“I’m not getting anywhere with him,” Bingham complained to Calvin, as if Jack were no longer in the room. “I thought you said his behavior had improved.”
“It had, until this episode,” Calvin said. He then glared down at Jack. “What irks me,” Calvin said, finally addressing Jack, “is that you know damn well that releases from the medical examiner’s office are to come from Dr. Bingham or through public relations, period! You examiner grunts are not to take it upon yourselves to divulge information. The reality is that this job is highly politicized, and in the face of our current problems we certainly don’t need more bad press.”
“Time out,” Jack said. “Something’s not right here. I’m not sure we’re talking the same language.”
“You can say that again,” Bingham asserted.
“What I mean is,” Jack said, “I don’t think we are talking about the same issue. When I came in here, I thought I was being called onto the carpet because I bullied the janitor into giving me keys for this office so I could find Franconi’s films.”
“Hell, no!” Bingham yelled. He pointed his finger at Jack’s nose. “It’s because you leaked the story about Franconi’s body being discovered here at the morgue after it had been stolen. What did you think? This would somehow advance your career?”
“Hold up,” Jack said. “First, I’m not all that excited about advancing my career. Second, I was not responsible for this story getting to the media.”
“You’re not?” Bingham asked.
“Certainly, you’re not suggesting that Laurie Montgomery was responsible?” Calvin asked.
“Not at all,” Jack said. “But it wasn’t me. Look, to tell you the truth, I don’t even think it’s a story.”
“That’s not how the media feels,” Bingham said. “Nor the mayor for that matter. He’s already called me twice this morning, asking what kind of circus we’re running around here. This Franconi business continues to make us look bad in the eyes of the entire city-particularly when news about our own office takes us by surprise.”
“The real story about Franconi isn’t about his body going on an overnight out of the morgue,” Jack said. “It’s about the fact that the man seemingly had a liver transplant that no one knows about, that’s hard to detect by DNA analysis, and that somebody wanted to hide it.”
Bingham looked up at Calvin, who raised his hands defensively. “This is the first I’ve heard about this,” he said.
Jack gave a rapid summary of his autopsy findings and then told about Ted Lynch’s confusing DNA analysis results.
“This sounds weird,” Bingham said. He took off his glasses and wiped his rheumy eyes. “It also sounds bad, considering that I want this whole Franconi business to fade away. If there is something truly screwy going on like Franconi getting an unauthorized liver, then that’s not going to happen.”
“I’ll know more today,” Jack said. “I’ve got Bart Arnold contacting all the transplant centers around the country, John DeVries up in the lab running assays for immunosuppressants, Maureen O’Conner in histology pushing through the slides, and Ted doing a six polymarker DNA test, which he contends is foolproof. By this afternoon, we’ll know for sure whether there’d been a transplant, and, if we’re lucky, where it had taken place.”
Bingham squinted across his desk at Jack. “And you’re sure you didn’t leak today’s newspaper story to the media?”
“Scout’s honor,” Jack said, holding up two fingers to form a V.
“All right, I apologize,” Bingham said. “But listen, Stapleton, keep this all under your hat. And don’t go irritating everyone under the sun, so that I start getting calls complaining about your behavior. You have a knack for getting under people’s skin. And finally, promise me that nothing goes to the media unless it goes through me. Understand?”
“As clear as a crystal,” Jack said.
Jack could rarely find an excuse to get out on his mountain bike during the day, so that it was with a good deal of pleasure that he pedaled with the traffic up First Avenue on his way to visit Dr. Daniel Levitz. There was no sun, but the temperature was pleasantly in the fifties, heralding the coming spring. For Jack, spring was the best season in New York City.
With his bike safely secured to a no parking sign, Jack walked up to the sidewalk entrance of Dr. Daniel Levitz’s office. Jack had called ahead to make sure the doctor was in, but he’d specifically avoided making an appointment. It was Jack’s feeling that a surprise visit might be more fruitful. If Franconi had had a transplant, there was definitely something surreptitious about it.
“Your name please?” the silver-haired matronly receptionist asked.
Jack flashed open his medical examiner badge. Its shiny surface and official appearance confused most people into thinking it was a police badge. In situations like this, Jack didn’t explain the difference. The badge never failed to cause a reaction.
“I must see the doctor,” Jack said, slipping his badge back inside his pocket. “The sooner the better.”
When the receptionist regained her voice, she asked for Jack’s name. When he gave it, he left off the title of doctor so as not to clarify the nature of his employ.
The receptionist immediately scraped back her chair and disappeared into the depths of the office.
Jack’s eyes roamed the waiting room. It was generous in size and lavishly decorated. It was a far cry from the utilitarian waiting room he’d had when he’d been a practicing ophthalmologist. That had been before the retraining necessitated by the managed-care invasion. To Jack, it seemed like a previous life, and in many ways it was.
There were five well-dressed people in the waiting room. All eyed Jack clandestinely as they continued to peruse their respective magazines. As they noisily flipped the pages, Jack sensed an aura of irritation, as if they knew he was about to upset the schedule and relegate them to additional waiting. Jack hoped none of them were notorious crime figures who might consider such an inconvenience a reason for revenge.
The receptionist reappeared, and with embarrassing subservience, she guided Jack back to the doctor’s private study. Once Jack was inside, she closed the door.
Dr. Levitz was not in the room. Jack sat in one of the two chairs facing the desk and surveyed the surroundings. There were the usual framed diplomas and licenses, the family pictures, and even the stacks of unread medical journals. It was all familiar to Jack and gave him a shudder. From his current vantage point, he wondered how he’d lasted as long as he had in a similar, confining environment.
Dr. Daniel Levitz came through a second door. He was dressed in his white coat complete with pocket full of tongue depressors and assorted pens. A stethoscope hung from his neck. Compared with Jack’s muscular, thick-shouldered, six-foot frame, Dr. Levitz was rather short and almost fragile in appearance.
Jack immediately noticed the man’s nervous tics, which involved slight twists and nods of his head. Dr. Levitz gave no indication he was aware of these movements. He shook hands stiffly with Jack and then retreated behind the vast expanse of his desk.
“I’m very busy,” Dr. Levitz said. “But, of course, I always have time for the police.”
“I’m not the police,” Jack said. “I’m Dr. Jack Stapleton from the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner of New York.”
Dr. Levitz’s head twitched as did his sparse mustache. He appeared to swallow. “Oh,” he commented.
“I wanted to talk to you briefly about one of your patients,” Jack said.
“My patients’ conditions are confidential,” Dr. Levitz said, as if by rote.
“Of course,” Jack said. He smiled. “That is, of course, until they have died and become a medical examiner’s case. You see, I want to ask you about Mr. Carlo Franconi.”