Natural Causes (26 page)

“I understand.” But Sarah wasn’t at all certain she did.

“Your Honor, Dr. Dunleavy, Mr. Keefe,” Matt said, eschewing the pacing tactics of his opponent and allowing just a hint of drawl into his speech. “What we’re all looking for today is the presentation of a
prima facie
case from my colleague, Mr. Mallon. But what we have gotten instead is a very impressive smoke screen. What’s missing? What void is Mr. Mallon trying to hide behind all that smoke? Well, I suspect you see the answer to those questions as well as I do. He’s trying to hide the fact that he has nothing that connects action taken or not taken by Dr. Sarah Baldwin with the development of DIC in Lisa Grayson.

“Frankly, with what little substantive material he has produced today, I’m surprised Mr. Mallon has the gumption even to bring this case before a tribunal. We’ve heard a
shouldn’t have
from Dr. Gorfinkle and a
could possibly have
from Mr. Ling, but those are the weakest speculations. There’s no science here, no expert saying that what this caring, dedicated physician did was wrong, and that because—
because
—of her alleged actions, an infant was stillborn and her mother gravely injured. Without such an expert, Mr. Mallon has failed to prove his
prima facie
case. On that basis, I request a dismissal of the charges against my client.”

“Bravo,” Sarah whispered after Matt sat down. “Bravo.”

“Bullshit,” he whispered back.

“What?”

“I’m the one whipping up a smoke screen. And you can see by the faces on our panel up there that they know it. Mallon’s done more than he had to to win here.”

The judge thanked the participants, promised to have a decision within the hour, and dismissed the tribunal.

Matt spoke not at all as they left the courthouse and headed back toward his office.

“Well?” Sarah asked finally.

“Well, what?”

“Well, what do you think?”

“Think about what?” He seemed distracted and perplexed.

“About what just went on in there, of course,” she said irritably.

“I think we lost.”

“So what? You told me that was going to happen before we even went in.”

“That doesn’t make me feel any better about it. We were pretty much hammered in there. And Mallon did it without even working up a sweat.” He sank down on a curbside bench. “Sarah, listen,” he went on. “Dead babies and maimed young women make juries angry. Sometimes very angry. I don’t know how solid a link Mallon’s going to be able to forge between Mr. Kwong’s herbs and Lisa Grayson’s DIC, or even if a judge is going to allow him to introduce the two other DIC cases. But my sense is that with Kwong’s drug arrest, and frail, pretty, one-armed Lisa coming forward to testify, he’ll be able to pluck enough emotional chords to make a jury stick the burden of proof on us. And that’s a position the defense never wants to be in.”

There was a nervousness about him, a tension in his
eyes and the set of his jaw, that Sarah had never seen before.

“Maybe you should go right to the bottom line,” she said.

He looked up, startled that she had read him so quickly and so accurately. “Well, the bottom line is that there’s an option available to us that I haven’t discussed with you, but that I think we ought to seriously consider.”

“Namely.”

Black Cat Daniels chewed at his lower lip and scuffed at a cigarette butt with the toe of his shoe.

“Namely, to quit,” he said.

T
HE THREE-FAMILY CLAPBOARD TENEMENT WAS ON A
dead-end street in a decaying section of Dorchester. It was badly in need of new shingles, gutters, and a coat of paint. Lugging a heavy briefcase, Rosa Suarez trudged up the front walk. Her data-gathering was well along now, but nothing had yet emerged to explain the three DIC patients at the Medical Center of Boston.

At her urging, the CDC had sent out requests to hundreds of hospitals searching for other, similar cases. But those that had been reported so far all had logical, well-established explanations such as
abruptio placentae
, toxemia, or overwhelming infection.

Now, in hopes of stirring up something that she might have overlooked, Rosa was retracing some steps. She was starting with follow-up interviews with the families of the two deceased victims and later in the week with Lisa Grayson. At the same time, she planned to check and recheck the massive number of cultures she was running.

