“Dr. Taylor?”
“Yes.” She was holding her breath.
“I just got the third report from the forensic pathologist.”
“And?” Her heart was pounding.
“There was no trace of chloral hydrate or any other sedative in Dr. Hunter’s body. None.”
That was impossible! There had to be. There was no sign of any blow or anything that would have caused her to become unconscious. No bruises on her throat. It didn’t make sense. Kat had to have been unconscious when Mallory killed her. The forensic pathologist was wrong.
Paige decided to go talk to him herself.
Dr. Dolan was in an irritable mood. “I don’t like to be questioned like this,” he said. “I’ve checked it three times. I told Inspector Burns that there was no trace of chloral hydrate in any of her organs, and there wasn’t.”
“But…”
“Is there anything else, doctor?”
Paige looked at him helplessly. Her last hope was gone. Ken Mallory was going to get away with murder. “I…I guess not. If you didn’t find any chemicals in her body, then I don’t…”
“I didn’t say I didn’t find any chemicals.”
She looked at him a moment. “You found something?”
“Just a trace of trichloroethylene.”
She frowned. “What would that do?”
He shrugged. “Nothing. It’s an analgesic drug. It wouldn’t put anyone to sleep.”
“I see.”
“Sorry I can’t help you.”
Paige nodded. “Thank you.”
She walked down the long, antiseptic corridor of the morgue, depressed, feeling that she was missing something. She had been so sure Kat had been put to sleep with chloral hydrate.
All he found was a trace of trichloroethylene. It wouldn’t put anyone to sleep. But why would trichloroethylene be in Kat’s body? Kat had not been taking any medications. Paige stopped in the middle of the corridor, her mind working furiously.
When Paige arrived at the hospital, she went directly to the medical library on the fifth floor. It took her less than a minute to find trichloroethylene. The description read: A colorless, clear, volatile liquid with a specific gravity of 1.47 at 59 degrees F. It is a halogenated hydrocarbon, having the chemical formula CCl CCl :CHCl.
And there, on the last line, she found what she was looking for. When chloral hydrate is metabolized, it produces trichloroethylene as a by-product.
Chapter Thirty-five
“Inspector, Dr. Taylor is here to see you.”
“Again?” He was tempted to turn her away. She was obsessed with the half-baked theory she had. He was going to have to put a stop to it. “Send her in.”
When Paige walked into his office, Inspector Burns said, “Look, doctor, I think this has gone far enough. Dr. Dolan called to complain about—”
“I know how Ken Mallory did it!” Her voice was charged with excitement. “There was trichloroethylene in Kat’s body.”
He nodded. “Dr. Dolan told me that. But he said it couldn’t have made her unconscious. He—”
“Chloral hydrate turns into trichloroethylene!” Paige said triumphantly. “Mallory lied when he said he didn’t go back into the apartment with Kat. He put chloral hydrate in her drink. It has no taste when you mix it with alcohol, and it only takes a few minutes for it to work. Then when she was unconscious, he killed her and made it look like a bungled abortion.”
“Doctor, if you’ll forgive my saying so, that’s a hell of a lot of speculation.”
“No, it isn’t. He wrote the prescription for a patient named Spyros Levathes, but he never gave it to him.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because he couldn’t have. I checked on Spyros Levathes. He has erythropoietic porphyria.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s a genetic metabolic disorder. It causes photosensitivity and lesions, hypertension, tachycardia, and a few other unpleasant symptoms. It’s the result of a defective gene.”
“I still don’t understand.”
“Dr. Mallory didn’t give his patient chloral hydrate because it would have killed him! Chloral hydrate is contraindicated for porphyria. It would have caused immediate convulsive seizures.”
For the first time, Inspector Burns was impressed. “You’ve really done your homework, haven’t you?”
Paige pressed on. “Why would Ken Mallory go to a remote pharmacy and fill a prescription for a patient he knew he couldn’t give it to? You’ve got to arrest him.”