Bitter Medicine (26 page)

The footsteps came past me without halting and headed down the hall. A man, by the weight of the tread. I cracked the door and looked out. It was Peter. Why the hell was he coming into the hospital this time of night?

I watched tensely while he inserted his key in the lock. He turned it absentmindedly, couldn’t get the door open, frowned at the lock and turned the key again. His thin shoulders shrugged and he went inside. I saw the bars of light come on around the edges of the door. I waited for what seemed an endless amount of time. Would he call security when he found his own office unlocked as well?

I ran through “Batti, batti” from
Don Giovanni
—that takes me about five minutes. I carefully mouthed the words twice. Ten minutes and no action. Ignoring the impulse that had sent me to the bathroom to begin with, I slunk down the hallway, retrieved the key to the photocopier, and went back down the stairs to the main wing of the hospital.

I went briskly down the corridor to the main entrance, got into the car, and circled around the building until I found the staff parking lot. In the suburbs, if you work you drive to get there. The parking area was filled with the night shift’s cars. I couldn’t drive into the area without a plastic card to open the gates, but I went in on foot and finally located Peter’s car at the far end.

I returned to the car and moved it down the road where it would be inconspicuous, but where I could see the lot entrance. At three o’clock, Peter finally emerged. I watched him into the lot, waited until the Maxima came out, and followed it at a discreet distance until I was sure he was heading for home.

My silk shirt was again wet with sweat. You are so dumb, I admonished myself. Why will you persist in wearing silk on difficult errands in midsummer?

By this point I was past caring whether anyone intercepted me. I boldly made my way back to Peter’s office wing. It was still deserted. Once more, I used his secretary’s key to bring the Xerox machine to life. When the “ready” light was on, I copied the papers, stuck them
in my portfolio, reopened Peter’s office, and restored what I’d taken.

As I hung the keys I’d borrowed back on the little hooks by the secretary’s desk, I saw what had brought him into his office: work on his amniotic-embolism conference. A note in his cramped handwriting lay on top of a stack of papers: “Okay now for typesetting and 35mm. Sorry to bring it down to the wire for you.” The conference was this coming Friday—he’d left his poor secretary with two working days to get his slides together.

On impulse I picked up samples of the brightly colored brochures and stuffed them with the other papers into my now-bulging portfolio. I carefully locked the doors behind me and left.

It was time for whiskey, bath, and bed. Near the entrance to the tollway I found a Marriott, which even at this late hour was willing to provide me with all three. I took a double Black Label from the bar up to my room. By the time I’d finished soaking in the narrow tub I’d drunk all the whiskey. Practice makes perfect in these precision-timed exercises. I fell into bed and slept the perfect sleep of the honest laborer.

I woke up at eleven, refreshed and relaxed. I lay stretching in the king-size bed for several minutes, not wanting to break my mood of lazy well-being. They say completing a successful criminal enterprise often leaves this feeling in its wake—the people I used to represent for the county weren’t successful, so I never saw it firsthand.

At last I swung out of bed and went into the bathroom to wash. The walls were covered with mirrors, offering me a complete and unappetizing view of my stomach and hips—time to lay off the pancakes and double orders of bacon. I sent down to room service for fresh fruit, yogurt, and coffee before phoning Lotty at the clinic.

“Vic! I’ve been debating the last half hour whether I should ring Murray Ryerson. Are you all right?”

“Yes, yes. I’m fine. I didn’t get done at the hospital
until close to four this morning, so I checked into a hotel out here. I’ll be back later this afternoon. Are you free this evening? Can we go over some papers?”

We agreed to meet at the Dortmunder again at seven. I phoned my answering service next. Murray Ryerson and Detective Rawlings both wanted to talk to me. I tried Murray first.

“So what’ve you got?” he greeted me, after I’d waited on hold for five minutes.

“I won’t know until after Lotty’s looked at it tonight. We’re meeting at the Dortmunder for supper and powwow—want to join us?”

“I’ll try…. Hang on a second.”

As he put me back on hold, a knock on the door heralded my breakfast. I hadn’t planned ahead and was still naked. I looked around me dubiously—the only clothes I had were what I’d worn yesterday. I put on the skirt to the suit and wrapped a towel around my top and let in the waiter.

