Devil's Waltz

22

I drove away trying to figure out what he’d been after and whether I’d given it to him.

Wanting me to see him as a concerned grandfather?

Chip and Cindy don’t keep secrets from me.

Yet Chip and Cindy hadn’t taken the trouble to inform him Cassie was being discharged. I realized that during all the contacts I’d had with both of them, his name hadn’t come up once.

A tightly wound little man who was all business — even during our few minutes together, he’d mixed family matters with hospital affairs.

He hadn’t wasted a moment on debate, had never tried to change my opinion.

Choosing, instead, to shape the conversation.

Even the choice of meeting place had been calculated. The dining room he closed and now treated as his personal galley. Getting refreshments for himself, but not me.

Brandishing a ring of keys to let me know he could open any door in the hospital. Bragging about it, but letting me know he had too much integrity to grab office space.

Bringing my presumed hostility toward the despoiler of the Psychiatry department out in the open, then trying to neutralize me by appending a bribe just subtle enough to be taken as casual conversation:

Hopefully, one day we’ll be able to establish a good, solid department. Bring in some top people... Would you ever consider returning?

When I’d demurred, he’d backed off immediately. Empathized with my good sense, then used it to support his point of view.

If he’d been a hog farmer, he’d have found a way to use the squeal.

So I had to believe that though ours had been a chance encounter, if we hadn’t bumped into each other soon, he would have arranged a meeting.

I was too small a fry for him to care what I thought about him.

Except as it related to Cassie and Chip and Cindy.

Wanting to know what I’d learned about his family.

Meaning there was probably something to hide and he didn’t know if I’d discovered it.

I thought of Cindy’s worry: People must think I’m crazy.

Was there a breakdown in her past?

The entire family fearful of a psychological probe?

If so, what better place to avoid scrutiny than a hospital without a Psychiatry department?

Another reason not to transfer Cassie.

Then Stephanie had gone and mined things by bringing in a free-lance.

I remembered Plumb’s surprise when she told him what I was.

Now his boss had checked me out personally.

Shaping, molding. Painting a rosy picture of Chip and Cindy.

Mostly Chip — I realized he’d spent very little time on Cindy.

Paternal pride? Or directing me away from his daughter-in-law because the less said about her the better?

I stopped for a red light at Sunset and La Brea.

My hands were tight on the steering wheel. I’d cruised a couple of miles without knowing it.

When I got home I was in a bad mood and thankful that Robin wasn’t there to share it.

The operator at my service said, “Nothing, Dr. Delaware. Isn’t that nice?”

“You bet.” We told each other to have a nice day.

Unable to get Ashmore and Dawn Herbert out of my head, I drove over to the university, hooking into the campus at the north end and continuing southward until I came to the Medical Center.

A new exhibit on the history of leeching lined the hallway leading to the Biomed library — medieval etchings and wax simulations of patients being feasted upon by rubbery parasites. The main reading room was open for another two hours. One librarian, a good-looking blond woman, sat at the reference desk.

I searched through a decade of the Index Medicus for articles by Ashmore and Herbert and came up with four by him, all published during the last ten years.

The earliest appeared in the World Health Organization’s public-health bulletin — Ashmore’s summary of his work on infectious diseases in the southern Sudan, emphasizing the difficulty of conducting research in a war-torn environment. His writing style was cool, but the anger leaked through.

The other three pieces had been published in biomathematics journals. The first, funded by a grant from the National Institutes of Health, was Ashmore’s take on the Love Canal disaster. The second was a federally funded review of mathematical applications to the life sciences. Ashmore’s final sentence: “There are lies, damn lies, and statistics.”

The last report was the work Mrs. Ashmore had described: analyzing the relationship between soil-concentration of pesticides and rates of leukemia, brain tumors, and lymphatic and liver cancers in children. The results were less than dramatic — a small numerical link between chemicals and disease, but one that wasn’t statistically significant. But Ashmore said if even one life was saved, the study had justified itself.

A little strident and self-serving for scientific writing. I checked the funding on the study: The Ferris Dixon Institute for Chemical Research, Norfolk, Virginia. Grant #37958.

It sounded like an industry front, though Ashmore’s point of view wouldn’t have made him a likely candidate for the chemical industry’s largesse. I wondered if the absence of any more publications meant the institute had cut off his grant money.

If so, who paid his bills at Western Peds?

I went over to the librarian and asked her if there was a compilation of scientific grants issued by private agencies.

“Sure,” she said. “Life science or physical?”

Not sure how Ashmore’s work would be categorized, I said, “Both.”

She got up and walked briskly back to the reference shelves. Heading straight for a case in the center of the section, she pulled down two thick soft-cover books.

