Chapter 10 Section IX

Dismus Hardy was standing on the sidewalk on Irving Avenue talking to another lawyer named Wes Ferrell.They've only met once or twice before, most recently at Griski's wedding last September, where they bumped into each other for a wine comparison, testing the human body's tolerance for champagne.It turned out that both of them were heavy drinkers. Last night, Franny finally showed up at the Clover Bar, and she and Hardy continued their date - eating Chinese food at Zi Yue Hua Restaurant.When he got home, he couldn't get the Sean McGee that McGuire mentioned in the story out of his mind.This morning, after asking around, he learned that McKee's family had actually hired a lawyer -- Farrell -- to launch a malpractice investigation into his death.After all, medical treatment is a hot topic these days, and yesterday was the news of Tim Markham's death, which made him interested in knowing more.Farrell would be a good source of information.Hardy knew that Farrell would feel the same, and would be more than happy to do it.So, just after 8:30, as Wes approaches his office, Hardy stands on the sidewalk, a bottle of champagne tied with a ribbon in his hand, waiting for him to show up.

Farrell greeted him affectionately, as if seeing a long-lost brother, but when he saw the gift that Hardy handed over, he backed away in feigned horror. "I haven't had a sip of that thing since Abramovich's wedding. That's enough wine for ten years. If I think back to that day, I can't believe I really did that." did." "It's like riding a horse," Hardy said. "When he jumps and throws you to the ground, you have to step on the right rear of him. Churchill drank this stuff every day, you know, even at breakfast .He also won the Nobel Prize.”

"Because of the champagne?" Hardy shook his head in the negative. "It was the peace prize, and I thought, no, wait a minute, maybe literature." "It would be nice if it was a peace prize," Farrell said, ignoring Hardy, but to himself, "I love the madness of how they give the peace prize to these world-class war fighters .Henry Kissinger, Le Duc Tho, Yasser Arafat. Churchill is also in this category. These guys are definitely not Gandhi, you know." "Politician," Hardy said, "if you're a politician, you can kill as many people as you want in wartime, and then when you stop, everyone in Sweden will thankfully grant you peace prize."

"The only thing you got wrong is that Sweden does not award peace prizes." "No? Then who will send it?" "Norway." "When did it start?" "A long time ago, I think. The other Nobel prizes go to Sweden, but Norway gives it the peace prize. Don't ask me why." "They're probably good politicians," Hardy said. "I could be a politician, too," Farrell said. "I'd like to kill a lot of people too." would mean I have a customer." Hardy leaned back in the chair, crossed his legs and said, "Isn't things going well lately?"

Farrell waved his hand aimlessly in the air. "Barely worth keeping an office open every day." He sighed. "If I didn't care so much about my clients..." "The McKee case, for example?" Farrell dwarfed.He shook his head back and forth several times in disappointment, then fixed Hardy with hound-like eyes and said, "Don't tell me they've been looking for you." Hardy laughed out loud, then held back his gaffe.After all, losing business is no laughing matter. "No," he said, "I swear. I'm not poaching your client, Wes, but it's about McGee."

"What about them, not only have they lost a son, but they've lost their minds and been unreasonable?" "Why is it difficult?" "Because recently our Supreme Court ruled, as you may have heard, that individuals cannot sue their health maintenance organizations for malpractice because they don't test drugs. They're commercial, not medical. agency." He held it up with an open palm, then lowered it in frustration, "Unfortunately, Deeds, this rule more or less exactly reversed the complaint I filed on behalf of McKee and five other clients. Keep it out. Also, to gain time, I'm nailing myself to the car and running around non-stop on this as if it's going to the future. Anyway, now I have to rewrite it under the terms of the new bill All the complaints: lack of due care, total negligence. Is that it? The program's governing body facilitated product improvements, as in this case, but at the same time, failed to issue corresponding fines."

Hardy sat leaning back in his chair the entire time, with his hands folded over his chest, enjoying Farrell's growl half the time.He knew the reality of the ticket.That is, if you can't handle them, you're knocked out of the mall. "So what happened to Sean?" "Sean's information is like a textbook." Farrell burst out these words, walked to his filing cabinet, and pulled out a thick folder from it, "Look at this, check it out .” Hardy got up and went to his desk.Farrell has all the medical records that Moses McGuire mentioned last night at the Clover, but they purposefully embellished a lot of the details, especially with the twist at the end that made Sean McGee's death even more disturbing. People feel miserable.One of Sean's doctors suggested that he might have an approach, a new treatment being used at Cedars-Sinai Hospital in Los Angeles, that might help his condition.But Sean's health maintenance organization has characterized the treatment as experimental, so they won't hold him accountable for it.This means that if he accepts this treatment, Sean will pay nearly 300,000 US dollars for treatment from his own pocket. “After months of wrestling with deciding whether he should spend the money, he decided to go into therapy. He and his parents sold their house, basically for cash, and went south Los Angeles. Guess where he is?"