When I got back to the phone, Murray was bellowing into it. “Jesus, Vic—I thought maybe a mysterious foreigner had given you knockout drops. I didn’t even know where to the send the marines.”

“Schaumburg. Any luck on your end?”

“It would help if I knew what I was looking for. If your pal Burgoyne is a good old buddy of Tom Coulter’s in the public-health arena, there isn’t any evidence I can turn up on it. No one in Coulter’s office seems to have heard of Burgoyne. Coulter’s wife doesn’t know him.
In fact she was pretty shirty on the question of her husband’s friends. Seems he goes drinking six nights out of five with his boss, Bert McMichaels. The two of them go back a ways.”

“Who’s McMichaels?” I asked as sharply as I could through a mouthful of berries.

“I just told you, Warshawski: Tom Coulter’s boss. Schaumburg addling your brains? And don’t eat while you talk, or vice versa—didn’t your mother teach you the basics?”

“Yeah, yeah.” I hastily washed the berries down with a mouthful of coffee. “I mean, what’s McMichaels’s position?”

“Oh.” Murray stopped a moment to consult his notes. “He’s deputy director of health regulation. Reports to Dr. Strachey, who heads up the Human Resources part of the department.”

“And how do these guys get their jobs? They’re not elected, are they?”

“You want Civics One-oh-one? No, they’re appointed by the governor and approved by the legislature.”

“I see.” I studied the rest of the fruit. I had an inkling of an idea. It would mean going back to Friendship tonight to check out… unless… let your fingers do the walking.

“You still there?” Murray demanded.

“Yeah, and the unit charges are ticking away. Look, someone recommends these people, right? I mean, does Big Jim call the state medical society and say, tell
me who your ten best people in public health are and I’ll pick one to be king of Human Resources?”

“Get real, Warshawski. This here is Illinois. Some hack down in Springfield who’s on the public-health committee, or whatever legislative name they give it, has a pal who wants a job and he—” He broke off, suddenly. “I see. The lumbering Swede catches up finally with the nimble-brained Polack. I’ll try to see you tonight at Dortmunder’s.”

He hung up without another word. I smiled sardonically and dialed the Sixth Area Headquarters. Rawlings came on the line immediately.

“Where in hell are you, Warshawski? I thought I told you not to leave the jurisdiction.”

“Sorry—I went to the burbs last night and stayed up too late to drive home. Didn’t want one of your pals in traffic patrol prying my body away from a lamppost on the Kennedy. What’s up?”

“Just thought you’d like to know,
Ms.
Warshawski, that since your gun hasn’t been fired lately we don’t think you used it to kill Fabiano Hernandez.”

“What a relief. It’s been keeping me up nights. Anything on Sergio?”

He made a disgusted noise. “He’s got an airtight alibi. Not that that means anything. But we took his little place on Washtenaw apart. Found enough crack to maybe get a judge to agree he ain’t a model citizen, but no Smith and Wesson.”

I remembered the little place on Washtenaw all too
clearly. I wished I’d been able to help strip it and said as much to Rawlings.

“I didn’t realize I had anything to be thankful for until just now. Anyway, come by the division and pick up your gun if you want it. And in the future, if you’re spending a night away from Chicago, I want to know about it.”

“You mean, forever and ever? Like if I go to England in the spring, you want to know about—” The receiver slammed in my ear before I could finish the sentence. Some people, nothing you do can please them.

I smelled the shirt I’d been wearing yesterday. If I put it back on again I wasn’t sure I’d be able to stand the drive home. Marriott’s little guide to hotel services listed a “Galleria of shops.” I chose a sportswear store and explained my predicament.

“Could you send someone up with two or three tops—medium, or size twelve? Red, yellow, white—anything in those colors?”

They were happy to help out. Half an hour later, dressed in a white ribbed T-shirt and black jeans, with my smelly business clothes stuffed into a laundry bag, I settled the bill and headed back to the city. My night’s rest and all the little extras came to over two hundred dollars. Thank goodness for the box factory in Downers Grove—something was going to have to come in before the American Express bill arrived.