Although her supervisor had said little to her directly, the first signs of his impatience had already surfaced in
the form of a brief memo. Dr. Wayne Werner, senior field epidemiologist, would be finished with his current project and would be available for reassignment in three to four weeks, it read. Anyone in the department needing Werner’s help with an ongoing investigation should submit a request in writing within the next two weeks. Rosa knew that the memo was at least a demand for some sort of likely hypothesis from her, and at worst a threat that she was soon to be replaced.

The name crudely painted just above the mail slot of the first-floor flat was BARAHONA. Fredy Barahona, a laborer, was home all day, every day, drawing disability for a back problem. His wife, Maria, was working the night shift in a sneaker factory. Maria’s daughter by her previous marriage, and the only child she would ever conceive, was Constanza Hidalgo.

Rosa was feeling the strain of her intensive investigation, now nearly seven weeks along. She had lost weight, quarreled with her husband for the first time in several years, and developed an annoying tic at the corner of one eye. But she was frightened enough and determined enough to keep pushing herself to the limit. She desperately wanted to leave her profession a winner. More important, she wanted to head off what she firmly believed was impending disaster.

Someone had deliberately torn pages from the hospital records of at least two of the three DIC cases she was investigating. Sarah Baldwin was being followed and had been accosted once. And the meticulous research techniques that had served Rosa so faithfully over the years were not delivering. She felt as if she were tiptoeing around a ticking bomb, with no clear idea how to disarm it. The only thing that seemed certain to her at this point was that unless answers were found, and soon, more women and their unborn infants were going to die.

Maria Barahona was a plump, work-weary woman who had almost surely been quite attractive at one time in her life. She kept up a cheery front, but the pain of
losing her only child showed in her eyes. Once, during Rosa’s initial interview with her, she had begun to weep. But just as quickly she composed herself, apologized, and went on answering questions. Now, with her husband across the room, dozing on a tattered recliner, she served Rosa tea and talked once again of Connie. Although her English was decent enough, she seemed relieved to be conversing in Spanish.

“There were drugs in the car, you know,” she said. “They told us Connie had marijuana in her blood, but I don’t believe it. She was a happy girl. A good girl, too. And so, so beautiful. Her only crime was falling in love with that bastard, Billy Molinaro. Please, Mrs. Suarez, please. Forgive me for swearing.”

“Mrs. Barahona, there is no need for you to apologize.”

“She was so beautiful. You should have seen her, Mrs. Suarez. Men would just stop what they were doing and stare when she walked by. We had already picked out her boy’s name. Guillermo. Even though he would have been called Billy, Connie was going to spell it the Spanish way.”

As she had during their first interview, Maria Barahona was rambling. She was once again nearing tears. Rosa broke in somewhat desperately.

“Mrs. Barahona,” she said, “somewhere between three and five years ago your daughter was treated for something at the Medical Center of Boston. Would you have any idea at all what that was?”

Some of the anguish left the woman’s face as she focused on Rosa’s question.

“I—I don’t remember anything. She had some headaches and some stomach trouble—especially with, you know, her monthly. But nothing that didn’t get better when she took medicine. She always had great faith in the doctors at the Medical Center. If they said take this pill at three minutes after four, my Constanza sat looking at her watch until three minutes after four.”

Another dead end. Rosa stared at the floor, trying to imagine Connie Hidalgo’s mounting terror during those last nightmarish hours of her life. Was there anything else? Anything at all she could try?

“Mrs. Barahona, Maria, I know that Connie was living with Billy Molinaro,” she said finally. “When did she leave home for good?”

“They were planning a wedding,” Maria said, obviously embarrassed. “And she still spent many nights here. Many nights.”

“Please, Maria. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply anything at all. I just wondered if her room still had her things in it. That’s all. If it does, with your permission I’d like to check it over.”

“Oh. Well, if you think it might help, certainly you can look at anything you want. It’s the room back there on the right. I haven’t changed anything. If you don’t mind, though, I’d like to get dinner started. I work the night shift, you know.”

“I know,” Rosa said, glancing over at Fredy Barahona, who was in need of a shave and hadn’t so much as stirred since her arrival. She wondered if he had ever prepared a meal on his own, and reflected momentarily on how lucky she was to have spent forty years married to Alberto Suarez. “Thank you, Maria. I’ll be fine.”