"He's dead," Hardy said gravely. "He's dead," Farrell repeated, "but I've got a witness there who says they could have saved him if he'd gone to therapy three months ago." Hardy hissed and said, "If his testimony is solid, it will be worth a lot to you." "Yes, but that day won't come. Let me tell you." Farrell closed the folder, "In short, these are all time-consuming lawsuits, and the critical parts for me are difficult. Confirmed. Those medical records that should have been preserved or sorted were not found, because Parnassus did not allow..."

Hardy stood up abruptly from his chair, as if he was going to jump at the word he heard in his ear. "Parnassus? Is this the group we're talking about now?" Farrell nodded. "Yes, Sean works for the city, so they provide him with health insurance." "And what about your other clients? Are they also Parnassus' insureds?" "Of course. After all, they are the largest insured group in the town." "Then, are the other clients involved in the death of family members?" "yes." "They're also time-consuming cases, like Sean's?"

"Not really, there was this little girl named Susan Muggs who was allergic to sulfa drugs and the doctor who saw her forgot about her drug allergy history. I mean, can you believe that kind of thing? You would think that when they called up the patient's name, the computer system would have recorded the patient's allergy drug information, but about five years ago, they made a choice not to install this information system software, just It’s to save some money.” He shook his head contemptuously, “But let me ask you, Diz, if you don’t even have a client, where is your interest?”

