Long Knives Read online

  Primo, who had been in class the day we discussed that topic, must have sensed my disbelief. “My grandfather,” he said, “took the story of the survivor and calculated approximately where is the ship. You must believe this.”

  I didn’t think I needed to believe it. “When did your grandfather figure that out?”

  “I am not sure. Perhaps it was in the early 1980s.”

  “How deep is the ocean where you think the ship is?”

  “Many thousands of feet.”

  “Primo, I’m now totally disbelieving. Until the late 1980s only the US military had the technology to locate wrecks in thousands of feet of water.”

  “We started a company,” he responded. “With family and investors. Two years ago we paid to have a sonar array towed over many miles of ocean bottom.”

  “Where?”

  “Where we thought the wreck could be. After many, many weeks of searching we found the wreckage precisamente—precisely.”

  “How precisely?”

  “It is spread over many meters of ocean floor. But we know where is that area.”

  “Well, that makes more sense as a matter of theory, although you would have needed millions of dollars and a good bit of luck to pull that off.”

  “We did. We spent many millions to find it. And we need now money to go down and seize the treasure from the bottom.”

  “What cargo do you expect to find when you get down there?”

  “Gold and silver coins.”

  The whole conversation had begun to feel more and more unreal. A galleon that wrecked off Catalina would have been on its return voyage from Manila. Inbound from Manila to Mexico, the ship would have carried only trade goods to sell in Acapulco. Instead of challenging him in detail, I said, “There wouldn’t have been gold and silver coins on that voyage. Or at least not very many.”

  “You are right,” he said, “but Chinese porcelains are there, and they live well in the water of the ocean, even for centuries. Plus many gold and silver jewelries made in China. Also of great value.”

  It would soon be time to get Primo out of my office and leave him to his fantasy. And I had no intention of helping him find another lawyer to assist him. Before he left, though, I did want to find a way to finagle a look at the supposed survivor account—if it really existed. That did intrigue me. But if I had to sign an agreement to see it, I’d just pass.

  A small tone sounded, indicating the coffee was now ready. I grabbed two mugs from the bookshelf behind me. “Do you take sugar?”

  “Again, I am Italian. So of course.”

  I removed the carafe from the warmer, poured the coffee into his mug and set it on my desk. Then I opened the bottom drawer, where I keep sugar for those who take their coffee adulterated, and took out a spoon and the sugar bowl.

  “Two spoonsful or one?”

  “Two, please.”

  I dished in the sugar and set the mug in front of him. “I’d give it a minute or two, Primo. It’s probably still too hot to drink.”

  As I was about to pour my own cup, my cell phone rang. Or actually, it played “Yankee Doodle,” which is what I had set it to that week. I glanced at the number and saw that it was from the 650 area code—Palo Alto. That meant it was probably someone from the Stanford Law Review, calling about my article. It was a call I didn’t want to miss. I set the carafe back in its warmer and picked up the phone.

  “Jenna James here…Yes, I can talk now. But can you hold on a moment?”

  Primo was starting to get up. I put the phone against my thigh to mask my voice. “Primo, just stay here, please. This will be quick, and I can take the call in the empty office across the hall. Enjoy the coffee. Please pour yourself some more if you finish that one.” I got up, came out from behind my desk, walked across the hall into the empty office that was directly across from mine and shut the door behind me. I’d try to get a look at the survivor account when I got back.

  CHAPTER 3

  The call took longer than I expected. The Stanford Law Review editor—for reasons lost to history, scholarly law journals are for the most part edited by law students—was insistent that my article needed additional footnotes to support several points I had made. We argued back and forth for a while until I caved. Then he went on to tell me about his recent ski trip to Mammoth—he was a great skier, in his opinion—and seek my advice on which summer law-firm clerkship he should accept. During the whole thing, I was feeling guilty that Primo was sitting in my office, waiting. At least he had great coffee to drink.