“Here you go — these are the most recent. Anything prior to this year is bound, over there. If you want federally funded research, that’s over there to the right.”

I thanked her, took the books to a table, and read their covers.

I opened the first one and turned to the “Grantee” section at the back. Laurence Ashmore’s name popped out at me midway through the As, cross-referenced to a page number in the “Grantor” section. I flipped to it:

The institute had funded only two projects for the current academic year:

The second study was quite a mouthful, but Ferris Dixon obviously wasn’t paying by the word. Ashmore had received nearly 90 percent of its total funding.

Nearly a million dollars for three years.

Very big bucks for a one-man project that was basically a rehash. I was curious about what it took to impress the folks at Ferris Dixon. But it was Sunday and even those with deep pockets rested.

I returned home, changed into soft clothes, and puttered, pretending the fact that it was the weekend meant something to me. At six o’clock, no longer able to fake it, I called the Jones house. As the phone rang, the front door opened and Robin stepped in. She waved, stopped in the kitchen to kiss my cheek, then kept going toward the bedroom. Just as she disappeared from view Cindy’s voice came on the line.

“Hello.”

“Hi. It’s Alex Delaware.”

“Oh, hi. How are you, Dr. Delaware?”

“Fine. And you?”

“Oh... pretty good.” She sounded edgy.

“Something the matter, Cindy?”

“No... Um, could you hold for just one second?”

She covered the receiver and the next time I heard her voice it was muffled and her words were unintelligible. But I made out another voice answering — from the low tones, Chip.

“Sorry,” she said. “We’re just getting settled. I thought I heard Cassie — she’s taking a nap.”

Definitely edgy.

“Tired from the ride?” I said.

“Um... that and just getting readjusted. She had a great big dinner, plus dessert, then just dropped off. I’m across the hall from her right now. Keeping my ears open... you know.”

“Sure,” I said.

“I keep her door open to our bathroom — it connects to our room — and a night light on inside. So I can look in on her regularly.”

“How do you get any sleep that way?”

“Oh, I manage. If I’m tired, I nap when she does. Being together so much, we’ve kind of gotten on to the same schedule.”

“Do you and Chip ever take shifts?”

“No, I couldn’t do that — his course load’s really heavy this semester. Are you coming out to visit us, soon?”

“How about tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow? Sure. Um... how about in the afternoon — around four?”

Thinking of the 101 freeway snarl, I said, “Would earlier be possible?”

“Um, okay — three-thirty?”

“I was thinking even earlier, Cindy, like two?”

“Oh, sure... I’ve got some things to do — would two-thirty be okay?”

“Fine.”

“Great, Dr. Delaware. We’re looking forward to seeing you.”

I walked to the bedroom, thinking how much more nervous she sounded at home than in the hospital. Something about home setting her off — raising her anxiety and leading to Munchausen manipulation?

Though, even if she was virgin-innocent, I supposed it made sense for her house to spook her. For her, home was where the harm was.

Robin was slipping into a little black dress I’d never seen before. I zipped her up, pressed my cheek to the warmth between her shoulder blades, and finally managed to complete the process. We drove to the top of the Glen, to an Italian place in the shopping center just below Mulholland. No reservation, and we had to wait at a cold onyx bar. Frantic singles scene tonight, lots of tanned flesh and triple entendres. We enjoyed not being part of it, reveled in silence. I started to have real faith in our reunion — something pleasant to think about.

A half hour later we were seated at a corner table and ordering before the waiter could escape. We ate veal and drank wine for a peaceful hour, drove back home, got out of our clothes and straight into bed. Despite the wine, our union was quick, limber, almost jovial. Afterward, Robin ran a bath, got in, and called for me to join her. Just as I was about to, the phone rang.

“Dr. Delaware, this is Janie at your service. I’ve got a call from a Chip Jones.”

“Thanks. Put him on, please.”

“Dr. Delaware?”

“Hi, Chip, what’s up?”

“Nothing — nothing medical, that is, thank God. I hope I’m not calling too late?”

“Not at all.”

“Cindy just phoned me to say you’re coming by, tomorrow afternoon. I’m checking to see if you need me to be there.”

“Your input’s always welcome, Chip.”

“Hmm.”

“Is there a problem?”

“I’m afraid there is. I’ve got an afternoon class at one-thirty, then a meeting with some of my students right afterward. Nothing earth-shattering — just routine office hours — but with finals approaching, the undergraduate panic level’s been rising at a precipitous rate.”

“No problem,” I said, “I’ll catch you the next time.”

“Great — and if something comes up that you want to ask me about, just call. I gave you my number here, didn’t I?”

“Yes, you did.”