Hardy sat on the corner of his desk. "To tell you the truth, I don't know too much about this. I just heard about Sean last night and wondered if his fiancée or his family needed any help, which is why I came to you. But when I heard until it is all Parnassus's..." "It's all Parnassus's what?" Hardy frowned, reluctant, against his usual practice, to repeat what he was sure had been conveyed veiled.He took advantage of the opportunity to change the subject, "This name has been talked about a lot recently. Have you heard of Tim Markham?" "What's up with him?" Hardy glanced at Farrell suspiciously, thinking to himself, is Wes trying to play tricks on purpose?But it's obviously not like pretending. "He was killed yesterday. A hit-and-run vehicular case." "You're kidding me!" Farrell softened. "I've got to start watching some late-night TV shows and reading the papers. When did this happen?" "Yesterday morning. They took him to Portola Hospital, but that's where he died." "Jesus, at his own hospital. I like it. They must be messing around there." Farrell smiled. "Maybe I can call his wife and see if she plans to sue them. Isn't it a beautiful thing?" "Accuse whom?" "Portola, Parnassus, the usual suspects." "Don't forget, they didn't kill him, Wes, he got hit by a car." Farrell leaned forward, elbows on his desk, still grinning. "Listen to me, Deeds. Do you know Tim Markham? But I do. He's been known for fifteen years to squeeze money out of a superfluous hospital, and he's not spared himself anyway. Difficult. I promise it is." Hardy laughed too. "That's a good inference, Wes, but I don't think that's the case." Farrell stretched out a finger, and said firmly, "Just wait and see." Hardy sometimes asks himself why he has an office downtown.After returning from Farrell's, he spent an hour in his office, and then joined Freeman for a long lunch at Belden Lane.Just after three o'clock, he finally settled down and focused on the summary he was writing.At this moment, a call from his friend Pico Morales interrupted his train of thought again.Biko said on the phone that he didn't want to disturb him, but the matter was urgent and related to a friend of his.He needed a crime lawyer and wanted Hardy to come to the Steinhardt Aquarium and interview him.Biko said the guy often took walks with him.Hardy understood what he meant.The words got into Biko's head when he went on to say that the friend was a doctor named Kenson in Parnassus.He planned to change his originally planned driving route and turned around to the street where Biko was. As Steinhardt's director, Biko has long had ambitions to acquire a great white shark for the Golden Gate Park aquarium.A few times a year, when a boat comes with a shark, Biko calls the volunteers on his list to see if they can come and serve.Hardy was one of its first volunteers long ago.At that time, he would enter the tank in the aquarium, put on a waterproof suit, and walk around a shark in the tank for half an hour without thinking about anything.Theoretically, before a newcomer shark could breathe on its own, this walking would allow a constant stream of water to flow through the animal's gills and stimulate it to breathe, but it never worked.At the back of the aquarium, six concrete steps below ground level, is its only entrance, which is half-hidden in a bush.In the dim corridor, someone stood in the faint halo of light from a small light bulb. Hardy pressed the switch of the electric glass door, and the door opened, but he was still surprised by the strong familiarity of this place.It looks like the same drops of moisture are still running on the same green walls.The low roof made him want to lower his head involuntarily, although he knew that according to his height, his head would not touch his head.He heard voices that sounded like they were coming from an oil drum.He also heard the echo of his own footsteps, and there was a faint, constant, barely audible hum, perhaps from a generator or a pool pump, Hardy hadn't been able to figure out what made it. sound. Turn left from the hall, then go straight, then turn right again, and finally enter a circular house.The room was almost filled by a huge pool of seawater rising above the ground.Pico Morales, tall and stocky, was leaning against the edge of the sink.Under a clump of unkempt black hair, the gloomy face is like a black granite rock that has been eroded by wind and rain. Coupled with a drooping beard and soft eyes, it looks extremely vicissitudes.He was holding an oversized, chipped coffee cup in his hand, and the waterproof pants he was wearing were almost torn by his protruding belly. In the tank, a man in a waterproof suit was busy with a shark.It was the biggest one Hardy had ever seen here, over six feet long.Behind him, the shark's dorsal fin was sticking out of the water, its tail flapping in the water, but Hardy had given up on sharks years ago. But the man who was walking next to the shark was another matter to him. "Hey," Pico said to Hardy, "the troopers are here. Deeds, this is Dr. Eric Kenson." The man in the pool looked up and nodded.He was still working hard, almost breathing hard, walking hard step by step.However, he slowly leaned towards the edge of the pool, nodding his head to greet Hardy. "You are Hardy?" he asked, "I should shake hands with you, but..." Then, he said more seriously, "Thank you for coming." "Hey, Biko mentioned it on the phone. He said you were in trouble." "Not yet, maybe, but..." At that moment, Hardy and Pico watched as the shark writhed and wrenched free from the man's grip.With a curse in his mouth, he turned and chased after it. "Leave it alone," Pico yelled suddenly. Hearing this, the man turned and walked towards the pool, but stopped halfway and looked back.It was just a blink of an eye, but at that very moment, the shark turned around from the side of the pool and rushed towards him at high speed.Pico's eyes never moved away from the shark, so he saw it all. "Come out! Now! Watch out!" Kensen hurried to the edge of the pool.Hardy and Pico each grabbed him by the arm and lifted him out of the sink.At the same time, the shark rushed over, opened