Dead Air (Sammy Greene Thriller) Read online

  To the board of regents, the chancellor pleaded financial necessity. With government grant funds providing less and less economic support, he’d explained, EU would be forced to take a backseat in science to major research centers like Harvard, Stanford, and MIT whose international reputations guaranteed first-pick for limited grants. The institute was touted as a positive example of the new spirit of scientific cooperation for the global community of the new millennium less than a decade ahead.

  But the protesters remained undeterred. So much so that one demonstration led to a riot, resulting in a dozen injured students and police. It had been several months before calm returned to EU. Today, the Nitshi Research Institute’s bucolic setting belied past tempests. The hillside grounds once trampled by rioters were lush with overgrowth; the air once choking with tear gas was scented with pine. Ellsford graduate students in biology and chemistry worked side by side with visiting fellows from renowned Japanese research programs. Everything Dean Jeffries had promised, Reed mused, had come to pass — Japanese and Americans together stretching the horizons of science and technology, freely sharing their information and discoveries.

  That is, on floors one through three.

  The fourth floor was off limits to everyone but a select few. Dr. Palmer led Reed to an elevator marked PRIVATE and placed his plastic card face up, the magnetic code instructing the car to travel straight to the top, bypassing the other floors.

  When the doors slid open, Reed struggled not to gawk. He’d toured the first three floors with a group of medical students some months earlier, more than a little impressed with the quality of the labs. But to get access to this — something out of a science-fiction movie. The titanium-plated walls resembled the corridors of the Starship Enterprise.

  A shutter snapped. “Welcome Dr. Palmer.” Reed spun around, stunned. The voice of the tiny silver robot facing him was part Bart Simpson, part Elmer Fudd.

  “Hello, CARL.” Palmer explained that the acronym stood for Computer Aided Robotics for Learning. “Carl is state of the art — complete with infrared scanners for short distances, sonar for longer, lasers, TV cameras, the works.”

  “Your guest will need a pass.” A tray emerged from within the machine. “Place your right hand here,” the robot commanded Reed. Within moments, his prints had been copied and processed. “Reed Wyndham, fourth-year medical student, Ellsford University Medical School, 3304 Menlo Avenue, Apartment number 2B, phone number: 617-555-9748. Social security number: 555-03-1806.”

  “How — ?” Reed blurted, as seconds later, a plastic card similar to Palmer’s appeared on the tray.

  “Keep it with you at all times. Follow me, sir,” Carl lisped.

  The robot turned, gliding silently along a labyrinth of white tiled corridors, negotiating corners with programmed ease. They passed a couple of Asian men in lab coats who nodded to Palmer. Must be developing new drugs in this area, Reed guessed. No wonder it was restricted. That kind of research demanded utmost confidentiality and security, explaining all the miniature TV cameras hanging from the ceilings.

  Finally, the corridor forked two ways. From a passage to the right came the low hum of machinery. Pointing the other way, a single sign read in English and Japanese: PATHOLOGY.

  The robot stopped at the door, but Palmer ushered Reed inside a fluorescent-lit, formaldehyde-smelling room lined with counters, shelves, and sinks. A long soapstone table stood in the center on which lay the newly deceased body of a young olive-skinned man.

  “Sir?” Reed ventured.

  “Yes?”

  “May I ask why we’re doing this post?” He’d been told the dead man was an undergrad who committed suicide. Reed knew that Palmer had been a pathologist before turning to immunology and research, but it seemed unusual for him to be performing the autopsy. “I mean, instead of the coroner.”

  “Long story,” the silver-haired professor smiled easily. “Bottom line, this is one of my HIV-positive patients. Frankly, the ME would just as soon we do the post here. Don’t worry, it’s all very official. Your first one?”

  “Third.” Reed replied. “The others were — older.”

  Palmer reached into one of the lockers lining the far wall and handed Reed shoe covers, a plastic apron, and rubber gloves. “You’ll need these too,” he said, adding a mask and goggles.

