Flashback

CHAPTER NINE

Over the months since her son's attacks had first begun, Barbara Nelms's approach to housework had changed radically. Where once she had been meticulous almost to the point of obsession, now she cut corners wherever possible. She was never comfortable remaining out of range of the boy for more than five ten fninutes at a time. With sitters unwilling to stay alone with Toby, and her husband drifting further and further into his work, the television set had become her closest ally.

Only when Toby was engrossed in Saturday cartoons, or some of the programs on the children's cable network, did she dare spend any prolonged time doing laundry or preparing meals. It was late afternoon, and Barbara had not even begun to think about dinner. All day Toby had been even more restless and remote than usual. She had read to him for a time and taken him to the store with her. She had pulled him around the block in his wagon and pushed him on the tire swing in the backyard. for, as she stared at the unwashed dishes in the sink and thought about the pile of ironing she had been avoiding, it was all she could do to keep from breaking down. Through the door to the living room she could see her son, Lying on his back on the carpet, staring at the ceiling. troby, " she called out, "five more minutes and Robin's on. We missed him this morning while we were at the park. Why don't you go nd get your bear, and I'll turn him on." rhat the boy did not react was upsetting.

When Toby was at his worst, his most distant, the prospect of watching Robin the Good usually brought a response of some sort. The actor who played Robin was Overveight for the role and as patronizing to the children, as inane and vapid, as anyone she had ever seen, but his half-hour show, aired three times a day, was bright and quick. "Okay, honey, " she said, "you just stay put, then. I'm going to do some dishes, and then I'll turn on Robin."

Glancing almost continuously over her shoulder, she thrust her hand into the sink and snapped a nail off so low that it drew blood. "Dammit," she said, sucking at the wound. "Dammit, dammit, damfait."

She ran cold water over her finger. Then, as much from frustration as from pain, she began to cry. She snatched up the phone, dialed the mill, and had her husband called out of a meeting. "Bob, hi, it's me, " she said. "I know. Has he done it again?"

"No. No, he's okay just now. But he's not acting right."

"He never acts right. Honey, I'm sorry I can't talk now, but I'm in the middle of an important meeting. Was there something special?

" farbara blotted her bleeding finger on a towel. "I… I was hoping you might be able to come home early. I'd like to put a nice dinner together, but I'm worried about Toby." 4"Impossible, " Bob Nelms said too quickly. "Honey, you just said he was okay. The people from Chicago are here. I've got a ton of stuff to go over with them. In fact, I was going to have Sharon call and tell you I'd be late."

"Couldn't you postpone them for a day? Just this once?"

"Sweetie, you know I'd come if I could. But they're only going to be here for a day."

"Please? " she whispered, fumbling through a cabinet for a Bandaid.

"What?"

"Nothing. Nothing. When should I expect you?"

"Probably pretty late. How about you take Toby out for some pizza I'll eat here."

"Bob, isn't there any way you could-"

"Barbie, please. Don't make things any more difficult for me than they are. I'll be home as soon as I can, okay?… Okay… Doggone it, Barb, don't do this…"

Slowly, Barbara Nelms replaced the receiver. Then she waited for her husband's return call. A minute passed, then another. Finally, she wrapped a Band-Aid around her finger and shuffled to the living room "Come on, my merry man, " she said hoarsely, "it's time for Robin., Toby Nelms let his mother lead him into the den and then sank down on the floor by the couch. He wanted her to get his bear for him, but the words to ask wouldn't come. "Okay, To be, " she said, switching on the television, "I'll just be in the kitchen. Call if you need me."

Stay, he thought. Please stay with me. The cartoon that introduced Robin the Good's show appeared on the screen, along with a now-familiar voice that announced, "Hey, merry men and merry maids, get out your longbows and your stout staffs. It's time to travel once again to those days long, long ago-to Sherwood Forest and that friend of the poor, Robin the Good."

Toby watched quietly as his mother adjusted the color and then left the room. Moments later, she returned and set his tattered bear beside him.

"Enjoy the show, " she said, patting him on the head. "I'll be in the htchen."

"Thank you, " Toby whispered. But she was already gone. He stared toward the kitchen for a time, and then stuffed his bear between his legs and turned his attention to the television. Robin the Good, wearing a green suit and a hat with a feather, was dancing about and singing, while Alan-a-Dale played his guitar… We welcome all you boys and girls. But don't bring any diamonds or pearls. Cause I take from the rich and give to the poor. Then I go right out and get some more… What ho, merry men and maids. Welcome to Sherwood, where learning is always fun, fun, fun. Today we're going to do some drawing with Little John and take a ride on a camel with Maid Marian. But first, here's Friar Tuck. Tell us, pray the, good friar, what letter we are going to learn about today." A fat man with a brown robe and a bald place on the top of his head hopped onto the screen. "Hello, boys and girls, " he said. "What ho, there, Robin. Today, we're going to learn about one of my favorite letters. It's the letter that starts off a lot of our favorite words like candy and cartoon. It's the third letter in the alphabet, and it's called C. So here're Robin and Alan to tell you about it."

Robin the Good swung across the screen on a rope with leaves growing off it. Then he dropped to the ground as Alan-a-Dale began to play. "Alas, my love, you do me wrong, " Robin sang, "to cast me out so discourteously. Because today I sing this song about our friend the letter C…"

Toby Nelms rubbed at his eyes as the color of the television set began growing brighter and brighter."… C, C, is all our joy. C's for carrot and car and cat. C, C starts club and cloud. Now what do you think of that?…"

Robin the Good danced around a tree. Seated on the floor in his den, Toby Nelms's body grew rigid. His shoulders began to shake. The sound of Robin's voice grew softer as the music grew louder. Overhead, lights began to flash past. A face floated into view."… There's C for comet and C for crab, and C in front of the coat we wear…"

"… Now, Toby, " the face said, "there's nothing to worry about. You're going to go to sleep. Just relax. Relax and count back from one hundred…"

Robin the Good was singing and prancing across the television screen as Toby Nelms began, in a soft, tremulous voice, to count. He was on one knee, crooning the final lines of his ballad, as the boy began to scream. IT WAS, all would later agree, a magnificent funeral. Standing room only. The crowd, sweltering in the brutally humid summer afternoon, filled the pews of St. Anne's Church and spilled out into the vestibule.

