Rohn Federbush - Sally Bianco 03 - The Recorder's Way Read online

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  Copyright 2014 by Rohn Federbush

  Book Cover Design and Book Formatting by Rebel Ink Designs

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from the author at [email protected].

  This book is a work of fiction. The characters, events, and places portrayed in this book are products of the author’s imagination and are either fictitious or are used fictitiously. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author.

  For more information on the author and her works, please visit Rohn’s Website at http://www.RohnFederbush.com.

  Table of Contents

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Other Books by Rohn Federbush

  About Rohn Federbush

  Prologue

  “And while the meat was yet between their teeth, ere it was chewed, the wrath of the Almighty was kindled against the people, and God emaciated their souls.” Numbers 11:33

  1990, Ann Arbor

  Schneider Residence

  The victim, seven-year-old Larry Schneider came home early from Little League. His mother, Amy, invited his coach in, even though the house was a wreck, and she was still wearing her bathrobe. The coach instructed her to check Larry’s temperature. He needed to get back to the game to tell the other parents about Larry’s rash. After he left, Amy found the digital thermometer in the bathroom’s catch-all drawer. When she read how high her son’s temperature was, she immediately called his father at the computer company office.

  “104 degrees?” Tom asked.

  Amy was accustomed to hearing censure in her husband’s voice. “The coach brought him home. I guess he played too hard. I thought his cold was better this morning. Dr. Handler’s advice did keep the fever down with all that aspirin. Larry’s lying down on the sofa, watching the news.”

  “Larry’s too young to watch the news.”

  When Tom wasn’t making her feel guilty, he settled for treating her like an idiot. She tried to ameliorate the situation. “He seems happy enough. He did complain about too many cobwebs. I don’t see any.”

  “Force some fluids down him.” Tom was shouting. “I’ll be right home.”

  Amy rinsed a glass and made a chocolate shake for her son. Larry took one sip and set his glass down on the littered coffee table. She didn’t press him. She dressed and busied herself clearing some of the debris out of the room. Actually, Tom was a stickler for tidiness. Some might even call him compulsive. She could not care less. Life was too important to chase dust around. Books needed to be read, thoughts followed. One room would get cleaned just long enough for the rest of the house to appear messy in comparison. Amy would no sooner succeed in removing all the grime from Larry’s train set, which ran around a high ledge in the front room, before Tom would complain the plants around the front windows had sprouted spider webs, again. The dog, her puppies, and three cats seemed to choose the neatest room to shed their ceaseless balls of fur. Amy actually loved rainy days, because her husband could spy less of the prevailing dust.

  “Can’t you reach those cobwebs?” Larry waved his thin arms above his head, frowning as if fresh pain from his headache stabbed him.

  Amy twisted ice water from the washcloth before tenderly replacing it on her son’s searing brow. “Daddy will be here soon.”

  “Good,” the child said. “He’ll be able to reach the spiders for you.”

  There were no cobwebs, no spiders either. To entertain him while they waited for his father, Amy switched on the Lionel train set. As the cars circled the eight-inch wide shelf, accumulated dust particles from the tracks danced down slants of the late afternoon sun. Amy shoved last night’s supper dishes into the dishwasher just as her husband slammed the front door.

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  Tom Schneider centered his briefcase on the marble entrance table. He hung his raincoat by its inside label onto the antique coat rack before entering the cluttered front room. He picked up his son’s chocolate shake, tasted it and glared at his wife.

  “What’s wrong, now?” Amy’s voice never lost its tinge of whine to his ears.

  “You’re hopeless. The chocolate milk is sour. How is he supposed to drink this? Give him a glass of water. With ice!” He sat down next to his son and felt his brow. “Not feeling chipper?”

  Larry grinned. “You came home.”

  Tom examined the glass of water Amy offered before handing it to his son. His wife, whose nose was constantly in a book, was not a stringent housekeeper, but she was a loving mother. Larry only sipped the water and leaned back against the pillows. “Rough game?” Tom asked.

