Claws And Effect Part 13

"Bruce Buxton-and for free."

Surprised, she said, "That was nice of him." Glancing at the old railroad clock on the wall, Harry said, "I've got to feed horses, turn out, and get to work."

"You feel good enough to go to work?"

"Yeah. It hurts but it's okay. I'll stuff myself with Motrin."

"How about if I help you feed? One other little thing, don't tell people where you were or what you were doing. You've got until you walk into the post office to come up with a good story. The last thing we need on this case is to draw everyone's attention to the bas.e.m.e.nt. It's much better if the killer or killers get a little breathing room. Whatever they are doing, if indeed it does involve the hospital, let them get back to it. Rick is even delaying talking to Sam about this for twenty-four hours. The trick is to get everyone to let down, relax."

"You need someone on the inside."

"I know."

"Larry Johnson still goes to the hospital. He's true blue."

"Larry is in his seventies. I need a younger man," Coop replied.

"Old Doc might be in his seventies but he's tough as nails and twice as smart. I'd put my money on him any day of the week."

"Well-I'll talk to Rick."

"The other thing is, Larry's a deep well. Whatever goes in doesn't come out."

"That's true. Well, come on, girl. If you're going to work we'd better get cracking in the barn."

"Hey, Coop, thanks. Thanks for everything."

"You'd do the same for me."

As the humans pulled on their coats, Mrs. Murphy said to her friends, "She's right about one thing. A hospital is life and death."

19.

"What happened to you?" Miranda practically shouted when Harry walked through the back door at work.

Harry trusted Miranda, a well-founded trust, so she told her everything as they sorted the mail, fortunately light that morning.

"Oh, honey, I hope you haven't stirred up a hornet's nest." The older woman was quick to grasp the implications of what Harry had done.

In fact, Miranda's mind clicked along at a speedy pace. Most people upon meeting her beheld a pleasant-looking woman somewhere in her early sixties, late fifties on a good day. She used to be plump but she'd slimmed down quite a bit upon reigniting the flame with her high-school beau. She wore deep or bright colors, had a real flair for presenting herself without calling undue attention to herself, the Virginia ideal. But most people who didn't really know Mrs. George Hogendobber had slight insight into how bright she was. She always knew where the power in the room resided, a vital political and social survival tool. She was able to separate the wheat from the chaff. She also understood to the marrow of her bones that actions have consequences, a law of nature as yet unlearned by a large portion of the American population. She'd happily chat about her garden, cooking, the womanly skills at which she excelled. It was easy for people to overlook her. Over the years of working together, Harry had come to appreciate Miranda's intelligence, compa.s.sion, and concern. Without being fully conscious of it she relied on Miranda. And for Miranda's part, she had become a surrogate mother to Harry, who needed one.

Naturally, the cats and dog understood Miranda perfectly upon first introduction. In the beginning Miranda did not esteem cats but Mrs. Murphy set her right. The two became fast friends, and even Pewter, a far more self-indulgent soul, liked Miranda and vice versa.

Pewter couldn't understand why humans didn't talk more about tuna. They mostly talked about one another so she often tuned out. Or as she put it to herself, tuna-ed out.

n.o.body was tuning out this morning though. The animals were worried and simultaneously furious that Harry had taken such a dumb chance. Furthermore, she had left them home. Had they been with her, the crack on the head would have never happened.

As the morning wore on, everyone who opened a postbox commented on the square shaved spot on Harry's head and the st.i.tches. Her story was that she clunked herself in the barn. Big Mim, no slouch herself in the brain department, closely examined the wound and wondered just what could do that.

Harry fibbed, saying she'd hung a scythe over the beam closest to the hayloft ladder and when she slid down the ladder-she never climbed down, she'd put a foot on either side of the ladder and slide down-she forgot about the scythe. The story was stupid enough to be believable.

After Mim left, Miranda wryly said, "Harry, couldn't you have just said you b.u.mped your head?"

"Yeah, but I had to b.u.mp it on something hard enough to break skin." She touched the spot. "It hurts."

"I'm sure it does and it's going to keep hurting, too. You promise me you won't pull a stunt like that again?"

"I didn't think it was such a stunt."

"You wouldn't." Miranda put her hands on her hips. "Now look here, girlie. I know you. I have known you since you came out of the womb. You don't go around that hospital by yourself. A man's been murdered there."

"You're right. I shouldn't have gone alone."

Right before lunch Bruce Buxton walked in. "How's my patient?"

"Okay."

He inspected his handiwork. "A nice tight st.i.tch if I do say so myself."

As luck would have it, Sam Mahanes dropped in. As no one had thought to tell Bruce to keep his mouth shut, he told Sam what happened to Harry.

"You st.i.tched her up, discharged her, and didn't inform me?" Sam was aghast, and then wondered why Rick Shaw hadn't told him immediately.

"I'm telling you now," Bruce coolly responded, secretly delighted at Sam's distress.

"Buxton, you should have been on the phone the minute this happened. And whoever was down there"-he waited for a name to be forthcoming but Bruce was not about to finger Booty Weyman so Sam continued-"should have reported to me, too."

"First off, I gave the order to the orderlies that carried her up, to the nurse, to shut up. I said that I'd talk to you. I'm talking to you right now. I was going to call you this morning." He checked his watch. "In twenty minutes to be exact. Don't blow this out of proportion."

"I don't see how it could be any worse." Sam's jaw clapped shut.

"Oh, trust me, Sam Mahanes. It could be a lot worse."

This comment so enraged the hospital director that he turned on his heel, didn't even say good-bye to the ladies, and strode out of the post office, slamming the door hard behind him.

20.

Sam, still angry, cut off Tussie Logan as she was trying to back into a s.p.a.ce in the parking lot reserved for staff.

