CHAPTER 19
I SKULKED OUT OF THE Benedict house before sunrise, leaving like a thief through a door at the back of the garden. I had not been the first to tread that same path, I knew, but I could not let that concern me. There was no point in going home, so I went directly to the hospital. I succeeded in gaining a few hours’ sleep curled up on a settee in the doctors’ lounge.
When I awoke, I made once more for the library and, using the German-English dictionary and phrase book, I laboriously drafted an inquiry to the Bayer Company. With apologies for my grauenhaft Deutsch—my atrocious German—I asked about their experiments with diacetylmorphine. As a physician, I added, I was extremely interested in the analgesic properties of the substance and would be most interested to learn of the results of any clinical tests. Then I went to the cable office and was informed by a young and eager clerk whose skin still bore marks of a recent eruption of acne vulgaris that a number of relays would be required after the message was sent by transatlantic cable, but should arrive in Germany within a day. Any response would be held for me on a will-call basis.
The clerk then not only insisted on explaining the many ways in which the miracle of modern telegraphy was changing the world, but also on favoring me with a rendition of the tribulations in establishing a worldwide system of communication. Did I know how many times the cable snapped when being lowered into the pitching waters of the ocean? Was I aware of the persistence of Cyrus Field and those other visionaries who refused to abandon the project even though most investors refused to continue their support?
Although I was impatient, lest I be missed at the hospital, the boy’s enthusiasm was infectious. He had as much zeal for the future of electrical communication and magnetics as I did for diagnostics and surgery. A new century would be upon us in just over a decade and, with breathtaking advances in virtually every field of human endeavor, the world did unquestionably belong to the young.
I returned with about fifteen minutes to spare before afternoon rounds. I saw Simpson in the halls, but when I approached her to say hello, she nodded perfunctorily and turned to leave. I inquired if there was anything the matter, but she assured me quietly that there was not, so I joined the others and entered the main ward.
In the second bed, we encountered a newly admitted patient, a nearly comatose male in his twenties, with an exceptional set of symptoms. He had been found lying in the street, mumbling incoherently, and been brought to the hospital by the police. The man showed severe muscle spasticity, and there was a bluish tinge to his lips and fingernails. His breathing was slow, labored, and shallow, his pulse weak, his blood pressure low. The man’s tongue was discolored and his pupils, when we could rouse him sufficiently to open his eyes, were mere dots. He appeared to be severely constipated with a spasmodic gastrointestinal tract.
“Morphia poisoning,” said Corrigan immediately, “but I’ve never seen it so severe.”
“Nor I,” Simpson added. She seemed genuinely puzzled.
When the Professor finished his examination, he noted from the accompanying documents that the man was a denizen of the waterfront district. “Any ideas, Carroll?” he asked pointedly.
I looked at the Professor, trying to determine whether his question was genuine or rhetorical, but he gave no indication of his thinking.
“None,” I said.
“You’re becoming quite a regular,” Haggens grunted as he ushered me into the office later that evening. “Getting a little more attracted to the criminal element, Doc?”
“Do you want me to listen to your heart or not?” I asked, brandishing my stethoscope.
Haggens dropped his bravado, as he had done in the room on Wharf Lane. “Yeah. I do,” he replied meekly. Swagger did not hold up well against the prospect of a medical examination.
I instructed him to remove his vest and shirt. Haggens seemed slight in clothes, but bare-chested, he was deceptively broad across the chest and his arms were thick cords of muscle.
“I was a prizefighter, Doc,” he said, noticing me notice. “Gave it up, though. Much better ways of making a dollar.”
“I’m sure you were quite adept,” I said, breathing on the stethoscope’s diaphragm to warm it.
“I can still go a round or two.”
I was certain he could. I instructed Haggens to take deep breaths as I auscultated front and back. There was a soft rumble directly over the heart during the resting phase of the heartbeat, which became more distinct just before contraction. With Haggens’ history of rheumatic fever, it was a simple matter to determine the problem. I told him to dress.
“Is it serious, Doc?” he said, a look of genuine fear passing across his face. What power physicians possess!
“Have you had a cough? Was there blood in it?”
“I had a cough a while back,” Haggens answered softly. “No blood, though.”
“That’s good,” I said. “Do you ever get a constriction … tightening in your chest?”
Haggens shook his head. “That good too, Doc?”
I nodded. “Are you ever tired?”
“All the time,” he said.
“No, I mean very tired.”
“Sometimes,” he said. “Do you know what I got?”
“I think so,” I said. “You have the symptoms of a condition called mitral stenosis, which is a narrowing of one of the valves in your heart. It prevents adequate blood flow between the chambers.”