Connie Hidalgo’s bedroom spoke, of a woman who had never really stopped being a little girl. The bureau and bed, possibly painted by Connie herself, were white with pink accents. The pillow cases, also pink, were frilly, with hand-painted teddy bears and balloons. And there were stuffed animals everywhere—a hundred or more. Zebras and elephants; bears and orangutans; kittens and all manner of dogs. The walls were covered with posters of romantic island getaways and neon-lit cities. Rosa swallowed against the sadness in her throat. Despite the marijuana reported in Connie’s bloodstream,
Rosa sensed she would have developed into a loving, devoted parent.

Rosa took a framed five-by-seven snapshot from the bureau and raised the window shade to view it in better light. Connie, looking even more vibrant than in the newspaper photo Rosa had in her files, stood arm in arm with a swarthy, handsome, confidently grinning young man, whom Rosa was certain was Billy Molinaro. The snapshot was taken on board a boat of some sort, possibly the sightseeing kind. Behind them was the distinctive skyline of Manhattan. Connie, copper skinned, slender, and full breasted, was absolutely lovely.

Uncertain of what she was after, Rosa first checked the bureau drawers and then the contents of the small bookcase. The books were mostly paperback romances and library books that had never been returned. There were no photo albums or scrapbooks, but there was a yearbook—
The Sword and Rose
—from St. Cecilia’s High School. The yearbook was clearly low budget—a far cry from the glossy, full-color productions Rosa had seen from other high schools, including the one her daughters had attended.

She skimmed through the pages of black-and-white photos, searching for some that included Connie. There were, at least on first perusal, none. Nor were there many messages from classmates. The few she read were hardly passionate:
All the best to a terrific kid.… We didn’t know each other well, but I hope you have a wonderful life.… Good luck from your friend in Latin 213
.… Rosa glanced again at the radiant, sensuous woman sharing a harbor cruise with the dashing young man who was to become her husband. The tepid comments from Connie’s schoolmates did not jibe at all with that woman.

Rosa flipped to the class photos at the back of the book. Where her daughters’ yearbooks had four good-sized color portraits per page,
The Sword and Rose
had ten—all black-and-white. Printed in minute type beside
each photograph was a summary of that student’s activities during her years at St. Cecilia’s. Constanza Hidalgo had been a cafeteria aide and a member of the culinary arts club. Nothing else. No music, no drama, no sports. Rosa stared at Connie’s photograph. Even allowing for the fact that the portrait was slightly out of focus, Rosa doubted she would have been able to identify its subject without being told.

Once again she held up the framed snapshot. The girl in the yearbook was most certainly the woman with Billy Molinaro … yet she wasn’t. The mouth was the same, and the eyes, too, although they held none of the spark that Rosa saw in the more recent picture. But the face in the yearbook was much rounder and very much less interesting. It was as if someone had taken a paring knife and carved away the younger Connie’s plainness.

Rosa set the yearbook on the bed and completed her inspection of the room. There was nothing else of interest in the bookcase or on the floor. She opened the small closet. Along with two maternity dresses, there were a number of fairly chic outfits and dresses, all size six, and a dozen or more pairs of shoes. If what Rosa was seeing were the clothes Connie had chosen
not
to move to Billy Molinaro’s place, the former cafeteria aide and cooking club member had become a legitimate candidate for any best-dressed list.

The floor of the closet, like much of the room, was covered with stuffed animals. Rosa would never know what caught her eye, or what instinct made her bend down and move part of the pile aside. But there beneath the bears, snow leopards, and toucans was a shoe box, bound with rubber bands.

And inside the shoe box was a diary.

•  •  •

Matt delighted his secretary by sending her home for the remainder of the afternoon. Then Sarah and he split the
corned beef sandwich and fries they had picked up at Gold’s and talked for a time about absolutely nothing of any importance.

“Do you have to be back at the hospital soon?” he asked, as he poured coffee for them from the carafe of a well-used Mr. Coffee.

“I have some patients to sign out to the on-call doc, some dictation I need to do, and I have to get my bike. But I’m okay for a little longer.”