"The bastard got into the machine room over there and rigged the controls so that when Ted pushed the button upstairs, the door there opened but the car stayed down here. You know, I just can't imagine an observant guy like him not noticing the floor dial, or even worse, walking into an open space. Either he was distracted or pushed."
"Ugh," Kathy grunted.
"Okay if I don't join you and the team next door?" David said. "Foster's upstairs and I want to clear some things before they settle out."
"We'll go up afterward," Kathy said.
"And then, I'm looking for Spritz. He's turned into a loner-a frigging disappeared loner. If you run into him, call me, will you?"
Kathy nodded. "David." She beckoned him aside. "Nick says we have to step up our involvement. Says we've got a damn serial killer on our hands."
"Big revelation."
"You know what he means. People can be on our butts more than on yours."
David checked to see if Belle was watching before scooping up the unaware detective. "You can be on my butt any time you want," he whispered.
Kathy pulled away. "David! This is serious. Even the hospital unions called. And now, after this, everyone and his uncle will demand the impossible. Like bring in the killer in an hour."
"Sony." And he was, after rationalizing he had permitted himself a moment of therapeutic giddiness. "But, shouldn't that be `his or her uncle or aunt'?" David asked with a straight face.
Kathy peered down her nose and gave him a dismissive gesture.
Although David couldn't resist the quip, he scolded himself for compounding inappropriate and indelicate behavior. Idiot! He was your friend and mentor.
Before leaving, he handed Kathy an envelope containing the adhesive strip from the control room. "Could you give this to Sparky? Calling card. I'll explain later. Thanks."
David paraded the length of the building to the front elevators, rode to the sixth floor and doubled back to Foster's office suite. Now there's police officialdom to contend with. So we bump into each other. But maybe not; it's not as if they haven't been working the cases from the git-go. Okay, then, last one across the finish line's a rotten egg!
Foster's secretary was not there so he assumed she was on a coffee break-it was ten a.m. He barged into the administrator's office and found him standing at his desk, sorting through some letters which he fumbled to the floor. For the first time since Bugles' murder, David realized Foster had switched from sport jackets and slacks to more formal suits. This morning, he was in shirtsleeves and open vest. His coat lay slung on a table between a lamp and several overturned portraits.
"I didn't mean to frighten you, Alton."
"Who's frightened?" Foster said, stooping for the letters. "This institution is merely crumbling around us."
David sat stiffly on a chair before the desk, directly in line with threads of sunlight pouring through a venetian blind.
"Here, let me get that," Foster said.
"No problem," David said, moving the chair. "A few stripes of light on a black day. Black Day at Hollings General."
"Sounds like a murder mystery."
"Then how's Murders at Hollings General?"
"Jesus! Murder! What did we do to deserve this?" Foster said. He sat behind his desk and stared vacantly into space.
David took out his pad. "Alton, I have some questions." He didn't wait for a response. "When Ted came here, what did he want?"
"He handed me his resignation."
David's head snapped up. "His-his resignation?"
"That's right. I have no idea why. I tried to talk him out of it but he wouldn't listen. He left in kind of a huff."
"Yes, I know," David said, laying a finger across his lips. "I could hear some of the conversation. And then you followed him out?"
"Yes, but not immediately. I waited a second or two, hoping he'd come back."
"I see. And the door. Your back door there. Why was it locked?"
"Locked? But, I left it open for you."
"I tried it, Alton. It was locked."
"Well, I don't know. It must have blown shut. It does that sometimes. I should have made sure it was kept unlocked. I don't think I did, come to think of it. "
David didn't stop writing as he asked the next question. "Now, when you got to the elevator, you said you saw the exit door closing."
"Yes, I'm absolutely certain someone had just gone through it. But I didn't have the presence of mind to look. David, I was so shook by the whole thing. It happened so fast."
"And you didn't see Ted fall, right?"
"Right."
"You're sure?"
Foster's face darkened. "Yes, I'm sure. Are you suggesting …?"
"I'm not suggesting anything," David shot back, aware he'd stepped on words again. But he didn't care.
"I got there and it was too late. What more can I tell you?" Foster said.
"Fine. That's your story and I've got it written here."
"David, for Pete's sake!"
"One last quickie, Alton. Did Ted drop in on you or had he called ahead?"
"He called ahead."
"How far ahead?"
"Oh, maybe half an hour. What's that got to do with anything?"
"Curious, that's all."
David read over his last few lines and got up to leave. "That's it for now. I think you may have to go through the same thing with the police. Don't take it personally but you were the last person to see Ted alive."
Foster tensed his jaw. "Me or the guy who went out the door."
"Yeah, that's true," David said. "Him or you. By the way, have you seen Victor Spritz anywhere?"
"No, and he's not in his office. I already checked. His second banana is running the EMS scene and I'm worried about that, too. He's not very reliable."
"I'm afraid there's more to worry about than EMS ambulance dispatches," David said, closing his notepad. "As important as they are."
In the moments between Foster's office and his secretary's desk, David thought: Screw it, this is hardball. Hard-boiled in hardball. So? Let him take the Hole away from me-if he's not on death row.
The secretary had returned. David said, "The scream I'm sure you heard … "
This time, his words were stepped on. "Dr. Brooks, I hope I never hear anything like that again. Never, for the rest of my life."
"I understand, but can you remember whether the scream came before or after Mr. Foster passed you?"
The secretary pointed to spots in the air before her. "After. Yes, after."
"And, how long had you been at your desk?"
"I usually arrive at about quarter-to-nine."
"From the time you arrived until the tragedy occurred, did you have occasion to see Mr. Foster, other than when he passed you?"
"No."
"Or talk to him on the intercom?"
"No."
"Does he ever leave out the back door without letting you know?"
"Oh, please. More often than not."
David was about to pursue the issue when his cellular phone vibrated. It was Belle.
"Guess who's just been admitted to ICU-came in through the E.R."
"Christ, what now? Who?"
"The Bugles kid."
"Robert? What happened?"
"Somebody knocked him around, apparently. He's in pretty bad shape."
David waved off Foster's secretary who had pointed to the coffee maker. "Is he conscious, do you know?" "The E.R. says just barely."
"I'm going over. Then I'd better join the gang downstairs. I can't believe all this."
He thanked Foster's secretary with a thrust of Friday in her direction and hurried to the Surgical Intensive Care Unit.
He entered the central control station, a long exposed area separated from the corridor by a workbench laden with stacks of manuals and requisition slip trays and strewn with metal-covered patient charts. Behind the bench, a nurse sat before a counter attached to the full length of the monitoring wall. Making notations, she scanned the rows of EKG tracings and vital sign windows, once nodding to a specific panel to indicate to another nurse that its corresponding room needed checking.