It was already starting to get dark outside, making the stairs very dark, since the light on my landing had burned out again. I would have to call my landlord and tell him that for the outrageous rent I paid, I was ent.i.tled to service. So far no starving cat cries. I put my key in the lock, turned it, and pushed the door open. I groped for the light switch.
I know my office quite well. That"s why I was very surprised to crash into something. I was even more surprised to realize that I had hit it hard enough to force me sprawling back out the door and down the stairs. I landed with a heavy thud, at the half-flight landing.
The object that I had hit, or more accurately, that had hit me, was coming down the stairs after me. I couldn"t see very well, since my nose was bleeding, and having landed more upside down than not, the blood was running into my eyes. But I could see that there were two objects tromping down the stairs and Hepplewhite wasn"t coming to my rescue. I had no idea where my bag with the loaded gun had landed.
Object one kicked me in the side. I started yelling, more in pain than as a clever move to attract attention. That kick hurt like h.e.l.l. So did the next one. I rolled away and tried to get up, to at least get the blood flowing out of my eyes. I managed to get to my knees, but I was in a corner, with object two blocking my way downstairs. Number one pulled a knife out of his pocket and clicked the blade into place. Did I really want my eyes clear enough to see this? It looked like their orders were to rough me up, not kill me. For that, a quick gunshot would have * 99 *
sufficed. However, that knife didn"t look like a wonderful alternative to me. Number one took a swing at me. I managed to duck it. Then he made a lunge for my face. I got an arm up to block it, but the blade easily sliced through Danny"s gray sweater. It left a deep gash on my forearm. If I could get to my feet, I might make it. A couple of well-placed and lucky kicks were the only chance I had. Number one took another swing with the knife. I avoided it by hitting the floor. I tried to throw myself down the stairs with my hands, but they slipped in blood.
I wonder whose? I slid down two steps, on my stomach, leaving my back exposed to the knife. Number two put his foot on my shoulder, none too gently, and pinned me down. I braced myself for the blade in my back.
There was a thunderclap in the stairwell. Plaster and sheet rock fragments poured over me.
"I"ve called the police and they"re on their way," called an old woman"s voice from above us.
I looked up. Miss Clavish was standing there, in her prim navy blue dress, wearing white gloves and holding a large shotgun. That was the thunderclap-she had fired over our heads and into the wall.
"Get out of here, before I blow your brains out," she continued. I liked the blow your brains out part.
They took the hint. Men that big don"t scamper, but number one and two did the best approximation that they could, down the stairs and out of the building. Probably nothing in their contract called for them to deal with shotgun-toting old ladies. Contract, because this wasn"t just some random robbery that I had interrupted. Those men had been waiting for me. What a welcome home. First Danny had been right, now Ranson. It was galling to have such perfect friends.
"Here, dear, I think we"d better bind that arm," said Miss Clavish, arriving at my side, armed now with a first aid kit. She pushed back the torn sweater sleeve to expose my cut. I maneuvered myself to a sitting position, then slumped against the wall when I saw all the blood coming out of my body. Miss Clavish had me hold my cut arm up, to help slow the bleeding while she bandaged it. With my other arm, I rummaged in her first aid kit, got out a gauze pad, and held it against my nose, in an attempt to staunch the blood.
Now, the police arrived. They tried to ask a few questions, but every time I took the gauze pad off my nose to answer, blood gushed * 100 *
out. I gave up and clamped the b.l.o.o.d.y pad back over my nose. Miss Clavish suggested that these nice young policemen speed me to the nearest emergency room. Since Miss Clavish sounded like the fifth-grade teacher whom you always obeyed, they did so.
So for the second time today, I found myself at Aunt Greta"s favorite hospital. The only thing I like less than visiting hospitals is being a patient there. I didn"t have to wait in the four-hour emergency line. They let me inside very quickly. That"s the nice thing about blood, it gets attention.
I heard a couple of voices confer outside my cubicle. The only thing I caught was a, "Yes, Doctor James." I gathered that a Doctor James was going to have the privilege of binding my wounds. I didn"t care who, I just wanted them to hurry.
Dr. James entered. Of course, I should have known. I had a.s.sumed that Cordelia was a Holloway. She wasn"t. Somehow she had ended up being a James. She didn"t look too thrilled to see me, but whether it was the mess I was making or me personally, I couldn"t tell. She started working on my arm.
