“For the rest of this day, do not answer your door. Do not pick up your phone. Respond to no one. With vigilance, the danger will pass.”
The blue-haired woman nodded slowly, entranced.
I reached the familiar surfer on my office door, the thick mahogany and twin dead bolts so reassuring. Inside, on my desk, sat the same stack of invoices and bills that should have been filed last week, or the week before. It didn’t take long to save on my computer’s hard drive the vital files from Sara’s office.
As I was ejecting her floppy disk, my phone rang. I let it ring twice, then three times. For some reason I hesitated. Was I thinking of Madame Zenobia’s warning? I let it ring a fourth time. Just before my answering machine kicked in, I lifted the receiver.
“You are the ‘Surfing Detective,’ yes?” asked a Middle Eastern male voice.
“I’m Kai Cooke.” Another crank call?
“Mr. Cooke, I am Dr. Majerian, emergency room surgeon at Halekōkua Medical Center. You would kindly assist us, please, in locating the next of kin of a mainland accident victim?”
“Actually, I’m kind of busy with a case right now, but I can give you the name of another investigator.”
“You, Mr. Cooke, I called first,” the doctor continued, “because in her purse the victim had your business card. Last evening she was struck by a hit-and-run driver in Waikīkī”
“Waikīkī?”
“Correct, Sir.”
“Not Adrienne?”
“Yes, her Massachusetts driver’s license says ‘Adrienne M. Ridgely.’”
No words would come.
“Mr. Cooke? … Hello?”
I bolted out the door.
My Impala ripped along King Street at double the speed limit, through three yellow lights and one red. I squealed left against another red light at Punahou Street, then sped mauka up the hill toward the slopes of Tantalus. Just before the H-1 overpass, I screeched to the curb in front of Halekōkua Medical Center.
I ran to the emergency room and asked the first green smock I saw where I could find Adrienne. The orderly sent me to the ER admissions desk, where a receptionist sat behind a computer. She typed in Adrienne’s name and gazed at the screen.
“ICU,” she said. “Ms. Ridgely came out of surgery early this morning.”
“ICU?” I asked, breathless from my run.
“Intensive care. Her surgeon was Dr. Majerian.”
“Could you please page the doctor? Tell him it’s Kai Cooke. He’s expecting me.”
I stood huffing by the desk with my arms folded while she paged. “Dr. Majerian, call ER reception …”
A few minutes that felt like hours passed. Then the phone rang. The receptionist answered in whispered tones I couldn’t hear.
A minute later, a slight man with coffee-colored skin stepped off the elevator across the lobby and walked to the ER desk. His eyes were ebony and moist.
“How is Adrienne?” I asked.
He spoke softly: “Come, please, with me.”
We rode the elevator up to the second floor. “On Lewers Street the police found her, yes, at about ten last night in Waikīkī,” the doctor said. “From her purse was taken apparently nothing. Puzzling, no?”
“It was hit-and-run?”
Dr. Majerian nodded. He still hadn’t told me Adrienne’s condition. Now I was reluctant to ask.
We walked down a wide hallway ending at a pair of large double doors marked, Intensive Care–Medical Personnel Only. Dr. Majerian pushed through the doors into a big bay with several alcoves, each one holding a patient on a gurney surrounded by an awesome assemblage of high-tech medical machines. Nurses scurried from alcove to alcove. Patients were attached to the equipment through various tubes and lines and straps, like spacewalkers tethered to a mother ship. All looked utterly helpless. Ashen white, dependent for their existence on IV drips, oxygen hoses, tracheal tubes, and electronic hookups to measure heartbeat, pulse, blood pressure, body temperature.
It was a sobering sight. No wonder the hospital doesn’t let visitors in here. I
The blue-haired woman nodded slowly, entranced.
I reached the familiar surfer on my office door, the thick mahogany and twin dead bolts so reassuring. Inside, on my desk, sat the same stack of invoices and bills that should have been filed last week, or the week before. It didn’t take long to save on my computer’s hard drive the vital files from Sara’s office.
As I was ejecting her floppy disk, my phone rang. I let it ring twice, then three times. For some reason I hesitated. Was I thinking of Madame Zenobia’s warning? I let it ring a fourth time. Just before my answering machine kicked in, I lifted the receiver.
“You are the ‘Surfing Detective,’ yes?” asked a Middle Eastern male voice.
“I’m Kai Cooke.” Another crank call?
“Mr. Cooke, I am Dr. Majerian, emergency room surgeon at Halekōkua Medical Center. You would kindly assist us, please, in locating the next of kin of a mainland accident victim?”
“Actually, I’m kind of busy with a case right now, but I can give you the name of another investigator.”
“You, Mr. Cooke, I called first,” the doctor continued, “because in her purse the victim had your business card. Last evening she was struck by a hit-and-run driver in Waikīkī”
“Waikīkī?”
“Correct, Sir.”
“Not Adrienne?”
“Yes, her Massachusetts driver’s license says ‘Adrienne M. Ridgely.’”
No words would come.
“Mr. Cooke? … Hello?”
I bolted out the door.
My Impala ripped along King Street at double the speed limit, through three yellow lights and one red. I squealed left against another red light at Punahou Street, then sped mauka up the hill toward the slopes of Tantalus. Just before the H-1 overpass, I screeched to the curb in front of Halekōkua Medical Center.
I ran to the emergency room and asked the first green smock I saw where I could find Adrienne. The orderly sent me to the ER admissions desk, where a receptionist sat behind a computer. She typed in Adrienne’s name and gazed at the screen.
“ICU,” she said. “Ms. Ridgely came out of surgery early this morning.”
“ICU?” I asked, breathless from my run.
“Intensive care. Her surgeon was Dr. Majerian.”
“Could you please page the doctor? Tell him it’s Kai Cooke. He’s expecting me.”
I stood huffing by the desk with my arms folded while she paged. “Dr. Majerian, call ER reception …”
A few minutes that felt like hours passed. Then the phone rang. The receptionist answered in whispered tones I couldn’t hear.
A minute later, a slight man with coffee-colored skin stepped off the elevator across the lobby and walked to the ER desk. His eyes were ebony and moist.
“How is Adrienne?” I asked.
He spoke softly: “Come, please, with me.”
We rode the elevator up to the second floor. “On Lewers Street the police found her, yes, at about ten last night in Waikīkī,” the doctor said. “From her purse was taken apparently nothing. Puzzling, no?”
“It was hit-and-run?”
Dr. Majerian nodded. He still hadn’t told me Adrienne’s condition. Now I was reluctant to ask.
We walked down a wide hallway ending at a pair of large double doors marked, Intensive Care–Medical Personnel Only. Dr. Majerian pushed through the doors into a big bay with several alcoves, each one holding a patient on a gurney surrounded by an awesome assemblage of high-tech medical machines. Nurses scurried from alcove to alcove. Patients were attached to the equipment through various tubes and lines and straps, like spacewalkers tethered to a mother ship. All looked utterly helpless. Ashen white, dependent for their existence on IV drips, oxygen hoses, tracheal tubes, and electronic hookups to measure heartbeat, pulse, blood pressure, body temperature.
It was a sobering sight. No wonder the hospital doesn’t let visitors in here. I
Similar Books