its mouth and took a bite towards the place where he had just stood up. "It was sudden," Hardy said. "I thought it was a healthy fish." "It's hungry," Kenson said. "Maybe it mistook Pico for a walrus." Hardy remained calm and nodded thoughtfully. "Honest mistake." They all stood on the edge of the pool and watched the shark swim around like no one else. Biko never took his eyes off the water for a moment, staring at the swimming shark.Before that, how many times he had dreamed that a shark could survive, and this time he didn't want his dream to be shattered again. "Anyway, you two need to talk. Why don't you change places?" The Clover Cantina is less than a quarter mile away from this aquarium.After the doctor changed into his own clothes, the two of them left, leaving Biko alone with the still-swimming shark.Hardy hadn't driven a few hundred yards, and the afternoon sky was already fading quickly.Now they were sitting on a deformed couch in front of the fireplace, drinking.Hardy ordered beer from the Royal Irish Cavalry, and Kenson ordered bitter coffee, an atmosphere that seemed more suitable for recreation than for planning a legal defense. "So," Hardy started, "how did you meet Biko?" Kenson shrugged, took a sip of his coffee, and said, "His son is one of my patients. We met and talked about what he does, and then he told me about his shark. I want to do that." This kind of thing sounds very special and cool. He invited me over last night, so I was there just now. Even if I really can't get away, I will go if he calls. What about you? I I heard you used to be a volunteer too. I don't think Pico doesn't allow people to resign." "I've been given a special forgiveness." That answer didn't seem to make sense, so he added, "I've been hit too hard to take the kind that kills all the sharks." Kenson smiled wryly. "Don't take medicine." "Yeah," Hardy agreed, "I think that was a long time ago." He sipped his beer for a while, "I hear you're looking for a lawyer." After meeting Kenson, the It was Hardy who first noticed the faint pallor of his rosy face and the sleepiness in his eyes. "Do you know Tim Markham?" Hardy nodded. "He was hit by a car yesterday and died in hospital." "That's right. I was the doctor on duty in the intensive care unit of that hospital when he died. He was having an affair with my wife." "So you think the police might think you took this unexpected opportunity to kill him?" "I don't think it's impossible." "But you didn't do that." Kenson met Hardy's gaze. "No." "You're tempted by the opportunity?" Hardy quipped, trying to lighten the mood. He almost forced a smile. "I've dreamed of doing this all the time, but if I had planned it, he would have had a far more painful death than this. First, I would have broken his kneecap, slashed his Achilles tendon, cut his Drop his testicles. In short, any way that will make him suffer more than die cheaply like now." He shook his head in disappointment, "There is really no justice in this world, you know?" Perhaps, Hardy thought, he knew more about this than Dr. Kenson. "With or without justice," he said, "you're concerned." That's clearly not an issue. Dr. Kenson nodded grimly. "If the police start asking about Tim, all I can hear is my heart saying, 'Yeah, I hate him. You'll hate him too. I'm glad he's dead.' I don't want that." Hardy didn't expect such a situation to happen.But everything is possible now, and it is not yet conclusive. "Let me put you at ease. I know Markham died of his injuries, and if that is the case, you will not be charged with any crime." "And what if someone says I didn't do enough to save him? Say it was malicious medical liability or something like that? Call it murder?" Hardy shook his head puzzled. "I've never heard of that. Why?" "Because a homicide detective named Bracco was there yesterday, and they're doing an autopsy today." "I wouldn't worry about that. They do autopsies on every body." "No, they don't do that, especially for patients who die in ICU after surgery. We did an autopsy at the hospital, and I signed the death certificate: Severe internal organ damage from traumatic injuries. They ended up taking him downtown." "He died in a hit-and-run car accident," Hardy explained. "It was a homicide, so they did an autopsy. It happens every time." But the doctor asked another question. "Okay then, but I ran into Bracco last night when he was looking at my car parked outside my house in Markham." "Braco?" Hardy couldn't figure out who this man was, and shook his head in confusion, "Are you sure he's a San Francisco homicide detective, not a hit-and-run? I don't know him. " "That's what he said. He has a police badge." "He's looking at your car? Why are you at the Markham house?" "I know Carla, his wife. I don't think there's anything wrong with going there to offer my condolences and see if I can do something for them." He breathed a sigh of relief. Happened. I felt like I had some sort of obligation to do it." "So what did this cop do to your car?" Kenson looked around the bar over his shoulder, as if wondering how he'd gotten there.He thought for a moment, then turned to Hardy and said, "I think he was looking to see if my car looked like the one in the accident, if I hit Markham. Before I left her house, There were other people visiting Carla there as well, and there were other cars out there. My impression is that he looked at all the cars." Things are not as simple as they seem.Hardy immediately thought of a conversation he had had with Grisky on a recent walk.car police!This Bracco must have been mistreated in the homicide squad, one of the two new clowns. "Well, from what I've just heard, it doesn't look like you've had any real trouble with this anyway. You didn't kill him." "But he died while I was in charge of the job, and it's no secret that I hate him." "Well, I'll ask you again: Did you kill him?" "No." "He died from his injuries, right? Did you make it worse? No? Well, listen, you're fine." Clearly, those words weren't enough to fully convey what Hardy was trying to say. So he went on, "Let me ask you this question: What is the probability that Markham will