The priests conducting the mass were not only from the predominantly French-Canadian St. Anne's, but from the cross town parish, St.

Sebastian's, as well."… Guy Beaulieu was not a son of Sterling,"

Monsignor Tresche was declaring. g in his eulogy. "He was one of its fathers-a gentle man, whose skill and caring hands have, through the years, touched each and every one of us…"

Over the three days following Beaulieu's death, Zack had visited his widow, Clothilde, and daughter, Marie Fontaine, several times. Even so, he was surprised when Marie asked him to serve as a pall bearer.

Although he would have preferred to remain less intimately involved with Guy's funeral than he had been with his death, accepting their request was the least he could do. It had been at his desperate urging that Marie and her mother had put aside their biases against such things and had agreed to an autopsy… a man of vision and conviction. A humble man, who faced mounting personal difficulties with courage and dignity…."

The priest droned on, but Zack, seated in the first row with the seven other pall bearers, heard only snatches. His thoughts kept drifting, as they had much of the time, to the agonizing scene with Guy in the emergency room, and to the equally unpleasant experience of viewing his post mortem examination. As Zack had suspected, the man had died of a massive cerebral hemorrhage. There was, however, a major surprise. The arteries in Beaulieuss brain, and, in fact, in his whole body, were those of a man decades younger. The lethal stroke had resulted not from any crack in a hardened vessel but from the rupture of a small aneurysm-a pea-sized defect in one artery which, almost certainly, had been present without producing symptoms for many years. The cause of that fatal tear, Zack knew, could only have been a sudden, drastic rise in blood pressure. That thought sent an angry jet of bile rasping into his throat, as it had over and over again since the autopsy. Guy Beaulieu's two years of difficulties at Ultramed-Davis, whether real or contrived, had loaded the weapon of his destruction. The humiliating conflict in the emergency ward with Mainwaring, Frank, and the security guard had, in essence, pulled the trigger. Frank, of course, saw things differently. He had issued statements of shock and bereavement from the hospital, and from Ultramed, and had sent a basket of fruit to Guy's widow. But in the few minutes he and Zack had spent alone, he had made it clear that he considered Beaulieu's death nothing short of an act of Providence. Unobtrusively, Zack glanced about the chapel. Suzanne, though dressed in sedate blue and wearing no makeup, sparkled in the midst of two rows of Ultramed-Davis physicians which did not include Donald Norman, Jack Pearl, or Jason Mainwaring. Several pews behind her, between the Judge and Cinnie, sat Frank, resplendent in a beige summer suit and appearing, as usual, composed and in control. The mayor was there, along with several other area notables, including the region's congressman. Guy Beaulieu had once described himself to Zack as "just a plain, old, small-town Canuck, lucky enough to be born to parents who wouldn't let him quit school to work in the mills."

It was good, at least, to see that so many people knew better. Later, as Zack and the other pall bearers shuffled up the aisle with Guy's casket, his eyes and Frank's met briefly. He felt so distant from the man-so totally detached. Had they really grown up in the same home, played in the same yard year after year? Had they really worn the same clothes, shared so many childhood dreams? Had they really once been fast friends?

The hope of reestablishing a friendship with his brother suddenly seemed naive. They would make do, perhaps, tolerate one another, even work together. They would spend sterile time together at family functions.

But they would never be close. The open hearse was festooned with flowers. Zack, feeling overwhelmed by the sadness and futility of it all, helped slide the heavy casket into place among them. "Excuse me, Doctor, " a voice behind him said as he stepped back from the casket.

"Kin I talk to you?"

Zack turned and was surprised to find himself confronting the huge security guard, Henry Flowers, who seemed ill at ease in a dark suit and solid black tie. Looking on, several respectful steps behind him, was a petite, plain young woman in a white lace dress-almost certainly the man's wife. "Yes? " Zack asked. The guard shifted uncomfortably. "I… uh… I wanted you to know that I'm real sorry for what happened to Dr.

Beaulieu, " he said. "He took care of my wife's mother once, real good care, and he's never done nothin' bad to me… Dr Iverson, I never laid a hand on him except to grab his wrist. I swear it I… His voice drifted away. It took several moments before Zack realized that the man did not know the results of the autopsy, and if he did he did not understand them. Zack reached out and put a hand on the guard's shoulder "You didn't do anything that caused Dr. Beaulieu's death, Henry, " he said, loudly enough for the man's wife to hear. "He had an aneurysm — a time bomb-in his head, and it just happened to go off while you were there."

Relief flooded the guard's pocked face. "Thanks, Doc, " he said, pumping Zack's hand as if it were the handle on a tractor-trailer jack. "Oh, God, thanks a lot. If there's ever anything I can do for you, just ask.

Anything."

He backed away, and then grabbed his tiny wife by the arm and Zack watched until the incongruous couple had disappeared around the corner.

Then he turned and headed to his camper, feeling marginally less morose.

At least one other who had shared those awful moments in the quiet room had been affected by them. The procession to All Saints Cemetery was, according to the Judge, as long as any Sterling had ever seen. Following the service, Zack accompanied Frank and their parents to the shaded spot where Marie Fontaine and her mother were receiving final condolences.

Marie, who seemed to have aged a year in just three days since her return home, accepted an embrace from Cinnie and a kiss on the cheek from the Judge. However, she barely touched Frank's outstretched hand before pulling away. "It was good of you to come, " she said coolly.

Your father meant a great deal to all of us, " Frank replied blandly.

She eyed him for a moment, and then said simply, "That's nice to know."

Zack glanced over at his parents, but saw nothing to suggest that they appreciated the tension in the brief exchange. Marie then turned to him, took both his hands in hers, and kissed him by the ear. "Please stop by our limousine, " she whispered Imperceptible to the others, Zack nodded.

Half an hour later, Zack sat across from Marie Fontaine and Clothilde Beaulieu in the back of the mortuary's black stretch Cadillac. The smoked-glass windows, including the partition separating them from the driver, were closed, but the limo's air-conditioning system kept the steamy afternoon at bay. Marie's husband, a gaunt, bearded man whose quiet dignity reminded Zack a little of her father, stood outside. "We wanted you to know how grateful we are for all you've done, Marie began.

"Your father was always very good to me."

