I handed her the keys before heading back to the restaurant. I said, “Here, Lanny. You start the car and get the heater going. It’s that button in the center.”
I was about to go into the restaurant when I heard her call. I turned around and she was leaning out of the passenger door to ask, “Which button?”
I had to laugh. It was a fair question since the dashboard looks like the cockpit of a 757.
I yelled, “Right in the center.”
She turned back to look at it. I could see a smile of recognition when she must have read the label. She waved out the open door to me as she turned the starter key.
I can’t really describe any of the emotions after that. What I felt was mainly numbness. I can barely describe the facts. There was an explosion. The car seemed to come apart. I could see Lanny’s body hurled out onto the sidewalk.
I ran as fast as lead legs could get me there. Her body was twisted and her limbs were at odd angles. She was unconscious. There was a pool of blood spreading from where her head lay on the sidewalk.
I dropped down beside her somewhere between panic and shock. I tried to hold her head, but I had no idea what not to move. Danny ran out of the restaurant.
I yelled to him, “911!” He ran back inside.
It was about four or five minutes before we were surrounded by white vehicles with rotating lights. Someone lifted me out of the way, and three men in green overalls and coats went to work on her. I was totally useless except to pray harder than I ever had in my life.
When they had Lanny in the ambulance, I jumped in without asking. They understood. We made record time to whatever the nearest hospital was. The only thing I can remember is seeing a monitor with wires running to Lanny’s chest. I think I took my first breath when I saw the sawtooth squiggles running across the green screen. It got my hope machine going.
They wheeled Lanny into a room in the emergency section and three doctors went to work. One of them came out in about twenty minutes. He asked if I was a relative. It was no time to tiptoe around privacy laws. I said, “Yes.”
He said she had a broken leg, and possible broken ribs. That plus the cleanup they could handle. She also had a concussion and possible cranial fracture. For that they wanted to get her to Mass. General as soon as possible.
I rode with her on the full-throttle race to the emergency entrance of Mass. General. This time the wait was until about four in the morning, when I saw her being wheeled out of surgery with bandaging around her head. I stopped one of the doctors and caught hold of my heart.
“How is she, Doctor?”
“Are you…?”
“Yes. How is she?”
“We don’t know yet. She has a hairline cranial fracture. Concussion. She’s still unconscious. The next twenty-four hours are the important ones. The sooner she regains consciousness the better. We can let you know.”
“Actually, I’ll let you know. I’ll stay with her.”
He thought for a second. “That’ll be all right. What relation did …?”
“There’s another complication, Doctor. Her injuries were caused by a car bomb. She’s going to need security. What room will she be in?”
“She’ll be in the Phillips wing, room 504. I can notify the police.”
“Thanks, Doctor. I can do better than that. I’ll take care of it.”
I called Tom Burns’s private number. Fortunately he can come out of a sound sleep ready to listen. I explained what had happened. He said he’d have a good man at the room in twenty minutes. I told him this was connected with the Bradley case so he could start the meter running. He said he was more concerned about something else.
“What’s that, Tom?”
“You. You were the target, not the girl. How about if I put a man on you, too?”
“No, just her, Tom. It’d just get in the way. I’ll be careful. I’ve had the wake-up call.”
I spent the rest of the night and well into the morning beside her, holding her hand and talking to her. The nurses came and went, and I felt like an idiot, but I heard somewhere that the talking might do some good. I thought there might be something inside that was listening and wanted to come back to my voice.
Around ten o’clock I went out into the corridor and used my cell phone to call Mr. Devlin. I was relieved to see a tall man in nonmedical clothing sitting in the corridor with a good view of Lanny’s door. He had the indefinable but unmistakable stamp of private security about him. I knew Tom Burns had come through.
I relayed what had happened to Mr. Devlin. He was grim and grouchy, but there was no mistaking the tone of deep concern.
“What do the doctors say?”
“They say it’s important that she wake up. So far she hasn’t. I’m staying here with her at the hospital.”
“You do that. And call me as soon as there’s a change.”
“Thank you, Mr. Devlin. I will.”
“Another thing, sonny. I’m calling Tom Burns. I want you covered, too. This is getting way out of hand.”
It was hard to say no, but the last thing I wanted was a tail. I didn’t know where the next few days would take me, and speed and invisibility could be my two best friends. A tail could interfere with both. I said it and kept at it until Mr. Devlin backed off.
I later found out why.
22
Before going back to Lanny, I checked my messages. Nothing at the office, but there was one at home. It was from Daddy. I returned the call and got him at the club.
“Hey, Mickey, it’s like this. There were two men in here yesterday. They were asking questions about you.”
“Like what, Daddy?”
“When you be in, where you live, stuff like that.”
“What’d they look like?”
“Both Orientals. Maybe Chinese. One a big guy. He’s no sumo wrestler. A little smaller’n me. The other one’s a little guy. About your size.”
I realized anyone of normal proportions would be “a little guy” to Daddy.
“Thanks, Daddy. I know what you told them.”
“Right. Nothin’.”
It was painful, but I told Daddy about Lanny. He felt the pain, too. He, of course, asked what he could do. I told him same as me. Sit tight and pray.
I was more certain than ever that all of this could be traced back to Kip Liu, my personal perversion of Dick Clark. The gaping hole was the lack of proof. More than ever I wanted five minutes with Mei-Li.
I called Harry to see if we were still on for the next morning. After I filled him in, he was on with a vengeance.
There was no change through the day. I held Lanny’s hand and babbled on, but there was no response. Around four in the afternoon, my mind was numb. I was out of one-way conversation. The best I could do was recite song lyrics. At some point I told her I was going to say the words to one of my favorite Harry Arlen songs, “My Ship.” I got to the part where it says that the pearls and all the treasures my ship will bring will mean nothing “if the ship I sing doesn’t also bring my own true love to me.”
I could feel the wetness on my face as my head rested down on the pillow beside her. I must have fallen asleep, because I came up sharp when I thought I heard a hoarse whisper say, “Weill… Curt Weill.”
I jumped up and looked at her. Her eyes were at half-mast, but they were open.
“What? Lanny, did you say something?”
I bent down close and I could hear her say, “Curt Weill. You said it was Harry Arlen. Curt Weill wrote it.”
I grabbed her hand and almost yelled, “You came back! Lanny, stay here. Don’t move. And don’t go back to sleep!”
I ran out the door and down the corridor to the nurses’ station.
“Get the doctor! She’s awake!”
The nurse was on the pager, and the doctor arrived just after I was back beside her. I read encouragement in his face, and I started to come back to life. He checked her signs, asked her some questions, and gave orders to the nurse. He came over to me before leaving.