The Fall-Down Artist Read online

  “CT scan.” Dr. Tang’s glare sharpened as he handed out the test report to Dorsey. Looking over the results, Dorsey concluded that Radovic suffered only the signs of advancing age for a laborer: spurring on several vertebrae and a bulging disc at L5-S1.

  “There’s a recommendation for a myelogram.” Dorsey indicated the report, passing it back to Dr. Tang. “Has one been scheduled, doctor?”

  “Not by me. Patient will not consent.”

  “But isn’t a myelogram the way to go to decide whether or not surgery is indicated?”

  “What can I say?” Dr. Tang grinned, as if in triumph. “Mista Radovic refuse even to consider surgery. Said this on first exam. He didn’t care what I say: no myelogram and no surgery.”

  “Without your ever raising the question, he refused a myelogram and surgery?” Dorsey was intrigued that a steelworker would be familiar with a myelogram. Familiarity gotten from a good coach, he concluded.

  “Correct.”

  “No myelogram, but you’re sure it’s a herniation?” Dorsey thought he’d take a chance, tempted by the opportunity to show off. “No myelogram, inconclusive CT. So really, doctor, you’re basing your diagnosis and finding of disability on believing the patient’s subjective complaints?” It was a short-lived and Pyrrhic victory, and Dorsey saw his error even as he committed it. Never alienate your subject, he reminded himself. Be a friend and get the information you came for.

  First Dr. Tang stumbled, then he exploded. “Of course I believe. He came here and say he have pain, I got to believe. I’m not crazy! You know how serious that is, ignoring, disbelieving the patient? He say he hurts, I try to figure out why he hurts!”

  “What happens if you can’t figure it out?”

  “Then I send him somewhere else, let somebody else try. Not perfect, you know.”

  Yeah, Dorsey thought, somebody else will try. Somebody on the Pittsburgh Express, maybe. The patient goes right on the cycle, the treatment cycle. Dorsey had never seen proof, but he had been hearing about the Pittsburgh Express for years. Just rumors, rumors that small-town locals like Dr. Tang only treated patients until it was time for surgery. Then the patient was farmed out to one of a select number of neurosurgeons or orthopedists in Pittsburgh. After surgery, it was home again to the local doctor for a long convalescence and regularly scheduled examinations.

  On his way out through the reception area, Dorsey picked up a copy of the CT scan. He also got the name of the girl at Carlisle Steel: Claudia Maynard.

  “Think you’ll find her at home?” The receptionist leaned through the open partition. “Not likely. That girl has been on the go ever since the layoff. Signed up for unemployment, and when it came time to get her mail-in claims she took off for Myrtle Beach. Might still be there.”

  That evening in his room, the Olivetti portable on the chair seat, Dorsey sat at the edge of the bed, pecking away with two fingers, composing his report of the day’s activity. His attention was divided among writing the report, watching the Bulls and Knicks play an exhibition game on the room’s TV set, and listening to Roy Eldridge strain his trumpet on the tape player, packed along for the trip. At the foot of the bed was the Igloo cooler with a fresh layer of ice over the Rolling Rock.

  Threading a clean sheet of paper into the typewriter carriage, Dorsey once again realized that his ability to prepare a well-written report was his bread and butter. He often spoke like a leftover from the old films and recordings he loved, but knowing his way around a typewriter kept him in business. For years he had wondered who to thank, the nuns at Sacred Heart grade school or the instructors in his one year of law school.

  Pulling on a beer, Dorsey worked his way through the morning hours, describing his interview of the three Grub brothers, as he had come to call them. Although they had not meant to, the three boys had provided useful information. Radovic was a loner, a lifelong bachelor whose only interest was the beer at the Hotel Bar. It didn’t impact directly on the claim, Dorsey typed, but knowing this about Radovic was helpful in planning a surveillance. Anywhere that Radovic might go, other than the Hotel Bar or a grocery store, might be significant. He could be up to something. Maybe working on the side.

  Dorsey next described his meeting with Dr. Tang, wincing as he forced himself to relive the botched job. But even here he found material to build on. He concentrated on the physician’s defensive posture and the clear pleasure he had displayed when he told Dorsey that no myelogram or surgery would be done, thinking this ended the investigation.