  Palmer snapped on surgical gloves, and stepped up to the table.

  Reed took his place on the opposite side, facing Palmer. He adjusted the overhead light, its beam bathing the nude body stretched before them in a rectangle of iridescence. He couldn’t help thinking how vulnerable the boy appeared. By the fourth year of medical school, Reed had seen his share of death, but had never overcome his overwhelming sense of sadness at facing mortality in one so young. Perhaps it was simply the reminder that even at twenty-five he himself was not immortal. This case, though, seemed doubly poignant. Did the knowledge that his diagnosis carried an ominous prognosis lead the young man to take his own life? The fresh venipuncture marks on both arms made him wonder if he’d seen Palmer recently. The massive head wound and obvious limb fractures were signs of a painful end. Such a tragedy.

  “Ready?”

  Reed nodded.

  With his gloved left hand providing traction, Palmer made the typical Y-shaped autopsy incision from the points of each shoulder to the middle of the chest and then down to the pubic bone.

  Reed handed him a pair of branch cutters to cut the ribs, clipping all of them from the diaphragm right up to the clavicle.

  Palmer pointed to several large rib fractures. “No doubt they were sustained in the fall.”

  Reed watched his preceptor remove the breastbone. It lifted off easily, like a box top, exposing the entire chest cavity.

  “Heart and lungs look good on gross,” Palmer reported. “Of course, the microscopic will be telling.” Tying off the carotid artery, he removed the whole chest block — heart, lungs, trachea, bronchi — laying them out on separate trays on a steel cart and covering them with a towel.

  “Want blood cultures?” Reed asked, anticipating the nod. He had a long syringe ready for the former pathologist to insert in the sac around the boy’s heart, drawing a large tube of blood for the lab.

  Palmer next tackled the abdomen. He pulled out the intestine, coiled round and round the belly like a large serpent. “Liver and spleen seem untouched by disease,” he noted. “Hand me a couple syringes.” With Reed’s help, he took various fluids for testing, placing them in separately labeled specimen bottles. Then, returning to the organs laid out on the trays, he took multiple samples from each for microscopic examination.

  “Just the head now and we’re through.” Palmer began reflecting back the scalp. Despite the fact that the skull had been crushed by the fall, he needed to use the power vibrating saw to cut through to the brain. Once exposed, he lifted it out and plopped it into a pan. Wielding a long bladed knife similar to a butcher’s, he made serial cuts for future review. It was all very efficient, requiring little conversation. Just as well, Reed thought. Even after working with Palmer for the past two months, he still felt awkward around him.

  Less than an hour later, Palmer began proficiently wrapping up the procedure. Reed stood by, wondering how best to help. “Should I make any notes in the chart?” he asked, picking up the victim’s file from the counter and flipping through to the last page.

  Palmer jerked it from his hand. “No!” he snapped. Then in a more reasonable tone, “No, it’s uh, I’ll do it. I need to sign the report anyway. And you, my boy,” he said, placing a collegial arm over Reed’s shoulder and pushing him toward the door, “need to get some shut-eye. I expect to see you for rounds bright and early tomorrow morning.” Palmer pressed a button mounted on the wall, adding with a rare warm smile, “You’ve been a big help.”

  Seconds later, the silver robot appeared at the entrance to the autopsy room. “You rang?”

  “Please escort Dr. Wyndham out, Carl.”

  “After me, doct
or.”

  Reed followed the machine through the tiled maze, back to the elevator where he relinquished his plastic pass as requested. All the way down to the lobby, he reveled in the praise he’d received.

  You’ve been a big help.

  Not much, but significant, coming from a man who rarely gave compliments. He’d have to keep on his toes. And just maybe, he’d get that recommendation he needed for a choice residency.

  That thought alone was enough to extinguish any notion that something odd just occurred on the fourth floor of the Nitshi Research Institute.

  At least two hours before the autopsy was complete, the medical examiner’s computer system had been accessed and a final certified report filed: Sergio Pinez, EU freshman, cause of death: multiple blunt trauma; manner of death: suicide (jumped from height).