die, even if you did everything correctly that you were supposed to do?" "I did." "I agree with you, but that's not the question I want you to answer." The doctor thought about it very carefully. "Statistically speaking, once in the intensive care unit, maybe one or two out of ten people make it out alive." This number really surprised Hardy, and he leaned back on the sofa. "That's all? Only two out of ten?" Kenson shrugged. "Maybe three. I don't know the exact number, but not as many as most people think." "Then the maximum probability of Markham surviving can only be said to be 30%, even if you have done everything that should be done." "I did all of that. But yeah, about thirty percent." "In this way, the probability of his death in a hit-and-run vehicle accident is 70%, no matter which doctor does it or does nothing, am I right?" The body on the sofa moved forward, "This is good news. Even if you are at fault, remember, don't say you did it. No matter who knocked him down, medical malpractice cannot be used as a defense in the trial reason to exonerate himself. Homicide prosecutors in particular reject the defense that the 'doctor could have saved the victim'." There was a little life in Kenson's eyes. "You think I've heard of such a thing before, why?" "Because if it weren't for that, every lawyer in the world would start off by saying that it wasn't his client who shot his wife four times in the chest that killed her, but that the doctors were incapable of reviving her. It was their fault , not his client's." Kenson accepts this explanation with a grain of salt. "But there really isn't any malpractice involved in this," he said with certainty. "Really," he added. "I believe you. As I just said, I don't see anything that you can be charged with. It was the man in the car who hit him that threw Markham at the first scene of the accident. The guy Laco was looking for, the driver of the car that caused the accident." But the words that had been spinning in his mind before suddenly burst out, "You said you knew Mrs. Markham?" Upon hearing this, Kenson's body fell down visibly.He looked down at the scarred hardwood floor beneath his feet, then looked up again. "You don't know? That's another matter." Hardy waited for his next words. "Obviously something happened last night." He paused. "She died, and the rest of her family." "Oh my God." Hardy suddenly felt dizzy and weak, and felt like he was about to fall to the sofa. Kenson continued: "The news came out this morning, probably after tea time. I have been busy seeing patients, so I didn't know until noon. Not long after, Braco called to confirm whether I was in the hospital .He wanted to come and talk to me about it." "Then you also talked to him today?" Kenson shook his head. "Maybe it was a mistake, but I asked my bellman to tell him I wasn't available. Almost at the same time, Biko also called about the shark. I don't see Wednesday afternoons anyway, and at the same time I can see this. I didn't want to talk to the police until something happened. So here I am, in the aquarium, and I'm actually hiding, and I'm going around with Francis—" "Who is Francis?" "That shark's name. Pico named him Francis. So I was there just to pass the time, until it occurred to me that a solution would be to get a lawyer. Coincidentally, Pico knows you." His face A complicated expression appeared, apologetic and confused, "So, we are sitting here now, where did we just talk?" Hardy nodded, sat back, remembered his beer, and took a sip from his glass. "Oh, you have to be prepared to talk to the police whether you want to or not." "If they want to ask about my wife, how do I tell them?" Hardy had already answered this question, but this was only their first meeting, so he suppressed his impatience. "I just told you the truth, try not to panic. But if they're looking at the full investigation, they'll know about Markham and your wife, right? So just tell them straight up, it's not It means you kill someone." Kenson put things more bluntly. "Okay. Whether or not they're looking for the driver of the hit-and-run vehicle shouldn't matter, right?" "That's how I see it." Hardy's eyes moved to Kenson's face opposite.His eyes looked dull, only tired. "Are you OK?" He managed to squeeze out a few weak, dry laughs. "I was just a little bit tired, and now it's like this, I've always been tired," he said. "I've been tired for fifteen years. If I haven't been crushed by the limits of human endurance, I I don't even know what happened to me." Hardy slumped back on the couch, realizing he wasn't in the lighthearted mood that he was on the dance floor. "However, you got away this afternoon, weren't you going around with Pico's shark?" "Yeah, I know," Kenson said, "that doesn't mean much to me either. I'm just doing stuff." “Me too.” Hardy circled his own shark at a low point in his life, and for nearly a decade after his son Michelle died and he and Jane divorced, he was like It was like sleepwalking.The boredom he felt at that time was as bad as Kenson's.But for some reason, circling his shark seemed to mean something to him.When you see through the world and feel that there is nothing in your heart, you will always be obsessed with something wholeheartedly. Both men stood up.Hardy gave Kenson his business card and one last little advice. "You know, if they want to, they'll show up at your place of work or at your house. They might come to your house with a warrant or a subpoena to knock on your door. If either of those things happen, don't say anything. .Don't let them coerce you, you have my phone number, you can find me." Kenson was so nervous that his mouth involuntarily opened wide.He let out a long breath, shook his head, and said, "That sounds like tough baseball." "No. Baseball is a game." Hardy would do everything he could to reassure his client, but he didn't want Kenson to think that any of the investigators' actions were taken by surprise, "but from what I've heard In that case, we're fine. You didn't drive the car that killed him. His wife had nothing to do with you, did you? Fine. Then the rest is the truth, save for the broken kneecap part. "