Whistleblower. Tess Gerritsen

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      Reluctantly, she left the warmth of her bed and poked around in her suitcase for a sweater and jeans. She dressed to the thrashing of blue jays in the branches, the battle having moved from the roof to the treetops. From the window, she watched them dart from twig to twig until one finally hoisted up the feathered version of a white flag and took off, defeated. The victor, his authority no longer in question, gave one last screech and settled back to preen his feathers.

      Only then did Cathy notice the silence of the house, a stillness that magnified her every heartbeat, her every breath.

      Leaving the room, she descended the attic steps and confronted the empty living room. Ashes from last night’s fire mounded the grate. A silver garland drooped from the Christmas tree. A cardboard angel with glittery wings winked on the mantelpiece. She followed the hallway to Sarah’s room and frowned at the rumpled bed, the coverlet flung aside. “Sarah?”

      Her voice was swallowed up in the stillness. How could a cottage seem so immense? She wandered back through the living room and into the kitchen. Last night’s teacups still sat in the sink. On the windowsill, an asparagus fern trembled, stirred by a breeze through the open door.

      Cathy stepped out into the carport where Sarah’s old Dodge was parked. “Sarah?” she called.

      Something skittered across the roof. Startled, Cathy looked up and suddenly laughed as she heard the blue jay chattering in the tree above—a victory speech, no doubt. Even the animal kingdom had its conceits.

      She started to head back into the house when her gaze swept past a stain on the gravel near the car’s rear tire. For a few seconds she stared at the blot of rust-brown, unable to comprehend its meaning. Slowly, she moved alongside the car, her gaze tracing the stain backward along its meandering course.

      As she rounded the rear of the car, the driveway came into full view. The dried rivulet of brown became a crimson lake in which a single swimmer lay open-eyed and still.

      The blue jay’s chatter abruptly ceased as another sound rose up and filled the trees. It was Cathy, screaming.

      “HEY, MISTER. Hey, mister.”

      Victor tried to brush off the sound but it kept buzzing in his ear, like a fly that can’t be shooed away.

      “Hey, mister. You awake?”

      Victor opened his eyes and focused painfully on a wry little face stubbled with gray whiskers. The apparition grinned, and darkness gaped where teeth should have been. Victor stared into that foul black hole of a mouth and thought: I’ve died and gone to hell.

      “Hey, mister, you got a cigarette?”

      Victor shook his head and barely managed to whisper: “I don’t think so.”

      “Well, you got a dollar I could borrow?”

      “Go away,” groaned Victor, shutting his eyes against the daylight. He tried to think, tried to remember where he was, but his head ached and the little man’s voice kept distracting him.

      “Can’t get no cigarettes in this place. Like a jail in here. Don’t know why I don’t just get up and walk out. But y’know, streets are cold this time of year. Been rainin’ all night long. Least in here it’s warm….”

      Raining all night long… Suddenly Victor remembered. The rain. Running and running through the rain.

      Victor’s eyes shot open. “Where am I?”

      “Three East. Land o’ the bitches.”

      He struggled to sit up and almost gasped from the pain. Dizzily, he focused on the metal pole with its bag of fluid dripping slowly into the plastic intravenous tube, then stared at the bandages on his left shoulder. Through the window, he saw that the day was already drenched in sunshine. “What time is it?”

      “Dunno. Nine o’clock, I guess. You missed breakfast.”

      “I’ve got to get out of here.” Victor swung his legs out of bed and discovered that, except for a flimsy hospital gown, he was stark naked. “Where’s my clothes? My wallet?”

      The old man shrugged. “Nurse’d know. Ask her.”

      Victor found the call button buried among the bed sheets. He stabbed it a few times, then turned his attention to peeling off the tape affixing the IV tube to his arm.

      The door hissed open and a woman’s voice barked,

      “Mr. Holland! What do you think you’re doing?”

      “I’m getting out of here, that’s what I’m doing,” said Victor as he stripped off the last piece of tape. Before he could pull the IV out, the nurse rushed across the room as fast as her stout legs could carry her and slapped a piece of gauze over the catheter.

      “Don’t blame me, Miss Redfern!” screeched the little man.

      “Lenny, go back to your own bed this instant! And as for you, Mr. Holland,” she said, turning her steel-blue eyes on Victor, “you’ve lost too much blood.” Trapping his arm against her massive biceps, she began to retape the catheter firmly in place.

      “Just get me my clothes.”

      “Don’t argue, Mr. Holland. You have to stay.”

      “Why?”

      “Because you’ve got an IV, that’s why!” she snapped, as if the plastic tube itself was some sort of irreversible condition.

      “I want my clothes.”

      “I’d have to check with the ER. Nothing of yours came up to the floor.”

      “Then call the ER, damn you!” At Miss Redfern’s disapproving scowl, he added with strained politeness, “If you don’t mind.”

      It was another half hour before a woman showed up from the business office to explain what had happened to Victor’s belongings.

      “I’m afraid we—well, we seem to have…lost your clothes, Mr. Holland,” she said, fidgeting under his astonished gaze.

      “What do you mean, lost?”

      “They were—” she cleared her throat “—er, stolen. From the emergency room. Believe me, this has never happened before. We’re really very sorry about this, Mr. Holland, and I’m sure we’ll be able to arrange a purchase of replacement clothing….”

      She was too busy trying to make excuses to notice that Victor’s face had frozen in alarm. That his mind was racing as he tried to remember, through the blur of last night’s events, just what had happened to the film canister. He knew he’d had it in his pocket during the endless drive to the hospital. He remembered clutching it there, remembered flailing senselessly at the woman when she’d tried to pull his hand from his pocket. After that, nothing was clear, nothing was certain. Have I lost it? he thought. Have I lost my only evidence?

      “…While the money’s missing, your credit cards seem to be all there, so I guess that’s something to be thankful for.”

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