Without a Word (21 page)

“Is that why you think she was killed, because she knew the truth and she might tell it one day?”

I nodded.

“And you think the truth, whatever Eric was doing to raise the money he needed, you think that is connected to what may have been removed from Madison's records?”

“I do, Doctor.”

“Some kind of insurance fraud?”

“I can't answer your question until you call me tomorrow.”

She stood. Again she didn't leave. I stood, too, and reached for her free hand.

“Please be careful, Doctor. Someone was willing to let a child take the fall for stabbing her doctor in the heart. Someone killed a second time to keep a secret.”

“Then you don't know?”

“Know what?”

“The needle used to inject Botox into the muscles just beneath the surface of the skin is barely an inch long.”

“So it couldn't reach the heart?”

“There's more than one way to reach the heart, Ms. Alexander.”

“I read that Botox could prove fatal if it paralyzed the respiratory muscles. Is that what happened?”

She shook her head. “He died too quickly for it to have been any sort of paralysis from the Botox.”

“Anaphylactic shock?”

She nodded. “His body shut down in a matter of seconds.”

“Did he know about the allergy?”

“I have no reason to think he did.”

“But then whoever killed him couldn't have known either.”

“We can assume that.”

“Which means his death was an accident?”

“Of sorts,” she said. She took the copy of Madison's medical records and slipped them into the outside pocket of her purse, handing me the finished drawing, a heart broken in two.

“But Celia's death wasn't,” I said. “And it wasn't suicide. It was murder.” I folded Madison's drawing and put it into my pocket. “We may never know what was in the heart of the killer the first time, Doctor. We may never know his or her intent. It might have been, as the police suggest, something that happened in the heat of the moment, a mindless explosion of rage that left Bechman dead for a reason no one could have guessed. But what happened to Celia was another story. That death was clearly premeditated, coldly planned and heartlessly executed.”

“And it left that poor little girl without a mother,” she said. “Things like that shouldn't happen, not ever.”

“I couldn't agree more,” I said, thinking about two little girls, not one. “I'll wait for your call.”

She reached out and touched my arm, then turned away and headed home.

I avoided the park on the way home. I was mostly think
ing about what Dr. Edelstein was going to find. It was hard to think about anything else. But something else was trying to get my attention, something I had seen that had invaded my subconscious. Walking along the dark side streets of the Village, I tried to play it out of hiding, the way you would tease a cat out from under the bed with a feather on the end of a string. But whatever it was, it stayed beyond reach, safely hidden in the dark.

There was no use waiting around the house all morning for a call that wouldn't come until afternoon. I took Dashiell for a long walk, then headed for the Y to swim. Would I ever stop thinking of Madison's room when I was swimming, of the way Sally had painted the walls in the hope that the underwater scene would calm her daughter, as if that were all it took, all the kid needed? She did it for Madison, that's what I'd been told. Perhaps that wasn't so. Perhaps she'd painted her daughter's room that way in an effort to stay, as a way of trying to bring the world she needed to the place where she was. And then like a siren, all that blue called to her, pulling her away from Madison and Leon, drawing her to a more comfortable place, a world of fish and coral and rocks, a world without people, like the one on her daughter's walls.

My head in the water, my arms reaching out in front of me, then driving the water back, I was in that world, too. No matter that there was someone swimming laps in the next lane, that in other parts of the Y people were walking on treadmills, riding stationary bicycles, doing yoga, step aerobics, ballet. All I could see was the pale blue of the pool's water as if I were alone in the world.

Was that what Sally was after? Was that what she had achieved? No emotional attachments, a job where strangers came and went, no one staying long enough to make things personal. And when she wasn't working, a world away, apart, a cool, quiet place where she never had to tell a needy child to be quiet, a lonely husband that she had to study, where she never had to tell her family that she didn't love them, at least not enough, that she never had and never would.

Where had she gone? I wondered. Someplace else where she could slip under the radar, work off the books, spend her time reading and swimming. I thought of the dog, Roy, waiting on the shore, a demanding breed, but nothing compared to the demands of family, nothing compared to the demands Madison must have made on her. Sally could meet Roy's demands, a walk in the morning, a swim in the afternoon, a game of fetch when the air cooled down at night. Perhaps he slept on the foot of the bed, too, and that might have been all she needed, all she wanted, all she could handle.

