Working Stiff (27 page)

And judging from the look on Gina's face, she knows, too. As she stares at me, I think I see something else there as well: accusation and blame. Much as I would like to shrug it off, I can't. She is right. I try to offer her an apology with my eyes but all I can feel coming through is the terrible weight of my guilt.

Gina shifts her gaze back to the den door and slowly walks toward it. She looks like a zombie operating off of some ancient instinct that is pulling her toward a fate she neither wants nor understands. I don't want it either; I don't want her to go there, to look in the den and make it all real. For a brief moment I seriously consider running down the hall and tackling her to the floor. Anything to stop her. But she keeps on going and I keep on watching. As she opens the door and looks inside, I hold my breath.

She rushes into the room and my hope surges. When nothing happens for several seconds, I slowly start moving back toward the den, still clinging to my denial even as an all-too-familiar scent reaches my nostrils. I hear a faint
thump
and something about it makes my nurse's training kick in. Shaking off my daze, I hurry the last few steps toward the room, thinking, hoping, it might not be too late.

I
t is definitely too late. Sid's body sits on that lovely butter-soft couch, his head hanging forward, a growing pool of blood gathering in his lap. The back of the couch and part of the wall behind it is painted in red gore. Sid's right hand lays open, palm up. Beside it is a revolver.

Gina is sitting in the chair where Sid was moments before, staring at her husband, her face curiously blank. I move closer to Sid and see that while the wound in his head isn't nearly as severe as Mike Halverson's was, his situation is no less grave. I can see bits of gray matter clinging to both his skull and the wall behind him.

I stare at Sid's chest and see he isn't breathing. I don't bother to check for a pulse because I know that surviving a head wound such as this is nigh onto impossible.

I turn back to Gina and find her staring at me, her eyes searching mine with begging appeal. I shake my head and feel my heart clench as the light of hope in her eyes extinguishes itself.

“I'm sorry, Gina. So sorry.”

She says nothing, does nothing. Her lifeless expression frightens me.

“We need to call the police,” I say gently.

She nods then, mechanically.

I look over at the phone on Sid's desk and start to reach for it. But then I remember what I've learned about crime scene preservation and how I managed to mess up the two I've been to so far.

“Come on, Gina,” I say, urging her gently. “Let's wait somewhere else.”

I take her elbow and she rises from her chair like a robot. As she shuffles forward, one foot catches itself along the edge of the rug and she nearly falls. I hold her arm tight as she disentangles her foot and lets the rug fall back down against the chair legs. Then I steer her gently out into the hall and we enter the living room, where she sinks into a chair.

I move back out into the hallway, pull my cell phone out of my jacket pocket, flip it open, and punch in 9-1-1. Gina does nothing. She just sits there, not crying, not moving, staring empty-eyed off into space. I fear she is in shock and worry that she might try to do something desperate herself.

My anxiety isn't relieved any when my call goes through and I recognize the voice on the other end. It is Jeannie, the same woman who answered when I called about Mike Halverson.

“9-1-1 operator. Do you have an emergency?”

“Jeannie?”

“Yes, this is Jeannie. Do you have an emergency?”

“Kind of,” I say, realizing that this sort of call is getting uncomfortably close to becoming a habit. I move away from Gina and lower my voice. “I have a death here. A suicide. He shot himself in the head.”

There is the briefest of pauses, then, “Mattie? Is that you?”

“It is.”

“And you really have another dead man?”

“I'm afraid so.”

“Do you know who this one is?”

“Yes, it's Sidney Carrigan. Dr. Sidney Carrigan.”

I hear Jeannie gasp, which isn't surprising. Pretty much everyone in the county knows the Carrigans. But she recovers quickly. “Give me the address.”

I do so.

“Okay, I'm dispatching police and rescue now. They should be there in five minutes or less.”

“Thank you.”

“Are you okay, Mattie?”

“I'm pretty shook up, but I'll be fine.”

“Okay. We'll keep talking until someone arrives.”

“Okay. Thank you.” I am impressed. Jeannie is getting better at this pretty fast.

“Um, how dead is this one?” she asks me.

“Very.”

“No point in making any rescue attempts?”

“Nope.”

“For my records, can you describe the extent of the wounds?”

I do so, trying to be as sterile as I can when describing the grimmer parts, keeping a wary eye on Gina the whole time. She still hasn't moved.

“Is anyone else there?” Jeannie asks.

“Yes, Sid's wife, Gina.”

“Is she okay?”

“As okay as you might expect, I guess. She may be a bit shocky.” Off in the distance, I hear a siren.

