Will persistently denied doing anything special, but in truth he was puffed over the turnabout he had been able to effect in the encounter with Halliday. He was not, however, at all pleased that the Willard cat had been let out of the bag. Even his office staff was surprised and amused that he was not a William. It didn’t help that the classic horror flick that had initially caused his dubbing as Ratboy had not too long ago been remade, and to generally favorable reviews, as well. As he flipped through a dozen excited e-mails, mostly from Hippocrates Society colleagues, Will wondered if he had ever even bothered telling the twins his true given name. Most likely, he acknowledged, even if he hadn’t, Maxine had found a way.
In addition to the article, Mimi had dutifully left a copy of the day’s appointment schedule on his desk. Patient visits, sandwiched about the removal of a large fatty tumor from a woman’s back, were light. This was exactly the mellow, stress-free day he would have prescribed for himself after an evening that hadn’t ended until nearly two in the morning.
He was scanning the list of patients when he remembered the card Detective Sergeant Patricia Moriarity had given him, along with the request that he call her. He had little doubt she wanted to speak to him about the managed-care murders. Others in the Hippocrates Society had already been questioned. He took the card from his wallet and studied it absently as he thought about the woman. In all likelihood there had been a shoulder holster and pistol under her vest. Except for the one time a friend had dragged him to a firing range, he had never even held a real handgun. Patricia Moriarity lived by one. He gave a moment’s thought to calling her, then wedged the card alongside his desk blotter, protruding out as a reminder. This just wasn’t the time he wanted to be grilled about serial killings and his views on managed care.
“Dr. Grant, it’s Mimi. Could you come out here, please?”
Will did as the intercom requested and found Grace Peng-Grace Davis, he remembered-seated alone in an otherwise empty waiting room. He was struck, as he had been yesterday, with the remarkable transformation in the woman, who had essentially been a bag lady not that many years before.
“Do you have a moment to speak with me?” she asked, quite obviously agitated and distressed.
“Sure, come in to my office.”
She settled into one of the two walnut-stained, Danish modern chairs that Jim Katz’s interior-decorator wife had chosen for each of the offices.
“My insurance company is Steadfast Health,” she said.
“I’ve done some business with them.”
Will hadn’t actually had all that much contact with the company, but he had operated on a number of patients whom they covered. From what he recalled, Steadfast Health was smaller than most of the HMOs, and for the most part more civil.
“Well, they are refusing to allow you to do my surgery.”
“When did they say that?” he asked, wondering if somehow last night’s forum and the resulting publicity could have already had some undesirable fallout.
“Yesterday. Just in case there was some clause or other like the one they have requiring preapproval for everything, I called them shortly after we got home from here to inform them about the change we wanted from Dr. Hollister to you. The woman who answered the phone checked around and then called me back to say they have a contract with Excelsius Health that includes the requirement that the referral surgeon is the only one allowed to operate on Steadfast Health patients.”
Will was stunned. Was this yet another managed-care game?
“What do you mean contract?” he asked. “What’s Excelsius Health got to do with this?”
“From what I was told when my primary-care doctor scheduled my mammogram, Steadfast Health is too small to have cancer centers the way Excelsius Health does, so their patients are X-rayed at the Excelsius mammography clinics, and if they need it, they’re treated at the Excelsius cancer centers. Then, I guess, Steadfast Health reimburses them somehow.”
“Well, this is just crazy,” Will said. “I’m on the provider panels for both Steadfast Health and Excelsius.” Even though, he chose not to add, Excelsius had tried several times in the past to have him removed from their provider list for various technicalities, including failure to get a form in on time.
“No matter what,” Grace said, “my husband and I have decided that we want you to do my biopsy, even if we have to pay for it ourselves. We have some money saved and-”
“Stop right there. This is absolute nonsense. You aren’t going to have to pay for this yourselves.”
The oversize manila folder with Grace’s mammograms in it was still propped against his desk from the previous evening. It was ironic and somewhat amusing that he had completely missed the Excelsius Health label in the upper left corner. Briefly, he scanned the films once more. The cancer was as he remembered-not huge but, in truth, indisputable. Biopsying the lesion would be technically simple, as would be its removal, provided there were no local lymph nodes with cancer in them. If the cancer had spread to the nodes-a part of the system draining foreign matter from the body-a meeting with the oncologist would be worth having to decide whether removing the lump or the upper outer quadrant of the breast would be statistically the best way to go.
Charles Newcomber was the radiologist who had read the mammogram, dictated his reading, and subsequently referred his patient to Susan. Emphasizing his title to the Excelsius Cancer Center operator, Will had no problem getting patched through to the man, who had a rather high-pitched voice and a fairly pronounced British accent.
“Dr. Newcomber,” Will said after introducing himself, “I’m here with a Mrs. Grace Davis, who had a set of mammograms that you correctly read as showing probable cancer.”
“Well, I’m certainly relieved at being deemed correct about such a thing.”
“Oops. I’m sorry, Doctor. I hope you know that’s not what I meant. I really do apologize.” Will expected the man to say something that would help ease his discomfiture, but there was only silence from the radiologist. “I. . um. . the problem I’m calling about is that you referred Mrs. Davis to Dr. Susan Hollister, who is one of my partners.”
“Yes?”
“Well, it turns out that Mrs. Davis and I have a history together that goes back more than ten years.”
“How sweet,” Newcomber said.
Will sensed his neck redden, but held his tongue in check. Newcomber was part of the Excelsius Health family. It was quite possible he was aware of the forum and its aftermath. Perhaps he had even been there.
“Dr. Newcomber, Mrs. Davis is here with me right now. She would like me to perform her surgery. I have spoken with Dr. Hollister, and she has no problem with the change.”
“I’m afraid that isn’t possible.”
“What?”
“Dr. Grand, first of all, this cancer center has an approved list of consultants from which we select a surgeon based on our patients’ hometown and any sexual preference. Dr. Hollister is on that list. You, sir, are not. Secondly, I have made it a point to personally get to know any surgeon to whom I make a referral. I don’t know you at all. If Mrs. Davis has a problem with that, I suggest she make an appointment to come in and share her concerns with me.”
Will could barely speak.
“Dr. Newcomber,” he managed, “who is your supervisor?”
“I am the supervisor, sir,” came the acid reply.
“Well, you’re not the boss!” Will shot. “And my name’s Grant, not Grand.”
He slammed the receiver down.