V.I. Warshawski 04 - Bitter Medicine (13 page)

It took a scant ten minutes to cover the three miles to the church. We had no trouble finding a parking space in the derelict streets. Burgoyne carefully locked the Maxima and switched on its alarm. It might slow down the less enterprising of the neighborhood’s youth, at least in broad daylight.

Holy Sepulchre had been built sixty years ago as part of a large Polish community. In its heyday, close to a thousand people attended the main Sunday mass. Now, even a multitude of Alvarados, an entire convent of nuns, and dozens of schoolgirls could not fill the nave. Unadorned stone pillars disappeared high overhead into a vaulted ceiling. A high altar attached to the wall was lit fitfully by many candles: Holy Sepulchre had stood firm against many of the changes of Vatican II. The windows had been covered with wire netting to protect the few remaining pieces of stained glass, adding to the church’s dark, forbidding atmosphere. Any color was provided by the schoolgirls, who were dressed in bright pastels. I liked the Catholic custom of not wearing mourning for the funeral of a child.

Lotty was sitting by herself about two thirds of the way up the aisle, looking severe in black. I went up to sit next to her, Burgoyne trailing meekly in my wake. In a hasty undertone I performed introductions. Lotty nodded briefly.

The organ played softly as people went to the front of the church to kneel at the flower-laden coffins. Mrs. Alvarado sat in the front row with her five other children. I could see the back of her head nod stiffly as various people stopped to condole with her.

The music increased a few decibels. Under its cover, Lotty leaned her head next to my ear and muttered, “Fabiano’s sitting three rows up with his mother. Take a look at him.”

I followed her discreetly pointing finger, but could see only his slouched shoulders and a one-eighth view of his face. I raised inquiring eyebrows at Lotty.

“Go up to the front and catch his face on your way back.”

I obediently wriggled past Burgoyne and joined the pious procession to the coffins. Casting a perfunctory glance at the flowers and the photograph on Consuelo’s, and avoiding a look at the miniature box next to her, I turned to Mrs. Alvarado. She accepted my courtesies with a sorrowful smile. I gave Carol’s hand a quick squeeze and turned back down the aisle.

Looking soberly at the floor, I sneaked an oblique glance at Fabiano. I was so startled that I nearly lost my composure. Someone had worked him over thoroughly. His face was badly swollen, covered in purples and blacks that made my wound look like a shaving cut.

Burgoyne got up to let me back into the pew.

“Who did that?” I demanded of Lotty.

She hunched a shoulder. “I thought you might know. His mother showed up at the clinic this morning to get a salve for him, but since he wouldn’t come with her, I couldn’t let her have anything. She made him come to the funeral- Carol told me he was going to stay away.”

One of the traditionally garbed nuns a few rows in front of us turned to give us a basilisk glare, putting a forefinger to her lips. We obediently lapsed into silence, but as the processional started, Lotty muttered at me again. “You’re wearing your gun, aren’t you?” I grinned but didn’t say anything, concentrating my attention on the priest.

The mass was conducted in Spanish, at such a rapid rate that I couldn’t follow it. Conseulo’s schoolmates sang an anthem, and the priest preached a sermon in Spanish, which I picked up parts of. Consuelo’s name figured a number of times, as did Victoria Charlotte’s. I gathered that we were bemoaning the cutting off of life before it had had a chance to flower, but that God would sort it all out at some later date. This struck me as pretty grim counsel, but from what I’d seen of Mrs. Alvarado it probably satisfied her reasonably well.

It took a scant forty minutes to do all this, including giving communion to all the frilly dressed girls and the Alvarados. The organ piped up again and the church began to empty. Burgoyne made his way against the tide to Mrs. Alvarado. I leaned back and rubbed my eyes.

“I’ve done all I think I’m up to,” I announced to Lotty. “Are you going to the cemetery with them?”

She grimaced. “I’m no crazier about this charade of piety than you are. Besides, I need to get back to the clinic. Mondays are our busiest day and I don’t have Carol to help me… Your face is looking better. How are you feeling?”

I made a face. “Oh, more bruised in spirit than body, I guess. I’m a little nervous of what Sergio will do after the police pick him up. And it makes me really nervous to think I was so far off base on him-thinking he’d be reasonably pleased to see me, instead of bearing a grudge all these years.”

I told Lotty what he’d said about my treating him like a worm. “He has a point, you know. But the thing is, if I’d been at all sensitive to that-how I’d treated him, how he’d felt about it-I wouldn’t have gone off to see him alone. So it makes me wonder about my judgment.”

Burgoyne reappeared at the pew, waiting politely while we gathered handbags-and in Lorry’s case gloves. We strolled outside together. Burgoyne looked nervously at Lotty.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t save Consuelo, Dr. Herschel. I wondered if-I’m sure Dr. Tregiere gave you a report, but maybe you have some questions? If I could see a copy of what he wrote, I might be able to fill in the gaps on what we did before he got there.”

Lotty looked at him measuringly. “Dr. Tregiere was killed before he got a chance to give his report to me. So I would be most obliged if you would send me a complete record of your treatment.” She fished in her handbag for a card for him, then put a reassuring hand on my shoulder.

“You’ll be okay, Vic. You’re fundamentally sound. Trust yourself.”