Floating on my back at the end of my time in the pool, I thought about the people Dashiell and I did pet therapy with. Some of them had come not to trust another human. But they trusted Dashiell. They trusted a dog's nonjudgmental attitude. They felt safe with him. And for some, that safety allowed them, over time, rapport with the person who had brought the dog. Sally had stopped, it seemed with Roy, Roy who would never ask a question that would tear her to shreds, Roy who would never ask for more than she could give.

I picked up lunch on the way home. Then, sitting at my desk, sharing my sushi with Dashiell, I began to go over all my notes again, knowing that sometimes what you were looking for ended up being right under your nose all along.

I had started a time line for Sally's disappearance, at least
for the one when Paul spirited her away from the meat market in his truck. I put that in a folder. It was no longer the point. I put the notes from the meeting with Jim there as well, and the printouts of the other letters I'd gotten by posting Sally's name on Classmates.com.

I had notes from speaking to neighbors in Leon and Madison's building, Nancy Goodman and Ted Fowler. I hadn't made notes after talking to Nina. I didn't think anything she had to say would help me help Madison. I put all those notes away, too.

That's when I noticed the contact sheets Leon had given me, pictures of Dashiell from the time I was away. I checked the time. I wouldn't hear from Dr. Edelstein for at least another hour, probably much longer, so I took out my loupe and started to look at pictures of Dash, Dash at the waterfront, Dash at the dog run, Dash with Madison. I guess Madison was learning how to use his camera, too, because there were even shots of Dash with Leon. I thought by now the whole world had gone digital, but not Leon. Leon was out of step. He probably always was. Leon and Sally. What a pair.

I went downstairs to make a cup of tea, thinking about the pictures, thinking that Dash had given Leon and Madison something to do together, thinking that that was a good thing; it was exactly what they needed.

As I waited for the kettle to boil something occurred to me, that when Ms. Peach went out, I might be invited in, that if Dr. Edelstein found something telling, she might want me to see it, too. Or she might ask me to come in for just a moment to pick up a real copy of Madison's records. After all, the letter from Leon was in the file, and he had given me the first set, the set where I thought things were missing. Why not just give me the corrected version? We hadn't planned that part. But why not be on hand, just in case?

I shut off the stove, grabbed my jacket and picked up Dashiell's leash. If I was at the dog run when I got the doctor's call, I could be at the office in a minute, gone just as quickly, long before Ms. Peach got back. But if I was home when she called, I wouldn't be able to get in and out without the chance that Ms. Peach would see me. In fact, something else occurred to me. Binoculars might look funny at the dog run, but a camera wouldn't. I'd gone digital, too, but I still had my old Nikon with its telephoto lens. I ran back up to the office for the camera, slipped the loupe and the contact sheets I'd been looking at into the camera bag, stopped back in the kitchen to take a roll of film out of the refrigerator, just in case there was something I actually wanted to shoot, and headed for Washington Square Park.

There were eight dogs at the run when we arrived, seven playing, and a black pug lying on his master's coat, which had been spread out on one of the benches for just that purpose. I unhooked Dashiell's leash and watched him join another young male, telegraph his benign intentions with his rounded body language and then begin to wrestle. I chose a bench on the east side of the run, which seemed to have a partial view of the town house I would want to be watching later on, loaded the camera and checked out the view. And there to my surprise was Ms. Peach. She was on the path inside the park that was parallel to where Bechman's office was, and she was limping. She finally found a bench to her liking, the very same one where I'd been sitting just the day before, as if she, too, wanted to watch the entrance to the office where she worked.

Had she come early so that she'd have time to sit outdoors for a while before going in to work? Or was she just sitting for a minute because she was in pain? Perhaps she'd come in early to catch up on her paperwork. Or white out things on some other child's records.

Dr. Edelstein wouldn't be in. She said she was at the hospital in the morning. She wasn't due at this office for another forty-five minutes, assuming her appointments started when her hours did. This would be a good time for Ms. Peach to work, but to work at what, I wondered.

I panned the camera around, as if I wanted a picture of the Washington Square Arch, the people leaning over the fence and trying to get some dog's attention, the black pug still lying on his master's jacket, his front paws crossed, then back toward the bench where Ms. Peach sat in her white uniform, a navy sweater over it, enjoying the sunny day.

