Murder at St Mary's
Chapter 08
8.1
The phone continued to ring. Ironside waited.
"That cat is going to love you, calling him at this hour," Mark said.
Ironside scowled at him. "Ben, Bob Ironside."
"I knew that before I picked up the phone. You are the only one that calls me at this hour. Take the pain medication I prescribed and go to therapy more often."
"I am not calling for me," Ironside said. He told Dr Stern what had transpired at the hospital.
"What is it you want of me?" Stern asked.
"Dr Witt is scheduled to do the surgery on Agatha tomorrow morning. I want a doctor that you trust to do the procedure."
"Why is the head of the hospital doing the surgery?" Stern wondered aloud.
"He's not if I can help it. Who do you recommend?"
"Josh Develin is about the best there is in that field. I just don't know that you could get him on such short notice."
"Ben, this is Agatha we are talking about." Ironside pressured his friend.
Ben sighed. "Alright, Bob, I will call Josh myself. If I can't get him, I have a couple of others that I can call. Are you going to be there in the morning? Witt is going to want an explanation. You better let me handle this. Agatha has no living relatives so he will make the decision regarding her emergency care."
"I'll be there but he will not be making any decisions where Agatha is concerned." Ironside hung up the phone.
8.2
Morgan Haynes knocked on the door of Billy Carson's home. When the door opened, Carson had a look of panic on his face. "What are you doing here? I don't want to be seen with you."
"We need to talk."
"Not here and not now." Billy attempted to close the door but Morgan put his hand against it, preventing him from doing so.
"Now. I don't care where but it will be now."
Billy stood there for a moment not sure what to do. He did not want to bring Haynes into his home. He had kept him away from his family and he wanted to continue to do so. "There is a coffee shop down the street. I will meet you there."
"You better be there or I will be back."
"I'll be there." Billy shut the door. After checking on his son, he went back into the bedroom. His wife had fallen asleep in front of the television in his absence. Billy grabbed a tablet and wrote a short note so that she would not worry if she were to awaken while he was gone.
He arrived at the all-night coffee shop and slipped into the booth on the opposite side of Morgan Haynes. "You can threaten me with anything you want. I am not going to kill anyone for you."
Haynes smirked. "You are already in too deep so quit with the innocent act. The police are not going to care that you quit after three murders."
Billy was unable to hide his contempt for the man across from him. "I didn't murder anyone. I tried but I just couldn't do it, so you can stop trying to pin those deaths on me."
Haynes laughed at him and then sat forward. "Then how did those people die? Don't act innocent with me, Carson."
"I don't know who killed them but it wasn't me. I told you I couldn't do it but you would not listen to me."
"Do you really think the police will buy that? You are a fool if you think you can just wash your hands of this."
"There is nothing to wash my hands of. I did not kill them. So if you have nothing else, I have to get back to my family." Billy stood up to leave.
"You don't seem to care much about either one of them because if you walk out of here, they just might meet with an accident."
Billy turned back. He grabbed Haynes by the collar. "You go anywhere near them, I won't have any trouble killing you. You hear me? You piece of..."
"Come to think of it I won't have to touch them. In fact, if you don't cooperate Ironside is going to receive a big tip. You see we have been placing money into a bank account in your name each time one of the... what do you say we call them mercy killings? ... have taken place. Since you have been doing as you were told and eliminating each person, you have been rewarded."
"What the hell are you talking about? I told you I did not kill anyone."
"Sit down, Billy."
Carson was clearly shaken. He let go of Morgan Haynes and sat down in the booth. "Why are you doing this to me?"
"If you think for one minute you can walk away from this, you are wrong. I would like to walk away but I can't either. You and I are going to make sure that we can't be implicated. Either we work together or we fall together. The fool in charge refused to listen to me. He had Jody Dent killed and then stupidly attacked Sister Agatha. You know who that is going to bring into this, don't you?"
Billy nodded. "Ironside."
"I told him to stay under Ironside's radar but he ignored me. He would not let things cool off. Killing Dent while Ironside was in the hospital was stupid but attacking that damn nun was suicide. They would not have had to deal with her if they had arranged the killing on her day off. She would not have become suspicious. No, this idiot had to do it right on the same floor as she. He should have known she would run to Ironside."
"She would have gotten suspicious whether or not she was on duty. You can't kill people who are not ready to die and not have that busybody involved. It was stupid to think she would not demand an investigation. Don't you think it is time you told me what this meeting is all about?"
"You and I are going to blow the whistle on this operation and save our own tails in the process."
Billy was skeptical. "Just how do you propose we do that?"
"By helping Ironside."
8.3
"You don't run my hospital, Ironside! You don't have anything to say about who does the surgery on Sister Agatha! If you don't get out of here, I will call security!"
