Son of Stone (Stone Barrington 21)

lock slowly, looking for one. He found a heavy, wrought-iron gate and could see a corner of the gardens through that, but it was locked, and he knew nothing about picking locks. He walked down to Second Avenue, then up Barrington’s street again. He was going to have to catch him entering or leaving his house, but he had no way of knowing when that might be.

He finally gave up and went down to Second Avenue to find someplace to eat.

Peter found the emergency room entrance to the hospital and went inside. The waiting area was packed with people waiting for treatment, many of them wet. He went to the admitting desk, and a woman in scrubs looked up from her desk. “May I help you?”

“Yes, please. I’m looking for a young woman who was brought in by ambulance.”

“Name?”

“Springer.”

The woman consulted her computer screen. “I’m sorry, we don’t have a patient named Springer.”

“Try Patrick.”

The woman looked at him oddly. “She has two names?”

“She might have used either.”

The woman checked her computer again. “First name?”

“Hattie.”

“Yes, she came in about two hours ago and is being seen by a doctor.”

“May I see her?”

“Not until she’s admitted,” the woman replied.

“Will she be admitted? Will she have to stay overnight?”

“I won’t know that until the doctor who is seeing her makes his report on her condition.”

“May I visit her before she’s admitted?”

“You’ll have to wait until I get her chart back and see if there’s an admitting order. Have a seat, and I’ll call you. What’s your name?”

“Peter,” he said.

“Last name?”

“Just Peter.” He went and found an empty seat, one that allowed him to look down a hallway. He had been there for five minutes when a large double door opened, and two ambulance drivers wheeled in a patient on a gurney, pushing it down the hallway and taking a right turn.

Peter got up and followed the gurney. He found himself looking through a window in a pair of double doors at a row of treatment tables, some of them occupied by patients. Behind the treatment tables was a row of cubicles, most with patients on tables, some with curtains drawn. As he watched, a man on an examining table sat up, and an orderly brought over a wheelchair. The patient got into the chair, and the orderly took his chart from the foot of the table and put it in the man’s lap. Peter stood back to let them pass through the double doors. Apparently, the man was being discharged.

He pushed open the door and walked briskly into the room, wanting to appear as if he knew where he was going. He walked along the row of cubicles and, four or five down, found Hattie, lying on a table, half sitting up. She looked relieved when she saw him.

He went and stood next to her. “Are you all right?”

“Yes, I’m fine. I was bleeding, but it stopped over an hour ago.

The doctor said he would discharge me in a few minutes, and that was half an hour ago.”

Peter pulled up a chair. “I was scared,” he said. “I came back from the movie, and they said you were in the emergency room.”

“I wanted to call you, but they took my bag away when they put me in the ambulance, and when I got here they wouldn’t let me use my cell phone.”

A very young man in scrubs and a white coat walked into the cubicle. “How are you feeling?” he asked Hattie.