  I finally got the guy off the line, dropped the cell into my pocket and dashed back across the hall. I was by now utterly desperate for my own first cup of coffee of the day, which the gods seemed to be conspiring to deny me.

  To my surprise, my door was now closed, even though I knew I’d left it open. When I tried to reopen it, it was locked, which was even stranger, because it’s a door that doesn’t lock automatically when you close it unless you push in the little button on the side. Which I had for sure not done. What’s worse, my keys were still in my purse, which was inside my office. I knocked, but there was no answer. Then I knocked louder. “Primo, are you in there?” There was no response.

  Crap. He had no doubt gotten tired of waiting and left, not that I could blame him. Probably closed and locked the door as a courtesy.

  I plucked the cell from my pocket and called campus security. They said someone would be there shortly to open it with a master key. Sure enough, only a few minutes went by before a skinny guy wearing a UCLA security uniform came walking down the hall.

  “Good morning, Professor,” he said. “I’m George Skillings from security. You lock yourself out?”

  “Yeah. Kind of embarrassing, but I did, and my keys are in my purse, which is in my office.”

  “Happens all the time,” he said as he unhooked a heavy ring of keys from his belt, chose one and inserted it in the lock. He turned the key, depressed the latch and pushed open the door. “There you go.”

  As the door swung open, the first thing I saw was Primo, slumped in his chair. His head lolled to the right, while his entire body also listed sharply in the same direction, held upright only by the chrome arm of the chair. His right arm drooped over the side, his hand almost touching the ground. He looked as if he might topple over at any moment.

  “Jesus,” George said, as we simultaneously moved in front of Primo.

  From the front he looked even worse. There was drool coming from one side of his mouth, and he was breathing rapidly, with a horrible rasping sound escaping with each breath. His eyes were open but glassy.

  I was frozen to the spot. George reached out and tried to straighten him up in the chair, then took two fingers and put them to Primo’s neck. He held them there a few seconds while looking at his watch. “His heart rate’s almost 180 per minute. Tachycardia.” He punched a single number—clearly a speed dial—into his cell phone. I heard a click as someone picked it up on the other end. “It’s George Skillings from security. I’m over at the law school. There’s a guy in distress in Professor James’s office. Possible drug overdose, heart attack or stroke. We need the UCLA ambulance here ASAP. We’re in the southeast corner of the building.” Then he gave them the room number, put the cell back in his pocket and turned to me. “Help me get him on the floor. It will help his breathing.”

  I nodded my assent. George moved up to the chair and put his hands under Primo’s armpits. “Professor, why don’t you get his legs, and we’ll see if we can move him without dropping him? On my count of three, okay?”

  “Okay,” I said, as I moved over and grabbed Primo’s feet.

  “Okay, one, two, three!”

  I lifted his feet while George lifted Primo’s heavier upper body, and we managed to lower him to the floor without dropping him or hitting his head.

  George tilted Primo’s head to the side and reached into his mouth to try to clear some of the drool. “Don’t want him to inhale his vomit if he throws up,” he sai
d. “I don’t think there’s anything else I can do for him until the EMTs get here with the ambulance, which should only take a couple of minutes. They’re based on campus at the UCLA police station.”

  “What do you think is wrong with him?” I asked.

  “No idea. Could be a reaction to drugs. Could be a heart attack or a stroke. Who is he?”

  “Primo Giordano. A student in my seminar. He was meeting with me. But I got a phone call and took it across the hall so he wouldn’t have to clear out. I told him to have some coffee and I’d be right back.”

  “How long were you gone?”

  “I’m not sure exactly. Maybe six or seven minutes, maybe a little longer.”

  “Did you close the door when you left?”

  “No.”

  “Weird.”

  Further conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a man and woman in crisp blue uniforms with patches on their shoulders that said UCLA Emergency Medical Services. They were pushing a red gurney loaded with a green backpack and other equipment I didn’t recognize. From the look of them, they were students.

