The Cradle Will Fall

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

EDGAR Highley had left Katie's room with a smile of satisfaction on his face. The pills were working. The cut on her finger proved that her blood was no longer clotting.

He went down to the second floor and stopped in to see Mrs. Aldrich. The baby was in a crib by her bed. Her husband was with her. Dr. Highley smiled, then bent over the child. "A handsome specimen," he proclaimed. "I don't think we'll trade him in."

He knew his humor was heavy-handed, but sometimes it was necessary. These people were important. Delano Aldrich could direct thousands of dollars of research funds to Westlake.

Delano Aldrich was staring at his son, his face a study in awe and admiration. "Doctor, we still can't believe it. Everyone else said we'd never have a child."

"Everyone else was obviously wrong." Her anxiety had been the main problem. Fukhito had spotted that. Muscular dystrophy in her father's family. She knew she might be a carrier. And she had some fibroid cysts. He'd taken care of the cysts and she'd become pregnant. Then he'd done an early test of the amniotic fluid and had been able to reassure her on the dystrophy question. Still, she was highly emotional. She'd had two miscarriages over ten years ago, so he'd put her to bed two months before the birth. And it had worked.

"I'll stop by in the morning." These people would be witnesses for him if there were any questions about Katie DeMaio's death.

But there shouldn't be any questions. The dropping blood pressure was a matter of hospital record. The emergency operation would take place in the presence of the top nurses on the staff. He'd ask the emergency-room surgeon to assist. They'd tell the family that it had been impossible to stop the hemorrhaging.

Leaving the Aldriches, he went to the nurses' desk.

"Nurse Renge."

She stood up quickly, her hands fluttering nervously.

"I am quite concerned about Mrs. DeMaio. I will be back right after dinner to see the lab report on her blood count. I would not be surprised if we have to operate tonight."

He had made a point of speaking to several people in the lobby and then gone to the restaurant adjacent to the hospital grounds for dinner. He wanted to be able later to present the image of a conscientious doctor: Instead of going home, I had dinner next door and went back to the hospital to check on Mrs. DeMaio. At least we tried.

At a quarter to eight he was in the restaurant ordering a steak. Katie had been given the sleeping pill at seven thirty. By eight thirty it would be safe to take the last necessary step. While he waited for his coffee to be served, he'd go up the back fire stairs of the hospital to the third floor. He'd give her a shot of heparin, the powerful anticoagulant that, combined with the pills, would send her blood pressure and blood count plummeting.

He'd come back here and have his coffee, pay the bill and then return to the hospital. He'd take Nurse Renge up with him to check on Katie. Ten minutes later Katie would be in surgery.

That would be the end of the danger. His bag had not shown up. It probably never would. He had eliminated the Salem threat. Edna had been buried this morning. The moccasin in her drawer would mean nothing to whoever disposed of her belongings.

A terrible week. And so unnecessary if he'd been allowed to pursue his work openly. But now nothing would stand in his way. Someday he would receive the Nobel Prize. For contributions to medicine not imagined possible. Single-handedly he had solved the abortion problem and the sterility problem.

"Did you enjoy your dinner, Doctor?" the waitress asked.

"Very much indeed. I'd like cappuccino, please."

"Certainly, Doctor, but that will take about ten minutes."

"While you're getting it, I'll make some phone calls." He'd be gone less than ten minutes. The waitress wouldn't miss him.

Slipping out the side door near the hallway with the telephones and rest rooms, he hurried across the parking lot. He kept in the shadows. He had his key to the fire exit at the rear of the maternity wing. No one ever used those stairs. He let himself in.

The stairway was brightly lighted. He turned off the switch. He could find his way through this hospital blindfolded. At the third floor he opened the door and listened. There was no sound. Noiselessly he stepped into the hall. An instant later he was in the living room of Katie's suite.

That had been another problem he'd anticipated. Suppose someone had accompanied her to the hospital-her sister, a friend? Suppose that person had asked to stay overnight on the sofa bed in the living room? By ordering the room repainted, he'd blocked that possibility. Planning. Planning. It was everything.

That afternoon he had left the needle with the heparin in a drawer of an end table under the painter's drop cloth. A light from the parking lot filtered through the window, giving him enough visibility to find the table. He reached for the needle.

Now for the most important moment of all. He was in the room, bending over her. The drapery was open. Faint light was coming into the room. Her breathing was uneven. She must be dreaming. He took her arm, slipped the needle in, squeezed. She winced and sighed. Her eyes, cloudy with sleep, opened as she turned her head. She looked up at him, puzzled. "Dr. Highley," she murmured, "why did you kill Vangie Lewis?"

SCOTT Myerson was more tired than angry. Since Vangie Lewis' body had been found Tuesday morning, two other people had died. Two very decent people-a hardworking receptionist who deserved a few years of freedom after caring for her aged parents, and a doctor who was making a real contribution to medicine.

