Neville’s eyes widened in surprise. Tyrell gave her just long enough for what he’d said to sink in before continuing. “We came here to help Daniel. We think he may have been abused, maybe even the victim of a crime.”
Mrs. Neville stared back and forth between them and her eyes narrowed.
“How’d I know tha’s the truth?”
“What’s your name, ma’am?” Tyrell asked.
“Claretta,” she replied cautiously. “And don’t give me no horseshit now, y’hear?”
“Daniel is hardly able to commit crimes while inside this hospital,” Tyrell pointed out. “We’re here because we think he’s the victim and we want to know what happened.”
Claretta Neville looked at him for a long moment.
“How come none o’ you been here askin’ about this afore now?”
“Something happened,” Tyrell said. “Another victim whose pathology matches your son’s. We need to speak to Daniel.”
Claretta sighed mightily, reversing her copious frame and parking it on a chair in the corridor that vanished beneath her floral dress.
“There ain’t nobody seein’ him,” she said softly. “He’s in quarantine.”
Tyrell glanced at Michael Shaw before speaking.
“Quarantine?” he echoed. “You haven’t seen him?”
“Only briefly, to bring him his meals,” Claretta said. “They say it ain’t safe to be about him an’ all.”
Lopez squatted down and took one of Claretta’s hands in her own.
“Can you tell us what happened to Daniel?” she asked.
“His line was crack cocaine,” Claretta whispered. “Part of their colors, to run with the gangs they had to be on somethin’. He got too high one night and was picked up by the meds on Fourth. Got a trip in th’ ambulance, so they said.”
“What happened next?” Tyrell asked.
“He got discharged into the care of the people that run this place—good people, so they said.”
“He was brought directly here?” Lopez asked.
“Nah,” Claretta said. “They says he was, but I know he was taken someplace else for a few hours. They’s been lyin’ ever since I came here.”
Michael Shaw stepped in quickly.
“We both know that’s not true. Daniel was very sick and probably has no idea what was happening to him after he overdosed and—”
“The hell would you know about it?” Claretta snarled. “You just some lily-white shit-fo’-brains security guard.”
Tyrell looked at Shaw.
“Just give us a moment here, okay?”
Shaw’s skin flushed red, but he turned and strode a few paces down the corridor. Tyrell looked back down at Claretta, who continued while glaring at the guard.
“They took Daniel to someplace in the District along with some other guys he knew, and tripped them out on drugs again.”
“What happened next?” Lopez pressed gently. “Did they drug all of the kids there?”
“They’s were all gang colors, so Daniel said: Columbia Heights, Trinidad, boys from all over.”
“Do you know what they did to Daniel?”
Claretta’s features tightened.
“He said they’s all crackers about their tests. He said they took their blood, and that some of the kids died in some kind of experiments.”
A tear trickled down her face.
Lopez spoke softly to her. “What kind of experiments?”
“The eternal flame, the covenant of God and man, burns for us in our blood,” Claretta whispered, as though reciting some medieval verse. “We shall take this bread, for it will sustain us. That was what Daniel said they kept whisperin’ to him, that his blood was special and that it would join him to God with the ‘men of renown.’ What the hell does that mean?”
Claretta’s formidable visage was haunted now as she stared into space. Tyrell looked up at the closed doors beside him, and quickly came to a decision.
“Claretta, I want you to get up and hit me,” he whispered.
Claretta looked up at Tyrell with widening eyes.
“What the hell’s you talking about?”
“Hit me,” Tyrell said, “and make a damned fuss about it. I need that guard out of here for five minutes, ’kay?”
Claretta looked at Tyrell for a moment, and then lurched out of her seat and swung a blow that landed under Tyrell’s jaw with enough force to hurl him sideways into the metal gates as Claretta’s voice thundered out in his ears.
“You goddamn hypocritical motherf—”
Lopez jumped up to restrain Claretta as Michael Shaw bolted back toward them down the corridor. Tyrell staggered upright, regaining his vision as he saw Lopez twist Claretta Neville’s arm up behind her back as she ranted and raged. Tyrell gestured to her as he looked at Shaw.
“Jesus, get her out of here! Nicola, help him out.”
Michael Shaw nodded, grabbing Claretta’s other arm as between them they began hauling her, kicking and screaming, away down the corridor.
Tyrell waited until they were out of sight, wishing