The Butcher's Theatre by Jonathan Kellerman Read Free Book Online Page B

please,” he said, writing. “Who else?”
    “Dr. Carter, Dr. Al Biyadi, possibly Dr. Darousha.”
    “Possibly?”
    “Dr. Darousha lives in Ramallah. He’s a very dedicated man, a fine physician. Comes here after seeing his private patients and sometimes works well into the night. We provide him with a room so that he doesn’t have to drive home in a state of fatigue. I have no way of knowing if he used it last night.”
    “The doctors’ first names, please.”
    “Richard Carter, Hassan Al Biyadi, Walid Darousha.”
    “Thank you. Any others?”
    “Ma’ila Khoury, our secretary; Zia—whom you’ve met; and myself.”
    Daniel consulted his notes. “Dr. Carter is an American?”
    “Canadian. Dr. Al Biyadi is a native of Jerusalem.”
    Daniel knew an Al Biyadi family. Greengrocers with a stall in the Old City, on the Street of Chains. He wondered about a connection.
    “Ma’ila is Lebanese,” Baldwin was saying, “Zia’s a Palestinian, and I’m from the great Lone Star State of Texas. And that’s it.”
    “What about patients?”
    Baldwin cleared his throat.
    “There are no clinics today, in honor of Muslim Sabbath.”
    “I mean hospitalized patients.”
    Baldwin frowned. “I explained before, we function primarily as an outpatient center and outreach facility. Our goal is to make contact with those who wouldn’t ordinarily have access to health care. We identify problems and direct them to the appropriate source of treatment.”
    “A referral center.”
    “In a sense, but we do administer primary treatment at our clinics.”
    “So patients are never admitted here?”
    “I wouldn’t say never, but rarely.”
    Such a huge building, thought Daniel, housing only a handful of people. Vacant wards, empty beds. All that foreign money so that poor Arabs could see doctors who told them to go see other doctors. It seemed foolish, symbolism posing
    as function. Typical of the U.N. But that was neither here
    nor there.
    “Mr. Hajab,” he said. “What is his job?” “Watchman, custodial work, general repairs.” “This is a large building to be maintained by one person.” “A cleaning crew—some women from East Jerusalem—do
    the daily mop-up. Zia helps with odds and ends.”
    “Both Mr. Hajab and Dr. Darousha are from Ramallah.
    Did they know each other before Mr. Hajab began working
    here?”
    “Dr. Darousha recommended Zia for the job. More than
    that, I can’t tell you.”
    “Mr. Hajab told me his first contact with the hospital was
    as a patient. Was Dr. Darousha his physician?” “You’ll have to talk to Dr. Darousha about that.” “Very well,” said Daniel, rising. “I’d like to do just that.”
    Baldwin made a phone call and, when no one answered, took Daniel across the hall, to the source of the typing. Ma’ila Khoury was a lovely-looking woman of about twenty-five, with full pale lips, curly hennaed hair, and widely spaced khaki eyes. She wore smart Western clothes and her nails were long and polished. An emancipated woman of old Beirut. Daniel wondered why and how she’d come to Israel to work and received his answer a moment later when a quick look—something that implied more than boss and secretary—passed between her and Baldwin. The American spoke to her in poor Arabic and she answered in a cultured Lebanese accent.
    “Did Dr. Darousha sleep here last night, Ma’ila?”
    “I don’t know, sir.”
    “Is he here in the hospital?”
    “Yes, sir. In examining room four, with an emergency patient who just arrived.”
    “Come with me, Officer Sharavi.”
    The examining rooms were on the other side of the staircase, on the west wing of the building, five numbered doors that had once been servants’ quarters. Baldwin knocked lightly on number four and opened it. The room within was peacock-blue paint over lumpy plaster, relieved by a
    single grilled window just below the arch of the ceiling. An olive-wood crucifix and a white metal first-aid box adhered to one wall. Filling