There was a homeless man coming up the path, heading toward Ms. Peach. His shoulders rounded forward, his head low, the upper part of his face covered by a baseball cap pulled down over his brow, the lower part by an untrimmed beard, the sign of a man who hadn't seen the inside of a barbershop in way too long. When he got to where she was sitting, he reached out one hand. He was wearing those woolen gloves where the tips of the fingers stick out, the kind the people who sold newspapers in those little outdoor kiosks wore because they keep your hands warm but you can still count money and make change.

When she reached into her bag, I thought she was about to give him money. Don't do it, I thought. He sees your money, he might grab it all and take off, though this one didn't look like he could run any faster than Ms. Peach. But he must have asked for a cigarette, because a moment later I saw him bending toward her, then standing up again, blowing a plume of smoke off to the side. I saw the smoke coming up from where Ms. Peach sat, too.

He bent close again, perhaps to thank her, then turned and walked back the way he'd come, an old sack in one hand, perhaps holding whatever little he owned. He headed toward the southwest corner of the park where the chess players
were at it, playing against the clock, feet tapping nervously under the tables as they did. When I looked back to where Ms. Peach had been sitting, the bench was empty. I saw her across the street, an umbrella in one hand, a lady who liked to be prepared. She opened the gate, pulled it closed behind her and stepped down into the entranceway. I couldn't see much after that. There were bushes in the way obscuring my view. I thought I'd let Dashiell play a little longer—there was nothing I could do right now anyway—and then move closer, to where I could see Dr. Edelstein get to the office, to where I'd be able to see Ms. Peach leave.

I was sitting where Ms. Peach had been when my phone rang.

“What medications does Madison take?” It was Dr. Edelstein, talking fast.

“None,” I told her.

“You're sure?”

“As sure as I can be. I asked her father. That's what he told me. I also checked their medicine cabinet. And Madison stayed at my house one night. Leon didn't send any meds with her. The whole point of the Botox was that there was nothing else that could do the job, nothing else that was going to help her. The Botox was supposed to be a miracle. It was supposed to—”

“What about early on? What about right after her diagnosis? Did Mr. Spector mention her trying any antidepressants, any antianxiety medication, anything like that? Did he mention risperidone or pimozide? What about Prozac?”

“Why are you asking me, Doctor? You have her records, don't you?”

“Those, at least, I could understand.”

“What did you find?”

“Where are you?” she asked.

“In the park. Right across the street from the office. Do you want me to come in?”

“No, no, don't do that. Do you have a pen with you?”

“Yes.” Reaching into the camera bag, finding a grease pencil, pulling out the contact sheets so that I could write on the back of them.

“Good,” breathless, “then write this down. In Madison's file, Oxycontin, Percocet, Percodan, and six times, injections of morphine sulfate.”

“No way.”

“I believe you're correct about that, Ms. Alexander. I checked ten other files, briefly. I don't want to be doing this when Ms. Peach returns.”

“And?”

“The same.”

“No matter what the child's diagnosis was?”

“That's correct.”

“I guess we know how Dr. Bechman was supporting Celia and JoAnn. And we know that Ms. Peach was involved somehow, because if not, she wouldn't have altered the files.”

“Had I not seen this with my own eyes, there's no way I would believe he…” Now silence on the line.

“Would have sold prescriptions for narcotics to take care of his second family?”

“Yes. He was…” She stopped again, perhaps thinking about the fact that he
had
a second family.

“The handwriting? It's definitely his?” Knowing it was. Had someone else written the notes, he would have seen them at the following visit. Besides, there were all those forms to file when narcotics were prescribed. He would have had to have done those as well.

“Yes. His. There's no doubt about it.”

“And of course Celia knew.” Going over the time line in
my head now. “In fact, she was killed after I spoke to Ms. Peach about how Dr. Bechman was supporting Celia and JoAnn. Once she knew Celia was talking to me, that I'd found her, there was no way she could take the chance that Celia might decide to come clean.”

“You're saying that Louise, Ms. Peach, killed Celia?” Panic in her voice now.

“I don't know. I don't know if she was doing this by herself or with—”

“I don't want her back here. I can't just leave, I have children coming. But I have a daughter, too, and she…” I heard papers rustling, a chair scraping. “I can't take the chance.”

“She doesn't know you know anything. And there'll be people in the office.”