  The guy, whose badge said his name was Carter Sullivan, looked at Primo and asked of the room in general, “What’s going on?”

  I repeated the story I had just told George Skillings. As Carter listened, he inflated a bag under Primo’s legs and simultaneously cradled his head. Meanwhile the woman EMT, whose badge said her name was Susan Suarez, took a piece of equipment off the gurney, which I recognized as a blood pressure cuff tethered to a machine with a video screen. She wrapped the cuff around Primo’s arm. As the cuff first inflated then deflated, she looked at the screen and called out, “Pulse is 190, pressure is 80 over 40. Really shocky.”

  Carter looked up at me. “What’s his name, Professor?”

  “Primo Giordano.”

  “Thanks.” He put his mouth close to Primo’s face. “Do you know your name?”

  “Primo,” he answered, but in a whispered voice, almost inaudible. Then Carter asked him, “Do you know where you are?”

  “Law school.” Again, it was hard to hear him.

  “What happened, man?”

  There was no response.

  “What day is it?”

  Again, Primo made no response.

  While Carter spoke to Primo, Susan produced from somewhere a large, black radio phone with a stubby antenna and pushed a button. “Dispatch, this is Number 59. We’re at the UCLA Law School. We have a white male law student in his twenties with shocky vitals. Essentially unconscious. No known cause. How long will it take the fire department paramedics to get here?” She paused and listened. “That’s too long. We’ll take him to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center as a Code 3.”

  “What’s a Code 3?” I asked

  “Means we’re going to use the siren.”

  “You’re not going to wait for the paramedics?”

  “No, they’ll take about ten minutes to get here. With the siren we can get him to the ER at Reagan in two or three.”

  Carter was still down on the floor with Primo and had put an oxygen mask over his face. At that point I realized that the door to my office was still open and a small crowd of people had gathered in the hallway, watching. I saw four students I knew, plus my faculty colleagues Aldous Hartleb and Henrietta Gomez, and a third person I didn’t recognize. I reached out and pushed the door shut. I don’t think anyone else inside my office noticed that I had done it. They were all focused on Primo.

  “Let’s get him on the gurney,” Carter said, looking up at Susan. “Sir,” he said, addressing George Skillings, “can you assist?”

  “Yes, I can.”

  Carter collapsed the gurney down to floor level, and the three of them hefted Primo onto it, blood pressure cuff still attached and oxygen mask still on. As soon as Primo was settled, Susan buckled him in with three leather straps, brought the gurney back up to chest height, reopened the door and began to pull the gurney backward out of the room. I followed them into the hallway. As I left the office, I glanced back and noticed for the first time that the red mailing tube Primo had been carrying didn’t appear to be there. Or maybe it was just out of my sight line.

  The group outside the door parted as we moved through, the faces of the crowd a mix of shock, concern and plain curiosity. I noticed that Henrietta was still there, but Aldous had gone.

  CHAPTER 4

  Carter and Susan were moving fast with the gurney. I trailed behind them, first down the hallway to the elevator bank, then into the elevator, which someone from security was holding open for us—where had he come from? Then they pushed their way out of the front door of the building, where, in the street, a white ambulance stood with its motor running, UCLA AMBULANCE emblazoned in blue letters across its double back doors. Another uniformed woman in blue, sporting a UCLA police badge, stood at the rear of the vehicle. As we arrived, she opened the doors, and the two EMTs slid the gurney into the ambulance and clamped it in place. Despite the oxygen mask over Primo’s mouth, I could still hear his ragged breathing.

  Carter looked over at me. “Why don’t you ride along with us? We can continue debriefing you to see if you know anything else that might be helpful.”

  “Okay, I will.”