"He was very good to everyone, " she said. "That's why it's so hard to understand why nobody stood up for him while he was being murdered."

Zack's impulse was to correct her, but the intensity of her eyes told him not to bother. "It upsets me a great deal to think that anyone might have deliberately set about to ruin him, " he said. "Not anyone, Zack.

Ultramed."

"What?"

"Zack, we know Father confided in you. We know that even though your brother runs the hospital, he thought you would give him the benefit of an open mind. Was he right?"

"I told him I would listen and that I would respect his confidence, if that's what you mean."

Marie glanced over at her mother, who nodded her approval of Zack's response. "That's exactly what we mean, " she went on. "Several years ago, Father opposed the sale of the hospital to Ultramed. He just didn t believe an outside corporation should be given such a vital foothold in this community-at least, not with so little community involvement or control. If it weren't for your father's influence, we think he would have succeeded in blocking it. But that is neither here nor there, now.

Did you know that shortly after they took over at the hospital, Ultramed took legal action to fire him?"

"No, " Zack said. "No, I didn't."

"He was preparing to countersue them when they backed off. According to Father, they became frightened by a court decision in Florida that ended up costing one of the other corporations millions for trying to do the same thing to a pathologist who was working in a hospital they had acquired. "Zack, Ultramed wants blind loyalty from everyone working for them-total acceptance of their policies. Father fought them at every turn. Less than a year after they dropped the suit against him, the rumors started. And within just a few months of that, a showy new surgeon was on the scene, snapping up chunks of Father's practice. i "That would be Jason Mainwaring, " Zack said. "Exactly."

"Have you any proof that Ultramed engineered all of this? " he asked.

"Only this." She reached beneath her seat, drew out a thick manila envelope and passed it across to him. "Mother and I talked it over last night. Father liked you and trusted you. And frankly, we have nowhere else to turn. This is all the information he had been able to gather in his battle against Ultramed. It doesn't prove they were behind his murder, but it does show something of how they operate-some of the things they're capable of doing to turn a profit."

"What am I to do with this?"

For the first time, Beaulieu's widow spoke. "Dr. Iverson, " she said, in a soft accent virtually identical to Guy's, "it was my husband's hope that the information contained in that envelope would convince the board of trustees, including your father, to exercise their option and order the repurchase of the hospital from Ultramed. Zack stared at her in disbelief. "Mrs. Beaulieu, are you forgetting that I work for Ultramed?

They pay my salary, my office expenses, insurance, everything. To say nothing of the administrator at the hospital being my brother. What you are asking me to do isn't really fair."

My huuand is dead. Is that fair?

Zack saw the response flash in the woman's eyes and then vanish. We are asking you, " Clothilde Beaulieu said patiently, "to do nothing more than study the contents of that envelope and use it-or not-as you see fit. I assure you there will be no hard feelings if you return the material to us after you have looked it over… or even right now."

"We mean that, Zachary, " Marie said. "We really do."

For a time, there was only silence. Zack looked first at one woman and then the other, and finally at the envelope in his lap A sucker for anybody's cause. Had Frank's terse assessment of him been so irritating because it was so close to the mark? Suzanne… the mountains… the Judge. his career. Any clash with Ultramed and Frank was almost certainly destined to be a losing proposition for him. And there was much, so very much, at stake. The envelope was a Pandora's box. A bomb that might be nothing more than a dud, or nothing less than a lethal explosion A sucker for anybody's cause. Slowly, deliberately, Zack slid the dead surgeon's legacy under his arm. Then he reached across and shook hands with both wnn Pn "I'll be in touch, " he said. h. -_, _w* ** Frank, Frank, he's our man. If he can't do it, no one can… Over the two decades since his graduation from Sterling High, not a day had passed that Frank Iverson did not hear the chant echoing in his mind.

Cheerleaders dancing on the sidelines, each one hoping Frank would at least spend a few minutes with her at the victory celebration after the game. Grandstands jammed with parents, teachers, students, and reporters, all screaming his name, all begging him for one more pass, one more score. The Judge and his mother, proudly accepting congratulations from those seated around them. Driving through the streets of Sterling toward his hospital, Frank heard the cheering as clearly as if he were standing on the field, staring across the line of scrimmage at the opposition, knowing that, in JUST a few seconds, his play would swell those cheers to a deafening roar. Frank, Frank, he's our man… They had been days of glory for him, days of strength and independence. It felt so good to realize that after all the difficult, humiliating years that had followed, after all the lousy breaks and the goddamn patronizing, demeaning lectures from his father, a return to the stature and influence of those times was so close at hand. Two weeks, that was all. Three at the most. He had done his part, and done it well.

Now, all he needed was patience-patience and constant vigilance. Three years before, he had made the mistake of complacency, of trusting, and it had cost him dearly. There would be no repeat of that fiasco this time. Nothing would be taken for granted. Nothing. Besides, he affirmed as he swung up the drive to Ultramed-Davis, there were reasons aplenty for keeping his eyes open and his guard up. A million reasons, to be exact… If he can't do it, no one can. "HELENE, I DON'T know how to tell you this, but I think it's time we moved Mr. Gerard Morris's fabulous woodland scene out of the window and more toward the back-like in the storeroom."

Suzanne propped Morris's huge oil against a display case and stepped back several paces, hoping that the change in lighting and perspective might thaw some of the feelings she had for the man and his work. "The man's a legend, " Helene Meyer called out from the back. In his own mind, he is."

"Suzanne, when are you going to come to grips with the reality that tourists don't come up to northern New Hampshire to buy abstract art?

They want mallards."

"Paint by numbers, " Suzanne muttered, remembering a tongue lashing she had received from the pompous artist for reducing the price of one of his "masterpieces" by fifty dollars. "What?"

"Nothing. Nothing."

It was nearing three in the afternoon. Suzanne and her partner had been doing inventory nonstop since her return from Guy's funeral. Outside, muted midday sunshine filtered through a row of expansive, century-old sugar maples, turning Main Street into a gentle work of art that far surpassed anything Gerard Morris had produced. Immersing herself in the inventory and spending time with Helene had helped lift some of the melancholy Suzanne was feeling, but memories of Guy Beaulieu kept her mood somber. Although she had not known the man outside the hospital, she had shared several patients with him before his practice dwindled, and more than respected him as a person and a physician. Nevertheless, the stories that had been circulating about him of late were disconcerting, and Suzanne had gradually come to agree with those who believed that it would be in everyone's best interest for Guy to retire.