  9:40 P.M.

  Sammy rubbed her weary eyes and tried to suppress a yawn. Hours of searching had turned up an incomplete collection of campus newspapers from her freshman year. She was hoping the story she remembered was in one of the survivors she’d scattered on the dust-streaked library floor.

  The faded type blurred into the stained yellow newsprint made the articles difficult to read. Still, she struggled on.

  Her growling stomach reminded Sammy that she’d barely eaten that day—just an English muffin before morning class and an apple at noon. It was now after nine-thirty. She massaged her neck and shoulders and did a few graceful stretches, secure from prying eyes in her distant stack hideaway. Another large pile of newspapers awaited her search and she briefly debated the prospect of giving up for the night. Journalism won out over dinner, however, and she dove into the next set of papers.

  Minutes later, she found it. Barely legible, portions of the article were destroyed by a large water stain. But enough remained to refresh her memory of the event early in her freshman year. Professor Yitashi Nakamura, a respected Japanese-American microbiologist had been found dead in his office on North Campus from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

  A police investigation concluded that Nakamura, who had been herded into one of the U.S. internment camps that imprisoned Japanese-Americans during World War II, suffered from delayed post-traumatic stress syndrome leading to depression and, ultimately, suicide. The gun, a .22 semiautomatic, with five remaining bullets was clutched in his hand. And, Sammy noted with a shudder, on the floor by his desk, broken and bent, lay the bronze Ellsford Teaching Award he’d received the day before. Survived by his wife and two grown children, the article stated that Mrs. Nakamura planned to return permanently to Kyoto, her husband’s birthplace.

  Sammy made a Xerox copy of the article, checked the campus directory, then grabbed her purse, threw on her jacket, and hurried from the library in the direction of Professor Conrad’s home. Running at top speed, she reached his two-story Queen Anne near South Campus in less than twenty minutes.

  It looked as though someone had begun a badly needed renovation, then abruptly stopped. A light coat of fresh yellow paint only partially covered the white primer underneath, the fish scale siding on the upstairs turret was coming apart. The shutters were drawn with no light visible through the windows. She leaned against the newel post on the broad front porch to catch her breath, then knocked firmly on the splintered door.

  Sammy strained to listen for footsteps, but heard nothing. She knocked even more loudly.

  Still no response.

  Glancing at her watch, she frowned and began shuffling down the front steps, almost missing the faint “Who is it?” from behind the door.

  “Professor. Please, I have to talk to you. It’s Sammy.”

  The door slowly opened a crack, held in place by a rusty chain. Conrad’s bloodshot eye met hers. “Not short for Samantha. I know.” His tone was unwelcoming. “What do you want?”

  “May I come in for a second? There’s something I’d like to ask you.”

  The door remained chained. “So you can broadcast more of my secrets on campus radio?”

  “Fair enough. What if we just talk for a few minutes ‘off the record’?”

  “Is there such a thing?”

  “With me, yes.” Sammy looked openly and intently at the professor’s disheveled visage.

  “Oh, all right, come in.” Peering behind her into the darkness, Conrad unhooked the chain and hurried her inside. He latched the door closed as soon as she entered. In the dim hall, she could see he was wearing an old sweat suit, socks, and no shoes.

  “Thanks. Hope I didn’t wake you.”

  He led her to the front room. “Couldn’t sleep.”

  Conrad switched on a table lamp, illuminating a cozy, eclectic, and thoroughly chaotic living area. A small French provincial patterned sofa, two mismatched leather armchairs, and an oak rolltop desk filled most of the room. On the far wall were bookshelves tightly packed with science textbooks while several lopsided piles of research journals lay on the scuffed oak wood floors, yellow Post-its flagging areas of interest.

  A few photographs of Conrad and a dark-haired woman were also displayed. Sailing, skin diving, hiking, the attractive couple always smiling, holding each other in a warm embrace. The woman must be his wife, Sammy presumed, wondering why he still kept her picture when everyone on campus knew she’d left him for another professor nearly a year ago.