The line was still open, but there was no response, long enough for me to wonder if I had suggested the right thing. Surely Ms. Peach couldn't think she could get away with killing a second doctor in the office and not have the finger point to her. It couldn't be another suicide. And she wouldn't be able to make it look as if Madison had done it. Who would she blame it on this time, another child? A door left unlocked? All too hinky. No, Laura Edelstein wasn't in danger at work, but if she thought she was, if she acted nervous or jittery, Peach would know something was up. Unless I came up with something fast, this wasn't going to work.

“Doctor?”

“She'll be back soon. I have to put everything away. I have to make sure I leave things exactly as I found them.”

“I have an idea, a way to make sure you're perfectly safe.”

“Yes?”

For the next minute or so, I talked and Dr. Edelstein listened.

“As for the papers,” I said finally, “don't rush. Take your
time and get it right. As I told you, I'm right here, right across the street. I can give you a few more minutes. When I see her coming, I'll make an excuse to talk to her.”

I heard her sigh. “Five minutes more,” she said. “That's all I need.”

“When is the next patient due?”

“Not for another twenty minutes.”

“Good. Because I was wondering if you could talk to Dr. Willet and tell him what you found. I was hoping you could get him to change his stand on protecting the patients' privacy. The detectives on the case need to see these files, perhaps, I don't know if you can arrange it that way, with the names blocked. But that's the next step and it should be taken right away.”

“I'll take care of it,” she said. “But I'd rather do that when I'm out of the office.”

“Can you reach him this evening?”

“Yes, I can. I will.” Sounding strong now, determined.

“Are you sure you're okay with this?” I asked. “Because if you need me to—”

“Yes, thanks to you, Ms. Alexander. I'm just fine now. Better than fine. I know exactly what to do. There won't be a problem.”

“Then I'll talk to you very soon,” I said, but she'd already hung up. Just in time, too, because Dashiell stood, looking toward the southwest corner of the park, and there was Ms. Peach, coming not from around the corner as I expected, but cutting through the park, a small bag in one hand, the other on the strap of her shoulder bag. She was walking slowly, still limping I was happy to see, bending now to rub one of her knees. Perhaps it was arthritis, acting up because there was rain in the forecast. Wasn't that why she'd taken her umbrella to work? But she needed more than an umbrella to protect her knees, some glucosamine with MSM on a daily
basis, perhaps Celebrex, or when the pain was really bad, something stronger. No problem, at least until a few weeks ago. For a while there, apparently, Ms. Peach had been able to get whatever it was she needed, for a price.

But the great majority, if not all, of the drugs carefully recorded in the patient files, as required by law, weren't for Ms. Peach's personal use. There was no way she could have paid Dr. Bechman for all those prescriptions unless she was reselling them and doing so for much more money. And money, it was clear, was the name of the game, cash for Dr. Bechman, a nice stash for Ms. Peach, perhaps for her old age.

In fact, lucky lady, she worked right across the street from a ready clientele. There wasn't a soul alive who didn't know that Washington Square Park was the Kmart of the downtown illegal drug trade. And for those who didn't know where to sit to signal their desire and willingness to self-medicate life's pain for cash rolled up and stuffed into a film canister or a cigarette pack, say, five minutes of observation would give them the location, on the wall just behind the chess players, one addiction abutting the next, one that would keep you out even when the weather was sending more sensible people rushing to get home, the other a little more serious, the other one people killed for, or in some cases, got killed for.

Ms. Peach was going slowly, stopping every few steps to rest her knee. Putting the camera bag and the contact sheets down on the bench, careful to put the sheets picture side up, I stood so that she'd see me, waving her over, waiting for her to approach before sitting again. It was a little out of her way, but perhaps she was no more anxious to get back to the office than Dr. Edelstein was to have her back there.

“Ms. Peach,” I said. “Just the lady I was hoping to see.”

She was frowning, less than delighted to see me, but she looked hopefully toward the bench.

“Are you having a problem?” I asked, mustering all the faux concern I could on a moment's notice. “Here, sit down. You look as if you could use a moment to rest.”

“It's my knees,” she said.