Ben Stern stepped in between them. "Take it easy, Peter. Chief Ironside is right. You have been running this hospital for so long, you have not done this kind of surgery in..."
"Are you saying I'm not qualified to do the surgery?"
"No, I am simply saying you have not done this kind of surgery in years."
"Maybe not but I have kept up on the procedure. I am qualified and since Sister Agatha has no family and is unable to speak for herself, I have to speak for her."
"Peter, the chief does not want you to do the surgery."
"I don't care what he wants. He has nothing to say about it!"
Ironside had agreed to let Ben Stern handle this but he had heard all he was willing to listen to. "Wrong, Doctor." He pulled a paper out of his pocket. "You will find this document to be legal and binding." He handed it to Stern without taking his eyes off Peter Witt.
"What is it?" Witt snarled.
Dr Stern read over the document and looked up. Trying to keep from smiling at the discovery that his detective friend would have just trumped Witt's ace, had they been playing poker, he said, "It is a legal power of attorney. It gives Chief Ironside the sole legal power to make all decisions on Agatha's behalf if she is unable to make them. That includes medical decisions."
Dr Peter Witt snatched the paper out of Stern's hand. He read over the wording and looked at Ironside. "I could challenge this in court."
"Go ahead. I will take it to Judge Thatcher. He will uphold it immediately," Ironside said, his tone cold as ice.
Witt knew that Thatcher greatly admired Ironside and usually gave him whatever he asked for. It would be an uphill battle, one he knew he would not win. He attempted to contain his anger without much success. "I resent your interference in the running of this hospital."
"And I resent mysterious deaths that are not considered important enough to investigate, Doctor. Someone in this hospital is killing patients. I resent that a respected nurse such as Sister Agatha is ignored when she suspects fowl play and I further resent after she consults me that she becomes the victim of attempted murder."
"Murder attempt! That is preposterous! It was nothing more than an unfortunate accident," Witt said, losing control of his temper.
"No, it was attempted murder and it was not your vampire that did it," Ironside snapped back at him.
Ben lifted his eyebrows and stared at Ironside, not understanding why in the world his friend would make such a remark. "Vampire?"
Ironside ignored Ben and continued, "Since everyone in this hospital is suspect, I have no intention of allowing hospital personnel to participate in the operation. I don't want Sister Agatha dying of another phantom heart attack." Ironside stared at Witt. "Do we understand each other?"
"I think we do, Ironside. I will be filing a complaint with the commissioner and the city council," Witt said, now not attempting to suppress the anger.
"You can file it, Doctor, but it won't go anywhere," Commissioner Randall said from behind them as he entered the room. "Bob, I stopped by your office and Eve told me what happened last night. I am, at the request of the city council, ordering you to begin a full-scale investigation into Jody Dent's death as well as the others and the attempted murder of Sister Agatha. And yes, Doctor, attempted murder. It was no accident. I read Chief Ironside's report this morning."
Witt knew he was beaten. He had no one to speak to for going over Ironside's head. He said nothing further and stormed toward the door.
"Doctor!" Ironside called over his shoulder rather loudly.
Witt turned around and looked at him with contempt. "What?"
The chief continued to sit there with his back to Witt. "I want that power of attorney back." He put his hand out.
Witt walked back to the detective, slammed the paper into his hand and proceeded to storm out of the room.
"You better hope that man never has the opportunity to do surgery on you, Bob," Randall said slightly amused.
"I would do it myself first," Ironside said. Randall and Stern were both grinning from ear to ear.
8.4
The magazine pages turned one after another but the reader wasn't absorbing its contents. Ironside hated waiting for surgeries to take place. He did not have the patience and they made him nervous. He threw the magazine on one of the tables in the waiting room, picked up the phone and dialed his office. He waited as it continued to ring. Eve's voice came through the phone and spoke into his ear. When he began to issue an order, she continued to tell him to leave a message and his office would call him back. He slammed the phone down in disgust. Why could not they just hire someone to answer the phones as they used to? "Voice mail... there is a term for you. How can it be mail if it is not a piece of paper in an envelope?" he asked, talking to himself.
This was wasting time. Ironside wheeled out of the waiting room to the desk. He spoke to the woman behind the desk. "Please have me paged when there is word on Sister Agatha."
"Yes, Chief Ironside."
The detective wheeled to the elevator and took it to the floor to where Dr Todd Prentis' office was located. When he arrived, he knocked on the door. There wasn't any answer. He pushed the door with his knuckles. It swung inward into the office. "Dr Prentis!" Still there was no answer.
Ironside wheeled to the man's desk. He looked over the contents on the desk but was careful not to touch anything. One particular piece of paper contained a name and phone number... Morgan Haynes. Where had he heard that name before? He could be sure if it struck a bell with him, it was not good. Ironside made a mental note to check on Haynes' whereabouts.
