Looking for Jane (57)

Dr. Taylor flies around the room, stashing things into locked cupboards. The ruffled snap of a garbage bag being tied. Voices out in the hallway. Nancy wants to go home more than she has ever wanted anything in her life. Dr. Taylor pulls out other items she didn’t even use for the procedure, sets them out on the metal standing tray that’s perched beside Nancy’s ankle. The actors are taking their places, Nancy realizes, fixing their expressions into forced and gleaming smiles. Ready to fool their audience the moment the curtain rises on the scene.

Nancy is still taking deep, deliberate breaths in an effort not to vomit when Dr. Taylor resettles herself onto the small stool. She lets Nancy out of the stirrups and rubs her hands up and down the tops of her feet in reassurance.

“I can’t let you get dressed just yet,” she says through her mask. “I still need to check a couple of things. But I’ve set out everything I’d normally need for a PAP,” she says, indicating the tray full of innocent tools. “That’s all they’ll see. As long as they don’t catch us in the act, they can’t charge us. We’ll try to keep them away from you, but they won’t want to come too close anyway. In my experience, men like these guys are thoroughly freaked out by anything to do with a vagina that isn’t sex.”

Despite the situation, Nancy feels the muscles of her face strain into a smile.

“Don’t say anything unless they demand to speak with you. Then just stick to the story.”

“Okay.”

Dr. Taylor gives Nancy’s left foot a small squeeze. The voices in the hall draw closer. Alice is demanding to see a warrant. Nancy can hear three or four men, their voices rising to an angry crescendo against Alice’s protests.

A moment later, there’s a soft knock on the door. It opens and Alice pokes her head through, eyes wide.

“Dr. Taylor?”

“Yes?”

“There are a few policemen here to speak with you. They have a warrant to search the premises.” Alice’s final word is still lingering in the stifling air of the bright room when the door is pushed open forcibly from over her shoulder. “Sir—”

“I understand you wish to speak with me, Officer.” Dr. Taylor stands up now. She strides the few steps across the small room to the doorway. Nancy’s breathing is shallow. She already misses the weight of Dr. Taylor’s hand on her foot.

Dr. Taylor extends that hand instead to the policeman. The officer hesitates before shaking it.

“Pernith,” he answers.

“Nice to meet you, Officer Pernith.” She grips his hand before dropping it aggressively, as though she would rather throw it across the room. “I understand you and your fellows here have a search warrant for my practice?” She nods to the other three young officers who stand behind Pernith. Two of them, closest to the door, wear hard expressions, their jaws set tightly, eyes narrowed underneath their heavy brows. The other lurks much farther back down the hall, his eyes cast down at his shoes.

“Yes, we do, ma’am. We received information that you may be conducting illegal activity on these premises.”

“Please, do tell. What illegal activity am I suspected of conducting?” Dr. Taylor steps forward through the doorway and tries to pull the door shut behind her, but Officer Pernith’s well-practiced arm shoots out and holds the door open.

“I’m afraid I’m going to have to see inside this room, ma’am.”

“My name is Dr. Taylor, not ma’am, if you please.”

He chews his lip, but she holds her ground, though she’s at least a head shorter than him. “I need to search the room, Doctor.”

“I would like to see the warrant. If you are going to barge in on one of my patients during a perfectly routine exam of her vagina, I insist on seeing evidence that you have been granted such pointless authority.”

Dr. Taylor’s matter-of-fact pronouncement of the word “vagina” causes the heat to rise in his neck and stops him dead in his tracks. Officer Pernith clears his throat. Nancy sees the corner of Alice’s mouth twitch.

“Stevenson.” He beckons imperiously to one of his tight-jawed underlings, who thrusts a piece of paper into Dr. Taylor’s outstretched hand. She examines it for a moment before her lips press into a thin line and she steps backward into the room. Nancy feels like her insides have melted.

“Lucy?” Dr. Taylor calls. Nancy turns toward the door, wondering who she’s speaking to. Beside the policeman’s shoulder, Dr. Taylor nods her head a fraction of an inch.

“Yes?” Nancy answers.

“These officers have a warrant to search my practice, which includes this exam room. They insist on coming in. Please stay where you are.”

Officer Pernith strides into the room. He’s a huge man with broad shoulders. All the cops look larger than normal men. His fellows and Alice follow them in. The room is now cramped with bodies, suffocating. Nancy catches a whiff of one of the policemen’s cologne and her stomach falls through the floor. She would know the scent anywhere: Hugo Boss, the same one Len wears. She turns her head to face the wall and holds her breath as long as she can.

Alice scurries over to Nancy’s side and takes her hand in both of her own. She grips it tightly. She’s grounding, motherly, and Nancy half wishes her own mother could be here with her, but the thought of telling her about the pregnancy was unbearable. She closes her eyes, trying to block out the scene. But a moment later, Nancy hears the clip of shoes on the floor beside the exam table, senses a heavy presence beside her. The officer clears his throat.