I looked up at the sky. “They predicted rain,” as if her knees hadn't made the same forecast. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

She frowned again. “No, I just need to sit a minute.” She checked her watch. “The next patient's not due until two and they're always late anyway. You'd think for a
doctor's
appointment, they could manage to get somewhere on time.” Shaking her head at the lack of consideration some people had. “What is it you wanted to see me about?” Frowning again, figuring it was me, it couldn't be anything good.

I slid the camera bag over to make room for her. “It's about Madison,” I said, winging it as I went along, the way Celia had when she told me how Dr. Bechman earned the money to support his second family. “Mr. Spector was wondering if another pediatric neurologist would be taking over the practice,” I said, congratulating myself on the neutral save, “or if you are recommending someone at another practice.” I waited a moment, but she was rubbing her knee again, not paying all that much attention to what I was saying. “I told him I was taking the dog to the run,” I told her, pointing to the other side of the park, “and that I'd drop by and ask.”

“They're still in the talking stage,” she said. “Why? Does Madison need an appointment right away? Has something changed?”

I shook my head. “Not a damn thing. She's still got the tics. And she's still not talking.” Thinking I needed some damage control now. “The shrink thinks she probably never will.” Leaning toward her, just our little secret.

“That's too bad,” she said, but I thought I saw a little glimmer of a smile. “And the mother? Any luck there?”

I shook my head. “Turned out to be a dead end. Or rather, a bunch of dead ends.”

“I'm not surprised,” she said. “After all, the police must have done everything they could at the time she disappeared and
they
couldn't find her. Perhaps she just didn't want to be found.”

“We don't even know if she's still alive, Ms. Peach, and now it appears we never will.” I checked my watch. It was time to let her go, but I thought I'd go for an extra few minutes, just in case.

“The child must have taken it very hard, your failure to bring her mother back.” She shook her head. “I imagine this will drive her even further into herself, don't you?”

I nodded.

“Well, I guess it's time to go. Please tell Mr. Spector that if he needs a referral, he can call me during office hours. And if he can wait, we should know more within a couple of weeks.”

“Thanks. I'll tell him.” Then pointing to the little bag. “Something for your knees?”

“This? Why, no. It's something for Dr. Edelstein.”

“Oh, too bad. Pain like that,” shaking my head, “you should be taking something. You shouldn't have to suffer like that. No one should.”

She pushed off the bench. I watched her make her way down the path that led out of the park, then wait for a small van to pass before crossing the street. She moved slowly, stopping two more times to take weight off her left knee before finally unlatching the low gate, stepping carefully down the steps and then disappearing behind the iron gate that led under the main staircase.

I picked up the contact sheets again, looking at the list of drugs. I was sure all the requisite paperwork was in the files, too, everything in triplicate whenever a controlled substance was prescribed. Clever, I thought, everything appearing to be on the up-and-up when it was anything but.

Before putting the sheets away, I flipped them over, looking at the pictures of Dashiell and then seeing something else. The earliest pictures on the contact sheets were not of Dash. They were of this end of the park. It appeared that Leon had taken pictures when he got out of Bechman's office after picking up the copies of Madison's records, or perhaps on the way in to get them. Because that's what I was looking at, the very bench where I was sitting, a view of the arch, the corner of the park where Ms. Peach had just been, even a view straight west, as if he stood in the middle of the street to take it.

There was a homeless man on the corner in that last one. Is that why he took the picture, the man the point of it against the background of opulent buildings? There was something familiar about him, not the face, which I couldn't really see without a loupe, something about his hands I thought. No, maybe it was something else, not the hands. Maybe it was the way he held his legs, toes pointing out Charlie Chaplin style. Or his shoulders, not exactly hunched, but slightly forward. Whatever it was, I couldn't put my finger on it. Perhaps he was just one of the men I often saw in the park, no other place to call home. They hung around the chess players, slept on the benches, tried to get the dogs to come over to the fence of the dog run and lick their filthy hands.

I put the sheets away and slipped the strap of the bag over my shoulder. I could see Ms. Peach through the window, on the phone. And then I saw the next patient coming down the block. The mother was tugging her along, as if it might be
the child's fault that they were fifteen minutes late. The little girl was crying, even before getting her booster shots or whatever other scary thing she was there for. As I got up to leave, I saw the mother pull the child closer and take her by the shoulders in a not so benign way. “Do you have to always make a scene, Sylvia?” she asked. Then, without waiting for an answer, she opened the gate and pulled the little girl along behind her.