Blood Shot

26

I had a new roommate in the morning, a twenty-year-old named Jean Fishbeck whose lover had shot at her and hit a shoulder before she got him in the stomach. The cosmetic surgery patient had moved three rooms down the hall.

I got the whole shooting story, with loud-pitched expletives, at midnight when Ms. Fishbeck came in from postop. At seven, when the morning shift came in to see if we’d expired in the night, she vented her rage at being awakened in the clarion nasal of the northwest side. By the time Lotty showed up at eight-thirty I was ready to go anywhere, even the psychiatric wing, just to get away from the obscenities and cigarettes.

“I don’t care what shape I’m in,” I told Lotty irritably. “Just sign my discharge and let me out of here. I’ll leave in my nightgown if I have to.”

Lotty cocked an eye at the crumpled chewing-gum wrappers and cigarette pack on the floor. She raised both eyebrows as a stream of profanity poured from behind the closed curtain while an intern tried to conduct an exam.

“The floor head told me you’d been rough on your roommate yesterday and that they were giving you someone more suited to your personality. Did you vent your anger by handing her a few punches?” She started probing my shoulder muscles.

“Ow, damn you, that hurts. And the word you want is throw, not hand Or land, maybe.”

Lotty used her ophthalmoscope on my eyes. “We gave you X rays and a CT scan after we stabilized you on Wednesday. By some miracle you don’t have any cracks or breaks. Some more physical therapy over the next few days should help your sore muscles, but don’t expect them to recover overnight-tissue tears can take as long as a year to heal if you don’t rest the muscles properly. And yes, you can go home-you can do the therapy as an outpatient. If you give me your keys, I’ll have Carol bring you some clothes at lunchtime.”

I’d tied the keys through the laces of my running shoes before setting out on Wednesday. Lotty had rescued them before giving orders to trash what clothes I’d still been wearing on arrival at Beth Israel.

She stood up and looked at me gravely. When she spoke again her Viennese accent was pronounced. “I would ask that you not be reckless, Victoria. I would ask it except that you seem to be in love with danger and death. You make life very hard for those who love you.”

I couldn’t think of anything to say. She stared at me for a long moment, her eyes very dark in her angular face, then gave her head a little shake and left.

My twenty-four-hour character summary wasn’t too appealing: a coldhearted bitch in love with death and danger who drove timid cosmetic surgery patients to the nursing staff for refuge. When an orderly came by an hour or so later to take me down for physical therapy, I went along morosely. The normal hospital routine, which depersonalizes patients at its expense, usually drives me into a frenzy of uncooperative sarcasm. Today I took it like a good little lump.

After my physical therapy I myself took refuge from my vituperous roommate, waiting in the lounge for my clothes with a stack of old Glamours and Sports Illustrated Carol Alvarez, the nurse and chief backup at Lotty’s clinic, arrived a little before two. She greeted me warmly, with a hug, a kiss, and little exclamations of horror over my ordeal.

“Even Mama has been praying to the Blessed Mother for your safety, Vic.” That was something, indeed-Mrs. Alvarez usually looked on me with silent contempt.

Carol had brought jeans, a sweatshirt, and a pair of boots. The clothes and underwear seemed unnaturally clean. I’d forgotten leaving them in the laundry on Wednesday. Apparently one of my downstairs neighbors had dumped them in a wet heap outside my apartment door with an angry note -Carol had generously taken the time to run them back through the machine.

She helped me quickly with the discharge routine. Since she knew a lot of the nurses on the floor, their hostility toward me cooled a little when they saw me with her. With me carrying Max’s oriental bowl and Carol the geraniums, we made our way through the long corridors to the staff parking lot behind the hospital.

My head seemed stuffed with cotton, remote not just from my body but from the day around me. It had been only two days since my ill-fated run, but I felt as though I’d been away from the world for months. My boots felt new and strange and I couldn’t get used to the sensation of the jeans zipped close to my body. At that they weren’t as close as they used to be-the last few days seemed to have taken a good five pounds off me.

Mr. Contreras was waiting for me when we got to my apartment on Racine. He had tied a big red ribbon around Peppy’s neck and groomed her auburn hair until it shone in the dull gray day. Carol turned me over to them with another kiss and left us at the door.

I would have much preferred to be alone to order my thoughts, but he had earned the right to fuss. I submitted to his ushering me into the armchair, pulling off my boots, and tucking a blanket tenderly around my legs and feet.