Now, reflecting on Zack's opinion that the aging surgeon seemed quite capable and mentally intact, and with the realization that the man had died defending himself, she was having second thoughts. First Guy Beaulieu, and then the old woodsman Chris Gow-in both cases she had backed off, siding with Ultramed through her silence. True, the corporation had plucked her from a situation that had seemed totally hopeless and had given her a chance. For that alone she owed Ultramed her loyalty. But still, there had been a time, she knew, when she considered herself a liberal, a champion of the underdog.

There had been a time when she would have gone to the mat for either man, Just as Zack had done. It was hard to believe she had changed so much over just a few short years. As she hefted Morris's painting off the floor and replaced it in the window, Suzanne silently cursed Paul Cole for the chaos he had brought to her life. "So?"

Helene Meyer, dressed in jeans and a blue-print smock, emerged from the storeroom with a pair of ceramic vases that the had taken on consignment from a Micmac Indian potter. She was a short, dark, energetic woman with close-cut hair and just enough excess pounds to puff her cheeks and arms. "So what? " Suzanne asked. "So where are Morris's ducks?"

Suzanne nodded toward the window. "Good, good. You're learning, child.

You're learning."

The White Mountain Olde Curiosity Shop and Gallery occupied the ground floor of a half-century-old, red-brick structure two blocks from the center of town. Three years before, when she received word that an uncle had died and left the place to her, Helene was working in a dead-end advertising job in Manhattan and competing with what seemed like several million other forty-year-old divorced women for any one of a minuscule pool of available men. She took her inheritance as an omen for change.

Despite having "taken her act on the road, " along with her two children, Helene had never given up on the notion that Mr. Perfect was, at any given moment, just one man away. Perhaps, Suzanne reflected, that was why the woman always had a smile and an encouraging word for even the bleakest situation. "You okay? " Helene asked, setting the vases on a pair of lucite pedestals, and then reversing them. "Huh? Oh, sure, I'm fine."

"You look tired."

"I always look tired."

"You always look beautiful, " Helene corrected. "Today you look beautiful and tired."

"I'm fine. I'm just not sleeping too well."

The explanation was an understatement. Since her discharge from the hospital, she had been almost continuously restless and ill at ease, sleeping no more than an hour or two at a time and often awakening with an intense, free-floating anxiety. It was hardly the mood she would have expected, given the outcome of her surgery. "You need some sex, " Helene said. "I don't need any sex. That's your cure for everything."

"Well, have I had a sick day since you've known me? As long as there are ski lodges and contra dances and Thursday night single-mingles at the Holiday Inn, I intend to stay healthy as a horse. Don't you think it's time you-"

"No. No, I don't. Now let's change the subject. Besides-" She caught herself after that one word, but it was too late. Helene leapt at the opening. "Besides, what?"

"Nothing "

"Oh, yes." She squinted across at Suzanne. "You did it, didn't you?

The other night with that new doctor. What's his name?"

"Zachary. But-"

"Well, I'll be damned. No wonder you're so tired."

"I thought that was supposed to perk me up."

"Not when it's the first time in several years, it's not, " Helene said.

"You need to keep in shape for that sort of thing. Glory be. He must be something else, that's all I can say. Tell me about him."

"There's nothing to tell. He's a nice guy. I was frightened about my surgery and he was understanding, and things… things just… got out of hand. It was a mistake-just one of those things. We're not even going to see one another again outside the hospital."

"Glory be, " Helene said again. "You stop that."

Helene took Suzanne by the shoulders. "No, you stop that, " she said.

"Suze, you're like my sister. Bringing you in as a partner in this place is the best thing I've ever done-except maybe for that furrier from White Plains…"

She sighed wistfully, and Suzanne laughed. "If I keep putting my two cents into your life, " she went on, "it's because I love you. I know you had it rough with that jerk you were married to and all, but that's water under the bridge. He's gone.

You can't keep letting him rule your life."

"I don't let him rule my life. I'm doing just fine, thank you"

"And you've got a great job and a great kid and a lot of interests and you don't need anyone messing things up for you again. I know.

I know. You've said all that before."

"So…"

"So there's more. It's out there waiting if you'd just stop running scared and give it a chance."

"Helene, I'm perfectly happy, and my life is perfectly under control.

"Okay, okay. But if you ask me, you could do with a little less control and a little more-"

"Meyer, enough."

Helene held up her hands defensively. "Just trying to help, " she said.

"I know."

"So, this Zachary that you're not going to see again outside the hospital, tell me about him."

"Helene, I thought we-"

"Tall? Kind of a Clint Eastwood face? Great eyes? Dark brown "How did you-" At that instant, the door behind Suzanne opened. She whirled, and tensed visibly. "Hi, " Zack said. "I thought so, " Helene muttered.

"Glory be…"*** "I'm sorry to have popped in on you like this,"

Zack said, sipping the cappuccino Suzanne had made him. "I know you said Wednesday."

"That's okay. I needed a break."

They were perched on cherrywood stools on either side of a glass case that doubled as a sales counter and jewelry display. Following introductions, small talk, and a nudge that Suzanne had tried unsuccessfully to find annoying, Helene had gone off on "errands."

Across the gallery, a dowager tourist and her diminutive husband were eyeing a Gerard Morris, entitled typically, The Forest Is a Symphony.

Life in Itself. "How's the incision? " Zack asked. "No problem…"

The atmosphere between them was subdued, but not strained. And despite her efforts to pull away, Suzanne sensed that her connection to him, forged on the hillside behind her house and later in her hospital room, had not softened. Silently, she cautioned herself against giving off any encouraging signals. Helene meant well, but she simply didn't understand. "I'm sorry about Guy, " she said. "He was a nice man."

"Yeah."

Zack debated telling her about the envelope, but decided against it — especially since it still lay unopened on the seat of the camper.

"Are you off for the afternoon? " she asked. "Nope. I'm due at the office in a couple of minutes. I… um… actually, I came by for a consultation."