"What happened?" she asked, as she finished taking Miss Clavish"s bandage off my arm.
"The big brother of that first doorway I ran into."
"This is a knife wound," she pointed out.
"So it is." Blood started running out of my nose.
"We have to report this to the police," she said.
I did the best shrug I could from flat on my back. The police already knew.
"Hold still," she said as I flinched at something she was cleaning my arm with. She finished cleaning and started st.i.tching the wound. I did my best to hold still and not make my nose bleed any more than it had to. I closed my eyes so I didn"t have to watch the needle going in and out. But that started to make me feel queasy and light-headed. So I settled for staring fixedly at the ceiling, trying to find patterns in the water stains, until she was finished.
Then she started on my nose, taking my hand, with its b.l.o.o.d.y gauze pad, away. She poked and prodded for a moment, then said, "It"s not broken."
Good, I"d hate to have my beauty ruined. She tilted my head back and told me to breathe through my mouth. She started cleaning the * 101 *
blood off my face. We were very close and I found myself looking into her eyes. They were a deep blue, flecked with gray. There was a depth and intensity in them that I hadn"t noticed before. If her eyes were any true indication, then I had underestimated Cordelia James. For a moment, we were both aware of it, then we broke off, she by looking off to the side for something. I stared up at the ceiling.
"You need to find some new friends," she said as she started packing cotton up my nose. I grabbed her hand and held it, so I could reply.
"There was nothing friendly about this," I said, then let her hand go. "My friends don"t beat people up."
"An everyday mugging?"
"Not quite," I answered, between pieces of cotton.
"Couldn"t use your loaded gun?"
I shook my head no, which started it throbbing.
"Sorry," she said. "It"s not fair of me to ask questions when you"re like this."
Someone else appeared on my other side.
"Can she talk yet?" Sergeant Ranson on the scene.
"Let me finish packing her nose," Cordelia answered. She worked quickly. "You can talk, but try to keep your head tilted back." She started attending to a cut on my thigh that I didn"t know I had. s.h.i.t, that meant Danny"s pants were torn.
"Did you recognize those men from the old Riven place?" was Ranson"s first question.
I gingerly shook my head no. I had never seen those two before and I didn"t want to see them again.
"The Riven place?" Cordelia said. "That"s next to Granddad"s estate. That"s where that woman up in ICU was shot."
"Right," Ranson replied. "Our hero here would have been shot, too, if that bas.e.m.e.nt she was tied up in didn"t have an old coal drop for her to climb out of."
"The rope burn on your wrist," Cordelia said, putting two and two together.
"Yeah," Ranson replied for me. "And it looks like the mob sent you a message." She put a hand on my side for what she intended to be a comforting gesture. It wasn"t, it was too close to where I had been kicked. I jerked up and rolled away from the pain. I hadn"t paid much * 102 *
attention to my side while my arm had been bleeding. Now I was paying attention. Cordelia pulled my arm away from my side.
"Take it easy," she said. "Breathe in...out...in," and she paced me until I had stopped gasping and the pain was down to a dull throb. Then she cut away the sweater. Sorry, Danny.
"You got kicked," Ranson said on seeing my bruises.
"Yeah," I replied.
Cordelia was gently feeling my side. She stopped and said, "d.a.m.n it, it"s horrible enough to treat people with cancer and heart disease, the things that have no fault or blame. Then there are the car accidents and gun accidents and any other kind of accident stupidity can come up with. I don"t like those either. But how can someone deliberately come at another person with a knife and break a couple of ribs just for good measure?" She was very angry. "We don"t need people like you clogging up our hospitals."
"Sorry, Dr. James," I said in my now small and very nasal voice, "New Orleans"s finest wouldn"t let me bleed to death on the stairs."
"No, I"m sorry," she said. She bent over until her eyes were looking into mine and she held my gaze, deliberately this time. "I"m not angry at you. I"m furious at the men who put you here." She paused and took a deep breath. "Okay, enough soap-boxing for today." She went back to caring for my bruised ribs.
Ranson asked me some more questions about who, what, how, and why. Unfortunately my answers weighed heavily on the I-don"t-know side.
"I"ve got to head back to the station," she said, finishing her questioning. "While I"m there, I"m going to talk loudly, and at length, about how you want nothing more to do with any of this and that you have no intention of testifying."
I started to protest, to say that as long as Barbara Selby was in this hospital, I wasn"t dropping out, but Ranson waved me silent.