I caught up with Paul Alvarado before he got into the limousine that was to carry him to the cemetery. He and Diego, looking uncomfortable in black suits, were waiting for their mother to finish talking to one of the nuns. Paul bent over to kiss me underneath the brim of my straw hat. He took the opportunity to inspect my face.

“Lotty told Carol what happened, Vic. I’m real sorry-sorry you got messed up with that heap of garbage because of us.”

I shook my head. “It wasn’t because of you I was trying to find out something about Malcolm for Lotty, I saw Fabiano. Was that your handiwork?”

Paul stared at me solemnly.

“You don’t know anything about it, huh? And Diego doesn’t either, I suppose?”

Diego grinned. ‘You got it, Vic.“

“Look, guys-I appreciate the spirit. But I’m nervous enough about Sergio as it is. What’s he going to think when Fabiano comes whining to him?”

Paul put an arm around me. “I have a feeling, Vic, that the boy is not going to go crying to the Lions. The way I heard it, he was driving that Eldorado of his too fast, braked suddenly and went into the windshield. The way I heard it, that’s what he was going to tell Sergio if he asked.”

Burgoyne was listening to the conversation with a puzzled frown. Before he could ask about these unknown people, the nun finally detached herself from Mrs. Alvarado, who moved with stately dignity to the waiting limo. Burgoyne took her hand, told her once more how sorry he was, and helped her into the car. Paul and Diego shook my hand warmly and joined their mother. Herman, Carol, and the third sister, Alicia, followed in a second car. A bevy of other close relatives took up an additional four limos; it was quite a procession. Burgoyne and I watched it down the street before getting back into his Maxima.

“Feeling better now?” I asked sardonically.

“Mrs. Alvarado is remarkably composed for a bereaved mother,” he answered seriously, pulling out onto FuUerton. “It makes it much easier for people to talk to her.”

“You were expecting a frantic display of Latin emotion? She’s a woman with a lot of dignity.”

“Those were her sons you were talking to? I wondered… Maybe it’s none of my business, but did someone attack you? I thought you got that cut in a car accident”

I grinned at him. “You’re right-it isn’t your business. An old client of mine felt he had a long-standing score to settle and took after me with a knife. It didn’t have anything to do with Consuelo, so don’t extend your bleeding heart to crying over me.”

He looked startled. “Is that how I look to you? Being dramatic over a patient’s death? Maybe I am. But this is the first obstetrical patient who’s died since I’ve been at Friendship. Maybe it’s something I should be used to, but I’m not.” He turned east onto Belmont.

We drove in silence for a few blocks, I feeling a bit embarrassed by my remark, he brooding perhaps on Consuelo’s death. At Ashland Avenue, the traffic gummed up suddenly-the Cubs were playing a late-starting game and happy fans were packing the streets.

“How did she actually die?” I asked. “Consuelo, I mean.”

“Heart failure. Her heart simply stopped beating. I was at home. They called me, but by the time I got there, she was dead. Dr. Herschel arrived about five minutes after I’d left again. I live only fifteen minutes from the hospital.”

“Wasn’t there an autopsy?”

He grimaced. “Oh, yes. And the county gets involved and wants a report, too. And the state, I suppose-haven’t heard from them yet. I could tell you the ugly technical details, but it boils down to the fact that her heart stopped beating. Very disturbing in a young girl. I don’t understand it. Maybe her diabetes…”

He shook his head and inched forward to Racine. Outside my apartment he fiddled with the steering wheel for a minute, then finally said, “We haven’t exactly met under ideal circumstances, but I’d like to get to know you a little better. Could we have dinner sometime? Tonight, maybe? I’m taking the rest of the afternoon off-have to run an errand in the Loop, but I could pick you up here around six-thirty.”

“Sure,” I said lightly. “That’d be fine.”

I swung my legs carefully out of the car so as not to run the stockings and went inside. Mr. Contreras didn’t appear-I supposed he was out with his tomatoes. Just as well. I could use a few minutes of silence. Upstairs I took out my gun, laid it carefully on the dresser, and stripped down to my underwear. Even though the suit was a lightweight summer weave, between it and the automatic I’d gotten extremely warm and damp by the end of the service.

I lay on the floor of the living room for a while, watching the start of the game and trying to decide what further action I could take in the matter of Malcolm’s death. Since leaving Sergio’s late Saturday night my head had been fogged-first by pain and humiliation, then dope. This was my first opportunity to think clearly about the situation.

Sergio was a charming sociopath. At eighteen, when I was defending him, he had told the most alarming lies with great plausibility. If I hadn’t had a well-documented police report I’m not sure I would ever have realized this in time to save him from being ripped apart in court. As it was, his fury had been extreme when I questioned him. He changed stories, not for the better, and it was some time before we came up with something that would stand up under examination.

He certainly could have killed Malcolm without turning a hair and lied about it with a smile later. Or given the orders for someone else to kill him, as he probably did these days. But the only reason for him to do so would have been at Fabiano’s request.

But Fabiano, while a whiner and a jerk, didn’t have Sergio’s psychotic outlook. And anyway, Fabiano didn’t stand that well with the Lions-I couldn’t picture Sergio committing murder at his behest-he’d be more likely to taunt and humiliate Fabiano. I got the feeling that Fabiano knew something about Malcolm’s death. But not that he had been involved in it directly. Maybe the beating he’d gotten would soften him up. I’d have to try talking to him again.