Chapter Six
Charles had just turned up in front of the hospital when a green Hyundai dodger was leaving the premises. He saw two people, a man and a woman seated in the driver and passenger seats, respectfully. The woman looked familiar despite the cap and the pony tail effects put on by the woman. He was always super observant and acted on his instincts, but this time he decided to let his guard down.
"What could possibly go wrong?" he mused to himself as he parked his corolla in the parking lot of the hospital.
He walked steadily with quick steps towards the front desk of the hospital. Brandishing his police detective badge in front of the nurse on duty he commanded to see Cecilia Hershold, saying…
"My name is Detective Charles Joyce, I'm here to make sure Mrs. Hershold is fine"….
The nurse examined, cautiously, the badge held in front of her, and then took a quick look at the patients' admissions ledger to make certain the room she was in.
"Follow me, she's this way…" the nurse finally said after a while.
The nurse and Charles arrived at a closed door leading to a private posh room. She paused for a while then turned the knob to the room, opening it.
The nurse was shocked to see a disheveled hospital bed. She grew alarmed and rushed to search in the only other room in the patient's room, the bathroom. She shrieked at the sight of the IV tube and stand on the floor with Cecilia being nowhere to be found.
Charles rushed quickly to the bathroom, and noticing what had just happened, just by observing the scene, he composed himself quickly and tried to calm down the nurse who was a little bit confused as to what had happened to Mrs. Hershold.
Holding her hand gently and ushering her to a chair in the room, he spoke softly to the nurse.
"Okay, Jennifer, there's nothing to worry about." Calling her name, after noticing it on her name tag.
"Let's trace our footsteps back to an hour before. I would need you to answer some questions. It's no big deal. It's just standard procedure. Are you up for it?" Charles explained gently to the shaken Nurse.
"Ye-s, yee-ss, yes, I think I can answer a few of your questions. I would like to help as much as I can" Jennifer, mumbled the words out, trying to get out of the shock of losing a patient, especially, under such strange circumstance.
"Okay, great. Were you the attending nurse to Mrs. Hershold this night?" Charles asked.
"No, that would be Jessica. But she left to get dinner, just before you came in" Jennifer replied.
"Were you in the front desk the whole night?" Charles asked again
"Yes, I was on duty from Six pm to now…" Jennifer explained further.
"Okay. Did you see Mrs. Hershold leave the hospital premises?" Charles kept on asking to establish a solid foundation of what he suspected had happened here.
"No. I would've noticed. And besides, I believe she was sedated so she couldn't have left here without help."
Then, a thought struck Charles. The woman in the Hyundai Dodger, she looked familiar. Could it be Mrs. Hershold? He suspected something. Could it be that she was kidnapped? But how? She looked comfortable in the vehicle. What's going on here? A lot of baffling questions kept on swarming in his head.
It took a while before he came back to reality from his innate web of conspiracy theories surrounding the Hershold case.
He asked Jennifer one last question.
"Did you see a Man in a Black Jacket with a Woman in a Baseball Cap leave the hospital?"
"Yes. Now that you've asked about it, I did. Something strange was about them. The man in the black jacket moved so quickly and avoided eye contact. And the woman, I didn't see her enter the hospital, but I saw her leave."
"That will be enough for now. You did great Jennifer. Now go back to your job. And take my card. Call me when you notice anything else. Thank You for your assistance." Charles said, smiling reassuringly.
Charles left the room with Jennifer, who felt a lot better now after answering his questions, to the front desk. He patted Jennifer gently on the shoulders and gave her a reassuring look before exiting the hospital.
He sat in his corolla for a while, planning on what to do next.
He could place an APB on Cecilia Hershold, signaling her to be missing.
Charles weighed his chances and decided to not place the APB.
He started his car, and drove in the direction the Hyundai dodger took. In the hopes of finding a trail of some sorts.
He knew something big was going on here, and kind of had a flashback of what the captain at the Precinct said earlier….
"…People with money have Skeletons; you know what I mean…"
He chuckled at this flashback and realized the night was a long one, and he was just following trails now hoping to get somewhere.
He looked at his watch after a long time the whole day, and said to himself
"Your day has just gotten started buddy, brace yourself, because it's going to be a bumpy ride"
He sighed and just kept on driving.