The Sisterhood - Michael Palmer [139]
“I’m calling Dahlia,” the young woman’s voice said.
“I’m sorry, but Dahlia is not readily available,” Dora said, assuming the whispered tone she had heard Dotty use on so many occasions. “However, this is her sister … Chrysanthemum. You may, if you wish, confide in me just as you did in Dahlia.”
“Well … all right, I guess,” the woman said uncertainly. “This is Violet calling again from Detroit. Saint Bart’s Hospital. A situation has come up here that I think could use some further research.”
“Go on,” Dora said reassuringly.
“It’s a woman named Agnes Morgan. Her husband is Carter Morgan, one of the executive directors at Ford. She’s only forty-two, but is drying out in our hospital for the third time this year. The scuttlebutt has it that her husband’s been trying to get a divorce for several years so he could marry his secretary. Apparently Mrs. Morgan won’t let him have one without bleeding him dry and doing what she can to ruin his career.”
“Sounds very promising,” Dora said, doodling the picture of an automobile on a yellow legal pad and overlaying it with an ornately inscribed dollar sign. “I’ll do some checking up on the situation and call you. Meanwhile, dig up as much information as you can on this Mr. Morgan and his wife. It sounds like the benefits in this case would be quite substantial, assuming the gentleman decides to do business with us.”
“I think he just might,” Violet said. “When can I expect to hear from you?”
“Within a day or so, I think,” Dora answered. “As you know, we’ll take care of any business dealings. You’ll have all the help you need.”
She replaced the receiver and picked up a gold-framed photo of Dotty from the table. The likeness to herself was such that she might have been holding a looking glass.
“Well, love, we’re still in business,” she said, resting the picture on her massive lap. “I can’t do it without your help, though, so you’d better not forget your promise. Anyhow, that’s what sisters are for, aren’t they?”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
MICHAEL PALMER, M.D., is the author of Miracle Cure, Critical Judgment, Silent Treatment, Natural Causes, Extreme Measures, Flashback, Side Effects, and The Sisterhood. His books have been translated into thirty languages. He trained in internal medicine at Boston City and Massachusetts General Hospitals, spent twenty years as a full-time practitioner of internal and emergency medicine, and is now an associate director of the Massachusetts Medical Society’s physician health program.
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It was the second straight day of unremitting rain. Nikki Solari hated running in this kind of weather, but today she was considering doing it anyway. It had been more than a week since her roommate and close friend, Kathy Wilson, had stormed from their South Boston flat. A week without so much as a word—to her or to their mutual friends. The police had been surprisingly little help. Nikki had filled out the appropriate forms and brought in some photographs, but so far nothing.
“Miss Solari, try to relax. I’m sure your friend will turn up.”
“It’s Doctor Solari, and why are you so sure?”
“That’s the way it is with cases like this. Everyone worries and the missing person just shows up.”
“Well, this missing person is an incredibly talented musician who would never leave her band in the lurch, which she has. She is a wonderfully dependable friend who would never do anything to upset me, which she has. And she is an extremely compassionate and kind woman who would never say anything abusive to anyone, yet before she disappeared she had become abusive to everyone.”
“Doctor Solari, tell me something honestly. Were you and Miss Wilson lovers?”
“Oh, Christ …”
Nikki desperately needed to wrest the worry from her brain, if only for a while, and the only ways she had ever been able to do so were running, making music, and performing autopsies.
It was eleven in the morning.