“Great. Then it’s all set.”

I hung up, bothered by his call but not sure why. Robin called from the bathroom and I went in. The light was dim and she was up to her neck in suds, head tilted back against the rim of the tub. A few clusters of bubbles dotted her pinned-up hair, shiny as gems. Her eyes were closed and she kept them that way as I got in.

Covering her breasts, she said, “Shudder, shudder — hope that’s not Norman Bates.”

“Norman preferred showers.”

“Oh. Right. Norman’s meditative brother, then.”

“Norman’s wet brother — Merman.”

She laughed. I stretched out, closed my eyes too. She put her legs atop mine. I sank, feeling myself warm, massaging her toes, trying to loosen up. But I kept thinking of the conversation I’d just had with Chip and remained tight.

Cindy just phoned me to say you’re coming by, tomorrow afternoon.

Meaning he hadn’t been home when I’d called.

Hadn’t been the man I’d heard Cindy speaking to.

The edginess...

Robin said, “What’s the matter? Your shoulders are all bunched.”

I told her.

“Maybe you’re reading too much into it, Alex. It could have been a relative visiting — her father or her brother.”

“She doesn’t have either.”

“So it was a cousin or an uncle. Or a service call — the plumber, the electrician, whatever.”

“Try getting one of those guys on a Sunday evening,” I said.

“They’re rich. The rich get what they want when they want it.”

“Yeah, maybe that’s all it was... Still, I thought she sounded nervous. As if I’d caught her off guard.”

“Okay, let’s say she’s having a fling. You already suspect her of poisoning her kid. Adultery’s a misdemeanor in comparison.”

“Having a fling the first day back from the hospital?”

“Hubby didn’t see anything wrong with flying off to his office the first day, did he? If that’s his usual pattern, she’s probably a lonely lady, Alex. He isn’t giving her what she needs, so she’s getting it elsewhere. Anyway, does adultery relate to this Munchausen business?”

“Anything that makes someone with those tendencies feel helpless could have an effect. But it’s more than that, Robin. If Cindy’s having an affair, that could provide a motive. Ditch hubby and kids, get free to be with her lover.”

“There are easier ways to get free of your family.”

“We’re talking about someone sick.”

“Really sick.”

“I don’t get paid to deal with healthy heads.”

She leaned forward and touched my face. “This is really getting to you.”

“Sure is. Cassie’s so damned dependent and everyone’s failing her.”

“You’re doing everything you can.”

“I suppose.”

We stayed in the water. I worked at relaxing again, settled finally for loose muscles and a tight mind. Soap-sud clouds gathered around Robin’s shoulders like an ermine stole. She looked beautiful and I told her so.

She said, “What a flatterer, Mer.” But her grin was deep and heartfelt. At least I’d made someone feel good.

We got back into bed and tackled the Sunday paper. I read carefully this time, searching for anything on Western Peds or Laurence Ashmore but finding nothing. The phone rang at ten forty-five. Robin answered. “Hi, Milo.”

He said something that made her laugh. She said, “Absolutely,” handed me the receiver, and returned to her crossword puzzle.

“Nice to hear her voice again,” he said. “Finally, you show some good judgment.” The connection was clear, but it sounded distant.

“Where are you?”

“Alley behind a leather-goods store, little pilfering surveillance, nothing so far. Am I interrupting something?”

“Domestic bliss,” I said, stroking Robin’s arm. She was concentrating hard on the puzzle, pencil in mouth, but her hand rose to meet mine and we laced fingers.

“Let’s hear it for any kind of bliss,” said Milo. “Got a couple of things for you. First, your Mr. Huenengarth has an interesting pattern. Valid driver’s license and social security number, but the address on the license traces to a mail drop in Tarzana, and he’s got no phone number, credit history, or IRS file. No county records either. No record of him in the military or on the voter roster. Similar pattern to a long-term con just out of the joint — someone who hasn’t voted or paid taxes. Though he doesn’t show up on NCIC or the parole rolls either, so maybe it’s a computer glitch or I screwed up technically. I’ll have Charlie try tomorrow.”

“Phantom of the hospital,” I said. “I feel so much better knowing he’s head of Security.”

Robin looked up briefly, then down again.

“Yeah,” said Milo. “You’d be surprised how many strange types get into security — nutcases who try out for police departments, don’t pass the psych evaluation. Meantime, keep your distance from him until I can find out more. Second thing is, I’ve been nosing around the Herbert file and plan to do a little late-night downtown prowl — talk to that bartender witness.”

“Does he have something new to offer?”

