RATH WAITED OUTSIDE Langevine’s office building. The temperature had risen to hover just above freezing, and he was chilled to the bone standing in the raw, damp cold. The sweat that had soaked his shirt during the hearing was icy against his skin now. He shuddered, trying to wipe the hearing from his mind. He’d left before Preacher had spoken, unequipped to deal with such a performance. He was exhausted.
Grout strode down the sidewalk toward him, and they walked toward Langevine’s office. “How’d it go?” Grout said.
Rath didn’t answer.
“Sorry,” Grout said, and clapped a hand on Rath’s shoulder.
Inside, an elderly woman showed them to Dr. Langevine’s office.
Dr. Langevine sat behind a modest pine desk, a slight man, delicate and diminutive, with narrow, bony shoulders beneath a slightly baggy pink-striped oxford. He was on the phone and extended a hand, his fingers long and fine as he covered the phone’s receiver with his other hand. His handshake was certain and warm. He eyed two chairs over large, round eyeglasses of the sort Rath hadn’t seen since John Denver on the Muppets.
Rath and Grout sat, Rath noting Langevine’s thick but impeccably trimmed red beard and absurd flop of red hair, and, in another throwback, a single wave of bangs hanging to his eyebrows.
Langevine’s minimalist office was the opposite of Snell’s, the walls absent of painting or prints, displaying a sole diploma and a medical license. Books on a shelf were aligned so precisely it was as if the books were never removed for reading. Langevine hung up the phone and sat with a smile of disarming warmth and kindness. He shook mints from a dispenser and popped them in his mouth, making a tiny, sucking noise, as if slurping the dregs of a milk shake through a straw. Then he folded his thin fingers on his knees and rocked slightly in his chair. “How may I assist you?”
Grout took a tape recorder from his coat. “Mind if I tape this? I hate taking notes.”
Langevine smiled again, a waft of mint mouthwash coming from him. “Be my guest.”
Grout set the tape recorder on the edge of the desk, where it whirred. “We believe you had a patient by the name of Mandy Wilks,” he said.
“Oh, gentlemen, sincerest apologies.” The doctor’s voice was soft as talcum powder. “I can’t comment on patients. I’m afraid—”
Grout plucked the subpoena from the same pocket from which he’d taken the tape recorder, set it on the desk.
Dr. Langevine glanced at it and nodded cordially. “Well, then, at your service.”
“Understand,” Rath said, “this is also about helping find your patient, who may be the victim of a crime. We can take her records with us, but wed prefer to have you answer pressing questions now, as well.”
“I have to say it does make me a trifle uncomfortable yet. I’ve never spoken openly about a patient to anyone other than the patient herself or staff.”
“Understood,” Grout said.
“Proceed.” Dr. Langevine dipped his chin at Grout.
“To give context,” Grout said, “Mandy disappeared late the night of October twenty-one or early on the twenty-second.”
“This world.” Dr. Langevine said.
“What was she seeing you for?” Grout said.
“Reproductive health.”
“Did she have a venereal disease?”
Dr. Langevine was clearly uncomfortable. But then, he had reason to be. This was a rare circumstance, and the information he might give was of the most personal.
“No,” he said, “she did not.”
“Was she pregnant?”
“No. At least not at her last scheduled appointment.”
Rath felt his shoulders sag with disappointment then straightened himself. “And when was that?” he asked.
“I’d have to check.”
“We’ll wait.”
As Langevine set about typing on his keyboard, Grout asked, “What was she like the last time you saw her? Her behavior. Was she agitated, nervous, distracted? Upset?”
“The last time I saw her?” Langevine stared at Rath from behind his glasses with big, magnified eyes that made him look a bit of the kook.
“If you could give us one word,” Rath said.
“Maybe a bit nervous,” Langevine said. “But that’s entirely normal for a young girl for such a visit.”
“She wasn’t depressed or upset or—”
“No. A tad nervous. More shy really. That’s it.”
“And what did she see you for, her last appointment?”
“Her annual check up. Here it is.” Langevine spun his monitor for Rath and Grout to see. “Friday, September 2.”
Grout glanced at Rath.
“You’re sure?” Grout said.
“Absolutely. Eve, my front-desk administrator, is scrupulous. I insist on it.”
Rath stared at Langevine, who met his gaze evenly.
“We have a conflict,” Rath said.
“Excuse me?” said Langevine. His voice remained level, unexcited but tinged with that natural curiosity of someone truly at a loss.
Grout tapped a hand on the chair arm, and said, “We have it from a sound witness that your patient was seen here in your office on Tuesday, October 4.”
“Impossible.”
“This witness is certain,” Grout said.
“He’s mistaken.” Langevine’s gaze and voice were resolute.
“Look,” Grout said, leaning in, “this witness is reliable. He’s the only reason we even knew she was a patient of yours. So you tell us how he sees a girl who is a stranger to him walk into this office on Tuesday, October 4, and you say it’s impossible, yet this girl is your patient. Do you know the odds of that coincidence?”
“Infinitesimal, I imagine,” Langevine said. “Nevertheless, the witness is mistaken.”
“Now look,” Grout said, rising halfway out of his chair.
Rath cleared his throat, and Grout sat back down.
“Perhaps your calendar is wrong,” Rath said, leaning to get a better look at the calendar on the monitor.
“As you see.” Langevine pointed to Tuesday, October 25 on his calendar, then the eighteenth, and the eleventh. “My office is closed Tuesdays, gentlemen.”
Grout and Rath stared at the calendar.
“If you like,” Langevine said, “I can call in Eve to attest to this, or any number of patients sitting out there now, many of whom are peeved I am closed on Tuesdays.”
Rath shook his head. “That won’t be necessary.”
Grout sat back, his jaw set.
“The office is closed,” Langevine said, “but the main door only leads to the waiting room, and from there no one can access the back offices and rooms. So, the door to the hallway may have been unlocked to allow cleaners access. It’s possible Ms. Wilks stopped in for some reason and, finding that the office door was unlocked, entered.”
“Wouldn’t she have known you were closed on Tuesdays?” Grout said.
“Apparently, no.”
“What could she have wanted to see you about?” Rath asked.
“I wish I could say.”
“She also visited Family Matters that day,” Grout said.
Rath flinched, wishing Grout had not played that card. It was sloppy.
“Well,” Langevine said, “she obviously came here for a purpose, perhaps something pressing, and when she found the office closed, went to them. They might be able to shed more light than I, in that case.”
“Let’s hope so,” Rath said.
“Will there be anything else?” Langevine directed his eyes to Rath.
“Yes,” Grout said. “You have CCTV.”
“Excuse me?”
“Closed Circuit TV. We will need to look at all the tapes from that Tuesday, along with getting copies of all Ms. Wilks’s records.”
“The records of course I can give you. The tapes, or digital chips, or whatever they are, unfortunately, I believe, but you can double check with security, are overwritten every couple weeks.”
“We will. We’ll expect copies of the records sent to this e-mail.” Grout handed Langevine his card.
Dr. Langevine escorted them out of his office to the hallway, limping faintly, his leg having apparently fallen asleep with it tossed on top of the other leg’s knee. Rath disliked when it happened, the odd prickling sensation that followed a dead numbness.
“Come back anytime with questions, gentleman,” Langevine said. “Except Tuesdays, of course.”