  “No. I dressed, but when it was my turn to bat, the coach felt my head. Mom can’t reach those cobwebs.” Larry’s arm jerked toward the clean ceiling.

  “So you haven’t been running around all day?” Tom unbuttoned the throat of his son’s sweaty baseball jersey. A purple rash ran down his neck, covering his chest.

  “I fell asleep in class. Mrs. Dobson sent home a note for you. She thinks I stay up too late at night.”

  “Get his coat,” Tom directed Amy. “Call that quack, Dr. Handler, and tell him to meet us at the hospital.”

  After he’d wrapped his lethargic son in a blanket, Tom noticed Larry didn’t want to keep his head upright. The boy leaned back on his father’s arm. He whispered his throat hurt. In the car, Tom kept the boy cradled in his arms.

  In an unbuttoned trench coat hastily thrown over a dingy housedress, his wife sped through red lights, frantically laying on the horn to race to St. Anthony’s emergency room. Tom wasn’t happy with her explanation about Dr. Handler’s answering service taking her message about Larry’s bumps.

  The hospital entrance area was filled with frantic parents and children dressed in Little League outfits. The other kids looked tired and hungry, but healthy. The general bedlam was punctuated by worried admonishments to, “Sit still,” by more than a dozen anxious parents.

  “Larry’s coach must have warned the parents about Larry’s hives,” Tom told Amy. When Larry moaned and tried to push away from Tom’s arms, saying there was a fire in front of his eyes, Tom screamed at the nurses, “Do something!”

  Amy pulled the collar of her trench coat over her ears. She rocked back and forth, singing a biblical dirge to herself, “Why has the wrath of the Almighty been kindled against the people? Why has God emaciated our souls?”

  The other occupants of the waiting room grew silent and moved away, as if Tom Schneider might become violent, or Amy might go berserk.

  When Larry was finally wheeled into an isolation room, Nurse Sharon Daley knew immediately what was wrong. The child was delirious and hallucinating from the high fever. Without waiting for permission, Sharon started an IV needle in the boy’s arm and prepared an antibiotic drip.

  Her supervisor, Marilyn Helms asked the parents to wait outside, telling them their doctor would be sending the boy down for an MRI.

  Sharon and Marilyn took turns staying with the dying child waiting for Dr. Benjami
n Hnndler. They traded off making trips to monitor two other patients of the University’s consultant staff. Jean Bacon, an end-stage diabetic, was in a coma and slipping rapidly. Dr. Cornell was notified they were making her comfortable. Charlie Klondike, a seriously ill alcoholic, was resting comfortably after a tiring bout of D.T.’s. His doctor was also his younger sister, Dr. Dorothy Whidbey, who told Sharon to keep her informed if his condition changed.

  Half an hour later, Marilyn closed the door in the isolation room and shook her head at Sharon. “Dr. Handler called. Said to tell the doctor on-call to authorize the antibiotic drip. All the University’s consultant services were terminated by St. Anthony’s for budget reasons. He told me to find the kid another doctor. It’s seven o’clock at night. Where am I going to come up with another pediatrician?”

  “Dr. Cornell never mentioned being let go.” Sharon placed a pillow under Larry’s shoulders to allow his swelling head to loll back even farther.

  “Neither did Dr. Whidbey,” Marilyn said. “I doubt Charlie’s sister wants anyone else to be called in to witness their family’s problem child.”

  When St. Anthony’s staff doctor came in, Sharon showed him how the boy’s knee wouldn’t relax after she bent it towards his stomach. His body was covered with a darkening inflammation.

  “You’re right,” The small Indian doctor said on his way out. “It’s spinal meningitis, advanced. Make him comfortable. There’s nothing to be done at this late stage. I’ve got more than I can handle reassuring the mob outside their offspring haven’t been infected.”