  Without waiting for an invitation to sit, Sammy created a place for herself on the sofa between a stack of books, opposite from Conrad’s chair by the rolltop desk. She draped her jacket on the sofa arm and rummaged in her oversize handbag amidst her tape recorder, notebook, makeup, and pens before finally extracting the Xerox copy. “Look at this,” she said, handing it to Conrad as she laid her purse on the hardwood floor.

  “Just a minute.” He reached for his reading glasses. “I need my specs.” Scanning the story, his face paled. “Why are you showing me this?” He shoved the article back at her.

  “You knew him?”

  Conrad’s response was guarded. “He was a very well-respected professor.”

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “Yes.” His expression was neutral.

  Sammy stared directly into his stony face. “They say he killed himself.”

  “Yes.” Conrad didn’t blink.

  “Why?”

  His tone was wary. “Why ask me?”

  She tapped the article. “Look at this. Paragraph after paragraph of praise and eulogies. Hundreds of publications. Over thirty scientific awards. Not only a full professor with tenure, but the guy brings in millions of dollars a year in federal grants to the university. He’s about to be crowned king of Ellsford — and he kills himself. Why?”

  “People have personal demons.”

  “Married over forty years and a new grandfather.” She looked at Conrad again. “His wife says in the article that they were planning a second honeymoon.”

  Conrad snapped back. “What makes you think I’ve got an answer?”

  “Because of what you said back in your office about the teaching award. You were trying to tell me something.”

  For a second, Conrad’s eyes drifted to a brown envelope on the desktop next to his computer. He seemed about to say something, but stopped himself. “I was speaking metaphorically. And drunk.”

  “That’s it? Nothing else?”

  “That’s it. Just the intoxicated ramblings of a weary man,” he said. “I’ve learned that sometimes it’s better to let sleeping dogs lie.” He looked at her and his tone turned cold. “Stay as far away from this as you can.” With a glance at the window near the front door, Conrad rose from his chair, indicating that the interview was over.

  “That sounds like a threat.”

  “Just a warning.”

  She reached for her jacket, letting her eyes fall on the envelope. It was addressed to Dean Jeffries and marked CONFIDENTIAL.

  Conrad stood by the front door. As she approached, he opened it carefully, peering into the moonlit darkness, then added firmly, “Now good night, Sammy.�
� He hesitated for a second before adding a softer, “And — take care.”

  “Thanks. You too.”

  As she left, Sammy was pleased to see the professor’s smile. For just a moment, he resembled the carefree man in his vacation photos. It was an image she wanted to remember him by. And would.

  Sammy walked all the way across campus in the crisp autumn air before realizing she’d forgotten her purse. She debated briefly about going back, but eleven o’clock might be too late to disturb the professor again. No matter, Sammy thought. It would give her a perfect excuse to return tomorrow and see if Conrad was in a sunnier and more open frame of mind. Good thing she kept a spare set of keys at the station.

  11:20 P.M.

  “Dammit, Sammy, must y’all make a megola out of every assignment?” Larry Dupree drawled.

  “I think the word you’re looking for is megillah,” Sammy corrected the program director as the two sat in the tiny station office planning the next week’s program schedule.

  A smile dawned on Larry’s dour face. “Oh yeah, like Magilla Gorilla.”

  Groaning, Sammy returned to the business at hand. “I’m figuring a week-long series’ll do. ‘The Death of Education.’ ‘Sell out or Get out’ for Part One.”

  Frustrated, Larry interrupted, “This was supposed to be a simple piece. ‘Professor wins teaching award.’ Three minutes at most. Just filler. Now you want to do an in-depth review of everything that’s wrong with higher education?”

  “I’m telling you. There’s more here than meets the eye.”

  “What meets the eye is all we can put on the air. Look, Sammy, you’re good, real good. But the second responsibility of the media is to get the facts.”