The door to the office opened and Dr Prentis entered. "Do you have a warrant, Ironside?"
The detective turned his chair towards the doctor and said, "Do I need one? Have you broken the law?"
Prentis' defensive tone softened and he forced a smile. "Of course not, Chief. I was just kidding. It is not every day the highest-ranking police detective in San Francisco comes to see me. What can I do for you?" He walked around his desk and sat down.
"You were the physician on duty when William Bauer, Carlton Holcomb and Jody Dent were murdered, were you not?"
He looked at the wheelchair-bound detective with caution. He knew he had to be extremely careful how he answered this man. This man was not stupid. He was a dangerous man to deal with. He forced another smile. "Come now, Chief. You have been on the job so long, you are seeing murders everywhere. All of those deaths were natural. They died of heart attacks."
"According to you," Ironside said gruffly.
Prentis knew that Ironside was trying to get a reaction out of him but he was having trouble controlling the anger that had begun to rise. Who was this man to question his diagnosis? "That is right, Ironside, according to me, a licensed physician. I did not know that they taught medicine at the police academy."
"You would be surprised what a detective learns over the years, Mr. Prentis."
"That's Dr Prentis, Ironside," Prentis snarled.
"That remains to be determined and if you want people to respect your title, you might try paying them the same courtesy."
Ironside's stare was intense and Prentis could not continue to look into his eyes. He dropped his from the detective and said, "Fair enough, CHIEF Ironside."
"You didn't answer my question."
"The answer is obvious, Ironside... Chief Ironside. Since I determined the time and cause of their deaths, it stands to reason I had to be there."
"Why did you ignore Sister Agatha's concerns over the cause of their deaths?" Ironside watched the doctor who seemed to be nervous about answering his questions.
"There was nothing there clinically to substantiate her concerns. They all died of heart attacks."
"You don't think it unusual that three people that had no history of heart trouble suddenly died of heart failure?" Ironside demanded.
"It happens all the time. Heart trouble can go undetected until it is too late and a disease can put undue stress on individuals. I see nothing unusual about it. Besides, there was an autopsy done on Mr. Holcomb. It confirmed my findings."
"Doctor, what would happen if air was injected into the patient's IV?"
Prentis looked very uncomfortable. "It could kill the patient."
"How?"
"Well..."
"It would cause the patient's heart to stop, would it not?"
"Yes, that could happen."
"And it would be undetectable, would it not?"
"Yes, but that is not the case here," the doctor insisted.
"Why not?"
"Because I was the doctor on duty in all three cases and I keep a close eye on my patients."
"I will remember you said that." Ironside leaned forward and looked directly into Prentis' eyes.
He squirmed in his chair. "You are wasting your time, Chief Ironside. The deaths were natural and you will find nothing in an autopsy that would say otherwise."
"Which is exactly what the killer was counting on. However, he made a mistake when he attacked Sister Agatha."
Prentis shook his head. "That was an accident. She fell from the shelf she had been climbing on."
"No, she was pushed."
Prentis could not stop the shocked look that began creeping onto his face. "I take it you have the evidence to back that up?"
Ironside had no doubt this man knew more about the murders than he was telling. "Her ankle has a bruise around it..."
Relief flooded his features. "Is that all? I don't think that proves a thing."
"You did not let me finish, Doctor. That bruise clearly showed the imprint of a man's hand."
"How do you know it was a man?"
"It would have taken the strength of a man to dislodge her from that shelf. He picked her up by the ankle and threw her backwards. I doubt that a woman could do that." Ironside continued to watch him closely. Prentis was beginning to look like a trapped animal.
"What evidence would you have that he picked her up?" His voice betrayed his nervousness.
"The bruises rose up the ankle indicating she was lifted," Ironside said, looking at him with the intensity in his blue eyes that always unnerved the most calm of criminals.
Prentis said nothing more. Ironside kept quiet while watching the doctor. Finally, he asked, "There were several of these similar deaths at San Francisco General while you were working there."
Prentis seemed to be daydreaming. "What?"
"I said there were similar deaths while you were at San Francisco General," Ironside repeated.
"Yes, well... like I said heart trouble quite often goes undetected."
"Does it, now?" the chief said sarcastically.
"What are you implying?"
"Nothing, Doctor. I get the facts and then I arrest the guilty. Believe me, I will find the person or persons responsible for this."
Prentis said nothing. He just looked back at Ironside with a blank look on his face.
"Incidentally, Doctor, did you see the man that ran out of Jody Dent's room?"
"No, I was not there at the time."
"That is rather convenient," the chief said, still staring at the doctor."
"I can't watch the patients all the time, Ironside." He watched the detective turn his chair and wheel towards the door.
Ironside turned his chair slightly back and looked over his shoulder. "Chief Ironside." He grabbed both sides of the doorframe and pulled his chair out into the hall.