My first stop in town was to pick up my gun at the police station. Rawlings wasn’t in, but he’d left word
with the desk sergeant. I had to show three pieces of identification and sign a couple of receipts, which suited me fine. I didn’t want anyone and his dog Rover able to pick up a handgun at whim. Especially my handgun. Although someone apparently had—or at least its twin brother.

I was still wearing high heels and panty hose under my new jeans, so I stopped at home to change into running shoes. I took a few extra minutes to arrange for a cleaning service to come straighten out my place, then headed downtown—I couldn’t concentrate on my work in the middle of such squalor.

My office faces east. It was relatively cool in the mid-afternoon heat. Instead of turning on the air conditioner, I opened a window to let in the city air and smells. The clattering roar of the Wabash L underneath made a pleasant backdrop for my work. Before getting started, I dialed the number I’d copied from Alan Humphries’s file on Consuelo. No answer.

I pulled the papers from the portfolio briefcase and divided them into neat piles: the medical material for Lotty, the financial and administrative documents for me. As I sorted, I sang snatches of “Whistle While You Work,” which filled me with the happy industry of Snow White and her pals.

I went through Peter’s employment agreement first, since that was only a few pages long. A base salary of $150,000 a year to join Friendship as their top obstetrics man. Plus two percent of all profits accruing from
the hospital’s obstetrics service. Plus profit sharing from the Schaumburg facility as a whole—at a rate to vary based on his own contributions to the hospital and the total number of staff. And, as a sweetener, a little chunk of change from the national franchise. Nice work if you could get it.

The letter was signed by Garth Hollingshead, chairman of the national company. In a concluding paragraph, Hollingshead commented:

“Your recommendations from Northwestern tell us you were the top man to graduate in your year. They offer similar comments on the skill you showed in three years of obstetrical residency. We at Friendship can all understand your desire to spend additional time training in perinatology, but believe the facilities we can offer you to do your training on the job, as it were, will not be equaled anywhere in the country.”

Well, gosh. If someone wrote me a letter like that, offering me that kind of money, with profit sharing thrown in, I’d have a hard time turning it down. Ms. Warshawski, as an unparalleled thorn in the side of the police, with deductive capabilities well above the average, we would like you to be a private detective for twenty or thirty thousand a year, plus no health insurance, plus getting your face cut open and your apartment burglarized every now and then.

I turned to the material I’d taken from Humphries’s office. These documented the formal organization of the hospital. Humphries was head of Friendship V,
with a salary and bonus guaranteed to equal two hundred thousand in any given year in which the hospital met its profit targets. Profit sharing kicked in for any amounts above plan. I pursed my lips in a silent whistle.

Friendship was a closely held corporation. Most of its hospitals were in Sunbelt states where certificates of need were not required. In the Northeast and Midwest, most states required their approval before anyone—town, corporation, or anyone else—could start a new hospital or add a major new facility to an existing hospital. As a result, Friendship’s Schaumburg facility was its first in the Great Lakes area.

As the afternoon wore on, I picked up a miscellany of useful knowledge. Friendship V, the chain’s eighteenth hospital, was the fifth it had built from scratch. When it acquired an existing facility it apparently kept the original name.

Every hospital department had separate sales and profit goals set by an administrative committee made up of Humphries and the department heads. The national parent set overall goals for each facility. It was hard to keep reminding myself that sales in this context referred to patient care.

Humphries sent out periodic administrative memos to the departments telling them how to work within federal guidelines, which set average lengths of stay and care for different conditions. Where Medicare or Medicaid reimbursement was involved, it was important
that they not exceed the guidelines, since the hospital paid the difference.

I wouldn’t have thought there’d be too much in the way of government-insured patients in the affluent northwest, but they apparently treated a fair number of older people. Humphries had detailed month-by-month statistics on who ran over and under the maximum reimbursed stay, with a note to one offender, heavily underscored, to “Please remember we are a for-profit institution.”

By the end of the afternoon I had made my laborious way through the stack of files and reports I’d brought with me. I’d marked a few questions for Lotty, acronyms and special jargon, but for the most part the documents were comprehensible corporate reports. They presented an approach to the practice of medicine that I personally found unappetizing, since it seemed to place the health of patients second to that of the organization. But Friendship didn’t seem involved in any direct malpractice, or any overt illegal finances—such as billing the government for more expensive procedures than it was performing.