Madison phoned Stevens and informed his secretary that seven was the earliest he could be there; then he called Leeza to apologize. Since he had been home often lately, the time away from the house this evening did not seem to loom as significantly as it had in the past.
Stevens’s office was the only one of the entire administrative suite that was still aglow by the time Madison walked in at 7:05 P.M. Stevens was sitting at his desk, his room lit by a single desk lamp that cast a warm, orange hue. Judging by the look on his friend’s face, however, there was nothing cozy or comfortable on his mind.
“Phil, please sit down,” he said, motioning Madison to the seat in front of his desk. Usually, when Madison had come to speak with Stevens in his office, he would direct him to the sofa against the far wall, where they would sit next to each other while chatting. This meeting had a very formal air to it. This was all business.
“What’s on your mind, John? Something’s bugging you.”
Stevens nodded, his gaze lost somewhere amongst the papers on his blotter. He placed his tremulous right hand on the desk and covered it with his left. “You know I’ve always hated administrators because of what their focus was — money. The bottom line. Income and expenses. Risks and exposure.” He paused on this last sentence, then looked up at Madison. “Risks and exposure are what the board is most concerned with at the moment. With increased risk comes greater exposure, and with greater exposure comes increased risk.”
“You’re talking in circles, John. What the hell are you saying?”
Stevens wiggled a bit uncomfortably in his seat. “I’m talking about increased risk of lawsuits. Of risking this hospital’s stellar reputation. Of risking the loss of research grants which are vital to the operation of this institution.”
“Why are we discussing this? What could I possibly do to help you lower the risk the hospital faces?”
Stevens scratched the back of his head, “Phil, there’s been talk.” He looked at Madison. “Talk of a loss of research funds if we don’t relieve you of your privileges.”
“Relieve me?” Madison swallowed hard. “Of my privileges?”
“You’re going to make me spell it out, huh?”
Madison sat there, staring at him.
Stevens heaved a big sigh. “You’ve become too great a risk to the hospital. The board doesn’t want you to be associated with us right now. They’re concerned that your presence here will result in our loss of funds — grants that we can’t afford to lose.”
Madison stood up. “This is absolutely ridiculous.”
“Phil, please sit down.”
“No, I won’t sit down. I demand a better answer than that. How dare you? We’ve worked together how many years? How can you do this to me?”
Stevens remained in his seat. “It’s not my doing. I think you know that. I fought them on this. I fought them hard. They wanted you off the list. Gone, good-bye, never to return, regardless of how your trial turns out.”
“Guilty no matter what, huh?” Madison said, beginning to pace.
“I was able to push something through. They didn’t like it, but I was able to push hard enough to get it through.”
“Guilty. I can’t believe they would do this to me...” he said, his voice trailing off.
“I was able to get them to suspend your privileges temporarily.”
“What a deal. Suspended privileges. How long is ‘temporarily’?”
“Indefinitely.”
“Indefinitely,” he said. “That’s utter bullshit, John, and you know it.”
“It is. But I did the best I could.”
Madison looked up at the ceiling. Tears welled in his eyes. Finally, he composed himself enough to speak. “When this hospital was on the brink of financial ruin, who stepped in and got us the grants to keep our research staff intact? Who was the one who was able to bring our reputation up a notch by performing the first knee replacement surgery in California?
“Who was the one who got the investor group together when we needed to take the hospital public so we could raise the five hundred million cash to purchase all that new equipment down in the OR suites?” He stood and leaned across the desk, two feet from Stevens’s face. “I was. I was the one who saved this hospital several times over. And this is how they repay me? I get falsely accused of a crime and they want to give me the boot out of here?”
“It’s not just a crime you’re accused of. It’s murder,” he said in a near whisper. “Double murder.”
“I know what it is! I live it, I breathe it, I can’t get away from it.” Madison sat back down and his gaze again found the ceiling. “You think I’m guilty, John?”
“What I think isn’t important, Phil. It’s what the big boys think that matters.”
“Answer my question.”
“Absolutely not.”
“I had to ask. I need to know where I stand with you.” Madison paused, shook his head. “There were protesters outside my office today. They wouldn’t let any patients in. They assaulted me as I tried to go in through the front doors.”
“I know. That was the last straw for the guys upstairs. They heard about it from a patient of yours who couldn’t get in to see you this morning, so she came over here for a refill of her meds. She told the receptionist about her ordeal, and the receptionist told Nancy Block, the RN who had the hots for you — the one you told in no uncertain terms that you’d never have an affair — she told Scott Smilton, the cardiologist who sits on the board.
“By noon we had our own group of protesters outside the hospital. Only about twenty of them, but they sure made a lot of noise. Stood under the overhang and shouted for two hours until they lost their voices.
