Festival of Deaths(90)

“If our friend is so damned smart,” John said, “why doesn’t our friend bolt right this minute? Why doesn’t he or she or it just hit you over the head for all this ‘our friend’—”

“When I give you pronouns, you get ideas,” Gregor interrupted patiently. “Go send somebody for that tire iron. You may have to chase it to the hospital. What was that we were saying about how DeAnna Kroll was going to get Itzaak there? Whatever. And then let’s go. It doesn’t make any sense for us to be standing around here. We’ve got work to do.”

“Work to do,” John Jackman muttered. “Sometimes I think I’m crazy ever to talk to you.”

Then he stalked back across the foyer, opened the fire door, and stuck his head through.

“Pilsudski! Estavez! Get over here. I’ve got something I want you to do.”





3


ONE OF THE THINGS Gregor always forgot between murder investigations was the media, by which he meant the Philadelphia Inquirer and the local television news. He didn’t forget that the media were there. He got the paper every morning and he watched the evening news at least once or twice a week. What he forgot was the way they behaved when they scented blood, and how much worse they were when the blood they scented had a tinge of celebrity in it. A murder and an attempted murder among the staff of The Lotte Goldman Show—with yet another murder, back in New York, to use for atmosphere—was just what these people liked the best. By the time Gregor and John Jackman got to St. Elizabeth’s hospital, the place was literally coated with reporters and photographers and stringers from the wire services with connections to the suburban weeklies. Gregor wondered how they had heard about this, who had called them. Monitoring the police band all by itself wouldn’t do. Monitoring the police band, they would have known there was an attempted murder. They would not have known there was this attempted murder. Gregor saw a young man in black sweats and black sneakers with a badge on his chest that said CBS. Whether he was really from CBS or just trying to crash the party, there was no way to know. Gregor saw a thin young woman with a half dozen cameras slung over her shoulders get knocked against a lamppost by another thin young woman with a notebook in her hand. A third thin young woman got out of the second thin young woman’s way before she could be knocked to the side herself.

“Wonderful manners these people have got,” Gregor commented.

John Jackman grunted.

They had come down to the hospital in a patrol car with the siren blasting. The siren was still blasting, but nobody was paying any attention to it. The entrance to St. Elizabeth’s parking garage was blocked by people. No amount of extra beeping and blooping would get them to move. They were stuck almost directly opposite St. Elizabeth’s front doors. The front doors were at the top of a long flight of shallow marble steps that led down to a gently curving drive that made a kind of smiley face in the road it came off of. Smiley face. Now Gregor knew he was losing it. A young man leaped onto the top of the police car and plastered himself against the windshield, peering inside. Even with the heater going and the siren wailing and the cop behind the wheel honking his horn to get the young man off, Gregor could hear what the young man had to say.

“It’s Demarkian!” he was shouting at the top of his lungs. “Right in here! It’s Demarkian!”

“Maybe I’ll get out and fire a warning shot,” John Jackman said.

Gregor sincerely doubted that a warning shot would do any good. Not a single person in the crowd would believe John Jackman meant it. Killing somebody would do some good or even wounding them a little, but neither of those things was a politically viable alternative. Moving the police car into the parking garage wasn’t a materially viable alternative. Now that they knew who was in it, the crowd would never let it pass. Gregor had never in his life felt so much in need of the National Guard.

“I think we’re going to have to make a run for it,” Gregor said.

“Run where?”

“Right up to the front doors. They won’t push too hard, John. These are not people who are used to getting hurt.”

“Maybe we could get them used to it.”

“On the count of three, I’m going to open this door and bolt. Be ready.”

“Why? Nobody is interested in me.”

“Three,” Gregor said.

So many people were leaning against the door, he almost couldn’t open it. Then someone out there realized what was happening and stepped back. Gregor shoved hard with his shoulder and the door sprang open. Gregor stuck his legs out into the street and a young woman fell into his lap.