She shook her head and smiled at me some more. “You were in the military?”
I raised a weak fist. “Remember the Maine.”
“You don’t want to talk about it?”
I smiled at her. “I’ll make you a deal; I don’t have to talk about Vietnam, and you don’t have to sing.”
“Deal.”
We crossed at Paddy O’Neil’s Tavern and looked down Bread, where there was a Philadelphia City Police cruiser idling with its parking lights on. I couldn’t be sure, but it looked as if it sat at Cady’s front door. I glanced at Lena, but she was frowning at the car. “Anybody looking for you?”
“Always.”
We walked down the narrow street; she was hurrying and was just a little ahead of me. By the time I got to the driver’s side of the unit, I could see that the young man behind the wheel looked remarkably like Lena and could only surmise that he was a Moretti. She was the first to speak. “What are you doing here, Tony?”
The patrolman looked up at her, but he didn’t smile. “Hey, Ma.” He looked past her to me and at my hat. “Are you Walter Longmire?”
Whatever smile I had drained away. “Yes.”
“There’s been an accident.”
3
The Trauma Center at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania was on the other side of town and the Schuylkill River, but it took Officer Anthony Moretti only twelve minutes to get there. It took me half that to get to the Surgical ICU on the fifth floor, and numerous lifetimes to think about the nature of trauma and how it takes more lives than cancer and heart disease combined. He wouldn’t give me details, only that my daughter had been involved in some sort of accident, that she was being treated at HUP, and that, as a professional courtesy, he would drive me there.
Lena Moretti had accompanied us, stating flatly that she could just as easily get a cab from Penn as from Bread Street. She had stayed with Tony while I found myself looking into the very tired eyes of a trauma physician who explained that Cady had sustained a depressed skull fracture and that she was currently unresponsive. A CAT scan had confirmed the damage, and there was a neurosurgeon battling a subdural hematoma.
There really wasn’t anything I could do but sit there with a Styrofoam cup of coffee and wait. There wasn’t a lot of room in the ICU, so I dragged one of the gray upholstered chairs into the hallway, where I had a clear view of the red doors of the emergency elevator. I watched it the next ten minutes. It was creeping up on midnight and, with the lights on all the time and the sounds of the machines, it was like a casino-only the stakes were higher.
Nobody speaks to you in these situations-it’s like you’re a pitcher throwing a no-hitter-they don’t look at you, and you don’t want them to. I thought about all the people I should call, but it was only Henry who could do anything. I pulled out my wallet; the business card from Fred Ray’s Durant Sinclair Service had Henry’s cell phone number scrawled across the back. I didn’t call him on his mobile very often and could never remember the number. I went to the nurse’s desk and asked if I could use the phone. I dialed and watched the elevator as the phone rang and a prissy little voice informed me that the person I was attempting to call was unavailable but that I could leave a message after the tone, which I did.
“Henry, it’s Walt. Cady’s been hurt, and I’m in the ICU at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania.” I gave him the number of the phone I was speaking into, along with the extension. As I hung up, Lena Moretti and another young police officer who was carrying a plastic basket and Cady’s briefcase turned the corner at the end of the hall. I stood there and waited for them; they stopped a full step away, like you would approach a large wounded animal.
Lena’s hand trailed out to me; she was the brave one. “How is she?”
I took two fingers of the hand and looked at the eyes that were so much like Vic’s. I felt my knees buckle a little. The next thing I knew, the cup of coffee from my other hand was on the polished surface of the speckled tile floor, and I was sitting in my chair trying to catch my breath. Lena and the young man kneeled beside me; he had placed the basket beside my chair, and I saw a small purse, a holstered electronic device I didn’t recognize, a cell phone, a wristwatch, and her grandmother’s engagement ring.
“Take it easy there, big fella.” He had one hand on my shoulder and the other at my back and was holding me there.
I took a deep breath. Lena’s hands were cool on my face. “Walter?”
I continued to breathe and leaned back in the chair. “I’m okay.”
She looked at me, not sure. “Do you want me to get a doctor?” She glanced around for comic effect. “I mean, there seem to be plenty around.”
I tried to laugh, but I think all I accomplished was a funny face. “I’m okay, really.” I thought I was but, when I looked at the young officer to thank him, he looked like Lena, too; everybody had started looking alike. I dipped my head back down and blinked to clear my vision; I looked back up at the guy, but he still looked like Lena, although not exactly like Tony. I felt slightly better when I glanced at his name tag. “Michael Moretti?”
He smiled. “How ya doin’?”
Michael was a handsome kid; somehow the features I had grown used to on females worked on him as well. The eyes were a true dark brown, and his chin was a little stronger, with a cleft that neither Lena nor Vic had. He was a little shorter than six feet, but his shoulders and arms were very large. I nodded to him. “I’m okay.”
He continued to smile. “Yeah, that’s what you keep sayin’.”
I looked at Lena, at the parchment lines at her eyes. “You called in the cavalry?”
She nodded. “It’s in his district, the Wild West. Tony’s the sixth.”
Lena got some paper towels from the nurse’s station and cleaned up the coffee as I signed the personal property list. Michael had heard through unofficial channels that Cady was stabilized and would be moved from surgery to the ICU soon. I looked at the favored son and listened as his almost new gun belt creaked in the silence of the hallway. “Mr. Longmire, do you mind if I ask you a few questions?”
“Walt, just call me Walt.”
“You sure you’re up to this?”
“Yep.”
He nodded. “Your daughter is an associate at Schomberg, Calder, Dallin, and Rhind?”
“Yep, she was working late.”
He wrote on his notepad and looked back at me. “Working late?”
“Yep. I spoke with her earlier, and she was supposed to have dinner with your mother and me, but she had some work to do.”
His lip stiffened, just a little. “The firm is located on the 1500 block of Market?”
“Yes.” I waited.
“Then do you have any idea why she would have been assaulted at the Franklin Institute?”
“Assaulted?”
“Look, I could tell you that it was an innocent accident…” He paused and then inclined his head a little. “But the attending officer said he spoke with the security guard, and he said there was an altercation between the young lady and another individual: male, Caucasian, approximately mid-thirties.”
“Where?”
“Franklin Institute, across from Logan Circle, near the art museum.” He continued to look at me. “The security guard said he heard voices, and then the next thing he knows the guy is beating on the door and asking for help. By the time he got the door unlocked and got out there, your daughter was lying on the steps and the man was gone. When you spoke with her, did she say anything about another engagement this evening?”
“No, she just said she’d be late.”
“Does the description of the individual sound familiar?”
“Well…she’s dating a young man.”
“And that man’s name?”