"This was a warning, Micky. You"ve caused them a lot of problems.
Someone connected to the police force is pa.s.sing information on and I want it pa.s.sed on that you"re not going to have anything more to do with the police or fighting drug rings. Understand?" Ranson said.
"She"s not going to be doing much of anything for a while,"
Cordelia answered.
"Good. I"ll come back later to see you," she said to me. Then to * 103 *
Cordelia, "Take care of her and make sure she doesn"t try anything foolish."
"You"ve got it, Joanne. Say h.e.l.lo to Alex for me," Cordelia replied and Ranson left.
Alex? Who was Alex? As in Alexandra Sayers, perhaps? Cordelia started poking on my side some more and I became preoccupied with more important things, like my threshold for pain. After a long (it seemed long) while, she said, "You"re lucky. It appears your ribs are bruised and not broken."
"Good, can I go home now?" I asked.
"I think you should stay at least overnight for observation," she answered, in typical doctor fashion.
"If I promise not to sue you for malpractice, can I leave?" I asked.
Being sick is not a luxury poor people can afford in this country. I always rate my medical needs on whether or not I worry about how much it costs. If the first thing that struck me about staying overnight in the hospital was how much it was going to cost me and how little I could afford to pay it, then I wasn"t damaged enough to have to stay in the hospital.
"What"s your hurry?" she asked.
"I hate hospital food."
She chuckled, then asked, "What"s the matter, don"t have health insurance?"
"Only the Mack truck variety." She gave me a questioning glance.
"In case of getting hit by a Mack truck and being in bed for six months,"
I explained.
"Well...did you get hit in the head?"
"No, I"m always like this."
"I want some X-rays of your ribs, if they"re negative and nothing else shows up-and you make good on your promise not to sue me- we"ll work something out." She smiled at me and then got an orderly to wheel me down to X-ray. After X-ray, I was deposited in an out-of-the-way examining room, given some pain medication, and left to enjoy it.
Cordelia showed up a couple of hours later.
"Your X-rays are negative. How do you feel?"
"I"m not ready to race the Iditarod, but then it doesn"t snow down here enough for me to worry about it."
"So you say. Let"s see you stand up and walk a straight line."
* 104 *
I slowly sat up, then slid off the examining table and a.s.sumed a standing position.
"Should I touch my fingers to my nose and recite the Pledge of Allegiance?" I asked to cover my unsteadiness.
"Not necessary," she replied. She gave me a thorough look over.
"Okay, let"s go."
She threw me an old sweatshirt to put on, obviously hers. Good thing America"s getting in shape these days and wearing baggy clothes or I"d have nothing to wear. I followed her all the way out of the building.
"No, this way," she said as I started to branch off.
"But the bus is this way."
"My car is this way."
She led the way to the parking lot. This was fortunate, because I wasn"t sure I had bus fare. Her car was a silver Toyota, a couple of years old. We got in and I gave her my address. She pulled out of the parking lot.
"How do you know Joanne Ranson?" Good detectives always ask questions, even if their noses are packed with cotton.
"Grandpa Holloway is a staunch law-and-order supporter. Every year around Mardi Gras, he has a big formal party for a.s.sorted law enforcement people. I always have to attend. So I"ve seen Joanne in pa.s.sing for a while now. Where did you meet her?"
I had to stop and think for a minute. I had met Ranson through Danny, but it had been socially, not professionally. I didn"t know if Cordelia knew that Ranson was gay and I didn"t think I should tell her I met Ranson at a party for girls only down in the Quarter. I was trying to come up with an alternate story, but the pain and drugs were slowing me down.
"Wait a second," Cordelia said. "You weren"t lovers, were you?"
"Us?" I said, my surprise at the question clearly showing.
"I guess not," Cordelia answered her own question.
"It was at some party in the Quarter a couple of years ago," I answered. Cordelia obviously knew that Ranson was a lesbian.
"This isn"t the best section of town," she said, noticing the neighborhood.
"But it"s not the worst," I replied, defending the surroundings of my humble abode.
* 105 *
"True. Have you worked with Joanne before?" For a doctor, Cordelia was being a good detective.
"Not really. We spar a lot." Before Cordelia could say that that was obvious, I clarified. "In karate. Once, after cla.s.s, we saw a mugging and Ranson and I ran the guy down. I guess you could say that was working together. She"s a tough fighter. Hard to read."