"No, I was as clear as day. He got in somehow."
"What? How?"
"I don't know how! He probably just walked in." Lee's head throbbed, and he had to sit on the bed.
"The bottom line here is that you're really not well yet."
"Oh, don't start with that again, for God's sake!"
"Would you just slow down for a minute and think what you're doing?"
"We're moving too slowly already!" Lee pulled on his shirt so violently that he ripped the sleeve. "Shit!" he said. "Goddamn it!" He picked up a shoe and threw it as hard as he could across the room.
As he did, he looked up to see his mother and Kylie standing in the doorway to his room. Kylie's eyes were wide with amazement, and his mother looked as though she had just swallowed a gnat.
"Well," Fiona Campbell said frostily, "it looks as though someone is having a bit of a temper tantrum."
"Uncle Lee, those are bad words," said Kylie.
"Yes, they are, Kylie," he replied, "very bad words."
Butts returned with two cups of coffee and an enormous cheese danish.
"I thought you might be hungry, so I-" He stopped, sensing the tension in the air. "What's the matter? Something happen while I was gone?"
"Well," Lee's mother said, "this is awkward, isn't it?"
Chapter Fifty-nine
Half a dozen apologies later, Fiona was persuaded to take Kylie shopping, while Lee and Chuck went back with Detective Butts to Chuck's office.
When they got there, Nelson and Florette were waiting for them. Nelson did not look happy.
"The Feds?" he bellowed. "The goddamn Federales? What the hell do you want to bring them in for?"
"It wasn't my idea," Chuck pointed out.
"Good God!" Nelson fumed. "You'd think they have enough on their hands right now, with all their recent screwups!" His eyes were bloodshot, and his cheeks were lit up by a map of tiny red veins. It was clear to everyone in the room that he was not sober.
"Look," Lee said, "why don't you get some rest? You don't look so good."
"I don't look so good? I don't? You should take a look in a mirror, laddy-you look like something the cat dragged in."
"Okay, okay," Chuck said, placing a hand on his shoulder, "calm down."
"I am perfectly calm," Nelson replied.
"I think we can use all the help we can get," Florette remarked. He was dressed in a dapper green suit with matching tie; his shoes were shined to a gleaming sheen. Next to him, Nelson looked ratty and scrappy, like a bar brawler ready to go.
"Well, then, why doesn't someone do something about it?" he muttered. "Why all this goddamn pussyfooting around?
Butts stepped forward. "I think the first thing that someone should do is to send you home. You're not-"
But he never got a chance to finish his sentence. Nelson growled and threw a punch at him. He was too drunk to make contact, though, and ended up flat on his back on the other side of the room.
"Oh, you wanna get into it?" Butts said. "Come on-bring it on! I'm ready for you."
"Stop it!" Chuck barked. "All right, that's it," he continued, kneeling beside Nelson. "We'll take a little break and start up again in a few minutes." He pulled Nelson to his feet. "What's the matter with you?"
"I'll tell you what's the matter with me," Nelson answered. "This damn psycho has us all by the short and curlies-that's what's the matter with me.
"This isn't helping things," Chuck said. "Why don't you go home until you can sleep this off?"
Nelson looked at Lee, who said, "I think you know Chuck is right."
It took more convincing to get Nelson to leave. After he had gone, a pall settled over the room. They were all emotionally exhausted, and Nelson's behavior reminded them how close to the edge they all were.
"All right," said Chuck. "Let's just try to concentrate for a moment, can we?"
"I know how Dr. Nelson feels," Florette said, adjusting his already perfectly centered silk tie, "but don't you think a fresh set of eyes might be a good idea at this point?"
"I'm surprised they've got anyone to spare, with all the antiterrorism work they're doing right now," Butts remarked.
"I trained with some of these guys at Quantico, and they're terrific, but it'll take time to bring them up to speed." Lee said.
"What you said before is right," Butts pointed out. "The bottom line is getting this guy off the street as soon as possible."
"Yeah," Lee agreed. He went to sit down, felt faint, and almost fell.
"Hey," Chuck said, "maybe someone else should be going home right about now."
"I'm fine," Lee replied tersely.
Butts squinted at him. "Is there any chance that your infection was caused by-by something that was done to you?"
Lee stared at him. "What do you mean?"
"Could he have-I mean, can someone cause that kind of infection in another person?"
"I think that's unlikely," Florette interjected. "I was a med student as an undergraduate, and I never heard of a case of bacterial meningitis that was the result of deliberate contamination. It's not-"
"Okay, so let's move on," Chuck said, coming around to lean on the front of his desk. "Did you have any luck tracing Samuel Beckett?" he asked Detective Florette.
"Not really. We looked into the handful of people with that name, but no one came even close to the profile-an old retired sailor on Staten Island, one rich, middle-aged French businessman on the Upper East Side, and a would-be playwright using it as a nom de plume in the East Village, most definitely gay."
"Any follow-up on how he got into the hospital room at that hour?" Chuck asked Butts.
"One of the night nurses found a discarded orderly jacket in a broom closet, but there are no workable prints on it," Butts replied. "Probably wore gloves again-God knows there are plenty of those in a hospital."
"Yeah, and he's too smart to discard those in the hospital," Lee remarked. "He would know that prints can be lifted from the inside of latex gloves."
Chuck looked at his watch. "Look, it's late. Why don't we all get a few hours of sleep, and meet first thing tomorrow morning?"
"Okay," said Butts. "My wife's gonna be real shocked to see me-says she hasn't seen me for so long that she's forgotten what I look like. Which, in my case, maybe isn't such a bad thing," he added with a rueful smile.
They all headed out for their various subway trains as the city settled into early evening stillness. A few clouds punctuated an otherwise clear night sky, and there was a smell of fresh earth in the air.
Lee and Florette took the express train downtown together as far as Times Square.
"You know," Lee said as the local stops flashed past the windows, "there's got to be some key to this whole thing."
Up on the walls of the subway car was an advertisement for horse racing at Belmont Park, a speeding thoroughbred with a jockey leaning low over its muscular neck. As Lee looked up at the picture, an idea slowly formed in his mind.
"Oh, my God-that's it! A key."
"What?" said Florette.
"Eddie," he said. "The racing form-that was the key!"
"What key?" Florette asked, still confused.
He explained his idea to Florette as the stops continued to rush by.
Half an hour later, he was on East Seventh Street, headed for his apartment. The minute he got inside, he dialed Chuck's number in New Jersey. After two rings a woman answered.
"Hello?"
It was Susan, her voice low and liquid, smooth as olive oil. Lee had seen her once since her drunken Christmas party confession, at one of the 9/11 police funerals, and he had done his best to avoid her then. He considered hanging up, and rejected the idea-knowing Susan, she would have caller ID, and hanging up would only make things worse.
He took a deep breath. "Hello, Susan." He tried to sound natural, and ended up sounding completely forced.