To The Bone

Chapter 23

Monks slept a surprising ten hours, a sign that he had been exhausted as well as drunk. He awoke hungover, no doubt about that, with his senses operating through a grainy screen. But the sleep made him feel a hell of a lot better than he otherwise would have.

Herded by cats darting between his ankles, he walked down the hall to the kitchen. He put out fresh food for them, started water heating for coffee, then checked the blinking light on his phone machine.

The message was from Larrabee. "I've got something good. Come on down here as soon as you can."

The call had come last night, and it was still early, not yet seven a.m. Monks decided there was time for breakfast. He scrambled eggs with cheddar cheese, browned half a can of corned beef hash, topped it all liberally with jalapeño sauce, and washed it down with strong black French roast. By the time he shaved and showered, it was just eight a.m.

Monks called Mercy Hospital to see if Dick Speidel, the Quality Assurance chairman, had come in yet. He had.

"I looked the case over last night, Carroll," Speidel said. "Personally, I lean toward your side, but I'm going to recommend that it go to committee. It's so unusual, and she did die."

"Fair enough."

"The bottom line is, it seems pretty clear that she was beyond help when she came in. You took a wild swing. I'd probably have done the same, if I'd even thought of it. But you're going to be up against some purists who might consider it an inappropriate procedure."

"I already am," Monks said.

"Well, you won't have long to wait. I've sent out copies to everyone. You're on the docket for Monday."

"I appreciate it, Dick."

"See you then. Good luck."

Monks put down the phone, feeling better than when he had picked it up.

His guns were still on the deck, glistening with dew, a silent accusation of last night's excesses. He dried them, wiped them down with an oily rag, and put each one away, where it belonged.

The fog that had been hovering offshore had moved in during the night, shielding him, at least for a few hours, from the hammering sun. Grateful for its cover, he got into the Bronco and drove down to the city again.

Stover Larrabee was just getting out of the shower when the phone rang, a little after eight a.m. He was groggy, not used to the hours. He usually stayed up late and slept late.

The caller was Tina Bauer. "I found something," she said. "Just a reference to a file, but the complainant's name's on it."

"I'll come get it. When's good?"

"I could bring it over, if you want."

"Well – if you're sure it's no trouble, Tina."

"I've got to run some errands anyway. Half an hour?"

"I'll be here."

While he dressed, he replayed the tape he had made last night, on the phone to Margaret Pendergast – D'Anton's former nurse. Strictly speaking, it was illegal to tape a conversation without the other party's permission, but sometimes expediency outweighed everything else.

It had taken some time to get her going, but Larrabee was a professional sympathetic listener, and Margaret, like a lot of people who hold on to a troubling secret for a long time, was glad for a chance to unburden herself at last.

"I don't think I did anything illegal," Margaret's recorded voice said nervously. "Not really, anyway. But what if I did? Would you turn me over to the police?"

"I don't have any reason to, Margaret. I'm just trying to get information that might help my client. I mean, you didn't do any bodily harm? Rob somebody, nothing like that?"

"Certainly not! I just – knew something I didn't tell. I don't even know for sure it was important."

"In that case, I seriously doubt it's an issue," Larrabee said. "How about this? You tell me what happened. I'll give you my professional opinion on whether you broke the law. If there's any problem, we can discuss it."

He heard her sigh, a thin, spinsterish sound. "It's not just the police," she said. "I was very disturbed. But-" The sentence lingered, unfinished.

"But it's time to make peace with it, huh?"

"I would like to get it settled," she said.

"Margaret, I do this all the time, and I can promise you, a lot of people it wouldn't bother. But you, I can tell you've got a real conscience. Believe me, you'll feel much better."

She sighed again, then started remembering out loud.

Margaret had worked for D'Anton for about two years, from 1995 to 1997. She had been in her forties then, never married, a highly competent nurse with a great deal of administrative experience. She had been wooed to D' Anton via a head-hunting agency. Her stay had by and large been a smooth one. She didn't have much personal contact with D'Anton – he tended to be brusque, and mainly ignored his support staff. His anger could be ferocious. The clinic was not a relaxed or friendly place, but it was run at a high level of competence, and pay and prestige were excellent.

She remembered the girl who had disappeared, Katie Bensen, because street-smart Katie had been very much out of place among D'Anton's other, affluent patients. But the staff did not ask questions. Katie's procedures had been simple, a couple of light skin peels to remove traces of adolescent acne.

About two months later, a plainclothes SFPD detective came in. Margaret was handling the desk. He showed her a photo of Katie and asked if they had a current address for her. He was polite, apologetic for bothering the august Dr. D'Anton, and it was clear that he did not really expect any help – this was just a space that needed to be filled in on a report.

Margaret looked up Katie's records. Her address was the same one the detective had, an apartment in San Francisco. To make sure, Margaret checked the billing records. There she found something surprising. Katie's bill had, in fact, been sent to a different address – D'Anton's Marin County house.