She eyed him suspiciously. "Seriously, " he said. She started to protest, but held back. Helene was right. He did have great eyes. Damn you, Paul, she thought. "Annie? " she asked. "No, thank goodness. Norman seems to be hanging in there all right with her. She doesn't care much for him, though. She says she doesn't trust him. No, I don't need advice from Suzanne Cole, cardiologist. I need it from Suzanne Cole, mother."

"Interesting, " she said. "In that case, let me just change my expression from knowledgeable and unflappable to disheveled, bewildered, and exhausted. Okay, you may proceed."

Across the gallery, the dowager and her husband had shifted their attention to Morris's Three Deer, a Stream, and the Cosmos, a garish rendering with luminescent stars and tiny sparkles in the water. "It's a consult I've got to do for Phil Brookings, " Zack said. "An eight-year-old boy."

"Name?"

Reflexively, Suzanne picked up a pen and doodled 8 years on the corner of a pad. "Nelms. Toby Nelms. The kid hasn't spoken more than a word or two to anyone in five months. Brookings is ready to enter therapy with him, but he wanted me to evaluate him first. I think he's terrified at the prospect of spending hour after hour locked in his office with a kid who won't talk."

"That does sound awful-especially for a shrink. But the child doesn't exactly sound neurosurgical."

"Probably not, but he might be neurological. Apparently he's been having some sort of psychomotor seizures."

"Psychomotor?"

"Sort of a grab-bag diagnosis, meaning, I don't have a handle on what's going on. Some variant of temporal-lobe epilepsy is as close as I can come, based on what Brookings told me. During the first seizure, just before he stopped speaking, he destroyed his room. There have been a number of others since then."

"So why isn't it temporal-lobe epilepsy?"

"Well, for one thing, although there is this rage component like we see in temporal-! obe patients, there's also an enormous fear component. The kid acts as if he's absolutely terrified of something. And for another-and this is what's really disturbing-the recovery time is getting longer and longer with each episode. It sounds as if these seizures, or whatever they are, are associated with some actual increased pressure in the boy's brain."

"Cerebral edema?"

"Quite possibly."

"That's frightening."

"Until now, the swelling's been reversible, but as you know, at some point a vicious cycle sets in, edema causing high fever, causing more edema, and so on."

"Are there any triggers?"

"Triggers?"

"You know, something that sets off an attack."

"Oh, no. Not that anyone has picked up on. Brookings wants to put him on Dilantin or one of the temporal-lobe epilepsy drugs, but he wanted me to check the boy out first. I thought maybe you could give me some hints about dealing with kids around his age."

"Has he had an EEG?"

"I want to get both that and a CT scan, but according to Brookings, the little guy gets so agitated when he gets anywhere near the hospital that it's been next to impossible to get any kind of technically satisfactory study."

"The hospital?"

"Brookings swears that the kid looked through his office window at the hospital and bolted. He had to chase him across the parking lot and actually tackle him."

Absently, Suzanne had scribbled the words and hospital on her pad. "I assume Brookings has looked for the obvious-a bad experience in the hospital, something like that? " she asked. "Uh-huh. Repair of an incarcerated hernia a year or so ago is all.

Your pal Mainwaring did the work. I reviewed the record. The boy was in overnight, but there were absolutely no problems."

Suzanne added hernia and no problems to her list. "Was it done under local?"

"Something like Pentothal and gas, I think it was. Why?"

"No reason. Just throwing out thoughts. I had the same anesthesia, and I'm still talking up a storm, so I don't think that's it."

Across the room, the tourists were embroiled in a heated debate, the dowager gesturing toward Cosmos, and her husband toward Symphony. "Any suggestions? " Zack asked. Suzanne scratched lines under several of the words on her pad. "Just one off the top, " she said. "Don't see him in your office."

"What?"

"And do your best not to look like a doctor, either, or to call yourself doctor. He'll probably know you are one, but there's no sense in making a big deal of it. Unlike most grown-ups, kids don't get impressed with our title. They just get scared."

"You mean, see him at my place?"

"Or even his place. Or better still, somewhere neutral. What about that plane you were telling Jen about? She's very excited about that. Is there any way you could put on a show for this child?"

"Excellent idea, " Zack said. "Of course I could. That's perfect.

I have just the place. The Meadows up at the top of Gaston Street. You know where that is?"

"Uh-huh. We've been there. That sounds just right. When are you seeing him?"

"Wednesday. Wednesday at one-thirty. Say, listen, that being Wednesday and all, why don't we meet up there at, say, eleven-thirty. We can have some lunch-a picnic. You can bring Jen and-"

"I can't, " she said too quickly. "What I mean is, we already have plans."

"Zack, I'm sorry."

"Yeah, sure. Another time… Well, thanks for the coffee." He cleared his throat and pushed off the stool. "I… um… I guess I'd better get back to the hospital."

"Zack…" she said as he headed off. He turned back. "Zack, I… I really am sorry about Guy."

"Yeah, " he said, the hurt in his eyes unmistakable. "Me, too." He turned again and was gone. Stonily, Suzanne tore the sheet from her pad and balled it in her fist. Perhaps it was time she herself made an appointment with Phil Brookings. Sterling had been every bit the refuge she had hoped it would be. Peace and beauty, a good job, and time to spend with Jen. That was all she had wanted, and all she needed. Why was this happening now?

"Excuse me, Miss?"

The dowager, her husband hovering behind, stood by the stool Zack had just vacated. "Huh? Oh, sorry, " Suzanne said. "I see you're interested in Gerard Morris's work?"

"Yes. Is he local?" f "One town over. He's growing more popular every year."

Why had she lied to him about Wednesday? Jen did have plans with friends, but she was free. Why had she lied?

"Well, " the woman said, "my husband and I are most interested in the work on the left. The one with those lovely deer. Could you tell me its price?"

"It's eibhteen hundred."

"Oh, " the woman said. "I see." She scanned Morris's mimeoed resume.

"Has he had any gallery shows outside of this area?

Boston?

New York?"

"No, " Suzanne said, realizing that, despite her taste in art, the woman was no novice at buying it. "I don't believe he has."

Maybe Helene was right. Maybe it was time to stop running scared. "Well,

" the woman said, "that being the case, don't you think the asking price for his work is a bit high?"