  After he left, Marilyn twisted the buttons on her tight uniform. “I’m not going to tell his parents Dr. Handler is not coming.”

  “I’ll do it.” Sharon knew the parents would be hysterical, but it was already too late. Even when the kid was given a spinal tap, his brain would be far beyond damaged.

  “Wait a half-hour,” Marilyn ordered.

  “He’ll be dead by then. I’ll take his parents to the chapel to pray. Maybe they’ll be better prepared.”

  Marilyn agreed. “At least they’ll be spared the anguish of scurrying around hopelessly trying to find help.”

  Sharon returned to Larry Schneider’s bedside after she had seen to settling the parents as best she could. “I prayed for his early release to death.”

  The two nurses waited together then, keeping the boy clean from the vomit and diarrhea. When Larry’s suffering seemed unbearable, Marilyn asked Sharon to check on Charlie Klondike for her.

  Before she left, Sharon saw Marilyn preparing to give the writhing child a large dose of morphine. She knew Marilyn would lose her nursing position at St. Anthony’s Hospital for the infraction. Dr. Handler might create a position for her at the University hospital to cover up his part in the disaster. Nurses were always needed. Sharon planned to suggest Marilyn join the National Guard. She seemed tough enough. Sharon didn’t know who to blame more, Dr. Handler or Marilyn Helms, but murder had been committed.

  Later, a doctor drained Larry’s spine. Only then did the hospital release the child’s body to the funeral parlor. If they hadn’t resorted to the cosmetic drains, the boy’s swollen skin under his scalp, the fluids around his neck and tragic bloated face would not have permitted the parents to recognize their own child.

  Sharon never discussed the fact those exact procedures might have saved the abandoned lad earlier. Marilyn agreed, Dr. Handler failed his Hippocratic Oaths, “to keep the good of the patient as the highest priority.”

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  First Week of March, 2008

  Interstate 94, Michigan

  Eighteen years later after her stint in Iraq, Marilyn Helms reluctantly rolled down the window of her Ford Taurus. “My dog jumped on me.”

  “License.” The short state trooper was all business.

  Marilyn fished around her candy-bar stuffed purse to find the identification card. “Is it all right if I get out of the car to dump out my purse?”

  The officer stepped back from the driver’s door.

  Marilyn deposited the contents of her bag onto the car’s hood. “It’s in here somewhere.” She had purposefully left the door open and Rufus took advantage of the situation, hopping onto the roadway. “Oh, catch my dog!” she yelled.

  The officer stood still, watchful of her movements. “Call him.”

  Marilyn did call him. She snickered inside, from the effect of the prescription diet pills or the knowledge her Irish setter appeared to be no threat. She’d rescued him from the Army’s attack unit. Actually, they rescued each other, when she’d been dishonorably discharged and the dog was listed to be put down. Rufus sat at her side as she handed her license to the cop.

  “I’ve been following you for two miles.” The trooper scrutinized her reaction. “You’re weaving all over the road. I need you to take a breath test.”

  “No problem.” Marilyn had the misfortune of giggling. Rufus wagged his tail.

  The officer frowned. “And that’s funny because ...?”

  “Nothing. Sorry.” The irony of being able to pass the test for alcohol while still being high on diet pills amused Marilyn. She repacked her purse trying to suppress her laughter.

  The officer moved closer and Rufus growled a warning. “Drugs?”

  “Yep!” Marilyn laughed openly. “You can’t touch me. They’re prescribed.”

  “Hands on the car!” the officer cried, moving in to push her shoulders down.

  But Marilyn possessed a concealed weapon. “Rufus, attack!”

  Within a matter of seconds, the cop, gun drawn, was on his back on the pavement with Rufus’ fangs at the ready on his neck. “Get this dog off me before I shoot him!”

  “Rufus, sit.”

  The cop kept his gun on the dog. “Now put your hound in your car and climb into the back seat of the cruiser.”

  ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

  First Sunday in May, 2008

  Adrian, Michigan

  Marilyn Helms moved the sautéed chicken parts to the far corner of the salad buffet hoping the ravenous horde would fill their plates with raw vegetables before homing in on the good stuff. The next entrée table was heaped with roast beef and salmon roll-ups. The addicts attending the convent’s recovery retreat would not starve to death. They treated Marilyn as if she were a part of their group. A tall woman commented that she, too, was a member of OA, Overeaters Anonymous.

  Marilyn’s knowledge of the various twelve-step programs was purely hearsay. She did, however, understand the need for a fix. Prescription diet pills alleviated her eating binges. She knew the first step of the twelve was a statement about believing in God. That would be a problem. Marilyn surmised from her nursing experience if there was a mastermind, He or She failed to protect the innocent from suffering. No sense believing in a cruel or uninterested God.

  The smells from sliced onions and bacon in the heaps of German potato salad caused Marilyn’s mammoth stomach to growl in protest.

  Sister James Marine had instructed her to wait until everyone else had eaten before choosing her own food. It hardly seemed fair. Of course, since she was a kitchen helper serving out a community-service sentence, Marilyn couldn’t complain. “Sister,” Marilyn asked instead, “what does it mean to be free from the bondage of self?”

  “We are free from the old self when we have a new sense of being in Christ.” The good woman seemed to think Marilyn understood her mumbo jumbo.

  Marilyn found it difficult to tell her honestly not a word in the answer penetrated her brain, nor did her soul embrace any meaning.

  Rufus bumped into her leg. At least the Dominican nuns at St. Anthony’s allowed her Irish setter to accompany her. Dogs were sweeter to her than any man had been. Dr. Cornell had been the most considerate of the three doctors in her life. Now he was gone. Death was so inconvenient. At the start, Dr. Cornell was sixty, so she told him she was only twenty to secure his sympathy, guilt really. Self-reproach was an easy sell. Marilyn could teach telemarketers a t
hing or two about the lucrative benefits of guilt. Her own remorse lasted until she got angry enough to find a monetary solution for her job loss. She’d done all she knew how to do for the patients eightteen years earlier. All three of the doctors agreed with her, but now there were only two medical benefactors.

  Marilyn scratched behind her dog’s ears. She immediately checked to see if one of the sisters might ask her to change the bothersome plastic gloves, again. Rufus was her only friend. Of course, one had to look at a dog in the light of reality. Dogs, pets were all really parasites. If you didn’t feed them, like if a person died and the pets were locked in the room, they would probably eat their owners, if need be. She didn’t like the idea of anything gnawing on her bones. She stifled a laugh at herself, as if anyone could dig through her fat to find bones.

  Rufus slept in the corridor outside Marilyn’s room at the convent precisely for that reason. Her room was filled with a stash of food stolen from the sisters. Once, when she’d swiped a full box of chocolates off the reception desk, she was forced to consume the whole box sitting in one of the main floor bathroom stalls. The sisters washed their hands and speculated on what had happened to the candy. Marilyn left the empty box in the waste bin stuffed under a handy supply of used paper towels.

  If boredom could kill a person, Marilyn knew she must be close to dying. Her knees ached. She knew without looking her ankles were swollen after standing around for an hour, waiting for the skinny old biddies to peck around the cafeteria’s spread. Not one of them had an ounce of extra meat on their bones. Marilyn knew she could be as slim as any of them, some day. Some day soon if she could get out of the convent long enough to hit up the doctors for a few more prescription diet pills. Dr. Handler would require a visit, but Dr. Whidbey would phone in a prescription to Adrian. Mother Superior wouldn’t need to know what the pills were for, confidentiality and all that.

  As if evoked by her thoughts, Sister James Marine quietly reappeared next to the empty cash register. Marilyn had learned, unhappily, the guests paid for their rooms and food when they registered.