Do No Harm

David's nausea reached a room-jarring pitch as he contemplated his mother's involvement in such a matter. It was probably she who had ordered the files cleared from the hospital, wanting to leave behind no paper trail. His head buzzed with shock. The full force of epiphany would come later, he knew; this was only the tug of the retreating surf, drawing back and back and back.

The foster home's address, listed on the check stub, was 1711 Pearson Rd. The same as Douglas DaVella's.

David slid the papers back in the envelope and sat quietly, trying to untangle the implications of what he'd just read. He breathed slowly and evenly, taking advantage of the surprisingly effective surroundings of the chapel.

David's earliest memory was of visiting his father at the hospital. He'd followed him around the entire day, tugging at the edge of the white coat. When he'd gotten bored, his father had inflated a latex glove and drawn a face on it for him. He couldn't remember how old he'd been, but when he'd walked by his father's side, he'd only come up to his hip. His father had rested his hand on his shoulder, as he always did.

A nurse had stopped his father, flipping some pages on a clipboard and needing advice. A bad trauma had come in-a motorcycle crash-and the body approached them on a gurney. David had made out only the gruesome red mess of the face before his father's hand rose from his shoulder and shielded his eyes, cool, protective, and rough from overwashing, pulling his face in tight to his white coat, never missing a beat in his conversation with the nurse.

He wracked his brain to recall an equally warm memory he had of his mother but found none. He remembered only briefer, colder images-how she wouldn't meet his eyes when he'd had chicken pox, as though something about his weakened state shamed her; the way his palms had sweat when he'd called to tell her about his low mark in embryology; how she wouldn't address Elisabeth at the dinner table when she broached medical topics.

Still, he was horrified by her complicity in covering up the study. And she was not alive for him to confront, question, or accuse. He'd always held her medical code of honor to be impeccable. That she'd been cold and withholding in her personal life, and a sharp-edged politician, had always seemed separate from that somehow. He should have known that in a field as absorbing as medicine the lines would eventually blur.

The bedrock had shifted beneath his feet. David had no choice but to desert it and seek more solid ground, to accept the injustices of the past and work at redeeming the present.

The door opened and someone sat in the chair beside him. He gradually came to realize it was Diane. He looked over. Her face was wrapped loosely in gauze. "I am not an animal," she joked in a creaky voice. "I am a woman."

"You shouldn't cover your wounds," he said, his voice tired and flat.

"I know," she said. "But I don't want to scare the patients."

"You are a patient."

"Oh," Diane said. "Oh yeah." She put her feet up on her chair and hugged her knees to her chest. "What are you doing in here? You're a Jew. And an atheist."

"How'd you find me?"

"Jill said she saw you duck inside."

"How are you feeling?"

"I feel pretty. Oh so pretty. It's a pity how pretty I feel." Diane's monotone matched David's pretty well. "They let me out of my cage, at least. Said I should be ready to go home tomorrow." She pointed to the manila folder in David's lap. "More notes from the underground?"

He told her briefly about Connolly's study, then handed her the folder. She read it slowly, then set it down. She didn't say anything for a few minutes as they stared at the tiny stained-glass window ahead. David realized it depicted a tree. A man came in and uttered a few prayers, his lips moving soundlessly. He departed quickly afterward.

Diane patted the bandage gently over her cheek, as if trying to alleviate an itch. "This keeps getting messier."

"It's just that with the attacks, the cops, bullshit hospital politics, the media all over me… " He rubbed his eyes. "It's all been wearing on me enough. And now to learn my mother bears some responsibility for these assaults… "

Diane's eyes sharpened. "From what do you draw that conclusion?"

"The experiments took place under her tenure."

"It sounds like she stopped them when she caught wind. You know damn well that the NPI chief of staff can't oversee every study run over there."

"She covered up the experiments that created him."

"Helped create him, David. Only helped. There were twenty-seven other kids in that study. None of them are throwing alkali."

"If you'd seen those films-"