Blue Labyrinth

77

ICU Bay Three of the emergency room at New York Methodist Hospital resembled a scene of controlled chaos. One intern wheeled in a red crash cart, while a nurse nearby readied an ear, nose, and throat tray. Another nurse was attaching various leads to the motionless figure of Pendergast: a blood pressure cuff, EKG, pulse oximeter, fresh IV line. The paramedic workers from the ambulance had passed off their information on Pendergast’s condition to the hospital staff, then left; there was nothing more they could do.

Two doctors in scrubs swept in and quickly began to examine Pendergast, speaking in low tones to the nurses and interns.

D’Agosta took a look around. Constance was seated in a far corner of the bay, her small form now dressed in a hospital gown. It had been five minutes since he’d delivered the requested materials to Margo, back in the ambulance. She was still in there, working like a demon, using his lighter to heat a liquid in the test tube, filling the air with a sweet stench.

“Vitals?” one of the doctors asked.

“BP’s at sixty-five over thirty and falling,” a nurse replied. “Pulse ox is seventy.”

“Prep for endotracheal intubation,” the doctor said.

D’Agosta watched as more equipment was wheeled into place. He felt a terrible mixture of rage, despair, and distant hope gnawing at him. Unable to keep still, he began to pace back and forth. One of the doctors, who earlier had tried to throw him and Constance out, shot him a glare, but he ignored it. What was the point of all this? This whole antidote thing seemed far-fetched, if not completely nuts. Pendergast had been dying for days — weeks — and now the final moments had come. All this fuss, this pointless bustle, just made him feel more agitated. There was nothing they could do — nothing anyone could do. Margo, for all her skill, was trying to concoct an elixir whose dosage she could only guess at — and that hadn’t worked before. Besides, it was moot now; it was taking her too long. Even these doctors, with all their equipment, couldn’t do jack to save Pendergast.

“Getting a lethal rhythm here,” an intern said, monitoring one of the screens at the head of Pendergast’s bed.

“Stop the lidocaine,” the second doctor said, pushing his way between the nurses. “Get a central vein catheter ready. Two milligrams epi, stat.”

D’Agosta sat down in the empty chair beside Constance.

“Vitals failing,” one of the interns said. “He’s coding.”

“Get that epi,” the doctor barked. “Stat!”

D’Agosta leapt to his feet. No! There had to be something he could do, there had to…

At that moment Margo Green appeared at the entrance of the ICU bay. Flinging the privacy screen wide, she stepped inside. She held a small beaker in one hand, partly full of a watery, greenish-brown liquid. The top of the beaker was covered with alternating layers of coffee filters and the cotton he’d appropriated from an ER gown locker. The entire beaker had then been wrapped in thin clear plastic and sealed with a rubber band.

One of the doctors looked over at her. “Who are you?”

Margo said nothing. Her gaze turned toward the still body on the bed. Then she approached a set of nurses.

“Damn it,” a doctor cried. “You can’t all be in here! This is a sterile environment.”

Margo turned to one of the nurses. “Get me a hypodermic,” she said.

The nurse blinked her surprise. “Excuse me?”

“A hypodermic. With a big-bore syringe. Now.”

“Do what she says,” D’Agosta said, holding out his badge. The nurse looked from Margo, to the doctors, to D’Agosta. Then, silently, she pulled open a drawer, exposing a number of long objects wrapped in sterile paper. Margo grabbed one and tore away the wrapper, exposing a large plastic syringe. Reaching into the same drawer, she selected a needle, fitted its adaptor to the end of the syringe. Then she walked toward D’Agosta and Constance. She was breathing heavily, and beads of sweat stood out on her temples.

“What’s going on?” one of the doctors asked, looking up from his work.

Margo looked from Constance to D’Agosta, then back again. The syringe was in one hand; the beaker in the other. Her mute question hung in the air.

Slowly, Constance nodded.

Margo eyed the antidote under the strong light of the ER bay, tore the seal off the beaker, stuck the needle into the liquid, drew up an amount, then pulled it out, holding it up and flicking the end of the syringe to remove extraneous bubbles. Then, taking a deep breath, she approached the bed.

“That’s it,” the doctor said. “Get the hell away from my patient.”

“I’m ordering you to give her access,” D’Agosta said. “On my authority as a lieutenant in the NYPD.”

“You have no authority here. I’ve had enough of this meddling. I’m calling security.”

D’Agosta planted his hands at his waist. His right hand curled over his holster and, to his great shock, found his service piece missing.

He spun around to see Constance standing there, pointing his .38 at the doctors and nurses. Although she had washed most of the mud from her person, and had exchanged the ragged silk chemise for a long hospital smock, she was still covered in scratches and cuts. Her face bore an expression that was chilling in its singular intensity. A sudden silence fell over the bay, and all work ceased.

“We’re going to save your patient’s life,” she said in a low voice. “Back away from the security alarm.”

Her expression, as much as D’Agosta’s weapon, caused the hospital staff to shrink back.

Quickly, while the doctors were stunned, Margo inserted the needle into the IV line, just above the drip chamber, and squeezed off about three ccs of liquid.

“You’ll kill him!” one of the doctors cried.

“He’s dead already,” Margo said.

There was a moment of shocked stasis. Pendergast’s body lay motionless on the bed. The various bleeps and blips of the monitoring machines formed a kind of funereal fugue. Now, amid the chorus, a low, urgent tone sounded.

“He’s coding again!” the first doctor said, leaning in from the far end of the bed.

For a moment, Margo remained still. Then she raised the syringe to the IV line again. “Fuck it,” she said, squeezing off a dose doubly large as the last one.

As if with a single movement, the nurses and interns surged around the body, ignoring the gun. Margo was dragged roughly away in the process, the syringe taken from her unresisting hand. There was a flurry of shrill, shouted orders and a security alarm went off. Constance lowered the gun, staring, her face white.

“Pulseless ventricular tachycardia!” one voice rose above the rest.

“We’re losing him!” the second doctor cried. “Cardiac compression, now!”

D’Agosta, frozen in shock, stared as the gowned figures worked feverishly around the bed. The EKG on the monitor above had flatlined. He stepped over to Constance, gently took the gun from her hand, and replaced it in the holster. “I’m sorry.”

He stared at the useless activity, trying to think of the last time Pendergast had spoken to him. Not the half-raving outburst in the gun room, but really talked to him, personally, face-to-face. It seemed very important for D’Agosta to remember those last words. As far as he could remember, it had been outside the jail at Indio, just after they’d finished trying to interrogate Rudd. And what had Pendergast said to him, precisely, as they’d stood on the asphalt of that parking lot, under the hot sun?

Because, my dear Vincent, our prisoner is not the only one who has begun smelling flowers of late.

Pendergast had understood what was happening to him almost from the beginning. God, to think those were to be the agent’s last words to him…

Suddenly the sounds around him, the shouted voices, changed in tone and urgency.

“I’ve got a pulse!” one doctor said. The EKG flatline began flickering, jumping, coming back to life.

“Blood pressure climbing,” said a nurse. “Seventy-five over forty.”

“Cease cardiac compression,” said the other doctor.

A minute passed as the doctors continued their labors, the patient’s vitals slowly coming back to life. And then, on the bed, the figure of Pendergast opened one eye, just slightly — a gleaming slit. D’Agosta, shocked, saw the pinpoint pupil rotate about, taking in the room. Constance leaned forward and clasped his hand.

“You’re alive!” D’Agosta heard himself say.

Pendergast’s lips worked; a short phrase escaped. “Alban… Good-bye, my son.”