Margaret thought it must be a mistake. The billing was done by a separate office, an independent contractor that handled many other physicians. Someone there must have been looking at D'Anton's address for another reason and carelessly typed it in.

She told the detective that the clinic had the same address for Katie that the police did. He thanked her and left.

Then, wanting to correct the mistake, Margaret went to D' Anton and told him what had happened.

She had never seen him get flustered before. He stammered out an explanation – Katie had modeled for his wife, Julia, and the procedures were partial payment for that.

Then he got angry. The police had no right to come around casting aspersions on him. And Margaret had no business giving out information without a subpoena.

She was taken aback. It was nothing medical, or confidential, she pointed out – just confirming the address the police already had. D'Anton barked a few more sharp words about loyalty and priorities, then turned his back and stalked away.

D' Anton ignored her for the rest of the week. Then he surprised her again, by asking her to meet with him privately – to stay late, on a Friday evening, after everyone else had gone home.

He ushered her into one of the operating rooms and closed the door behind, even though the building was empty. There was a cold intensity to him that frightened her. She had violated his strict policy of clinic confidentiality, he told her; she was being dismissed. If she agreed, without argument, he would give her an excellent recommendation and three months' severance pay. Otherwise, she would get neither.

She moved to Southern California soon afterward and found a new job.

"I should have gone to the police and told them," she said to Larrabee. "I'm not proud of it." Then she added, defensively, "But – you know. I was a nurse, a woman. He was the great surgeon. He'd have gotten rid of me anyway, with a bad recommendation and no money."

"Why do you suppose he got so upset, Margaret?" Larrabee asked.

He waited through her long silence, aware that this was the question that must have gnawed at her through the years.

"All I can think," she finally said, "is that he didn't want anybody to connect him, or his wife, to a girl who'd gone missing."

Tina arrived at Larrabee's right on schedule. She was wearing blue jean cutoffs, a tank top, and sandals. Her legs, he realized, were really pretty good. She handed him a sheet of paper, a computer printout. It read:

Case file # 3184-E 06: entry # 14 on this document

Opened: 7/25/98

Insured: D. Welles D' Anton, M.D. Complainant: Roberta E. Massey / 1632 Paloma Ct / RC

Allegation: Professional misconduct Status: No further action taken by complainant. Statute of limitations expired: 7/25/99

The reference was to an actual file, the kind kept in a folder in a cabinet, in the insurance company's offices. It would contain specific information about the case – but getting to it, at least legally, was next to impossible. Professional misconduct could mean many things, and it was possible that the claim was frivolous and had just gone away.

But D' Anton might have paid somebody off, as he had Margaret Pendergast. Apparently, the matter either had been dropped or settled informally – directly between the complainant and the physician, with no action from the insurance company. "You're a gem, Tina. What do I owe you?"

"Call it three hundred. It didn't take long." He gave her three one-hundred-dollar bills. She folded her arms. With the cutoffs and purse slung over her shoulder, she looked like a hooker from the neck down. But her face, with the cat's-eye glasses, still belonged in the world of fluorescent-lit offices.

"So?" she said. "You want me to do you?"

Larrabee hesitated, touched by something like superstition at disrespect to this serious business. But it wasn't tough to shake off. He glanced at the clock. Monks wasn't due for another hour.

"Well – sure, if you're sure," he said. You worried it'll fuck up our professional relationship?"

"Not from my side. You're not using me as leverage to break up with Bev, nothing like that?"

"Nope. We're tight. It's just something she can't give me."

"I feel a little funny about it being one way."

"That's okay. This way, I'm not really cheating." Tina unslung her purse and set it on a table, swinging into business mode.

"How do you like to, uh, operate?" Larrabee asked.

"You go sit on the couch."

He did as he was told. It was like being under the watchful gaze of a nurse.

She took a small tape recorder from her purse and clicked it on. Then she got beside him on the couch and curled herself over his lap, like a cat. She was a good warm weight, with perfume that suggested lilacs.

The tape started playing, the strumming of a folksy guitar, then a husky male voice talking. Larrabee realized, with some surprise, that it was an old episode of Prairie Home Companion.

"We used to listen to it in the joint," she said. "His voice turns me on. Wow, I haven't done this in a long time."

"I imagine it's like riding a bicycle."

"You can touch my breasts."

He slipped his hand inside her top. They barely existed, palm-sized areas of soft flesh, but the nipples were surprisingly large.

"That's nice," she said. "Maybe next time I'll bring my vibrator."

She went to work with that same businesslike competence, still wearing her glasses, occasionally raising her head to giggle at a joke from the tape. It was the first time Larrabee had ever heard her laugh.

The deep voice in the background was unsettling, like having another man in the room, and from time to time other voices chimed in. With the vibrator, it would be a full-fledged chorus.

But then, you could get used to just about anything.