W is for Wasted (Kinsey Millhone 23)

When I reached the floor, I spotted a nurse’s aide emerging from a supply room, her arms loaded with clean linens. I flagged her down and asked if Eloise Cantrell was available.

“She’s at the nurse’s station.”

“Is she the little blonde?”

With exaggerated patience, the nurse’s aide said, “Noooo. Eloise is six feet tall and she’s African American.”

After that, it was no trick at all to pick Eloise from among the many white nurses at work. I took a seat in the waiting room within eye shot of the nurse’s station and leafed through an issue of a ladies’ magazine that was only four years out of date. I was impressed by all the uses there were for instant vanilla pudding. This homemaking business, while beyond my modest aspirations, never failed to amaze.

By the time Eloise left work, I was in the same corridor, lagging slightly behind to allow her to exit ahead of me. I followed her out of the building and tagged along in her wake. There were a number of pedestrians in the area, so she wasn’t alerted to my presence. I waited until she turned the corner from Chapel onto Delgado before I closed the gap between us. “Eloise? Is that you?”

She turned, clearly expecting to see a familiar face. Her lips parted as though she meant to speak.

“Kinsey Millhone,” I said, pausing in case she wanted to rejoice.

She was dark-skinned, her hair arranged in close lines of head-hugging braids, each of which ended in a sage-green bead that exactly matched her eyes. The hazel irises against the deep chocolate of her complexion was striking. I wouldn’t describe her expression as hostile, but it wasn’t welcoming.

“You called me a few months ago, looking for information about R. T. Dace.”

I waited to see if the name would ring a bell. “I thought you were saying Artie, remember that? But you were talking about Randall Terrence Dace . . . R.T,” I said, framing the initials in air quotes. Still no flash of recognition, so I tried again. “You asked for Mr. Millhone, thinking I was a guy.”

I could tell she remembered because she shut her mouth.

“I was curious where you picked up my name and number.”

I could see her weighing the pros and cons of a reply.

She said, “You were listed in his hospital chart as next of kin.”

“Are you aware he died ten days ago?” I asked.

Her tone was neutral. “I’m not surprised. He was in bad shape when I saw him last.”

“I was hoping you might answer a question or two.”

“Such as?”

“Did you know he’d enrolled in a drug trial?”

She thought about her answer briefly and then said, “Yes.”

“Are you acquainted with the physician in charge?”

“Dr. Reed. Yes.”

“Did he come into CCU while Terrence Dace was a patient?”

“Once as a visitor, yes. What makes you ask?”

“Someone told me Dace signed himself out of CCU without the doctor’s okay.”

Her stare was unyielding.

“Was there any discussion about why?” I asked.

She dropped her gaze, which made her impossible to read.

I plowed on. “His friends tell me he was scared to death of Dr. Reed. I wondered what the problem was. You have any idea?”

She turned and began walking away from me.

I followed six feet behind, my voice embarrassingly plaintive even to my own ears. “I heard Dr. Reed terminated him for noncompliance, but he was sober when he died. No alcohol or drugs in his system, so what was going on?”

She glanced back at me. “I work for the hospital. I’m not affiliated with the university. You want information about Dr. Reed’s work, talk to him. In the meantime, if you’re hoping I’ll sink to the level of rumor and gossip, you’re out of luck.”

She turned on her heel.

I stopped in my tracks and watched her walk away from me. What had she said? If I was hoping she’d “sink to the level of rumor and gossip”?

“What rumors?” I called after her.

No answer.

•   •   •

I wasn’t giving up on this. Henry had said that if I met with Reed and didn’t feel he’d leveled with me, I should talk to someone else. Obviously, in approaching Eloise Cantrell I was searching too far afield. Anything she knew would be hearsay. I needed someone more directly involved with him. The obvious answer was Mary Lee Bryce. She’d know what was going on behind the scenes. The problem was, I had no way to get to her without going through Willard. I could call her directly, but how would I explain who I was or why I was so interested in the work she did? I only knew about her because Willard had hired Pete. The notion of approaching him created a mild thrill of uneasiness. It wasn’t my job to keep his dealings with Pete a secret from his wife. I wasn’t responsible for protecting either of them. Willard wasn’t my client and Pete was dead. There was a certain, subterranean moral code in play, but surely, I could think of a way around that old thing.