Bloody River Blues

unison, as if his answer to their question (“Did you know Vince Gaudia before he was killed?” “No.”) was the exit cue.
    He walked them to the door. They thanked him for his time then Bracken turned to him and said, “You weren’t thinking of leaving town soon, were you, sir?”
    There was something in the tone. He was not a bad cop yet but he was no longer a good cop either. “I’m staying until the film’s finished. But—”
    “How long will that be?”
    “A week, tops.”
    “Well, you should know—we have an intelligence report that Peter Crimmins—the main suspect in the Gaudi killing—has been speaking to associates out of state. Chicago, we think.”
    Pellam didn’t know what to make of this news bite.
    “That often happens,” Bracken continued, “when a mob boss is going to hire some muscle. They don’t like to use anybody local.”
    “Oh.”
    “I just say that so you’ll know to be careful.”
    “Right. Well, I appreciate you telling me that.”
    As they walked out the door, Monroe thanked him again and added, “You know, sir, we have men at all the local airports.”
    “All the airports?”
    “Amtrak, too.”
    And they left him to wonder if that meant they’d be looking for hit men or that Pellam himself should book a seat on Greyhound if he wanted to escape the long tentacle of the law.
    THE NURSE NOTICED his bloody thumbnail.
    “What?” she asked. “Whatsat?”
    She was Filipino, short and broad. She had kind eyes but the wispy mustache and broad purple lips made her face look dirty, which in turn gave her an impression of cruelty or, at best, indifference.
    The nurse pulled two clear plastic gloves off a roll. She put them on and lifted his hand, studying the red stain distastefully.
    “I don’t have AIDS,” he said miserably.
    She held his hand in a solid grip and twisted it as she examined the digit. God, she was strong. He detected a meaty smell coming from her.
    “Where you do it?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “Where you stick yourself?”
    Abruptly she yanked the sheet and blanket off of him and began with his midthigh, probing her way up, turning him, pushing his numb legs. Buffett thought of dough. Bread dough, kneading it. This made him want to cry.
    “I’m all right. Could you just leave me alone, please?”
    “You make it worse. You people make it worse.”
    Fingers he could not feel were searching along his skin. He closed his eyes. He made it a test—even now, in his humiliation and anguish, he tried to sense the fingers. He thought he could tell where she was probing but when he opened his eyes, her hands were not near where he had imagined her touch. He couldn’t feel a thing. . . .
    Then she saw the tissue, stuffed in his boxer shorts. She lifted it out, the wadded Kleenex, blotched with dark blood. Buffett’s face burned. Sweat broke out on his face.
    The nurse’s cruel or indifferent mouth tightened. She dropped the Kleenex into the wastebasket and bent and spread apart his pubic hair. She studied the small gash next to his penis. It wasn’t long or deep but it had bled a lot. The hair was matted and there was a red stain on the catheter.
    The nurse sighed then took short, shiny scissors and trimmed the thick hair back. She washed the cut and put gauze over it, then taped the gauze to the spot with white adhesive tape. She pulled the gloves off and threw them out.
    “I’m sorry,” he said. “I just . . .”
    Her dark lids lowered knowingly. “You wanted to see if you could feel something.” Her tongue clicked. “People like you. . . . You make it worse. You make everybody’s job worse.”
    Buffett watched her go. His eyes then slipped to the medical waste box, where his precious syringe had been. He looked up at the blank TV screen, hands in his lifeless lap, and stared at the ceiling, waiting for tears that never came. Finally he reached up and in fury began tugging at a jump rope, which was hung over a traction bar above his bed. After he had spent the entire morning—7:00 A.M. to noon—having tests done Buffett had asked an orderly to rig a rope over the bar so he could work on his arms. He would grip the handles hard, pulling against himself, first letting the right arm be the weak one, then the left. The orderly watched him with approval. “Man, I ain’t gonna arm-wrestle you.”
    Buffett now began the workout again. He was counting down from sixty. When he exercised, he always counted down, rather than up, because