The First Patient

CHAPTER 3

The White House Physician's clinic was situated directly across the corridor from the elevator to the First Family's residence. Standing before the bathroom mirror in the elegant three-room office, Gabe sensed he would have been more at ease had he been stationed in a clinic in downtown Baghdad.

It was just after seven in the evening. As promised, the tuxedo, complete with shoes, had arrived at the office at precisely six. The size was perfect in every respect-not surprisingly, since the arrangements had been made through the Social Office of the President by Magnus Lattimore. Unfortunately, the garment bag failed to include either a clip-on or instructions on how to knot the enclosed bow tie-a rare, if understandable, Lattimore oversight.

Gabe watched as the hands that had lassoed steers, hung on to bucking broncos, and sutured innumerable lacerations struggled to create even a passable knot. The directions he had printed out from the Internet were propped up on the sink. In addition to his limited dexterity, he looked tired and strained. The zygomatic arches above his cheeks were even more pronounced than usual, and his dark eyes, which Cinnie had called his sexiest feature, seemed lost. No surprise. Four whirlwind days in a new apartment, new city, and new job were taking their toll.

The formal dinner reception, scheduled for eight in the State Dining Room, was ostensibly to welcome the recently reelected President of Botswana. According to the Africa expert sent by Lattimore to brief Gabe, the country was a staunch ally of the United States and one of the enduring democracies on the continent. In truth, the guest list had carefully been stacked with dignitaries and cabinet members who were interested in meeting the man the president had selected to bring stability to the White House medical office.

Another try at the knot, another morbid failure.

The muscles in Gabe's neck and shoulders, always the physical receptacle in his body for stress and emotional fatigue, were drumhead tight, and a throbbing headache was developing beneath his temples. Some sort of medicine would help make the evening more bearable, he decided-maybe a couple of Tylenols with codeine.

Since Fairhaven he had sworn off alcohol forever, and for his first few years out of prison he had expanded that pledge to boycott all manner of drugs as well. But with an array of orthopedic maladies dating back to his rodeo and football days, and stress-related head- and neck aches, Tylenol and ibuprofen had intermittently begun surrendering to Darvon and Tylenol No. 3, with whatever happened to be in the medicine cabinet thrown in from time to time for those discomforts that crossed the imaginary line between dull ache and disruptive pain.

He knew relying on pain pills and even the antidepressants he resorted to from time to time wasn't the smartest behavior for an alcoholic in recovery, and he knew that there was always the danger he would be conjuring up the pains to justify taking the drugs, but he had gone about as far in life as he could go in terms of doing the right thing.

He set the tie and the instructions in the sink, brought a glass of water to the exquisite cherrywood desk the White House decorators had determined was appropriate for the inner office of the physician to the president, and fished out two Tylenols with codeine from the thirty or so he had transferred to a bottle that read simply: TYLENOL. If anyone found out about the deception, or discovered the envelopes of Demerol and antidepressants in the eyeglass case in the back of his drawer, so be it. If Drew had asked him about pills, he would have told him the truth. Probably should have said something anyhow. If he had, he might still be back in Tyler taking care of folks with calluses on their hands and teaching kids how to throw a lasso. But in the end, he decided it was his business and his business only. The world knew quite enough about him as it was.

The codeine had just begun its journey from stomach to brain when, with a firm knock, the door to the receptionist's office opened.

"Hello?" a man's voice, not one that Gabe recognized, called out.

"I'm in here," Gabe replied.

The admiral's dress whites seemed to throw off at least as much light as the desk lamp, and the golden "scrambled eggs" insignia on the brim of his cover appeared possessed of its own inner glow. He stepped across the threshold and, with his gaze fixed on Gabe, reached back and closed the door.

"Ellis Wright," he said, giving Gabe's hand a perfunctory pump. "My apologies for not having come by sooner, but I was overseas when you came on board. I assume you know who I am."

The two photos of the man Lattimore had shared with Gabe did not do the imposing officer full credit, nor did craggy and steely, the adjectives that had first come to Gabe's mind when he saw them. Ellis Wright was every fiber a military commander-ramrod straight and rock jawed, with gunmetal eyes and shoulders that seemed mitered at perfect ninety-degree angles. Given just one guess as to what he did for a living, few would ever be wrong. Gabe wondered if Wright's eyes were always this cold or the look had been reserved for him.

"Ellis Wright holds sway over virtually everything that moves or breathes around the president," Lattimore had said during his briefing, "except you, and to a much lesser extent, me. Nobody has any control over you other than the POTUS himself, and even he had better be careful trying to order you about. Before President Stoddard took office, his predecessor Brad Dunleavy allowed Wright to choose a military M.D. to be his personal physician, so it should come as no surprise that Wright resented having a civilian assume this position when Jim Ferendelli was appointed. I think it's safe to anticipate that he'll have issues with you for the same reason. Around here everything boils down to proximity and access to the POTUS, and first Ferendelli and now you nudge Wright back a notch in that regard."