Suzanne eyed her for a moment, and then flipped the crumpled list into the wastepaper basket. "As a matter of fact, " she said, "I do."

For years people had called her the Witch of West Eighty-seventh Street.

But Hattie Day had known better. They called her Batty Hattie and filed petitions claiming her cluttered apartment was a health menace and her family of cats against the law. But Hattie hadn't cared. On her infrequent trips to the store, children taunted her and even sometimes threw things at her. But Hattie had understood, and still loved them as much as she loved her cats. For years, people had said that she was crazy. But because she had known better, Hattie had just smiled at them But now, since the terrifying events that had followed her trip to V, Hattie smiled at no one. Because now Hattie knew they were right. It was nearly two in the morning. Exhausted, but reluctant to sleep, Hattie hobbled to her stove, lit a cigarette from the burner, and then put on a pot of tea. She was only sixty-two, but with her pallor, her long, unkempt hair, and her cadaverous thinness, she looked eighty. She sank into a tattered easy chair and studied her hands. There was nothing about the bony, nicotine-stained fingers and the long, curving nails to suggest the wonderful music they had once made. The death of her parents in an accident had, in effect, ripped the violin from her hands-pulled her out of Juilliard and into a succession of mental hospitals. But over the years, she had made do. She had her apartment, and her cats, and her battered stereo, and more than enough records to fill each day with music. But that was before Quebec. Shakily, Hattie stubbed out her cigarette, hesitated a moment, and then limped to the stove to light another. The water had not yet boiled. If only she had refused the invitation to Martin's wedding, she thought, if only she had stayed home where she belonged, none of this would have happened. But Martin, her cousin's son, was really the only family she had. And when he was at Juilliard he had stopped by often, bringing food and usually a record or two, and staying long enough to tell her about his studies. Once he had even brought his guitar and played for her-Bach, and several wonderful Villa-Lobos pieces. Hattie smiled grimly at the memory. The bus ride up to Canada had been easy enough, and the wedding had been beautiful-especially the chamber groups made up of Martin's friends. It was during the ride home that the dreadful ache in her leg had begun.

The bus driver had turned her over to the ambulance people in Sterling, New Hampshire, and within an hour she was in the operating room having a cloth artery put in to bypass the clot in her groin. They had called her recovery a miracle. After just a week in the hospital and two weeks in a nursing home, she had gone home. Martin had driven her back to Manhattan and had even gotten one of her cats back for her from the animal protection people. A miracle. It was just a day after Martin had dropped her off that the frightening episodes had begun. Without warning, her mind would go limp. For an hour or more at a time she would sit, staring at nothing, unable to move or to focus her thoughts, knowing what was happening but powerless to control it. The colors in the room would become uncomfortably bright, all sounds unnaturally muted. Sometimes she could force herself out of her chair. Other times, she could only sit and wait for the terribly unpleasant episodes to pass. Twice she had wet herself. She knew she was becoming insane. Then, as if verifying her fears, some of the bizarre episodes had begun exploding into horrible, vivid, distorted reenactments of her surgery. The teapot began whistling. Hattie pushed herself upright, put a tea bag into a chipped stoneware mug, and poured in the boiling water.

On the way back to her easy chair, she stopped and put on one of the albums Martin had left with her-Elizabethan music and English folk pieces, with Martin featured on his guitar. Perhaps, she thought, it was worth calling Martin and telling him she was going mad. She looked about for Orange, the cat he had retrieved for her. During the last of her nightmares, she had hurt it somehow-knocked out a tooth and cut its lip. Since then, the animal had spent most of its time under the bed or behind the bookshelf Hattie sank heavily into her chair. For a brief time, Martin's playing brought her some serenity and even some sweet glimpses into her dim past. There was a set of dances that she felt sure she had once played at a recital, and a lovely rendition of a song by Thomas Stewart. Next came her favorite, a gentle and haunting flute and guitar duet of "Greensleeves."

Bit by bit, her fears began to loosen their grip. Then, as they had twice before that day, the colors in the room began to intensify. No!

Hattie's mind screamed. Please, God, not again. The mus,^. grew faint, and gradually faded into the hum of traffic passing on nearby Columbus Avenue. No. Hattie felt the unpleasant inertia begin to settle in. The glow from the lamp across the room hurt her eyes. Please, God…

Desperately, and with all her strength, she forced herself to her feet, and grabbed her cigarettes, and stumbled toward the stove "Not this time, " she said out loud. "Goddamn it, not this time." She thrust a cigarette between her lips and shakily turned the burner knob. The gas flame flashed on. "Hattie… Hattie, just relax."

The voice, deep and soothing, seemed to be coming from everywhere at once. Then, from above her, Hattie saw the blue-gray eyes smiling at her over the mask. "Just relax now. There's nothing to worry about. Nothing at all. I want you to begin counting back from one hundred."

"Please…"

"Hattie, count!"

One hundred… ninety-nine…"

Good, Hattie. Keep counting. Keep counting."

"Ninety-eight…"

"She's under."

"Ninety-seven…"

"Ready, everyone. Okay."

"Ninety-six… No, wait, please. You're wrong. I'm not asleep. I'm not asleep yet."

"Suction up."

"Wait!"

"Knife, please."

"No! Not yet! Not yet!"

Hattie Day screamed as the scalpel cut into the wall of her lower abdomen. Her screams intensified as flame leapt from the stove and ignited first her hair and then her robe. "Snap, please. Now another.. "

Hattie reeled across her apartment, knocking away pieces of fiery cloth.

The rug began to smolder. She fell to the floor as the scalpel cut down her abdomen and over her groin. Flames seared her face and scalp. She retched from the smoke and the acrid smell of her own burning flesh.

"Retractors ready, please…"

The voice bored through the pain. The knife cut deeper. "Sponge. No, over here. Right here!"

Her clothes now a mass of flame, Hattie Day lurched to her feet and plunged toward the window. "Okay. Now, retract here."

Shrieking, and now engulfed in flame, the woman they all called the Witch of West Eighty-seventh Street hurled herself through the glass and out into the summer night, ten stories above the street. TUESDAY MORNING descended on Zack in the guise of one of his sneakers, set neatly and carefully on the side of his face by Cheap dog. "Self-centered brute," he mumbled, working his eyes open one at a time. "The world has to turn upside down just because you have to take Cheap dog responded to the rebuke by licking him on the mouth. "Okay, okay, mop-face. You made your point." Zack scratched the animal behind one ear and made yet another in a long series of promises to get him a haircut. "I'm afraid I haven't been paying much attention to you lately, old boy. Thanks for being so understanding."

