Tail Spin

The nurse, Louise Conver, gave Dr. MacLean a smile and left. “Yes,” Savich said, “we saw them in the lobby. They told us you’re feeling much better this morning.”

The neurologist had told them the disease was unpredictable and everyone was different. Savich prayed Dr. MacLean would remember enough of their conversation the day before so they wouldn’t have to begin all over.

MacLean said thoughtfully, “I always told his daddy I never liked the shortened version of his name, so he’ll stay Jackson to me. Fact is, I threw footballs with him, taught him how to pitch a curveball, gave him pointers on how to psychoanalyze his sister’s lemonade customers. He set up a stand right next to hers. Unlike Charlie Brown’s Lucy, Jackson charged ten cents for a three-minute reading and, ah, dispensing advice. He was ten years old, I believe.”

“How did he treat his customers?” Sherlock asked.

“I believe he looked at the men’s palms, and for the women, he swished the remains of the lemonade in the bottom of their paper cups and studied the arrangement of the pulp.

“That was the first time I realized how intuitive he was. His mother closed him down after he counseled a married neighbor to stop sleeping with Mrs. Hinkley, who lived two blocks over. He and his sister Jennifer made a bundle that summer.

“Listen, I can tell something’s going on with him and that young lady—Rachael—but he claimed everything was fine, all the bandages were for dippy stuff, all the result of our plane crash. I told him my injuries hadn’t made me stupid, but evidently his had. Rachael laughed. Jackson said she was an interior designer. She told me since I’m not going to be in this room for much longer, she wouldn’t bother coming up with a new color scheme. She managed to distract me, and then they left, so I’m asking you: What’s going on with Jackson? Don’t try telling me it’s only about me and my problems.”

Savich nodded. “You’re right, he is involved in some pretty hinky things. But you know he’s good. He’ll be fine. Try not to worry. The staff told us your wife stayed with you all last evening. You must have been very pleased to have her back from Lexington. Are you expecting her this morning?”

Sherlock realized, watching Dr. MacLean’s face, that his wife was the ultimate distraction.

MacLean said in a huff, “I told Molly not to come back today, that I’m not going anywhere and she doesn’t have to worry—she’d just piss me off with all her nagging, her never-ending litany about finding us a little beach house in Bermuda. At least the rest of the family is still in Lexington. That crew would bring down the hospital. I threatened them on pain of death not to come here and drive me nuts.” He grinned real big. “Hey, I guess I already am nuts.”

Time to get to it. Sherlock dove right in. “Dr. MacLean, do you remember what we spoke about yesterday?”

“My brain might be executing a big-time tailspin into never-never land, but I do remember our conversation from yesterday. It’s true, sometimes I don’t. But yesterday, yeah, I remember everything. I told you about two of my patients, something I shouldn’t have done. But you’re FBI, so I suppose I have no choice since some jerkface is trying to murder me. I’d sing it to you in an aria if I had to.

“Actually, telling you about those particular people was amusing. And you can call me Timothy.” They nodded, and he continued. “By the way, the FBI agent guarding my door, Tomlin, he’s come in a couple of times, told me I’m not to worry because he never snoozes on the job and he’s one tough bud, raised by a mom, a police lieutenant, who, according to him, shut down a gang in Detroit.” He grinned as he looked from Savich to Sherlock. “He also told me you guys were in San Francisco a couple of weeks ago, playing with psychic mediums. Talk about weird yahoos.”

“Agent Tomlin is a crackerjack,” Sherlock said. “I didn’t know his mom was such a hotshot.”

Timothy laughed. “I’ll tell him that next time he comes in to see me.”

Sherlock asked, “How are you feeling this morning, sir?”

“I still feel like I’m busted up all over, but I took a hit of pain meds maybe five minutes ago, so soon that will translate into feeling mighty fine, thank you.” He frowned, then said with all the innocence of a child, “I remember it clearly. I was telling you about Congresswoman Dolores McManus.”

“Yes,” Savich said. “And how she murdered her first husband.”

Timothy sighed, then smiled beatifically. “Fact is, she popped out with it under hypnosis—you know, surprised the crap out of me. I couldn’t believe it, didn’t want to believe it. At first I thought she was pulling my leg, but no, that wasn’t possible, she was indeed well under.

“I only wish I’d instructed her to forget everything she’d told me when I brought her out of it, but I was so flustered by what she’d said, I didn’t.”

Sherlock said, “Why don’t you tell us exactly what she said so we can follow up on it.”

For several moments MacLean looked uncertain. Even after saying he’d tell them everything, they could see him bat tling with himself. Then the disease must have blunted his concerns, or his sense of self-preservation exerted itself, because he said, his voice smooth, like a man carrying on a superficial social conversation, “Like I told you already, Dolores was married young, to a trucker, had two kids, and managed to get herself a communications degree before she was twenty-five. Life happened, as it always does, but with her it took an interesting twist. She started getting a reputation for taking on the big dogs, sometimes even bringing them down. This made her adjust her thinking about what she wanted and how she was going to get it.

“Her trucker husband, however, didn’t want to get with the program. He wanted his wife waiting for him at home, a beer for him in her hand. He threatened to hurt her, to take the kids, whatever.

“She believed, she told me, that he would beat her. But the kids? The last one was out of the house in another six months so that wasn’t a problem. But he was—a great big honking problem.

“So Dolores got to thinking. Who would vote for a congresswoman with a macho trucker for a husband? She knew this guy wouldn’t rocket her to the stars, which she felt she deserved. For her that was winning a political office, one that paid her. He would only underscore her lack of any working credentials and what had been, to date, a worthless education.