Chapter 19: The Cup With My Name

"It's true," I said. "I am Dr. Mara Quinlan."

The old men looked at me and not at Aldo.

"A patient died on my table five years ago. A forged note with my name on it said I was careless. I didn't write it."

"A convenient story," Aldo said.

"The man who paid for it is Conway Driscoll," I said. "His company shipped the tin. Ask your friend how he met him."

Aldo's smile did not slip, though something behind it did.

The older of the two men took out a handkerchief and wiped his glasses slowly.

"Tomorrow noon," he said. "Staten Island, the back room, as arranged. Don Ruggiero on his feet, or carried, as God allows."

He put the glasses on.

"And the doctor comes with her proof."

They left, with Aldo behind them, and he did not look back.

My hands began to shake the moment the door closed.

The old nurse put a paper cup of coffee in them.

"Sit," she said. "You haven't sat since Sunday."

An orderly had brought it, a young man with a clipboard that I'd never seen at the clinic.

I thought, he's new, and I didn't think anything more.

I drank half of it standing at Renata's bed, watching her pulse climb to sixty.

It was bitter and strong and I was too tired to taste it.

Twenty minutes later the lamp over the desk grew a halo.

It was a clear yellow ring, the kind I had asked a hundred patients about.

I put the cup down.

I turned it and looked at the rim.

There was a thin dry film in the glaze that caught the light.

"Nurse," I said, and my own voice sounded far away. "I need a pulse oximeter and an ECG. Now. And I need you to listen."

She was across the room in two steps.

"I've taken the drug," I said. "A large dose, in the coffee. I'm going to be sick and my rate will fall. Both vials are in Renata."

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