“Easily. He could have subdued her with two fingers. But he seemed pretty calm about being questioned, so either he's innocent or he's honed his craft and was prepared for me. His landlady likes him, says he never causes problems. He claims he's HIV-negative and if he's lying, he's not showing the effects yet. Tessa, on the other hand, looks worn-out. But now that we know about Mandy, what connection could there be to the committee?”

“Good question, but I want to finish with it, seen too many screwups that seemed perfectly logical at the time. Only one student left, right?”

“Deborah Brittain. I'll try to get to her tomorrow.”

“Thanks. I really appreciate this, Alex.”

He put the file back in the briefcase. “Thanks for the theorizing, too. I mean it. I'd rather have theories than nothing.”

I walked him to the door. “Where to now?”

“Home for a shower and then talking to fellow gendarmes. Maybe I can turn up some other pretty ladies triple-stabbed under big trees, and retreat to the comfort of utter powerlessness.”

Cruvic's lie about not knowing Hope before the fund-raiser stuck in my head and at 7:00 P.M., with Robin working in her shop, I took a drive over to Civic Center.

Hoping for what? A glimpse of his Bentley as he left the office? Some pretty face in the passenger window?

Futile. The pink building's windowless facade gave no indication if anyone was in.

Not exactly welcoming architecture. The same question: Why set up practice here, away from all the other Beverly Hills medicos?

Privacy alone didn't answer it. Psychiatrists and psychologists managed to provide confidentiality in conventional office buildings.

Something to hide?

Beverly Hills streets are accompanied by parallel back alleys- part of a city plan that intended to keep garbage collection and deliveries out of sight. Hanging a U-turn, I drove back to the nearest intersection- Foothill Drive- where I turned right and into the asphalt strip running behind the buildings. Rear facades, loading docks, dumpsters. Finally, a high pink wall.

Three parking spots, all of them empty. The building's back entrance was an old-fashioned wooden garage door, dark and crisscrossed by beams. Heavy hasp secured by a large padlock. More like storage space than a doctor's private entry.

No cars said this doctor had left for the day. Maybe for his nighttime gig at the clinic?

I reversed direction again, taking little Santa Monica to Century City, then Avenue of the Stars south to Olympic Boulevard West. Another twenty minutes and I was in Santa Monica, and by that time the sky was black.

A few lights on at the Women's Health Center, a dozen or so cars parked in the sunken lot. Mostly compacts, with the exception of a gleaming silver Bentley Turbo pulled up close to the clinic's main door.

The chain across the driveway was fastened and locked and a uniformed guard patrolled slowly. Even in the dim light I made out the holster on his hip. When he saw me, he picked up his pace. I sped away before we could read each other's faces.

17

Tying up loose ends.

The next morning I called the Psychology office and got Mary Ann Gonsalvez's number. The time difference made it 5:00 P.M. in London. No answer, no machine.

I made coffee and toast and ate without tasting, thinking of the crowd at the women's clinic last night.

The armed guard, the chain blocking the parking lot.

Dr. Cruvic operating.

On patients like Chenise Farney?

Fifteen cars. Even allowing for staff, probably ten or more procedures. And for all I knew he'd been going for hours, bringing them in in shifts.

Idealism, or profit motive?

The profit could be high if he was using the clinic's facilities at no cost, and billing the state. The clinic happy to have someone volunteer services to its poor clientele.

Poor women meant Medi-Cal. Abortion funding was always subject to political fluctuations and I had no idea if Medi-Cal paid.

I made a call to the L.A. Medi-Cal office, was referred to an 800 number in Sacramento, put on hold for ten minutes, and cut off. Trying again, I endured another hold, got through, and was transferred to another 800 number, more holds, two shell-shocked-sounding clerks, and finally someone coherent who admitted that Medi-Cal did indeed reimburse for both terminations and tubal ligations, but that I would need procedure codes, too, in order to obtain specific reimbursement allowances.

I phoned the med school crosstown and used my faculty status to get the business office at Women's Hospital. The head clerk there referred me to the billing office, which referred me to the direct Medi-Cal billing office. Finally, someone whose tone implied I should have known without asking informed me that abortions were indeed reimbursable by the state at nine hundred dollars per procedure, not including hospital costs, anesthesia, and other incidentals.

I hung up.

Nine hundred per procedure. And if you were a canny biller, as Cruvic seemed to be, you could throw in things like nursing charges, operating-room costs, supplies, anesthesia, and jack up the reimbursement.

Twenty abortions a week added up to just short of a seven-figure income.

Nice little supplement to the fertility practice.

Implanting fetuses in the rich, removing them from the poor.

There were risks, of course: an antiabortion fanatic lashing out violently. And if the papers got hold of it, bad press: BEVERLY HILLS FERTILITY DOCTOR RUNS NIGHTTIME ABORTION MILL. Pro-lifers would excoriate Cruvic for murdering babies and liberals would wax indignant over class inequality.

And whatever their political bent, Cruvic's fertility patients would shrink from that kind of publicity. And from the fact that their doctor's activities weren't limited to abetting pregnancy- despite the claim on his business card.

But with that kind of money, Cruvic probably figured the risk was worth it.

Off-the-path medical building.

Chains around the clinic parking lot, armed guard.

Had he been greedy and wanted even more?

Bloated billing? Cooking the books?

Hope going along with the fraud?

But Cruvic had paid her only thirty-six thousand a year, a very small chunk of a million-dollar business.

Maybe the thirty-six represented only what she'd reported on her tax returns and there'd been other payments, in cash.

Or had Hope not been a willing partner to fraud and, learning the truth, quit, or threatened to expose Cruvic?

And died because of it?

Then what about Mandy Wright? Her only link to obstetrics, so far, was a terminated pregnancy and a tubal ligation.

Far-fetched, Delaware.

The most likely scenario was that she and Hope had been murdered by a psychopathic stranger and Cruvic, however mercenary and ethically slippery, had nothing to do with it.

Still, I'd promised Milo to check out his credentials, Deborah Brittain would be in class for the next few hours, and the panicked Tessa Bowlby had a day off. Lots of days off, as a matter of fact: enrolled in only two classes, both on Tuesday and Thursday.

Reduced academic load.

Trouble coping?

I'd give her another try, too, but first things first.

Calling the state medical board, I found out no malpractice complaints had been lodged against Milan Cruvic, M.D., nor was his license in jeopardy.

Farther fetched.

I got dressed and drove to school.

At the Biomed Library, I looked Cruvic up in the Directory of Medical Specialists.

B.A., Berkeley- Hope's alma mater, another possible link. They were the same age, too, had graduated in the same class.