“Officer Childs should be pulling up any second now, Mattie,” Jeannie says.

Ah, Brian again. That is good, I suppose. “Thanks, Jeannie. You did really good this time.”

“Thank you. I've been practicing.”

Out the front door, which is still open, I see a squad car pull up. “Brian just arrived,” I inform Jeannie. “So I'll let you go.”

“Okay. Take care of yourself, you hear?”

“I will, Jeannie. You, too.”

I meet Brian at the front door so Gina won't be able to hear me and quickly fill him in on the highlights: Sid's affair with Mike Halverson, their HIV status, David's ultimatum to Sidney, and then finally, my visit, ending with the sound of the gunshot. I also let him know that I am unsure how much of this Gina knows. Brian asks me to wait and heads inside. After a quick look around the den, he steps across the hall to the living room and focuses on Gina.

A rescue squad pulls up and after assuring the techs that I am okay, I direct them inside. Then I collapse on the front stoop, wanting to cry, but too tired and drained to summon up any tears. Instead, I just sit there listening to the wind and welcoming the fading warmth of the sun on my face. Moments later another squad car arrives and right behind it comes Hurley.

He parks and stares at me through his window for a moment. Then he shakes his head and gets out. “Are you all right?” he asks, stopping in front of me.

I nod without looking up at him.

“Okay. Wait here. I'll be right back.” He disappears into the house and I hear the low murmur of voices. A few minutes later, Hurley comes back outside and settles down beside me on the porch.

“What a damned mess,” he mumbles. “Can you tell me what the hell is going on here, because Gina doesn't seem to have a clue. She said you dropped by unannounced and she's been in the kitchen cooking. Next thing she knows, her husband is lying dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head.”

“It's my fault,” I mumble. “I should have known he'd do something stupid like that.”

Hurley reaches over and cups my chin in his hand, turning my face to look at him. His eyes probe mine for a few seconds, then he brushes my hair back from my face with a touch so gentle, so sweetly tender, that it finally breaks the dam. The tears come and they keep on coming. And coming. And coming. I try to talk, but can't. Hurley gets up and disappears into the house again, then returns and hands me a wad of tissues. This final act of kindness only makes me cry harder. Finally, he puts an arm over my shoulders and pulls me to him.

There, cuddled against the solid warmth of his chest with his arms holding me tight and protected, I cry out all my guilt and grief.

 

It is several hours before the investigation at the Carrigan residence is finished and Sidney's body is removed. One of the backup pathologists covering for Izzy comes out to process the scene, and the body is taken to our morgue, where tomorrow, Izzy will do an autopsy. I'll get Arnie to help him because I don't think I can bring myself to participate in an autopsy on Sid.

I am surprised we are even going to bother with an autopsy, since both the cause and the circumstances of death are pretty obvious. But then Hurley reminds me that suicide is a crime and as such is a coroner's case. I nod automatically, but then spend several minutes trying to figure out why suicide is a crime. Who can you possibly prosecute?

I eventually tell Hurley everything I know, filling in those details he is missing, like my trip to the Grizzly. I conclude by relaying the conversation I had with David and my decision to come out and see Sid. Then I recall, as closely as I can, Sid's comments before he killed himself. I can tell Hurley is pissed at me, but he holds his tongue and keeps his thoughts to himself. Probably because he can see how much my guilt is eating away at me.

He spends about ten minutes gently questioning Gina about Sid. I listen as she tells him that she has no idea why he would want to kill himself and that she still can't believe he's actually done it. I imagine that once she learns the truth, she'll be devastated.

When Hurley asks her about the gun Sid used, Gina tells him that Sid always kept a pistol in his lower right desk drawer—according to Sid it was for protection. I start to interrupt at that point because I am certain that Gina is confused. I recall a night several months back when David and I attended a soirée here and ended up in Sid's den with Sid and two other doctors. Sid collapsed on the couch, half-drunk, laughing, and obviously enjoying himself. He played the dutiful host by asking us if we wanted to sample the thirty-year-old scotch he had in his desk drawer.

I passed on the offer, since the taste of scotch is about as appealing to me as the idea of drinking antifreeze. But the others accepted and Sid asked me to fetch the bottle for him from the drawer…his bottom right desk drawer, though he was initially confused and said left. When I pulled open the left drawer, all it had in it were dozens of hanging files. I finally found the scotch in the right drawer and I'm certain there wasn't any gun in there. But then I realize that it doesn't matter much where the gun was. The simple fact that Sid had it is enough.