“That sounds bad,” he said.
“Not necessarily. In many cases the condition doesn’t progress. If you can tolerate the symptoms and they don’t worsen, you should be fine.”
“What if they do worsen?”
There was no point in lying. Haggens was far too savvy to be taken in by platitudes. “If your symptoms worsen, you could eventually develop either blood clots or an infection of the heart muscle called endocarditis.”
“Bad?”
“Either can kill you.”
Haggens digested the information, sizing up the alternatives as he had when I had asked to borrow Mike. Like many patients, now that he knew the facts, he was able to consider his condition coolly and rationally. “How long is eventually?”
“There is no way to know. But most of the time the condition will stay as it is.”
“Anything I can do for it?”
“Well, you might want to drink less. Coffee won’t help you, either. And you might want to try to avoid nervous stress.”
Haggens guffawed. “Avoid stress? Down here?”
“Well,” I said, “do your best. We have another matter to discuss, however.”
Haggens dropped his eyes in mock shame, as he buttoned his shirt. “I know, Doc. I was a bad boy.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “How many people have tried it?”
“The stuff?”
“Of course, the stuff. I didn’t mean the revolver.”
“I heard rumors that some of it has gotten around.”
“What did these rumors say as to the effects?”
“Rumors said that this is the best stuff anyone has ever tried.”
“Not everyone thought so, I’ll wager. I would venture to say that some who tried it received an unpleasant surprise.” The patient I had seen earlier in the hospital, for one, I thought.
“Unpleasant surprises are everyday happenings down here, Doc.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “I’m sure. Has anyone died?”
Haggens turned his palms up. “Do I look like the town undertaker?”
I took a breath. I was about to take my association with Haggens into dangerous territory. “I need whoever is selling it to stop selling it. If they don’t stop selling it, people are going to keep showing up at either the hospital or the morgue with symptoms of poisoning that will force me to tell the police what I know about this mysterious substance.” Haggens began to speak, but I put up my hand. “And please don’t tell me how dangerous it would be for me to do so, or that I would be in just as much trouble as this unnamed party to whom I refer. I already know that. But I cannot allow people to die, and remain a physician. I do hope, however, that I will not be forced into the position of having to make a choice.”
Haggens cocked his head and lightly rubbed the first two fingers of his right hand across his lower lip, trying to choose how to respond. I decided to help him.
“You make a good living down here, Haggens. Why jeopardize it? It would not please me to make good my threat, but I cannot remain silent while poison is being sold, no matter who profits by it.”
Haggens continued to size up the situation. “I could make it that you don’t ever leave this room alive,” he said. “Thought about that?”
“Yes.”
We remained there in silence for some moments, my life suspended in the air between us. Finally, Haggens narrowed his eyes and gave a nod. “Okay, you win.” He broke into a grin. “Can’t kill my own doc after all, can I?” He raised a finger and wagged it in my direction. “But don’t forget. You owe me one.”
“I do indeed,” I agreed. I smiled back at him. “I don’t suppose you’d give it back to me?”
Haggens shook his head slowly. “That far I can’t go, Doc, not even for you. Here’s my deal: As long as a bunch of poor unfortunates don’t show up sick or dead, you stay outta my business and I stay outta yours.”
Now it was me who had to deduce what Haggens had in mind. The upshot was that the issue was moot. If Haggens found a means to deal with the drug in a manner that did not make users sick, I would not know that it was being sold. If I had no evidence that he was continuing the forbidden commerce, I could not act to stop him.
“All right, Haggens,” I said, thrusting out my hand. “It’s a bargain.”
Haggens shook my hand and heaved a sigh. “I’m going to miss it if you stop coming down here, Doc. It’s quite a nice change dealing with such a high-class chap.”
I would miss him too, although I would never admit to it. “Well, Haggens, you never know. Maybe I’ll come by from time to time just for a drink.”
“You’ll always be welcome, Doc.”
“Thank you. One more thing before I go. If you won’t give me back the, uh, stuff, would you mind giving me one of the tins that it came in?”
“Empty?” Haggens looked at me as if I had lost my wits.
“Have you changed your mind about giving it to me full?”
“Then empty will do.”
Haggens considered for a moment. When he could not think of what underhanded ploy I might be attempting, he agreed.
He asked me to leave the office. When, a few moments later, he called me back in, one of the empty tins was sitting on his desk. He gestured with his head that I should take it.
“Thank you,” I said, making to leave. I tapped my chest. “You will try to relax more.”
Haggens chortled. “Sure. Anything you say. I always wanted to die of old age.”