Feeling sluggish, and less enthused about a day at work than he had in some time, he pulled on a pair of surgical scrub pants emblazoned PROPERTY OF MUNICIPAL HOSPITAL OF BOSTON-NOT TO BE REMOVED FOR ANY REASON, let Cheap dog out into the backyard, did fifteen minutes of lackluster calisthenics, and finally started water for coffee. Suzanne's striking change of attitude toward him was, he knew, one reason for his unpleasant humor. And as wonderful as making love with her had been, he wished now that they had played things differently. But weighing perhaps even more heavily at that moment was Guy Beaulieu's legacy. For most of the prior evening, Guy's envelope had remained unopened in the camper.

In fact, at various times throughout the day Zack had actually considered returning it in that state. In the end, though, he realized that his decision to do what he could for the man had been made well before meeting with his widow and daughter, and in fact, even before the terrible events in the quiet room. As he dripped hot water through his Chemex filter and scrambled two eggs with some chopped peppers, onions, and bits of leftover bacon, Zack mulled over his initial impressions of the surgeon's strange and bitter legacy. It was after midnight when he had finally returned home from a long walk with Cheap dog and brought in the envelope. Too tired to read with much comprehension, he had spent two hours sifting through the material and sorting it into piles on the dining room table. From what he could tell, the Ultramed Hospitals Corporation, whether responsible for Guy's difficulties or not, had had a tiger by the tail. There were dozens of newspaper clippings and official documents, plus computer printouts, a number of typed and amended lists of corporate officers and boards of directors, and several smaller envelopes filled with hastily scrawled, handwritten notes.

Beaulieu and his researchers had been thoroughly preparing themselves for battle. Still, despite their diligence, it looked to Zack as if the evidence they had accumulated of Ultramed's avaricious business practices was circumstantial and vague. Zack felt certain that although the assorted documents might raise some eyebrows among the hospital trustees, they were lacking the one, essential ingredient that might turn that concern into votes, a flesh-and blood example-even one-of the dangers of such practices-what Rock Hudson had been to AIDS, or the Challenger explosion to the dangers of space exploration. Without such a rallying point, such an emotional linchpin, Zack knew that Beaulieu's efforts were ultimately as doomed as the man himself. In addition to the evidence against Ultramed, the envelope contained a diary. During the early morning hours, Zack had done no more than scan the small, spiral-bound notebook. Now, after clearing a space on the table for his breakfast, he opened it randomly. Not surprisingly, the writing, almost all of it in fountain pen, was meticulous and precise. December 11th, Several patients cancelled today, including Clarisse L'Frenniere. Spoke on phone to her. She was reluctant to say anything. Had to beg her.

Finally admitted that her son Ricky had heard at school that I had seen one of the girls in his class for a lump on her neck, and had undressed her and made her lie on my examining table, and then that I had walked around and around the table, touching her. No such patient exists in my records or memory. Made several calls to parents of any young girls I had treated. They admitted to having heard rumors, but denied any of them dealt with their daughters. They were all quite distant and embarrassed. I feel I may have done myself more harm than good by contacting them. Called Ricky and begged him to give me the girl's name.

He could or would not. Finally, Clarisse took the phone from him, told me not to call again, and hung up. I will not stop trying. Zack glanced at several other pages, some of which outlined more of Guy's efforts to dive beneath the murky sea of rumors. Others described clashes with members of the medical staff, the local newspaper, and even certain patients. Taken as a whole, it was a chronicle of the agonizing disintegration of a man's life. Allegations of malpractice, none of them substantiated or backed up with a suit… Ietters of complaint to the newspapers and the hospital, most of them anonymous… rumors of sexual misconduct… rumors of inappropriate behavior… patient defections … Blow after blow, humiliation after humiliation, yet Guy Beaulieu had refused to knuckle under. On one page he seemed heroic, on the next, pathologically obstinate. As Zack scanned the notes, the fine line separating the two conditions grew even less distinct. The chances that a man is in the right increase geometrically by the vigor with which others are trying to prove him wrong The maxim was one of Zack's favorites, and he had cited it any number of times over the years. But never had he felt it in his gut the way he did at this moment. Still, there was more than gut instinct to consider. There was the incriminating letter from Maureen Banas, along with other damning evidence Frank claimed to have. There was also Guy's explosive and irrational behavior in the emergency ward on the morning of his death.

And finally, there was the lack of any really good explanation as to why the man might have been singled out for destruction in the first place Certainly, his widow's belief that Ultramed was trying to rid itself of a potential troublemaker was possible, but the response seemed absurdly out of proportion to the threat Guy posed-like shooting a fly with an elephant gun. Zack retrieved Cheap dog from where he was lurking beneath the window of a neighbor's unspayed collie, and chained him on a long run in the yard. Then he showered, dressed, and headed for the hospital, wondering what he would do if he had to confront Marie Fontaine and her mother with hard evidence that Guy had been, in fact, irrational, unstable, and paranoid. Even with a negative autopsy, the man could have been in the early stages of Alzheimer's or struggling with nonanatomical mental illness. As he was pulling into the small Doctors Only lot at the hospital Zack flashed on another saying-this one from a poster he had tacked to the wall of his med school apartment. Just because you re paranoid, doesn't mean they're not out to get you. The emergency ward was in a louder-than-usual morning hum, with several private physicians doing minor procedures, and the E. R. physician of the day, Wilton Marshfield, huffing from one of four "active" rooms to the next, clearly upset that things were not proceeding at a more gentle pace. Zack stopped by the lounge for one final cup of coffee, and was in the process of failing to confound two candy stripers with a thumb palm, when he was paged for an outside call. "Zack, it's Brookings here, Phil Brookings."

"Oh, yes, Phil. If you're calling about that youngster, Nelms, I had to postpone his appointment because of Guy Beaulieu's funeral. I'll be seeing him tomorrow afternoon."

