15

4:15 p.m., Monday

Manhattan

Lou Soldano was back in the surgical lounge at Manhattan General for the second time that day. But on this visit he wouldn’t have long to wait. This time he’d called the operating room supervisor and asked when Dr. Scheffield would be through with his surgery. Lou had timed his arrival so that he’d catch Jordan just as he was coming out.

After waiting for less than five minutes, Lou was pleased to see the good doctor as he strode confidently through the lounge and into the locker room. Lou followed, hat in hand and trench coat over his arm. He kept his distance until Jordan had tossed his soiled scrub shirt and pants into the laundry bin. It had been Lou’s plan to catch the man in his skivvies, when he was psychologically vulnerable. It was Lou’s belief that interrogation worked better when the subject was off balance.

“Hey, Doc,” he called softly. Jordan spun around. The man was obviously tense.

“Excuse me,” Lou said, scratching his head. “I hate to be a bother, but I thought of something else.”

“Who the hell do you think you are?” Jordan snapped. “Colombo?”

“Very good,” Lou said. “I didn’t think you’d get it. But now that I have your attention, there is something I wanted to ask you.”

“Make it fast, Lieutenant,” Jordan said. “I’ve been stuck over here all day and I got an office full of unhappy patients.” He went to the sink and turned on the water.

“When I was here earlier, I mentioned that the patients who’d been killed were all waiting for surgery. But I failed to ask what kind of operations they were scheduled to have. I mean, I was told they were going to be corneal operations of some sort. Doc, fill me in. Just what was it you were going to do for these people?”

Jordan stood up from having been bent over the sink. Water dripped from his face. He nudged Lou to the side to get at the towels. He took one and vigorously dried his skin, making it glow.

“They were going to have corneal transplants,” Jordan said finally, eyeing himself in the mirror.

“That’s interesting,” Lou said. “They all had different diagnoses but they were all going to get the same treatment.”

“That’s right, Lieutenant,” Jordan said. He walked away from the sink to his locker. He spun the wheel on the combination lock.

Lou followed him like a dog. “I would have thought different diagnoses required different treatments.”

“It’s true these people all had different diagnoses,” Jordan explained. He began dressing. “But the physiological infirmity was the same. Their corneas weren’t clear.”

“But isn’t that treating the symptom and not the disease?” Lou asked.

Jordan stopped buttoning his shirt to stare at Lou. “I think I have underestimated you,” he said. “You are actually quite right. But often where the eye is concerned, we do precisely that. Of course, before you perform a transplant you have to treat the cause of the opacity. You do that so you can be reasonably sure the problem will not recur in the transplanted tissue, and with the proper treatment, it generally doesn’t.”

“Gee,” Lou said, “maybe I could have been a doctor if I’d had the chance to go to an Ivy League school like you.”

Jordan went back to his buttoning of his shirt. “That comment was much more in character,” he said.

“One way or the other,” Lou said, “isn’t it surprising that all your murdered patients were scheduled for the same operation?”

“Not at all,” Jordan said as he continued to dress. “I’m a superspecialist. Cornea is my area of expertise. I’ve just done four today.”

“Most of your operations are corneal transplants?” Lou asked.

“Maybe ninety percent. Even more, lately.”

“What about Cerino?” Lou asked.

“Same thing,” Jordan said. “But with Cerino I’ll be doing two procedures, since both eyes were affected equally.”

“Oh,” Lou said. Once again he was running out of questions.

“Don’t get me wrong, Lieutenant. I’m still shocked and distressed to know that these patients of mine were murdered. But knowing that these patients were killed, I’m not at all surprised to know they were all slated for corneal transplants. As my patients, almost by definition that would have to be expected. Now, is there anything else, Lieutenant?” He pulled on his jacket.

“Was there anything about the corneal transplants these people were waiting for that set them apart from other recipients?”

“Nope,” Jordan said.

“What about Marsha Schulman? Could she have been associated with these patients’ deaths?”

“She wasn’t waiting for an operation.”

“But she’d met the people,” Lou said.

“She was my main secretary. She met practically everyone who came into the office.”

Lou nodded.

“Now if you’ll excuse me, Lieutenant, I really must go to the recovery room to check on my last case. Good seeing you again.” With that, he was gone.

Discouraged again, Lou returned to his car. He’d been so sure that he’d hit on the crucial fact when Patrick O’Brian had come into his office to tell him that the dead patients were all to have the same operation. Now Lou thought it was just another dead end.

Lou pulled out into the street and instantly got bogged down in traffic. Rush hour was always murder in New York, and on rainy days it was even worse. When Lou glanced over at the sidewalk, he realized the pedestrians were moving faster than he was.

With time to think, Lou tried to review the facts of the case. He had a hard time getting past Dr. Jordan Scheffield’s personality. God, how he hated the guy. And it wasn’t just because of Laurie, although there was that. The guy was so smug and condescending. He was surprised Laurie didn’t see it.

Suddenly the car behind Lou’s rammed into his. His head snapped back, then forward. In a fit of anger, Lou jammed on the emergency brake and leaped out. The guy behind him had gotten out, too. Lou was chagrined to see that the man was at least two hundred and fifty pounds of solid muscle.

“Watch where you’re going,” Lou said, shaking his finger. He walked around to check the back of his Caprice. There was a bit of paint from the guy’s car on his bumper. He could have played tough cop but he chose not to. He rarely did; it took too much effort.

“Sorry, man,” the other driver said.

“No harm done,” Lou said. He got back into the car. Inching forward in the traffic, he turned his head to the left and right. He hoped he wouldn’t suffer any whiplash.

Suddenly the glimmer of an idea started to take shape in Lou’s head. Getting hit had worked some sense into him. How could he not have seen? For a moment he stared into space, mesmerized by the solution that had crystallized so suddenly in his brain. He was so deep in thought, the big guy behind him had to beep to get him to move ahead.

“Holy crap,” Lou said aloud. He wondered why it had not occurred to him before. As hideously outlandish as it was, all the facts seemed to fit.

Snapping up his cellular phone, he tried Laurie at the medical examiner’s office. The operator told him she’d been terminated.

“What?” Lou demanded.

“She’s been fired,” the operator said and hung up.

Lou quickly dialed Laurie’s home number. He kicked himself for not having tried to call her earlier to find out what had happened when she saw her chief. Obviously the meeting had not gone well.

Lou was disappointed to get Laurie’s answering machine. He left a message for her to call him ASAP at the office and if not there, at home.

Lou hung up the phone. He felt badly for Laurie. Losing her job had to have been an enormous blow for her. She was one of those rare people who liked her job as much as Lou liked his.

“There she is!” Tony cried. He gave Angelo a shove to wake him up.