He staggered to his feet and wandered toward the stairs. To the bathroom, to wash. He went away, came back a few minutes later, his hand on the banister leading up the stairs, his eyes dry from staring. He blinked once. Druze had been uncharacteristically moody on the trip to Wisconsin, the trip to cut George's eyes. Hadn't really understood the necessity of it. Was he pulling away? No. But Druze had changed… didn't have moods.
Need to involve him again. Bekker's eyes strayed to the phone. Just one call? No. Not from here. He must not.
He went away once more while he groomed himself and dressed, but he could not remember the content of the trip-if there was any content-when he returned. He finished dressing, took the car out, drove to the hospital. Inside the building, he took the stairs down, hurrying, not thinking.
The quickness of Bekker's move confused the surveillance team. One of the narcs was behind him by ten seconds, walked straight down the hall past the elevators and the staircase door, which were in an alcove. And Bekker was gone. Perhaps the elevator had been waiting, ready to go? The narc hurried back outside and told the team leader, who had a cellular telephone and punched Bekker's office number into it.
"Can I speak to Dr. Bekker?" The team leader looked like a mail clerk, short hair, harried, gone to a little weight.
"I'm sorry, Dr. Bekker hasn't come in yet."
"I'm downstairs and I thought I saw him just a minute ago."
"I sit right here by the door, and he's not in."
"We've lost him," the narc told the rest of the team. "He's got to be in the building. Spread out. Find him."
Bekker hurried down the steps to the tunnel that led to the next building. He stopped at a candy machine, got a Nut Goodie, then hurried on through the tunnel to a pay telephone.
Druze was not at his apartment. Bekker hesitated, then called information and got the number for the Lost River Theater. A woman answered and, after Bekker asked for Druze, dropped the telephone and went away. Not knowing whether she was looking for Druze or simply had been exasperated by the request, Bekker stood waiting, for two minutes, then three, and finally, Druze: "Hello?"
"You heard?" Bekker asked.
"Are you at a safe phone?" Druze's voice was low, almost a whisper.
"Yes. I've been very careful." Bekker looked down the empty hallway.
"I heard that they found the body and that this cop, Davenport, doesn't think George was the lover… And it's not a game they're playing. He's got some good reason to think so."
"How do you know that?"
"Because he's been seeing one of the actresses here, Cassie Lasch. She was the one who found Armistead, and she and Davenport struck up some kind of relationship."
"You mentioned her. She lives in your building…"
"Yeah, that's the one," Druze said. His words were tumbling over each other. "Cassie was telling us this morning that the lover's still out there. I think Davenport's talking to him, but doesn't know exactly who he is. And something else. The cops have supposedly got some kind of picture of me. Not a police drawing, it's something else."
"Jesus, can that be right?" Bekker rubbed his forehead furiously. This was getting complicated.
"Somebody asked Cassie why we wouldn't have seen it on television, if that's true," Druze said. "She said she hadn't seen the picture, but she knew about it and that there was something weird about it. And she was positive about the lover, by the way. She was being mysterious, but I think she knows. I think they're sleeping together, she's getting pillow talk…"
"Damn." Bekker gnawed on a fingernail. "You know what we've got to do? We talked about doing a number three before George came along? I think we've got to do it. We've got to do somebody that doesn't make any sense for either one of us. Somebody completely off the wall."
"Who?"
"I don't know. That's the whole point. Somebody at random. The goddamned shopping-mall parking lots are full of women. Go get one."
There was a moment of silence and then Druze said, "I'm really hanging out there, man."
"And so am I," Bekker snapped. "If there is some kind of drawing of you-if Stephanie's friend sent them something-and if this actress person sees it, then we've got serious trouble."
"Yeah, you're right about that. She sees me every goddamned day and night of my life…"
"What's her name again?" Bekker asked.
"Cassie Lasch. But if we do her…"
"I know. We couldn't do it now, but later, next week… If we can get the cops to go hounding off somewhere, maybe she could have an accident. Something unrelated. What floor is she on? High up?"
"Six, I guess. And she did once try to commit suicide…"
"So maybe if she went out a window… I don't know, Carlo. We'll work something. But we've got to get the cops going somewhere else. Something not related to the theater or to the university or antiques…"
"So… are you serious? A mall?" Druze sounded confused, uncertain.
"Yeah. I am. Pick one out on the edge of town. Burnsville would be good. Maplewood. Roseville. You're bright, figure out some way… Pick somebody who looks like she's on a big shopping trip. Get her at her car. Then dump the car with all the packages. Be sure you do the eyes. The thing is, we'll want it to look like it's totally random… You know what? Maybe you could cruise the lots. See if you could get somebody with Iowa plates or something."
"I don't know… I gotta have time to think about it."
"If the lover's out there, we don't have time," Bekker urged. "We've got to lead them away from us, at least until we can pinpoint the guy."
"Jesus, I wish…"
"Hey. We had to get rid of them. We deserved to be rid of them. Now we just have to clean up a little bit. Okay?"
Silence.
"Okay?" Bekker demanded.
"Okay, I guess. I gotta go…"
Druze was getting sticky: Bekker would have to move on him.
On the way back to his office, Bekker stopped at a men's room and urinated. He went to a sink and was washing his hands when a student came in, looked at him, then casually moved to a urinal. A heavy canvas bookbag hung from his shoulder.
The student looked a little odd, Bekker thought. The jeans and cardigan were okay, the oxford-cloth shirt was all right… He glanced at the student again as he went out.
It was the shoes, he thought, pleased that he'd picked it out. The kid must have just gotten out of the army or something. You didn't see students wearing that kind of black, shiny-toed, oxford anymore. Not since Vietnam, anyway.
In the restroom, the student listened to Bekker's heels hitting the concrete floor, moving away, then took the radio out of his bag. "I got him," he said. "He was in the can. He's on the basement level, on his way up the west stairs."
At the elevators, another student was waiting to go up, reading one of the free entertainment newspapers. He had shoes like the kid in the restroom. A new trend? A signal to buy oxford stock? On the other hand, neither of the kids looked exactly like fashion trend-setters…
Back to the office, or up to see the patient? Bekker glanced at his watch. He had time, and nobody coming to see him. A small thrill pulsed through him. Might as well do some serious work.
Bekker rode up to Surgery, nodded to a nurse, and went into the men's locker room, peeled his clothes off and dressed himself in a lavender scrub suit. Technically, he didn't need a scrub suit; he wouldn't be going into Surgery or Burns, where they were most useful. But he liked them. They were comfortable. And he liked them like surgeons liked them, for the aura… When he was wearing a scrub suit, people always called him "Dr. Bekker," which they sometimes forgot when he was in the Path area.