs in back, glancing down at a macadam play yard, its icy surface ruptured by frost heaves, like mole