Her schedule was abbreviated, due largely to a block of time marked simply "surgicals." Penciled in at the bottom was the one item she had forgotten, "Drinks with Tom." The three words triggered a surprising rush of feelings, beginning with the reflex notion to call and cancel, and ending with the sense of what her return home to an empty house would be like. Scattered in between were any number of images of the intense, gangly resident who had been her staunchest supporter during the difficult days that had followed the biopsy of Beverly Vitale. Tom Engleson was a man and a youth, enthusiastic at times even to exuberance, yet sensitive about people, about medicine, and especially about what her career involved and meant to her. The prospect of an hour or two together in the corner of some dark, leather and wood lounge might be just the carrot to get her through the day. "Dammit, Jared, " she muttered as the cab rolled to a stop in front of her hospital. "I need you."
She began her day as she had each of the last several working days, with a visit to Room 421 of the Berenson Building. Ellen was lying on her back, staring at the wall. Her breakfast was untouched on the formica stand by her bed. Suspended from a ceiling hook, a plastic bag drained saline into her arm. "Hi, " Kate said. "Hi, yourself." Ellen's eyes were shadowed. Her skin seemed lacking in color and turgor. Bruises, large and small, lined both arms. There was packing in one side of her nose.
Kate set the Cosmopolitan and morning Globe she had brought on the stand next to the breakfast tray. "Something new's been added, huh? " She nodded toward the IV. "Last night. A little while after you left."
Kate raised Ellen to a sitting position and then settled onto the bed by her knee. "They say why?"
"All they'll tell me is that it's a precautionary measure-"X "Have you had some new bleeding?"
"In my bowel movements, and I guess in my urine, too." She took a glass of orange juice from her tray and sipped at it absently that's probably why the IV, " Kate said. "In case they have to inject any X-ray dye or give you any blood." How much do you want to hear, El? Give me a sign.
Do you want to know about sudden massive hemorrhage? About circulatory collapse sudden and severe enough to make emergency insertion of an intravenous line extremely difficult? Do you want to know about Beverly Vitale. "Listen, Kate. As long as you're on top of what's going on, I'm satisfied."
"Good." Thank you, my friend. Thank you for making it a little easier.
"Sandy's back. He flew in late last night and then moved into the house to look after the girls."
Kate motioned to a vase of flowers by the window. "From him?"
"Uh-huh."
"So?"
Ellen shrugged. "No significance. He's still on his way out, I think."
"I hope not."
"Are you what?"
"On my way out."
"Jesus, Sandler, of course not."
Ellen took her hand. "Don't let me die, Katey, okay?"
"Count on it, " Kate said, having to work to keep from breaking down in front of her friend. Silently, she vowed to place her efforts on Ellen's behalf ahead of every other task, every other pressure in her life.
Somewhere, there was an answer, and somehow she would find it. "Listen, I've got to go and get ready for some biopsies. I'll check on your lab tests and speak with you later this afternoon. Okay?"
"Okay." The word was spiritless. "Anything I can bring you?"
"A cure?" Kate smiled weakly. "Coming right up, " she said. The flowers, in a metallic gray box with a red bow, were on her desk when Kate returned from the Berenson Building. First a huge bouquet for Ellen from Sandy and now flowers from Jared. The former Dartmouth roommates had come through in the clutch. "I knew you guys must have learned something at that school besides how to tap a keg, " she said, excitedly opening the box. They were long-stem roses, eleven red and one yellow-the red for love and the yellow for friendship, she had once been told. She scurried about her office, opening and closing doors and drawers until she found a heavy, green-glass vase. It was not until the roses were arranged to her satisfaction and set on the corner of her desk that she remembered the card taped to the box. It would say something at once both witty and tender. That was Jared's style-his way. "To a not so unexceptional pathologist, from a not so secret admirer. Tom."
Kate groaned and sank to her desk chair, feeling angry and a little foolish. Try as she might, she could not dispel the irrational reaction that Jared had somehow let her down. Call Tom. She wrote the reminder on a scrap of paper and taped it in a high-visibility spot on the shade of her desk lamp. Still, she knew from experience that even a location only inches from her eyes gave her at best only a fifty-fifty chance of remembering. Perhaps now was the time to call. It was almost nine. If Tom wasn't in the OR, a page would reach him. Things were beginning to get out of hand, and at this point, meeting Tom for a drink hardly seemed fair. Kate was reaching for the phone when it rang. "Hello. Kate Bennett, " she said. "Dr. Bennett, how do you do? My name is Arlen Paquette, Doctor Arlen Paquette, if you count a Phd in chemistry. I'm the director of product safety for Redding Pharmaceuticals. If this is an inopportune time for you, please tell me. If it is not, I would like to speak with you for a few minutes about the report Dr. William Zimmermann phoned in to us yesterday."
"I have a few minutes, " Kate said, retaping the Tom note to her lampshade. "Fine. Thank you. Dr. Bennett, I spent a fair amount of time taking information from Dr. Zimmermann. However, since you seem to have done most of the legwork, as it were, I had hoped you might go over exactly what it was that led you to the conclusion there was a problem with one of our Redding generics."
"I'd be happy to, Dr. Paquette."
It was obvious from the few questions Paquette asked during her three-minute summary that Zimmermann's account to him had been a complete one and, further, that the director of product safety had studied the data well. "So, " the caller said when she had finished, "as I see it, your initial suspicions of trouble at the Omnicenter were based on a coincidence of symptoms in three patients of the thousands treated there. Correct?"
"Not exactly, " Kate said, suddenly perturbed by the tone of the man's voice. "Please, " he said, "bear with me a moment longer. You then decided to focus your investigation on the pharmaceuticals provided for the Omnicenter by my company, and…"
"Dr. Paquette, I don't think it's at all fair to suggest that I jumped to the conclusion that the drugs were at fault. Even now I am not at all sure that is the case. However, of all the factors I checked-sterilization techniques, microbiology, and all others common to my three patients — the contaminated vitamins were the only finding out of the ordinary."
"Ah, yes, " Paquette said. "The vitamins. Several dozen samples analyzed, yet only one containing a painkiller. Correct?"
"Dr. Paquette, " Kate said somewhat angrily, "I have a busy schedule today, and I've told you about all there is to tell. You are sounding more and more like a lawyer and less and less like a man concerned with correcting a problem in his company's product. Now, I don't know whether Dr. Zimmermann told you or not, but I feel that the need to get to the bottom of all this is urgent, critical. A woman who happens to be a dear friend of mine is in the hospital right now, with her life quite possibly at stake, and for all I know, there may be others. I shall give you two more days to come up with a satisfactory explanation. If you don't have one, I am going to get the chemist from the state toxicology lab, and together we will march straight down to the FDA."
"By chemist, I assume you mean Mr. Ian Toole?"
"Yes, that's exactly who I mean."