“No, but Gomez and his partner didn’t follow through enough for my taste. The guy has a serious dope record and they figured him for an unreliable witness. So they let him off easy, not enough questions. I got hold of his number, spoke to his girlfriend, and found out he got a job at another club nearby, over in Newton Division. Thought I’d go over and talk to him. Thought you might be interested in a tag-along. But you’ve obviously got better things to do.”

Robin looked up. I realized my fingers had tightened around hers and eased my grip.

“When are you going?” I said.

“Hour or so. Figured I’d make it over there after midnight, when the scene just starts. I want to catch him in his element, but before it gets too intense. Anyway, enjoy your bliss.”

“Wait. I’ve got a few things for you. Got time?”

“Sure. Nothing here in this alley but us cats. What’s up?”

“I got buttonholed by Grandpa Chuck today, just as I left the hospital. He gave me a one-big-happy-family speech — defending the clan’s honor, just like we discussed. Topped it off by offering me a job. The implication I got was I should behave myself, not dig too deeply.”

“Not very subtle.”

“Actually, he managed to do it quite subtly. Even if it had been taped, he could never have been pinned down. Not that the offer was worth much, because a job at Western Peds isn’t likely to have much security.”

I recounted Plumb’s newspaper interview, and the financial-scheme hypotheses that had led me to look further into Laurence Ashmore’s research. By the time I got to the Ferris Dixon Institute, Robin had put her puzzle down and was listening intently.

“Virginia,” said Milo. “Been there a couple of times for fed training seminars. Pretty state, but anything down there always spells government to me.”

“The institute’s listed in a roster of private agencies. I figured it for some kind of corporate front.”

“What kind of grant was it?”

“Pesticides in the soil, Ashmore analyzing his old data. Way too much money for that kind of thing, Milo. I thought I’d call the institute tomorrow morning, see what else I can learn. I’m also going to try to contact Mrs. Ashmore again. Find out if Huenengarth the Mystery Man’s dropped by.”

“Like I said, Alex, keep your distance.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t get any closer than the phone. Afternoon I’ll be doing what I went to school for over at Chip and Cindy’s. Who may not be in a state of domestic bliss.”

I reviewed my suspicions, including the caveats Robin had raised. “What do you think?”

“I think, who the hell knows? Maybe she did have a leaky faucet, or maybe she’s the Hester Prynne of the San Fernando Valley. Tell you one thing, if she is stepping out on the Chipper, she’s being pretty sloppy about it, wouldn’t you say? Letting you hear Lover Boy’s voice.”

“Maybe she didn’t mean to — I caught her off guard. She sounded antsy — covered the phone almost immediately. All I actually made out were a few low tones. And if she’s a Munchausen type, flirting with another kind of danger would be right up her alley.”

“Low tones, huh? Sure it wasn’t the TV?”

“No, this was a real-life conversation. Cindy talked and the guy answered. I assumed it was Chip. If he hadn’t called me later, I’d never have known it wasn’t.”

“Hmm,” he said. “So what does it mean? In terms of Cassie?”

I repeated my motive theory.

He said, “Don’t forget Chip’s dough — that’s one hell of an incentive.”

“One hell of a family embarrassment, too, if it blows wide open and there’s a nasty divorce. Maybe that’s what Chuck’s trying to keep me away from. He talked about Chip and Cindy creating something solid — called Cindy a lovely girl. Even though she doesn’t seem like the girl a guy in his position would have wanted for his only daughter-in-law. On the other hand, from the look of his teeth, he came up the hard way himself. So maybe he’s not a snob.”

“His teeth?”

“They’re crooked and discolored. No one ever shelled out on orthodontia on his account. Fact is, his entire manner’s pretty rough.”

“Self-made man,” he said. “Maybe he respects Cindy for doing the same thing.”

“Who knows? Anything on why she left the army?”

“Not yet. Gotta press Charlie on that... Okay, I’ll check with you tomorrow.”

“If you find out anything from the bartender, call me first thing.”

There was a strain in my voice. My shoulders had bunched again.

Robin touched them and said, “What is it?”

I covered the phone and turned to her. “He’s found a lead to something that may or may not be related to the case.”

“And he called to invite you along.”

“Yes, but—”

“And you want to go.”

“No, I—”

“Is it anything dangerous?”

“No, just interviewing a witness.”

She gave me a gentle shove. “Go.”

“It’s not necessary, Robin.”

She laughed. “Go anyway.”

“I don’t need to. This is nice.”

“Domestic bliss?”

“Mega-bliss.” I put my arm around her.

She kissed it, then removed it.

“Go, Alex. I don’t want to lie here listening to you toss.”

“I won’t.”

“You know you will.”

“Being alone is preferable?”

“I won’t be. Not in my head. Not with what we’ve got going for us now.”