But old habits die hard, so by reflex his face assumed an approximation of his Mr. Mayor facade and he cleared his throat, entered the room, and sat down in one of the overstuffed chairs.
“Let’s play it your way, Sergeant,” Terry said curtly. “I don’t want to have to go on TV and explain it fifty times. Not now.”
“I fully agree” Ferro began but Terry cut him off.
“In fact I don’t want to release anything to the press until we have actually accomplished something,” he said with a touch of asperity.
LaMastra gave a surreptitious little silent whistle and raised his eyes significantly to Ferro, whose face had become wooden.
“As you say, Your Honor.”
Terry rubbed his red-rimmed eyes and sighed. In the back of his mind Mandy’s voice was whispering to him over the phone. The force necessary to keep a bland smile on his face was immense.
Ferro opened his mouth and was about to add something else when the lounge door opened and a very weary-looking doctor came in, his green skullcap and surgical scrubs stained with unpleasant splotches of various colors and viscosities. He sketched a weary wave, lumbered bleary-eyed over to the coffee station, and poured himself a cup of very strong black coffee in a chipped ceramic mug that said: #1 DAD.
Sipping the coffee, he ambled over and sank wearily down onto the couch beside Gus. He crossed his ankles and rested them on the coffee table, and Terry could see that the soft paper scrub booties he wore over his shoes were spattered with dark drops of dried Betadine. The doctor looked bleakly at the gathered faces, sipped his coffee, and sighed.
“Doc, have you met Detective Sergeant Ferro and Detective LaMastra?” Terry said, and the doctor gave them small nods.
“Yeah, but last night things were a little too busy to be social.” The doctor toasted them with his mug. “Saul Weinstock.” He tugged the green skullcap off, stared for a moment at the sweat stains that darkened the soft papery material, and then tossed it onto the table. Weinstock was thirty-five, looked thirty, and had a face that looked remarkably like a younger, tougher Hal Linden. A chai on a gold chain glittered from within the tangle of curly black chest hair.
Terry said, “Dr. Weinstock is the administrator here at Regional, as well as the chief surgeon and county coroner.”
“In small towns we wear a lot of hats,” Weinstock said with a small grin. “I also double as the mailman and the fire chief.”
“Uh…really?” LaMastra asked.
“No,” said Weinstock.
“Oh.”
The doctor glanced at Terry. “Christ, you look like shit.”
“Been a long couple of days, Saul,” Terry said. “So, where do we stand?”
“Well, that’s a loaded question. Which do you want first, the good news, the so-so news, the bad news, or the really bad news?”
“How about in that order?”
“Okay, the good news.” Weinstock had a clipped but affable voice. “Officer Rhoda Thomas is an exceptionally hardy and fit young lady. We removed two 9-millimeter bullets from her last night, and she is doing very well. She’s conscious and aware.”
“Prognosis?” asked Ferro.
Weinstock shrugged. “She’ll be fine. No truly life-threatening damage, except for the collapsed lung, and we fixed that. She gets the right P.T. and she’ll be playing tennis in the spring, no problem. In a couple of months, you’ll have to be a damn close friend to even see the scars.”
“Good,” Terry said. “And Crow?”
“Oh, also good news there. I told him he ought to be ashamed of himself for taking up bed space. Pissant little wounds both of them. If he didn’t eat at McDonald’s so much he probably wouldn’t have had big enough love handles for the bullets to graze. He’ll be out of here tomorrow.”
“What about his face?”
“Jeez, have you seen it?” Weinstock asked with a malicious grin. “Looks like something out of a Frankenstein movie, but that’s just bruising, couple lacerations. Piddling stuff. He’ll have a couple of scars, sure, but nothing that will spoil his looks.”
“What about his girlfriend?” asked LaMastra.
“Val? Well, that’s the so-so news. She has a couple of cracked ribs, some torn cartilage, a helluva lot of facial bruising, and assorted minor lacerations. Her shoulder was wrenched, but that’s just a sprain, nothing to worry about. We shot her up with some cortisone, and I had our sports med guy take a look at her and he said she’d be doing cartwheels in a few weeks. In short, the body trauma is in no way debilitating, so all that will heal.” He blew across the surface of his cup and then took a careful sip. “The real issue is the emotional and psychological trauma. I mean, she was threatened by a madman, was injured while fighting for her life, she more or less saw her father get gunned down, and saw her boyfriend get shot. That’s one hell of a lot to take in one night.”
“Val’s as tough as iron, Saul,” said Terry.
The doctor nodded. “I agree. I’ve known Val forever. Hell, my uncle David delivered her…she used to babysit my sister and me. I know she’s tough, and I think if anyone could recover from the psychic trauma of this, then she’s the one. This morning I had a long talk with her, and she’s tearing herself up with guilt.”
“Guilt?” asked Gus. “For what?”
“For leaving her father to die out in the field while she went to help her brother and sister-in-law, then for being too traumatized to help him after all the fireworks were over. No, no, don’t say it. We all know that that’s just grief talking, but grief coupled with this kind of trauma can really do a number on a person. Seen it too many times.”
“So,” asked Terry slowly, “will she recover? I mean, in your medical opinion?”
Weinstock sipped the steaming coffee, then paused and stared into the middle distance. “It is my considered medical opinion that it beats the hell out of me. She’ll need a good therapist, probably.”
“Swell,” grunted Terry. “What about Connie?”
“Now we come to the bad news. She is physically unharmed. In fact, she is the only one that really went through this relatively unscathed. Some minor bruises from rough handling and from a few hard slaps, but none of the brutal bashing the others experienced. Nevertheless, her trauma is even deeper and more dangerous than that of Val Guthrie. She was nearly raped, but in her own mind she actually was raped. Or at least violated beyond her capacity to endure. You have to understand, gentlemen, that this is a very old-fashioned, very modest woman. Probably a little naive, too, one of those people who just isn’t prepared for this kind of visit to the real world. Her kind isn’t made for a night in the swamps with all the alligators. Will she snap out of it? Probably yes. In most ways, yes, but can she put the event behind her and not let it haunt her and warp her like it does to so many of the innocent ones?” He just shook his head. “I don’t know, fellows. I’m a doctor, not a shrink. And she is going to need a very good shrink.”
“So’s her husband,” said LaMastra. “I had a talk with him, or tried to, but he just keeps saying that he doesn’t want to talk about it. He’s on some kind of denial trip, thinks his father’s death is his fault somehow. He’s tearing himself to pieces because, while Ruger was ripping his wife’s clothes off and running his hands all over her, all young Mr. Guthrie could do was sit and watch and scream.”
Weinstock nodded. “Yeah, Ruger hurt him by making him watch. If the rape had actually happened, with Mark watching and unable to do anything…well, I don’t even want to speculate.”