  A final section was reserved for the gift Dorsey had received from Dr. Tang’s receptionist. “Low-key interrogation” was his label for the method he had used to obtain this information. There is a distinct possibility, Dorsey wrote, that Mr. Radovic had prior knowledge of a planned reduction of manpower at Carlisle Steel that allowed him to schedule his accident. Also, the most likely source of information, a personnel secretary, had been able to finance a prolonged stay at a popular East Coast resort. Dorsey went on to state his firm resolve, if possible, to interview the woman. Finishing the report and knowing he could never properly realign the paper once it was out of the carriage, he did his proofreading while the page was still in the typewriter. Then he put the Olivetti in its case, opened a fresh beer, and stretched out on the bed, watching the Knicks cross the center court stripe and listening to the last notes drip from Roy Eldridge’s horn.

  Bernie, Dorsey thought. That guy can be a pain in the ass. This work from Corso is a windfall, nothing else, part of the cycle. Some insurance exec tells his people to get tough on claims and hire investigators; it’ll save us a bundle. Six months down the road a new exec may be in charge and come up with another idea: these investigations are a waste. Cancel them; we’ll save a bundle.

  Bernie don’t know shit. There’s nothing funny going on, and the old man doesn’t have the pull to be part of it. It is what it is.

  He missed Gretchen. He thought of putting through a call but she would never take it, not during her shift. Her work was too important, the future of her career even more so.

  The following morning Dorsey rose and dressed himself in a matching gray sweatsuit and worn-down Brooks running shoes. By seven o’clock he was off on his daily forty-five-minute exercise session, walking at a brisk pace around the Johnstown basin, arms pumping in unison with his legs. It was a regime he had begun two years ago following the surgical repair of a ligament in his left knee.

  The injury had occurred in a football game on Thanksgiving morning. Bernie had invited Dorsey out to Mellon Park to play in a game between the younger members of his law firm and the staff of a local legal aid service. “A struggle between the haves and have-nots,” Bernie had dubbed it. An hour into the game Dorsey had stepped forward to tag a ball carrier when a skinny paralegal on the other team dove into Dorsey’s left leg, clipping him. In his hospital room after surgery, casted from toe to hip, Dorsey received a visit from Bernie.

  “Nice guys,” Dorsey said, brushing the Demerol webs from his thoughts. “Great buncha fellas. Professionals, straight-up and honest. Guys you can turn your back on and feel good about it.”

  “What’s the bitch?” Bernie had said. “Lucky the guy was only a paralegal. Imagine the outcome if a lawyer, maybe a full partner, had caught you looking the other way.”

  After his walk Dorsey took a long hot shower and then dressed in a checked flannel shirt and blue jeans without a designer label. From the closet he took his army field jacket and draped it across the back of a chair. Watching daytime TV, sticking with the talk shows and avoiding the games, he thought again of calling Gretchen and again thought better of it. After an on-call shift she needed ten to twelve hours of recovery sleep. Instead, he went to the motel coffee shop and read the Pittsburgh morning paper over eggs and hash browns. At ten-thirty he packed his bags, checked out with an itemized bill for Corso, and put his things in the trunk of the Buick. Wearing his field jacket, he left on foot to begin his surveillance of Radovic.

&nbs
p; Standing across the street and halfway up the block from Radovic’s house, Dorsey checked his watch and wrote in his pocket notebook that he was in place and beginning the surveillance at eleven-fifteen. Relying on his own experience and the information gotten from the three Grub brothers, Dorsey figured an unemployed bachelor was never out of bed before eleven o’clock. Even then, Dorsey thought, he should be fighting a hangover.

  It wasn’t until five minutes after one that Radovic emerged from the house and came down the porch steps, shaking the loose handrail and apparently deciding that repairs could wait. With the exception of a blue windbreaker, his clothes matched Dorsey’s. Moving down Otterman he fought a stiff wind that played at the few strands of hair stretched across his crown. His gait was brisk and with his shoulders huddled against the wind he gave Dorsey the image of a neckless man whose fleshy head flowed directly into an overweight torso.