They had died because he had not moved fast enough. If only he had brought Chris Lewis in for questioning immediately, Edna Burns and Emmet Salem would be alive now.

Scott couldn't wait for the chance to get to Lewis. He and his girl friend had landed at seven. They should be here by eight. Lewis was cool all right. Knew better than to run. Thought he could brazen it out. Knows it's all circumstantial. But circumstantial evidence can be a lot better than eyewitness testimony when properly presented in court.

At seven fifty Richard walked into Scott's office. "I think we've uncovered a cesspool," he said, "and it's called the Westlake Maternity Concept."

"If you're saying that the shrink was probably playing around with Vangie Lewis, I agree," Scott said.

"That's not what I'm talking about," said Richard. "It's Highley I'm after. I think he's experimenting with his patients. I just spoke to the husband of one of them. He's been thinking that his wife agreed to artificial insemination without his permission. I think it goes beyond that. I think Highley is performing artificial insemination without his patients' knowledge."

Scott snorted. "You think Highley would inject Vangie Lewis with the semen of an Oriental and expect to get away with it?"

"Maybe he made a mistake."

"Doctors don't make mistakes like that. Even allowing your theory to be true-and frankly, I don't buy it-that doesn't make him Vangie's murderer. Look, we'll investigate Westlake's maternity clinic. If we find any kind of violation there, we'll prosecute. But right now Chris Lewis is my first order of business."

"Do this," Richard persisted. "Go back further with the check on Highley. I'm already looking into the malpractice suits against him. But Newsmaker said he was in Liverpool, in England, before he came here. Let's phone there and see what we can find."

Scott shrugged. "Sure, go ahead." The buzzer on his desk sounded. He switched on the intercom. "Bring him in," he said. Leaning back in his chair, he looked at Richard. "The bereaved widower, Captain Lewis, is here with his paramour."

DANNYBOY Duke sat in the precinct house miserably hunched forward in a chair. He was trembling and perspiring. In another thirty seconds he'd have gotten away. He'd be in his apartment now, feeling the blissful release of the fix. Instead, this steamy hell. "Give me a break," he whispered.

The cops weren't impressed. "You give us a break, Danny. There's blood on this paperweight. Who'd you hit with it?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Danny said.

"Sure you do. The doctor's bag was in your car. We know you stole it last night. The doorman at the Carlyle Hotel can identify you. But who'd you hit with that paperweight, Danny? And what about that shoe? Since when do you save beat-up shoes?"

"It was in the bag," Danny said.

The two detectives looked at each other. The younger one shrugged and turned to the newspaper on the desk behind him. The other dropped the file he had been examining back into the bag. "All right, Danny. We're calling Dr. Salem to find out just what he had in this bag. That'll settle it."

The younger detective looked up from the paper. "Dr. Salem?"

"Yeah. That's the name on the file. Oh, I see. The nameplate on the bag says Dr. Edgar Highley. Guess he had some other doctor's file."

The younger detective came over to the table carrying the Daily News. He pointed to page three. "Salem's the doctor whose body was found at the Essex House last night."

The police officers looked at Dannyboy with renewed interest.

H E WATCHED KATIE'S EYES CLOSE, HER breathing become even. She'd fallen asleep again. The question about Vangie had come from her subconscious, triggered perhaps by a duplication of her mental state of Monday night. Suppose she asked it again in the operating room before they anesthetized her?

He had to kill her before Nurse Renge made her check, in less than an hour. After the Coumadin pills she had taken, the heparin shot would further act to anticoagulate her blood. He had planned on several hours to complete the procedure. Now he couldn't wait. He had to give her a second shot immediately.

He had heparin in his office. He'd have to go down the fire stairs to the parking lot, use the private door to his office, refill the hypodermic and come back up here. It would take at least five minutes. The waitress would question his absence from the table, but there was no help for that. Satisfied that Katie was asleep, he hurried from the room.

THE technician in the Valley County forensic lab worked overtime on Friday evening. Dr. Carroll had asked him to compare all microscopic samples from the home of the presumed suicide Vangie Lewis with all microscopic samples from the home of the presumed accident victim Edna Burns.

The technician had a superb instinct for microscopic evidence, a hunch factor that rarely failed him. He was particularly interested in loose hair, and he was fond of saving, "It's astonishing how much hair we are constantly shedding."

Sifting the vacuum-bag contents from the Lewis home, he found many strands of the ash-blond hair of the victim. And he'd discovered a fair quantity of medium brown hair-undoubtedly the husband's. But there were also a number of silverish sandy hairs in the victim's bedroom. The length suggested that the hair was a man's. Some of the same strands were on the coat the victim had been wearing.

And then the technician found the connection Richard Carroll had been seeking. Several sandy hairs with silver roots were clinging to the faded blue bathrobe of Edna Bums.

The technician reached for the phone to call Dr. Carroll.