Helen wrote down the message and left. Martin went back to the two charts. It was encouraging that both young women had neurological symptoms, especially since multiple sclerosis was specifically listed as a possibility in Katherine Collins’ case. In the case of Ellen McCarthy, Philips checked to see how often seizures were a part of the clinical picture of multiple sclerosis. Less than ten percent, yet they did occur. But why had both girls been suddenly lost to follow-up? Martin couldn’t help worrying that he was going to have difficulty getting them in for X rays if they had transferred their care someplace else, maybe even to another city.
Just then Helen buzzed him to say that the resident was ready for him in the cerebral angiography room. Philips put on his lead apron with the faded Superman logo, picked up Collins’ and McCarthy’s charts and walked out of his office. Stopping at Helen’s desk, he asked her to track the two patients down and encourage them to come in for some free diagnostic X rays. He wanted Helen not to frighten the young women, but to make sure they understood it was important.
Downstairs he found Denise waiting for him. She had showered, washed her hair, and changed her clothes; it had been a miraculous thirty-minute transformation. She no longer looked tired and her light brown eyes sparkled above her surgical mask. Philips would have loved to have touched her, but instead let his eyes linger for an extra second on hers.
She had already done enough angiograms so that he just acted as her assistant. There was no conversation as she deftly handled the catheter, threading it up inside the patient’s artery. Philips watched carefully, ready to make suggestions if he thought they were needed. They weren’t. The patient was Harold Schiller, who’d been CAT scanned the day before. As Philips had guessed, Mannerheim had ordered a cerebral angiogram probably in preparation to operate, although clearly the case was inoperable.
An hour later the case was all but done.
“I tell you,” whispered Martin, “you’re getting better than I and you’ve only been doing it a few weeks.” Denise blushed but Martin knew she was pleased. Leaving her to finish, he told her to buzz when the next case was ready to go. He wanted to finish scanning the skull films on his alternator, then begin to set up running the old films through Michaels’ computer. He reasoned that if he could run a hundred a day he could go through the whole master list in a month and a half. He also thought that he could give Michaels the discrepancies as they surfaced so that perhaps by the time he finished, Michaels would have the bugs out of the program. If that were the case, they’d have something to present to the unsuspecting medical world by July.
But as Philips rounded the corner outside his office, Helen ambushed him with disappointing news. She’d had no luck with any of his requests. Lynn Anne Lucas could not be CAT scanned or X-rayed because she’d been transferred during the night to New York Medical Center. As far as Katherine Collins and Ellen McCarthy were concerned, she’d traced both of them to the university. They were both listed as undergraduates. However, Collins could not be reached because she’d allegedly run away a month ago and was considered a missing person. Ellen McCarthy, on the other hand, was dead. She’d had a fatal auto accident on the West Side Highway two months ago.
“Jesus Christ!” said Philips. “Tell me you’re joking.”
“I’m sorry,” said Helen. “That’s the best I could do.”
Philips shook his head in disbelief. He’d been so sure that he’d get at least one case out of the three to examine. He stepped into his office and stared blankly at the far wall. His compulsive personality wasn’t accustomed to dealing with such reversals.
He pounded his fist against his open hand so that the sound echoed in the room. Then he paced, trying to think. Collins was out. If the police couldn’t find her, how could he. McCarthy? If she’d been killed she must have been taken to a hospital. But which? And Lucas … at least she’d been taken to New York Medical Center where he had a good friend, instead of Bellevue. If it had been Bellevue, he would have had to give up.