"I'm the head of the White House Military Office," Wright, still standing, was saying. "The military's involvement with the smooth, efficient running of the presidency dates back to George Washington. We're responsible for communications, emergency operations, the airlift group, Helicopter Squadron One, Camp David, the White House Transportation Agency, the White House Mess, and"-he paused unsubtly for emphasis-"the White House Medical Unit. We're Military with a capital M. If the president so much as thinks of something he wants done, our people will have already started doing it. Is that clear?"

"Pretty clear, yes. You… um… want to sit down?"

Gabe stopped himself at the last possible moment from asking if the admiral also headed a department that knew anything about bow ties.

"I intend to say what I have to say and leave," Wright went on. "I can do both standing. You sound like something of a wiseass, Singleton. Are you a wiseass?"

Gabe cocked his head and hoped his expression said that he was open to any frank discussion, but he was not going to be easily pushed around.

"Admiral," he said, "I've been brought here to take care of the president. I'm board certified in internal medicine, and I've worked in big, gleaming hospitals and in Central American jungles. Most people who know me and know medicine think I'm pretty competent at what I do. If that's your definition of a wiseass, then maybe we have a problem."

"I told the president when he was considering a replacement for Dr. Ferendelli, and I'm telling you now: We have doctors in every branch of the military who are so knowledgeable, precise, and clinically competent that I doubt most doctors, including you, could carry their instrument bags. This is a military operation, and you are needed here about as much as a bull needs tits."

"The president doesn't seem to think so."

"I know all about what happened to you at the Academy, Singleton. Kicked out for being a drunk and killing a couple of people. You still a drunk? Pill popper?"

It was time, Gabe decided, to meet his new nemesis eye-to-eye. He exhaled as he stood, wondering how the president's spin doctors would deal with a fistfight between the president's private physician and the head of the White House Military Office. At just a shade under six feet, Gabe was still looking up at the admiral. He had the fleeting cartoon image of his fist slamming against the man's angular jaw and shattering into a million pieces.

"Exactly what do you want, Admiral?" he asked.

"I wonder, Dr. Singleton, if you have taken the time to learn anything about this job you have signed on to do." Wright's metallic eyes sparked. "For instance, the details of the Twenty-fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution."

"Presidential succession," Gabe said, grateful to have that much knowledge, although he remembered at the same instant that Wright had asked for details.

"Actually," Wright said with unbridled disdain, "presidential succession was dealt with in the Presidential Succession Law of 1886, and modified in 1947 to include the succession following the vice president of two elected officials-the president pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House."

"Oh."

Gabe felt the slight calming effect of the codeine kick in, and welcomed the sensation. In the short time between Drew's trip to Wyoming and his own flight on Air Force One to Washington, no one had discussed the provisions of the Twenty-fifth Amendment with him. Assuming that not doing so was an oversight on Magnus Lattimore's part, the seriousness of the lack of bow tie instructions had just been supplanted.

"The Twenty-fifth Amendment," Wright went on, "deals with the inability of the president to reliably conduct the duties of his office. It took years to hammer out the precise wording, and the most junior of my White House medical officers could summarize the amendment section by section. Many of them know the whole thing verbatim."

"The ones I've met have certainly seemed very bright."

"As the president's personal physician, I want you to review the presidential law of succession and memorize the Twenty-fifth Amendment," Wright demanded.

"And I want you to stop barking orders at a civilian," was Gabe's knee-jerk reply, "especially one who has been chosen by the president to be his personal physician."

Gabe transiently felt as if he were going to melt before the man's gaze and power.

"They put their pants on one leg at a time, just like the rest of us," his high school football coach used to say about an intimidating opponent. At that moment, Gabe could not imagine Admiral Ellis Wright ever being out of uniform.

"I am the head of this medical unit," Wright said with controlled fury. "If anything unusual goes on here and I am not informed, I promise I will squash you like a bug. You could never qualify to be considered military, my friend, but that doesn't mean for one second that you are not vulnerable. If you wish to learn how vulnerable, simply let me find out that you have been withholding information about the president from me. I will see you at dinner."

Wright executed a perfect turn, opened the door, and had taken one step into the reception area when he stopped.

"Cromartie, what in the hell are you doing here?" he snapped.

"I… I'm the covering nurse tonight, sir," a woman's quavering voice replied. "Seven until midnight."

For several seconds there was only silence.

"Well," Wright said finally, "if anything Dr. Singleton and I just discussed gets back to me, you're the first one I am going to come looking for."

"Yes, sir. I mean the door was closed, sir. I mean I didn't hear very much."

"Civilians," Wright grumbled as the outer door opened and slammed shut.

Cromartie. The name meant nothing to Gabe, but there were still a number of unit nurses and physician's assistants and even a couple of doctors he had yet to meet.

"Well, come on in, Nurse Cromartie," he called out. "The Admiral Wright fan club is now in session."

Gabe heard a magazine being dropped onto the table, and moments later Alison Cromartie appeared in the doorway to his office.