Life Expectancy

bones. More than twenty-four years after his first visit, he was returning to the Snow County Hospital maternity ward. This time, the baby he wanted was ours.
        I didn't want Lorrie to learn about the situation. As it was, she had her hands full. Well, not her hands, but she was otherwise fully occupied, and it couldn't be good for her to know that Beezo was loose.
        If I returned to the delivery room, no matter how distracted Lorrie was, she would at first glance read the fear in me. I would not be able to lie to her even for her own good. I would be butter to her hot knife, and she would spread me on toast in six seconds flat.
        Besides, Dr. Mello Melodeon would have more questions about my chocolate apple lattice tart, and I didn't have time for that.
        I hurried to the expectant-fathers' lounge where, in different decor, Dr. Ferris MacDonald had been shot to death. From this room, Beezo had burst into the maternity ward, shooting Nurse Hanson.
        If criminals really did like to return to the scenes of their crimes, he might come after our baby by this route.
        Might.
        I wasn't willing to hang the fate of my wife and baby on a might or a maybe.
        Blotting my hands on my greens again, I stepped into the main corridor that served the second floor.
        The place was unnaturally quiet, hushed, even for a hospital, as though the heavy snowfall exerted a muffling influence through the walls.
        Farther to my right, on this side of the hall, were four doors that evidently led into various departments of the maternity ward. Beyond the doors lay the long window that provided a view into the neonatal care unit where newborns were cradled in bassinets.
        At the end of the hall, a lighted red EXIT sign marked the door to the emergency stairs.
        Beezo could come up the stairs and choose any entrance to the ward. I wouldn't see him from the expectant-fathers' lounge, so I'd have to stand guard here in the corridor.
        Ding! Soft but instantly identifiable, the chime issued from the elevator alcove that branched off the midpoint of this m'ain corridor.
        Someone had arrived on the second floor.
        Lately I'd gotten so much practice holding my breath that I would soon be ready for a career in pearl diving.
        A doctor in a white lab coat came out of the alcove, carrying a clipboard, chatting with a nurse who was too small and too female to be Konrad Beezo. They headed toward the farther end of the hall.
        I thought I should go to the emergency stairwell and listen for ascending footsteps, but I didn't want to turn my back on the hallway.
        Where were Huey Foster's men? Surely they should have arrived by now.
        Consulting my watch, I discovered that only two minutes had passed since I'd hung up the phone. Huey's men were still putting on their shoes.
        Time doesn't pass a fraction as fast when you're waiting for a killer as it does when you're having fun in the kitchen.
        The hospital had a single security guard stationed in the lobby on the ground floor. I considered calling him up here to help cover the territory.
        His name was Vernon Tibbit. Sixty-eight years old, pot-bellied, nearsighted, Vernon didn't have a gun. Basically his job entailed giving directions to visitors, assisting patients in wheelchairs, getting coffee for the lady at the information desk, and polishing his badge.
        I didn't want to get Vernon killed and leave the info lady with no one to fetch her Java.
        If Konrad Beezo didn't actually drive a tank through the walls of the hospital, he would at least arrive with a formidable weapon. I had the distinct impression that he didn't go anywhere without heat.
        I didn't have a gun. I didn't have a knife. I didn't have a club. I didn't have a spitball.
        When I remembered the assault rifle that I had taken from Beezo and that now lay in the back of the Explorer, a thrill coursed up my spine.
        He had changed the magazine in the woods, and surely he hadn't emptied the second one. I succumbed to a spasm of macho stupidity, envisioning myself as Rambo, except markedly more buff than Sylvester Stallone.
        Then I realized I couldn't charge through a hospital, blithely firing an assault rifle. I wasn't a staff member, and visiting hours were over.
        In fear of being shot, worried about Lorrie in labor, worried about my unborn