  Two hours of crisscrossing the street pretending to look for a forgotten address had played on Dorsey’s nerves and he started off after Radovic much too quickly, leaving him only a half-block lead. Easy, Dorsey coached himself. Remember the rules. Give ’em rope. You’re in a small city, a tight-knit one. They’ll pick up on you. There’s only so much time. Make it count.

  When Radovic passed the Hotel Bar without stopping, Dorsey cursed, having promised himself a cold Rock as a reward for his self-control. Block after block went by. Dorsey marveled at the fat man’s stamina, giving him more and more credit for ducking the myelogram. Radovic took an abrupt left at the next intersection and Dorsey fell back even farther, fearing he had been spotted.

  After a ten-count, Dorsey rounded the corner and found the sidewalks empty. Couldn’t have gone far, he reasoned. Disabled or not, fat guys only move so fast. Unlike the sidewalk on which he stood, which was lined with worn-down private homes, the far side of the street held storefronts. Most were empty but some were secondhand clothing and furniture shops, the old owners’ names obliterated with whitewash and the names of the newcomers announced on hand-printed cardboard signs. Dorsey chose to check the shops. He could be in one of those houses, he told himself, but if he is, you’ve lost him.

  The first two shops were open but had no customers; the next three were closed. He passed a secondhand furniture store; from what he saw through the shop window Dorsey decided the owner had balls putting up a sign that said ANTIQUES. At the corner storefront Dorsey peeked through the dirt-streaked window and saw Radovic seated behind a folding table that served as a desk, diligently working the phone and returning Dorsey’s stare.

  “I’m made,” Dorsey muttered, knowing he would have to go in and play the scene through. Entering the small shop, he noted that the table and matching folding chairs were the total of the room’s furnishings. The drab walls were covered with reprinted Wobblies posters, photos of striking railroad workers in Altoona, and front-page newspaper stories recounting the famous steelworkers’ strike of the 1890s. Dorsey’s eyes went from poster to poster, following plaster cracks that served as a timeline, tracing the history of the American labor movement. The centerpiece of the wall to Radovic’s back was a sheet of white butcher paper that announced, in black ink, that this was the Johnstown headquarters of Movement Together.

  “Gotta get off. Gotta go,” Radovic mumbled into the receiver. “Guy just came in.” He hung up the phone and scratched his stomach through his windbreaker. Dorsey could feel the fat man’s eyes roam over his unfamiliar face.

  “Kinda on the cold side in here, don’t think?” Dorsey asked, avoiding introductions. “Somebody must’ve forgot to hit the thermostat.”

  “Ain’t no corporate fuckin’ penthouse,” Radovic said, his gut straining his jacket and pressing at the table’s metal edge. “Poor town, fella. No bucks for heat. Little guys, that’s what we got here.”

  “C’mon, no bucks, Movement Together?” Dorsey knew his best move would be to ease himself back out the door, but his more playful side was taking charge. Even as he spoke, an inner voice reminded him what an asshole he could be. “No money? I see the priest, your leader, on TV. At least I think he’s still a priest. He’s on TV, and not just on the news when you guys are getting back at the Japanese by busting up Toyotas with sledgehammers. He does his own commercials, and they cost. You have the shitty end of the stick. Put your office in for a bigger budget next year.”

  Radovic rose slowly from his chair and crossed toward Dorsey. “Who the fuck are you, tellin’ me about gettin’ the fuckin’ shaft? You got nothin’ new to teach me about that. We been gettin’ it from the money boys all along. This place ain’t about no shaft. This is gettin’ even, kickin’ ’em right in the balls.”

  “Hey, slow down.” With a hard-case radical on his hands, Dorsey saw he’d better back off some. In just two days, he thought, in the course of one investigation, you have pissed off two people and thereby pissed in your own hat. Corso’s easy money is getting to you.

  “Asked you who the fuck you was.”

  Dorsey knew the laws on misrepresentations, although he did break them from time to time. But this was different. He had an angry man on his hands who knew him for a stranger in a town that had so few. Being only from the insurance company and not the evil agent of Corporate America could get him outside without a fight. Dorsey identified himself and the company he represented.