He lurched into his s.p.a.ce, slammed the door, and locked his car as she finally backed in, avoiding his eyes.

Tussie knew the director's rages only too well. She didn't want to cross him and she didn't want her new Volkswagen Pa.s.sat station wagon scratched.

Larry Johnson, who had been driving behind Sam at a distance, observed the incident.

Sam strode toward the hospital without a h.e.l.lo or wave of acknowledgment.

After parking, Larry stepped out of his car as Tussie reached into hers, retrieving her worn leather satchel.

"Good morning, Dr. Johnson." She put her arm through the leather strap while closing her car door.

"Morning, Tussie. He d.a.m.n near knocked you out of the box."

"One of his funks."

"I don't remember Sam being such a moody man." The older doctor fell into step next to Tussie.

"The last month, I don't know, maybe it's been longer. He's tense, critical, nothing we do is right. Maybe he's having problems at home."

"Perhaps, but Sally seems happy enough. I've always prided myself on being able to read people but Sam eludes me."

"I know what you mean." She turned up the collar of her coat, an expensive Jaeger three-quarter-length that flowed when she walked. "I guess you've seen everything and everybody in this burg."

"Oh-some," he modestly replied. "But you still get surprised. Hank Brevard. I wouldn't think he could have aroused enough pa.s.sion in another person to kill him."

"Maybe he got the better of someone in a car deal." She said this with little conviction.

Hank had put his mechanical skills to work in fixing up old cars and trucks. His hobby became an obsession and occasionally a source of income, as he'd repair and sell a DeSoto or Morgan.

"G.o.d knows, he had his own car lot. This last year he must have gone on a buying spree. I don't remember him having so many cars. I'd love to buy the 1938 Plymouth. No such luck." Larry laughed.

"I bet once the dust settles, Lisa will sell his collection."

"Ah, Tussie, even if she did, I couldn't afford the Plymouth."

"Maybe you could. You've got to treat yourself every now and then. And what we do is draining. There are days when I love it as much as my first day out of nursing school and there are other days when I'm tired of being on my feet."

"Tussie, you're a wonderful nurse."

"Why, thank you, Doctor."

He smiled. "Here we are." He opened the front door. "Into the fray." He paused a moment, then said, "If you see anything off track, please tell me. In confidence. If there is something wrong here we've got to get to the bottom of it. This is too good of a hospital to be smeared with mud."

Surprised, she shrank back a moment, caught herself, and relaxed. "I agree. I'm a little touchy right now. A little watchful."

"We all are, Tussie. We all are."

21.

Four medium-sized smooth river stones anch.o.r.ed the corners of the large blueprint that covered Sheriff Shaw's desk. He leaned over with a magnifying gla.s.s, puffing away like a furnace on his cigarette. The smoke stung his eyes as he took the cigarette out, peered closely, then stuck the weed back in his mouth.

Cynthia, also smoking, stood next to him. She told herself she was smoking in self-defense but she was smoking because that little hit of nicotine coated her frayed nerve endings.

He pointed a stubby finger at the boiler room, put down the magnifying gla.s.s, and placed his left forefinger on the incinerator room. This meant his cigarette dangled from his mouth, a pillar of smoke rising into his eyes.

Coop took the cigarette out of his mouth, putting it in an ashtray.

"Thanks." He breathed deeply. "The two easiest spots to destroy evidence."

"Right but I don't think that's our problem."

"Oh?" His eyebrows arched upward. "I wouldn't mind finding the d.a.m.ned knife."

She shook her head. "That's not what I mean. We aren't going to find the knife. It's burned to a crisp or he could have taken it right back up to where those things are steamed or boiled or whatever they do. Fruitless."

"I like that word, fruitless." He reached for his cigarette again with his right hand but kept his left forefinger square on the incinerator room. "What's cooking in your brain?"

"You know, Harry had some good ideas last night."

"Oh." He snorted. "This I've got to hear."

"She thought maybe someone is pirating body parts, organs."

He paused a long time, lifted up his left finger. "Uh-huh."

"Or stealing drugs."

He stubbed out his cigarette, which he'd smoked to a nub. "The other angle is that his killer was an enemy and knew this would be the best place to find him. The killer knew his habits but then most killers do know the habits of their victims. Until Harry got clunked on the head I was not convinced the crime was tied to the hospital. Now I am."

"Me, too," Cooper agreed. "Now the trick is to find out what is at the hospital. What doesn't add up for me about Hank is-if he were in on a crooked deal, wouldn't he have lived higher on the hog? He didn't appear to live beyond his means."

Rick rubbed his chin. "Maybe not. Maybe not. Wait for retirement and then whoosh." He put his hands together and fluttered his fingers like a flyaway bird.

"He was in a position to take kickbacks from the fuel company, the electrical supply company, from everybody. For instance, those low-wattage lightbulbs. I noticed that when we answered Bobby Minifee's call. How do we know he didn't charge for a hundred watts but put in sixty? Now I went over those records and know that he didn't but I mean, for example. He was in the perfect position to skim."

"Wouldn't have been killed for that, I wouldn't reckon. But if he was corrupt it would have been d.a.m.ned hard to pin down. Those records, he could have falsified them, tossed the originals in the incinerator." He rubbed his palms together. "Right now, Coop, we're grasping at straws. We've got a hundred theories and not one hard piece of evidence."

"Let's go back to the bas.e.m.e.nt. Don't tell Sam Mahanes when we're there. Call and tell him our people will be there next Tuesday. Then you and I go in Monday night. Someone might be tempted to move something out. But even if that isn't the case we'd be down there without Sam or anyone knowing except for the maintenance man on duty and we can take care of him."

"That's not a bad idea."