The Fall of Never(37)

Strange how the brain operates, he thought.

Stranger still, the telephone rang just as he set the barbell down, and it was Carlos Mendes calling about Nellie Worthridge.



At the hospital, Josh met Mendes in the doctor’s office—an institutional-looking room with lemon yellow walls and a single window behind a small oak desk, the filthy tin shade drawn. It was early and Mendes, seated behind his desk and fingering a cup of coffee he hadn’t yet taken a single sip from, looked just as haggard as he had on their first meeting. Josh wondered if the doctor always looked that way, the way some people always seem to have bags under their eyes, tired or not. On the corner of Mendes’s desk was an old clock-radio, turned on but turned low. Its dial was stuck between two channels, and the result was the intermittent sounds of a radio talk show and a jazz station, occasionally interrupted by bursts of static.

“I’m going to assume, since you are here now,” Mendes began, “that you care for Miss Worthridge?”

The question seemed oddly phrased. “I…well, of course I do. I wouldn’t want anything bad to come to her, if that’s what you mean. You know, if it’s something serious, I’d want to know about it.”

“Well, no,” Mendes said. “What I mean is that you are of no relation to this woman and have no obligations to her. You found her in her apartment and called the paramedics. Essentially, your job is done. If you want to walk, I wouldn’t say anything about it. Couldn’t say anything about it.”

For one brief, insane instant, Josh thought Mendes was going to hit him up for the cost of Nellie Worthridge’s medical treatment. He shook his head. “Dr. Mendes, I’m not following you here…”

“I just don’t want you to feel as though I’m wasting your time with anything I’ve got to say, anything pertaining to Miss Worthridge…”

“No,” Josh said, “you’re not wasting my time. In fact, I appreciate the call. Please, go ahead.”

Mendes lightly tapped the side of the coffee cup with a fingernail. “Nellie doesn’t play bridge,” he said matter-of-factly. “I asked her about that this morning—you know, opening her up with what she assumed was merely chitchat—and she said yes, she played bridge. I asked her the names of the women she played with and she gave them to me, first and last names. I asked where she played and she said their Wednesday night bridge game was always held in an apartment in the building next to hers. Just one building over. And I smiled and said something to the effect that it was good she was keeping active and she smiled too and said that it was fun and it kept her mind off other things. Like dying, she said. It kept her mind off dying.”

Josh just nodded. This was making no sense.

Mendes continued, “I looked up the names she’d given me and it turned out that one of the women, a Betty Shotts, does have an apartment in the building next door. I’d planned on phoning her to tell her of Miss Worthridge’s condition, and maybe find out a little about Nellie Worthridge myself, but when I called and mentioned Miss Worthridge’s name, this Betty Shotts had never heard of her. I asked if she was certain and she said of course, that she was old but she wasn’t that old. Then I asked if she played bridge on Wednesday nights and she admitted that she did—but no one named Nellie Worthridge ever played. No one in a wheelchair with no legs.”

“All right,” Josh said. “So she fibbed a little. She’s an old woman, that’s no big deal. Maybe she just knew of the game from one of the other women who played.”

“Right,” Mendes said, “that’s what I figured too. So I got in touch with them as well. And guess what?”

“Don’t tell me—none of them have ever heard of Nellie Worthridge?”

“Nail on the head,” the doctor said. He brought the cup of coffee to his lips with a shaking hand, took a sip, then set it down. “I’m sorry, I didn’t offer you any—”

“I’m all right, thank you.” Josh thought about what the doctor had just told him. “I see why this is strange,” he said, “but I’m not really sure what this means.”

“Neither am I,” Mendes admitted. “I wish I knew. Something isn’t sitting right, keeps gnawing at the back of my brain, you know? Like something I should be figuring out, only I can’t. And it’s frustrating.”

What Josh guessed was that Carlos Mendes felt more than just frustrated. Looking at him, Josh could tell he felt scared.

“You’re thinking this has something to do with your son?” Josh said. “Has something to do with Nellie saying your son’s name?”

“Yes. I can’t even sleep, can’t get that out of my mind. She knew it, knew that name, and the child hasn’t even been born yet. I’ve been waiting for her to say something else about it, something I can almost use to reaffirm what I know damn well she already said once, but she hasn’t spoken another word about it. And I’ve tried prompting her, but how can I open up conversation like that? How can I be subtle about something so profound?”

The incident where Nellie had yelled out the name of Mendes’s unborn son was peculiar, sure, but it was not at the forefront of Josh’s concerns. There was Kelly’s well-being, first and foremost…and with each passing minutes, he could feel the knot in his stomach pull tighter and tighter. Damn it, why couldn’t she just call him? Didn’t she know he was worried about her?