  The tension lessened in Radovic’s eyes but only a degree. Dorsey figured it to be a downgrading from murder to maiming. “Get the fuck out,” Radovic said. “Got nothing to say, prick. Get a lawyer, he can talk to my lawyer.”

  “The company has plenty of lawyers. I trip over a couple everytime I visit the office. We can call them if that’s how it’s got to be.”

  “Said for you to get the fuck out.” Radovic stepped around Dorsey and opened the door.

  “Carl,” Dorsey said, gambling, hoping to salvage something out of his blown surveillance. “I’m going to be straight with you. I’ve been behind you for a while and you move pretty good for a disabled guy. I’m winded just trying to keep up. Scooted right along, you did. No limps, aches, pains, nothing. You’ve got a little something going here, from what I can see of it. So c’mon, Carl, give me a little of your time.”

  “Time.” Radovic gazed out at the street, tapping his toe. “I’ll give you time, I’ll give you a hard time. Gonna put in a call, get some of the boys over here. Same guys you saw on TV, with the Toyota that ain’t worth a shit now. Remember what that car looked like when they got bored and gave up? No resale value, that’s what we said about it. No resale value. I’m dialin’. What you gonna do?”

  Hiking back to the Sheraton, Dorsey came to the grim conclusion that through his own temporary (he hoped) ineptitude, the investigation was a bust. He had a few facts that others might convincingly call opinions and nothing on which Ray Corso could act. Radovic had taken a long walk and used a telephone. Oh, Dorsey thought, how the workers’ compensation board will be impressed by that! And that man is not being paid to be in that office, he’s dedicated and ruthless, the kind that mans the ship even when the water is over his head. Still, maybe this mess can be saved.

  Dorsey pulled the Buick out of the motel lot and for the first time on this trip he left the flat bottom of the crater that held Johnstown and climbed up Route 271, headed north. Passing the Flood Museum, Dorsey amused himself by thinking of the whole town as an extension of that institution. With hard times, flood memorabilia had become the town’s primary industry. Street signs marked a walking tour; bars and restaurants were decorated with flood scenes where photos of boxers and baseball players once hung. Water retention had replaced steelmaking and coal mining.

  Dorsey found Mundys Corner just south of where 271 links up with U.S. 22, several miles past the point of level ground. Though it was only a small village, it took Dorsey thirty minutes to find the correct house, glad it was thirty minutes that could be billed to Ray Corso. The house, set back from the road with only a dirt drive cutting through some pines, was like many found
in the highlands, constructed of stone, with wood stoves and high chimneys.

  Dorsey introduced himself through a locked screen door while a suspicious Mrs. Maynard examined him closely. Short and wide, her eyes squinted against the outdoor light as she looked up.

  “You from the unemployment? My Claudia, she got the mail-in cards, she don’t have to go to the office each week—to register, I mean. They give her a lot of cards; they do it to hold down the lines. You been gettin’ her cards? She said onna phone she was sending ’em in regular.”

  Patiently, Dorsey explained again that he was not from the state unemployment office and that he wanted to speak to Claudia concerning an accident at the mill. “Private insurance matter,” he told her.

  Mrs. Maynard explained that her daughter was on an extended vacation; she wouldn’t be home for two more weeks. It took some doing, but Dorsey persuaded Mrs. Maynard that her daughter might have said something to either her or Mr. Maynard about the accident. He was shown to an easy chair in a cramped living room, and Mrs. Maynard went for her husband.

  “She liked it there, Claudia did,” Mr. Maynard said from the sofa opposite Dorsey. Built similarly to his wife, he was dressed in matching green work clothes. “Told me she always got along real well with everybody at the mill, even the fancy office types. Even when she got axed in the layoff she didn’t have no hard feelings personally. Didn’t tell anybody off. The big shots stay and she goes, but she don’t make a fuss.”

  “Sounds like she just sort of tolerated management types, the ones she worked for.” Dorsey hoped to learn as much as he could through small talk before getting down to a line of questioning. “Sounds like she wanted to get along.”

  “Claudia grew up right. And she’s loyal to her people.”

  “Mr. Maynard,” Dorsey said, working on a casual expression, “this business I’m here on is pretty routine stuff. It’s about an accident down at Carlisle Steel. Just a few questions to set the record straight.”