Desperate Measures Read Online Free PDF Page B

the meanwhile.
    He returned to the hospital because of the television announcer's reference to Millgate. Through the thin walls , he had listened to the news report. Pittman's expectation was that Millgate had died and a brief description of his public-service career was being provided. Burt Forsyth would be annoyed about that-Millgate dying before Pittman finished the obituary in time for tomorrow morning's edition of the newspaper. But the TV news story had not been Millgate's death. To the contrary, Millgate was still in intensive care, as the announcer had pointed out.
    Instead, the story had been about another possible scrape in Millgate's background. To the government's dismay, copy of a Justice Department special prosecutor's report had been leaked to the press this evening. The report, a final draft never intended for publication, implicated Millgate a negotiator in a possible covert attempt-unsanctioned Congress-to buy nuclear weapons from the chaos of governments in what used to be the Soviet Union.
    An unsubstantiated charge against him. Solely an assessment of where the Justice Department's investigation might eventually lead. But the gravity of the news announcer's voice had made the grave allegation sound as established fact. Guilty until proven innocent. This was second time in seven years that Jonathan Millgate had implicated as a go-between in a major arms scandal, Pittman knew that if he failed to investigate this time, if he didn't at least make an attempt to get a statement from him- gate's people, Burt Forsyth would accuse him of renigging on his bargain to do his best for the Chronicle during brief time remaining to it. For Burt and what Burt had done for Jeremy, Pittman forced himself to try.
    Pittman stood on the corner across from the hospital's Emergency entrance. It was after midnight. A drizzle intensified the April night's chill. He buttoned his wed London Fog topcoat and felt dampness even through the soles of his shoes. The drizzle created misty halos around gleaming streetlights and the brighter floodlights at the Emergency entrance. By contrast, the lights in some of the hospital rooms were weak, making Pittman feel lonely. He stared up toward what had been Jeremy's window on the tenth floor, and that window was dark. Feeling even more lonely, he crossed the street toward the hospital.
    At this hour, traffic was slight. The Emergency area was almost deserted. He heard a far-off siren. The drizzle strengthened, wetting the back of his neck. When Jeremy had been sick, Pittman had learned about the hospital in considerable detail-the locations of the various departments, the lounges that were most quiet in the middle of the night, the areas that had coffee machines, the places to get a sandwich when the main cafeteria was closed. Bringing Jeremy to the hospital for chemotherapy, he had felt uncomfortable at the main entrance and in the lobby. The cancer had made Jeremy so delicate that Pittman had a fear of someone in a crowd bumping against him. Given Jeremy's low blood-cell counts, a bruise would have taken a considerable time to heal. In addition, Pittman had felt outraged by the stares of people in the lobby, who seemed shocked to see a skinny, bald fifteen-year-old, his face gaunt, his hairless scalp tinted blue from blood vessels close to the surface. Terribly sensitive about his son's feelings, Pittman had chosen an alternate route, in the back, a small entrance around the corner to the left of the Emergency area. The door was used primarily by interns and nurses, and as Pittman discovered, the elevators in this section were faster, perhaps because fewer people used them.
    Retracing this route created such vivid memories that he sensed Jeremy next to him as he passed a private ambulance parked outside this exit. It was gray. It had no hospital markings. But through a gap in curtains drawn across the back windows, Pittman saw a light, an oxygen unit, various medical monitors. A man wearing