Dead Past

The nurse left and a woman with a breakfast tray came in. Scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, orange juice, and cereal. Big breakfast, she thought. As the breakfast lady left, a policeman came in. He was one of the young policemen she had seen guarding the morgue tent. He had a pen and pad in his hand and a cigarette stuck behind his ear.

“Hi, Dr. Fallon,” he said, grinning.

Diane wondered if she looked that funny sitting in a hospital bed wearing the terrible hospital gown.

“It’s good to see you again,” he said. “Though, not like this. I need to get a statement.”

He pulled up a chair and as he sat down, Diane sneaked a peak at the cigarette behind his ear.

“You really shouldn’t smoke,” she said, taking a bite of bacon. “It’s bad for you.”

Chapter 47

“I know smoking is bad, ma’am,” he said. “I quit for a long time, but with all this explosion tragedy, I started up again.”

“Do you know that none of the three medical examiners, Webber, Pilgrim, or Rankin, smoke?” said Diane. “You know why?”

He shook his head.

“Because they’ve all seen firsthand what smokers’ lungs look like,” said Diane.

“Well, I’ll probably quit again. Right now I need to take a statement,” he said.

Diane gave him a brief version of what happened to her, not going into treasure hunts, dolls, secret codes, or historic hurricanes. She’d tell Garnett, but she didn’t really want to go into the whole thing right now-especially while her mind was focused on something else.

“Did he take anything?” asked the policeman.

“I haven’t been back to my office to check my safe. I’ll notify the police if anything’s missing. Why do you carry your cigarette behind your ear?” she said, trying to bring the conversation back to the Doral held in place between his ear and his brain. He looked under twenty-six. So much for David’s statistics.

“Cause it’ll get crushed in my pocket, ma’am. I’ve been trying not to start back, so I bum cigarettes instead of buying them. That way, I have only one at a time.” He took the cigarette between his fingers and looked at it. “Actually, I prefer a Marlboro, but beggars can’t be choosers.”

“Who did you bum that from?” asked Diane.

“Archie Donahue,” he said.

So, perhaps David’s statistics were right after all.

“Well, I wish you luck in your efforts to stop smoking,” she said.

“Thank you, ma’am.”

He folded his pad of paper and put it in his pocket with his pen. He stuck his cigarette back behind his ear and left.

Diane finished her breakfast, pondering what she’d learned. Which was what? Archie smoked Dorals? Not much. Hardly anything. There were probably others in the department who smoked them. Certainly not an indictment. She closed her eyes to think.

What did the person who attacked Jin hit him with-butt of his gun, nightstick, rock? I should have stayed up on the ridge to look for blunt instruments. Instead, I left the policemen there to look while I took Jin to the doctor. Ample chance to move the weapon to a new location. Damn. But if the weapon was something he carries, he may have only wiped the blood off. We could still find blood and bits of Jin’s flesh. But everybody knows about blood nowadays, especially policemen. He’d have cleaned it with kerosene or bleach. We might at least be able to detect that. And that would still leave us nowhere.

“I need to get out of here,” she said out loud.

“Not until the doctor says you can go.”

She opened her eyes and looked at Frank. She had forgotten to call him. Damn. He pulled up a chair and sat down.

“Why aren’t you at work?” she said.

“I had business in Rosewood today. It doesn’t happen often that there’s a Rosewood connection with a case I’m working on, but when it does happen, I take advantage of it. Why didn’t you call me?”

“I meant to, but I got conked on the head and forgot-really,” she said.

“David told me what happened this morning when I called the crime lab,” he said. “I’ll take you home. When are you being released?”

“As soon as I see the doctor,” said Diane.

Just as she said it, the doctor entered her room.

“Your CT scan was fine. You can go home. Get plenty of rest and sleep. We’ll give you a list of symptoms to watch for. If any of them occurs, call or come back here immediately.”

“Thanks. I’m ready to get out of here,” said Diane.

He smiled, handed her a prescription for pain pills, and went off to see other patients.

Diane got dressed and was still waiting thirty minutes later for someone to come and get her, tell her she could go, or… something.

“Be patient,” said Frank.

“I really don’t like hospitals,” said Diane. “And I don’t like waiting. I think I’ll start charging for my waiting time. Maybe it’ll get my bill down to some reasonable amount.”

“Isn’t irritability one of the signs you’re supposed to watch out for?” said Frank.

She was about to retort when the nurse came with the paperwork and a wheelchair. Diane signed the paperwork.

“I don’t need the wheelchair,” she said.

“Everyone leaves in a wheelchair. It’s hospital policy,” said the nurse.

“It’s not mine,” said Diane and walked out ahead of Frank and the nurse.

Frank caught up with her. “Diane, don’t you think you’d better slow down? What’s up with you?”

“I just want out of here. Do you know how much time I’ve spent in the hospital-either visiting people I care about or being a patient myself?”

“Yes, but something besides your concussion has you irritated,” he said.

“Right now, one of the suspects I have in mind for the killings of McNair and Stanton is someone I like. And I absolutely hate that. My gut reaction is to just let him go, and I don’t like that feeling, either. I’m at odds with myself and it’s damned uncomfortable. Plus, it pisses me off when a fish steals my bait.”

After Diane had insisted on being taken to the museum instead of home, Frank insisted on an explanation of what happened to her. She fumbled through an account of her intention to use the code to catch the doll thief-and probably Joana Cipriano’s murderer.

“Tell me again, how was this plan supposed to work?” asked Frank as he drove toward the museum.

“I told you, I hadn’t thought it out enough to implement it. He struck too soon,” she said.

“You know, you come up with some of the worst plans,” said Frank. “Remember that one in your museum vault?”

“I wasn’t finished with this one-there was no plan being played out. They just came and attacked me. The result would have been the same had I not been thinking of a plan at all. As it is, they do have the wrong code.”

“You may have delayed them, but how does that get you closer to catching them?” asked Frank.

“It doesn’t,” said Diane. “I was going to use the forged code as bait to catch them. How many times do I have to go over this so that you understand it? There was nothing I did, no plan I put in motion that caused them to come after me. They did this on their own.”

Frank pulled into the museum parking lot and Diane got out. The first place she headed was to Security. Frank followed and started to open the door for her, but she beat him to it. Everyone stopped what they were doing when Diane walked in.