When Hurley finishes questioning Gina, he offers to have one of the officers drive her somewhere. She protests at first, saying she wants to stay in her own home. But when Hurley explains to her that the house will need to be closed up until it is cleared as a crime scene, she gives in and decides to stay with a friend for a few days, until she can figure out what to do.

The press has already sniffed out the story, most likely by picking up the dispatch on a police scanner, and an officer posted at the entrance to the Carrigan driveway has been working steadily to keep the reporters at bay. Of course, that doesn't stop Alison Miller, who takes off on foot and hikes up to the house through the neighboring woods.

“Yoo-hoo! Stevie!” she hollers as she approaches the front of the house. Hurley and I are sitting side by side on the front stoop and Alison stops in front of us, sparing a spiteful glance at me before she turns her smile back on for Hurley. “This is just awful,” she says. “Is it true that Sid Carrigan is dead? That he shot himself?”

Hurley stands and takes Alison's arm, dragging her off to one side. I look away, trying to act indifferent though I keep sneaking peeks at them from the corner of my eye as I struggle to overhear what they are saying.

“Look, Alison. This is a delicate situation just now,” Hurley tells her. “I'm still processing the scene and trying to figure out exactly what happened. If you'll be patient and let me finish here, I promise you I'll give you the whole story.”

“When?” Alison asks. “The Monday edition gets put to bed at eleven tonight and this should really be in there. This is hot news.”

“I'll try to get it to you tonight, Alison. But no promises. Give me a couple of hours, okay?”

“Okay,” she says, flashing him a coquettish smile. “Thanks, Stevie.” She stands on tiptoe and plants a kiss on his cheek. Then, after shooting a smug glance at me, she struts down the driveway.

Hurley walks over to me while I do my best impression of someone who hasn't seen or heard a thing. I keep my eyes diverted, afraid to look at him. “When was the last time you ate anything?” he asks.

“I'm not sure. Breakfast I think. But I'm not hungry.” An historic moment.

“You should eat something anyway.”

“Maybe later.” I am pouting and determined to disagree with whatever he says, angry over the cutesy little exchange I observed between him and Alison.

“Okay,” he says with a sigh. “Come on. I'll drive you home.”

“Thanks, but I can drive myself. Besides, I don't want to leave my car here.”

“I can have one of the uniforms drive it for you.”

“That won't be necessary. I'm fine. Really.”

“Then I'm going to follow you home.”

Obviously he doesn't realize that I've already made the burgundy-and-gray van and know he's been having me tailed for the past several days. Still, when I think about him following me home tonight, I find I kind of like the idea. “Okay,” I say, giving him a tired smile.

The sight of Hurley's headlights in my rearview mirror makes me feel warm and tingly all over. I imagine what might happen when we get to the cottage. I'll invite him inside, of course. Good manners dictate as much. After that, who knows what might happen. And if he wants to call and talk to Alison Miller, I'll find a way to let her know where he is. In fact, maybe I'll encourage him to call her from my place so I can hear every word he says.

But my fantasy blows to pieces as I pull into my driveway and watch Hurley drive on by, honking once as he passes. He's probably on his way to meet Alison, I think, and the idea crushes me.

Once inside, I decide a nice, hot, soothing bath sounds wonderful, so I strip out of my clothes and put on my robe. The pile of dirty clothes in the corner of the bedroom is getting pretty high, so I throw a load into the washer. Then, rationalizing that I need something cold to balance out the heat from the bath, I dig a new carton of Cherry Garcia out of the freezer and settle in on the couch with it and a spoon.

Inevitably my mind wanders back to the afternoon's events and the image of Sid sitting in that chair, his head in his hands, his posture slumped and defeated. That image is in stark contrast to the man I knew, the man whose vivacious humor and gentle manner have charmed me for years.

Then I flash on the empty, dull-eyed expression I saw on Gina's face as she sat in the same chair and, oddly, this disturbs me even more. Something about the way she was sitting there seems wrong. I can't put a finger on anything specific, but it keeps nagging at me.

I try to shake it off by focusing on Rubbish instead, who is playing with a mangled tampon he most likely fished out of the bathroom garbage. I laugh as he bats the tampon across the rug and hunkers down, his pupils huge and dark, his little ass wiggling. Then he springs in for the kill, grabbing the tampon between his feet and rolling with it. He tosses it away, hunkers down again, and repeats the attack. At one point he manages to push the tampon under the corner of the rug, where he then spends several minutes trying to get at it from above. Finally he gets wise and burrows his way under, creating a tiny, wriggling hump in the rug.