Zack glanced over at the candy stripers, one of whom was completing the more-than-passable thumb palm of a penny on her first try. "I know," the psychiatrist said. "The boy's mother called me. She was, how can I say, a little concerned that you told her to meet you on the side of some mountain. I promised her I would check with you to see if… ah… if there was anything further I could do."

"Actually, " Zack said, smiling at Brookings's discomfiture, "It's near the base of the mountain. Not on the side."

"Oh… I see… Well, I'll just give Mrs. Nelms a call and reassure her that you're not the, how should I say, the eccentric she thinks you might be."

This time, Zack laughed out loud. "Phil, forgive me for being glib. The truth is, I probably am the eccentric she thinks I might be. But this time, at least, I'm just doing 1, what I can to avoid the difficulty you had. It's a little tricky doing a detailed neurological exam on a moving target."

"I understand, " Brookings said, although his tone suggested some lingering doubts. "I'll speak with the boy's mother and make sure they show up. And just in case, perhaps you should wear your sneakers.

The kid is fast."

"Thanks, Phil. I'll be in touch."

Zack hung up as the candy stripers, still practicing, were preparing to leave the lounge. "Here you go, ladies, " he said. "One more. This one's called a finger roll. In it, this perfectly normal American quarter will be magically transported across the tops of my fingers and back without the aid of a crane, bulldozer, or my other hand."

Between the second and the third roll, the quarter slipped between his fingers and plunked into his coffee. "Now, I suggest that you two stay away from this trick until you're old enough to work with hot coffee," he warned. He stood proudly by the cup and waited to retrieve his coin until the bewildered pair had left the room. "Me, eccentric, " he muttered as he headed through the emergency ward. "That's ridiculous.

Absolutely ridiculous."

A set of X rays, five views of a teenager's cervical spine, were wedged up on a four-paneled viewbox in the corridor. Hours later, when the tension and excitement had died down and there was time to reflect, Zack would be unable to explain what it was about those films that had caught his eye. But in that one microsecond as he passed by, something did. It might have been the widening of a shadow, or perhaps the slightly unusual curve in the lateral view. Or it might have been nothing more or less than the instinctive processing of the films against thirteen years of study and God only knew how many other C-spines in how many other settings. Whatever it was, something made him stop, turn, and study the X rays in more detail. The fractures of vertebrae C-1 and C-2 were far from the most obvious he had ever seen, but they were certainly present-and unquestionably unstable. If the spinal cord had not already been damaged, a sudden twist, or turn, or bump could be disastrous.

Either way, he certainly should have been called in on the case. He checked the name and birthdate, Stacy Mills, age 14 Next, he cut through the nurses' station, looking for Wilton Marshfield. The portly physician was hunched over a counter, hurriedly writing a set of discharge instructions. Next to the instruction sheet was a soft cervical collar.

"Hi, " Zack said, moving close enough to verify that the instructions were, in fact, for Stacy Mills. He looked past the man to bed 3, where a dark, pretty girl in riding jodhpurs and a lavender T-shirt was waiting with her parents. She was sitting on the edge of the litter with her feet dangling down, and she was rubbing gently at the base of her skull.

"Oh, hi, Iverson, " Marshfield said. He glanced up only long enough to nod, and then returned to his writing. "This is one bitch of a morning, I'll tell you… Saw you at Beaulieu's funeral yesterday Terrible business. Terrible."

"Wilton, could I talk to you for a moment? " Zack asked softly Marshfield shook his head. "Can't stop right now, " he said, pulling a prescription pad from his clinic coat. "I've got to get rid of this kid, and then I still have two more patients to see. I'm getting too old for this pace, Iverson. Too damn old. Tell your brother he'd better hurry up and get this place straightened out so I can get back to my trout stream and my grandchildren."

"It's about that girl you're getting ready to send home, " Zack said.

"Stacy Mills."

Marshfield squinted over at the girl, and then picked up the cervical collar and the instruction sheet, and began writing a prescription for a muscle relaxant. "Fell off her horse and strained her neck muscles, " he said as he wrote. "Look, Iverson, " he added curtly, "I'm sorry I snapped at you the other night. But please, just don't make any trouble for me today. I'm too far behind to-"

"Listen, Marshfield, " Zack whispered. "I just looked at her films over there. She has a fracture. Two of them, I think. C-one and C-two."

The older man froze. In slow motion, his pen wobbled in his fingertips and then fell, clattering onto the counter. "Are you sure? " he rasped.

Zack nodded. "Jesus…"

"Come, let me show you."

Moments later, Zack led a mute, badly shaken Wilton Marshfield across to Stacy Mills and her parents "Hello, Stacy, Mr. and Mrs. Mills, " he said. "My name is Iverson. Zachary Iverson. I'm a neurosurgeon."

He glanced back at Marshfield, who looked as if he were listening blindfolded to the final counts from a firing squad. Inwardly, Zack smiled. If the man was waiting for gunfire, he was in for a pleasant surprise. Hey, Wilton, relax, he was thinking. As far as I'm concerned, this business of ours has never been a contest or a game. It's life.

It's the real bananae And it's hard enough to do right even without the bullshit and the oneupsmanshipw You did the best you could, and that's all we got-any of us. There's no way I would hang you out to dzy. "Dr.

Marshfield, here, has just made an excellent pickup on Stacy's X rays," he said. "He spotted a shadow he didn't like, and wanted me to check it before he would consider sending her home. I'm afraid his suspicions were correct. Stacy, there is a small fracture-a broken bone right up here."

"I knew it, " Stacy said. "See Mother, I told you it was killing me."

"Is it dangerous? " the girl's mother asked. "It would have been, " Zack said, slipping the soft collar into place, "if it had gone undetected.

It could have been a blooming disaster. But everything is under control now. You're going to be just fine."

Mrs, Mills reached over and squeezed a stunned Wilton Marshfield's hand.

Her husband patted him on the shoulder. "Now, Stacy, " Zack went on,

"first of all, I don't want you moving your head around, okay?"

"Okay."

"Good. Then there are some things I must explain to you and to your parents about what we do for cervical fractures."

"Dr Iverson, please, " the girl's mother said. "Before you start, I d like to get Stacy's aunt-my sister-over here. Would that be okay?"

"Certainly, but I don't see-"

"She helps me understand medical things. I'm sure you know her. She's the head nurse here. Maureen. Maureen Banas."