“All right, then, let’s attack it a different way,” she’d stubbornly replied. “If I were forty-five years old, the same age as Mrs. Davis, and you were my attending physician, I assume you’d do all sorts of prenatal tests to monitor my health and that of the fetus. Am I right about that? Over.”
“That would be the usual course of treatment.”
“Tests such as amniocentesis, usually done around week sixteen. I assume one was done for Mrs. Davis. Over.”
“You can assume that much. Okay, over.”
“And I also have to assume the results were favorable, because the pregnancy hasn’t been terminated. Over.”
“You may be overstepping your bounds there. Some couples decide to continue a pregnancy, even when amniocentesis results strongly suggest an abnormality. Because of religious beliefs or similar humanitarian concerns. Over.”
“Dr. Owen, I believe an ethical physician such as yourself, concerned above all for the safety of his patients, wouldn’t have submitted Mrs. Davis to a risky test that might have caused a spontaneous abortion if he’d known in advance she was determined not to terminate the pregnancy even in the worst of circumstances. Over.”
Though he gave away nothing in his words, Dr. Owen seemed to soften a bit. “My responsibility is to ensure the safety of both the mother and the developing child, and I did exactly that in this case. As I do with all my patients. Over.”
“Did they want to know the sex of the child?” she demanded bluntly.
She must have taken him off guard, for he gave a direct answer. “Mrs. Davis didn’t want to know. She wants it to be a surprise on the day of the birth.” He covered himself. “I don’t think I’m getting into the realm of confidential information when I say that. Over.”
But he had. He hadn’t said “she wanted” but instead “she wants,” which implied Mrs. Davis hadn’t yet given birth. Amaia didn’t make a big deal of it. She kept her tone entirely casual. “But amniocentesis reveals the child’s sex. It’s shown in the lab results, or am I wrong? Over.”
“That’s correct,” the physician confirmed. “Over.”
“Did Mr. Davis ask for that information? Over.”
“I can’t answer that. It’s confidential. Over.”
“No problem. Let’s take a different tack. You’re not going to tell me, but I’m free to continue making my assumptions, right? Well, my belief is that Mr. Davis expressed a great deal of concern about the progress of the pregnancy, right from the first. Am I right? Over.”
“That’s hardly unusual, so I have no problem commenting. His wife is no longer young—when it comes to giving birth, I mean. Any husband would worry about a miscarriage. Over.”
Or he might pray for one, Amaia thought. God, take from me this bitter cup! Aloud, she said, “I believe Mr. Davis pretended he didn’t mind when his wife didn’t want to know the results, except in so far as they related to the normal development of the fetus. But I also believe that later, when no one else was around, he asked about the sex. And you gave him that information. Over.”
Owen tiptoed around that one. “The law provides that the father and the mother have the same rights and obligations concerning a child. Over.”
“I suppose the sex of a child shouldn’t be terribly important to a father who already has both a son and a daughter; and yet for him it was. My thought is that he wasn’t very happy to hear they were expecting another son. I’m sure that seemed odd to you. If he already had a boy and a girl, the sex shouldn’t have made any difference, right? You’d probably have found that reaction strange, especially on the part of a man who’d been following the course of the pregnancy so closely. Over.”
She heard Steve Owen, MD, sigh heavily. “I will admit you have an impressive intuition and ability to formulate convincing hypotheses. I don’t think I would care to be married to you. Over.”
They ended the call. Amaia was handing the microphone to Annabel when a woman’s voice came through the radio. “Assistant Inspector! Over . . . Assistant Inspector Salazar, this is Paula Thibodaux. Over.”
Taken by surprise, Amaia checked with Annabel, who encouraged her to answer. “Go ahead, Paula. Over.”
“Maybe this seem silly, but you know I was listening . . . Over.”
“Sure, Paula, and I’m really grateful. Is there something you wanted to mention? Over.”
“Well, yes, in fact. Listening to that doctor, I remember Cousin Tim’s wife say she didn’t want to know the baby sex till she had it. We thought it just a shame to visit the hospital without the right present, depending if it was a boy or girl. We figured out we could go and call the hospital florist. They get a list every day of all the new little boys and girls and the room numbers. We just gave her the mama’s name and found out she had a girl. Then, we waltzed in there with everything pink—baby clothes, bracelets, cuddly toys, pink flowers even! My sister-in-law still wondering how we knew!” She laughed. “If you want, I can try. Over.”
“Great idea, Paula,” Amaia responded, beaming. “It’s the women’s health care center at Seton Medical Center in Austin. Over.”
Paula called information and got the number. After a few moments of silence, they heard a dial tone, rings, and an answer. Her voice had a cheery lilt. “Hello, good morning there! I like to send two dozen roses to a Seton patient who just had a baby. Oh, and some balloons, please, but I don’t know the room or if it is a boy or a girl.”
“What’s the patient’s name?”
“It’s Mrs. Davis, Natalie Davis. I know they expect to induce.”
“Well, honey, you’re a little bit ahead of yourself. Your friend is scheduled to be admitted the day after tomorrow. But you can pay for the flowers now, and we’ll deliver them as soon as the baby arrives.”
“Oh, okay, then I have plenty of time to come in and pick ’em myself,” Paula chirped. “And I can get the balloons and a nice card too.”
“As you like.” The florist hung up. Paula giggled. “What you think? Over.”
“You’re a genius, Paula! Thanks! This is Salazar, out.”
68
IS IT NIGHT IN BAZTÁN ALREADY?
The swamp
Dupree studied Amaia again. She held tight to the deck railing as if it were somehow feeding her inspiration. He moved closer, put his hands out where she could see them, and unfolded the notebook page with her sketch of a heart. “Nice drawing.”
“I learned what a heart really looks like when I was twelve. A doctor showed me.”
“Mine’s a bit more compressed in the middle. Like one of those Japanese octopus traps.”
“Takotsubo.”
Dupree smiled, giving her that enigmatic look that had so disquieted her at first. This time she didn’t mind.
“Tell me, if you had to choose a single image or a single moment to define your experience back then, what would it be?”
She didn’t have to reflect. “The night.” A pause followed as she digested her spontaneous reply. Dupree knew she’d surprised herself. “I could put up with the daytime, but when the night fell in Baztán . . .”