  “Hop in,” Susan said, pointing to a bench on the right side, which was covered with a long flat beige plastic pillow, the kind you sometimes see on a chaise longue. I climbed aboard and sat down. Carter and Susan clambered in after me and seated themselves, one on either side of me. I heard rather than saw the rear doors slam. Seconds later we accelerated away as the siren began to wail. I had always wondered if the siren outside an ambulance sounded loud to people inside. It does.

  As we got under way, Susan turned to me and asked, “When he showed up in your office, did you notice anything at all that seemed unusual? Please think hard, this guy isn’t in good shape.”

  “No, nothing. It was just an ordinary conversation.”

  “Did he say anything about drugs or hard partying?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Did he mention any health problems?”

  “No.”

  “Why did he come to see you? Maybe there’s a clue there.”

  What ran through my mind at that point was that if Primo was so nervous about the treasure map that he was looking for hidden microphones in my office, I shouldn’t tell this unknown EMT about it. And besides, how could that have had anything to do with his collapse? But maybe I should tell them about it. After all, if it somehow came out that the map was important and I hid the information, wasn’t it going to make me look bad? And what if it was missing? I suddenly realized that Susan was staring at me, waiting for my answer.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m a little shaken up by all of this. I don’t really know why he came to see me. He put his name down on the sign-up sheet that’s on my office door last week, and he’d only been in my office about five minutes when, like I said before, I got a phone call and went across the hall to take it. Up ’til then we were just exchanging pleasantries.”

  “For five minutes?”

  “He’s Italian,” I said and smiled. “So yes, about five minutes of pleasantries, and during that time I was finishing up making coffee. I offered him a cup just before I left to take the phone call.”

  “Was there anything unusual about the coffee?”

  “Not that I know of. I bought it at Coffee Chaos, where I usually buy my beans, and ground it the day before, right before I left to go home.”

  “Did he put anything in the coffee?”

  “Sugar. A couple of teaspoons. Well, actually, I put it in, at his request.”

  “Sure. So nothing out of the ordinary there?”

  “No.”

  “Did he drink it?”

  “I assume so. I think his cup was sitting on my desk when I was let back into my office. I didn’t look in it, but I assume he drank it. I can check when I get back.”

  “Did you have any yourself?”

 
; “No. I was about to pour myself some when the call came. In fact, right now I’m dying for a cup of coffee. I haven’t had even one this morning, and I’m kind of an addict. By now I would usually have had at least three.”

  “There’s plenty of it around the hospital,” she said.

  Just then the ambulance, which had been twisting and turning its way through the campus to the hospital, came to a quick stop and began to back up. A few seconds later it stopped again and the back doors flew open.

  “Professor,” Carter said, “we’re at the ER receiving bay now. I’m sure the docs here will want to talk to you, but right now we need to off-load the patient and tell them what we know. Nice to meet you.” He stuck out his hand, we shook and he was gone.

  I waited for them to roll out the gurney, where it was immediately surrounded by three or four doctors and nurses dressed in scrubs of various colors. Then I stepped down from the ambulance and watched as they pushed the gurney into an exam room and pulled the curtain closed.

  I stood there, stunned. Not thirty minutes earlier, I had been sitting in my office—totally comfortable in my own world—talking to a student. Then, in what seemed the blink of an eye, I had been transported to an entirely different world, dumped off there and left to fend for myself while the denizens of that world went about their mysterious tasks—including whatever they were doing to Primo behind the curtain.

  I had been standing there alone for perhaps a minute or two, lost in those thoughts and perplexed about what to do next, when suddenly a voice from behind me said, “And who might you be?”

  I turned around and saw a short, slim man, perhaps in his midforties, with thinning black hair and a goatee that was beginning to be shot through with strands of gray. He was wearing a white coat and had a stethoscope tossed casually over his shoulder. His name, which was stitched in red just above the breast pocket on his white jacket, said William Nightingale, MD.

  “I’m Professor James,” I said. I don’t usually use my professorial title in introducing myself, but I could sense that I was in a professional world where rank might somehow count.