He’d fixed an elaborate tray of fruit and cheese, which he set next to me along with a pot of tea. “Now, cookie, I’m leaving her highness here to keep you company. You want anything, you just call me. I printed my number next to the phone so you don’t have to look it up. And before you go off sticking your head into trouble, you let me know. I ain’t gotta hover over you-I know you hate that-but someone’s gotta know where to come looking for you. You promise me that or I’m going to have to hire me a detective just to follow you around.”

I held out a hand. “It’s a deal, Uncle.”

The honorary title moved him so much that he spoke sternly to the dog, outlining her duties to me, before slapping me on my sore shoulder and moving off down the stairs.

I’m not much of a tea drinker, but it was pleasant to stay where I’d been planted. I poured myself a cup, mixed it with a lot of heavy cream, and alternately fed grapes to myself and the dog. She sat on her haunches watching me with unwavering eyes, panting slightly, taking her guard duties seriously, assuring herself that I wasn’t going to disappear again without her.

I forced my weary mind back to the time before my assault. Only three days earlier, but the neurons moved as though they’d been rusted over for years. When every muscle aches it’s hard to remember feeling whole.

I’d been warned out of South Chicago Monday night. On Wednesday I’d been dispatched most efficiently. That meant something I’d done Tuesday had brought an immediate re action. I frowned, trying to remember what all happened that day.

I’d found Jurshak’s insurance report and talked to Ron Kappelman about it. I’d also left a message for young Art implying I had the material. These were tangible documents and it was tempting to think they showed something so damaging that people would kill to keep them secure. It might be difficult to pry the truth from Kappelman if he was concealing something, but Jurshak was such a fragile young man, I ought to be able to pound the facts from him. If only I could find him. If he was still alive.

Still, I shouldn’t concentrate on those two at the expense of the other people involved. Curtis Chigwell, for example. Early Tuesday I’d sicced Murray Ryerson on him and twelve hours later he’d tried to kill himself And then there was the big shark, Gustav Humboldt himself Whatever Chigwell knew, whatever they were concealing about Joey Pankowski and Steve Ferraro, Gustav Humboldt had full knowledge of Otherwise he would never have sought me out to try to get me to swallow lies about two insignificant workers in his worldwide empire. And the insurance report Nancy had found dealt with his company. That must mean something-I just didn’t yet know what.

Finally, of course, there was little Caroline. Now that I’d worked out that she was protecting Louisa, I figured I could get her to talk. She might even know what Nancy had seen in the insurance report. She was my best starting point.

I took the blanket from my legs and got up. The dog immediately sprang to her feet, waving her tail-if I stood up, it was clearly time to go running. When she saw me just move to the phone, she flopped down in depression.

Caroline was in a meeting, the SCRAP receptionist told me. She was not to be disturbed.

“Just write the following on a note and take in into her-‘Louisa’s life story on the front page of the Herald-Star?’ And add my name. I guarantee she’ll be on the phone within nanoseconds.”

I had to cajole a little more, but the woman finally agreed. I carried the phone back over to the easy chair. Peppy eyed me in disgust, but I wanted to be sitting down for the coming blast.

Caroline came on the line without preamble. I let her rant at me unchecked for some minutes, shredding my character, expressing remorse that I’d risen unchastened from the swamp, even lamenting that I didn’t now lie buried in the mud.

At that I decided to interrupt. “Caroline, that was vile and offensive. If you had any imagination or sensitivity, you would never have thought such a thing, let alone said it.”

She was silent for a minute, then said gruffly. “I’m sorry, Vic. But you shouldn’t have sent me messages threatening Ma.”

“Right, kiddo. I understand. I understand that the only reason you’ve been behaving more like a horse’s rear end than usual is because someone was gunning for Louisa. I need to know who and why.”

“How do you know?” she blurted.

“It’s your character, sweetie. It just took me awhile to remember it. You’re manipulative, you’ll bend the rules any old way to get what you want, but you’re no chicken. You’d run scared for only one reason.”

She was silent for another long moment. “I’m not going to say if you’re right or wrong,” she finally said. “I just can’t talk about it. If you’re right, you can understand why. If you’re wrong-I guess it’s because I’m a horse’s rear end.”

I tried to will my personality into the phone. “Caroline, this is important. If someone told you they’d hurt Louisa unless you got me to stop hunting for your father, I need to know it. Because it means there’s a tie-in between Nancy’s death and my looking at Joey Pankowski and Steve Ferraro.”

“You’d have to sell me and I don’t think you can.” She was serious, more mature than I was used to hearing her.

“At least let me give it a shot, babe. Come up here some time tomorrow? As you can imagine, I’m not too fit right now or I’d zip down to see you tonight.”

She finally, reluctantly, agreed to come by in the afternoon. We hung up in greater amity than I’d have thought possible ten minutes earlier.