"When did he leave? Where did he go?"

"Who is this?" Matthews rasped. "Why do you want to know about Stu Thomas's whereabouts? What private clinic did you say you were with?"

Jeanette hung up. Her gut didn't like this at all.

Okay, so she had struck out with Stu Thomas. She still had her Eye Bank trail.

Flipping through her Rolodex, she found the number of the Eye Bank's administrative offices, then dialed. Several minutes later she hung up. The Executive Director of the Eye Bank was going to e-mail her a copy of the Eye Bank Board. She would track down the Board member she'd overheard -- Dr. Fred somebody. He seemed to know what Stu was talking about as far as supplying tissue to the Epi Study. He even seemed to know other medical center gossip about the study. He would definitely know Eye Bank policy concerning tissue coming into the program. He might even know how to find Stu Thomas.

And after she spoke to Dr. Fred whoever, she would go see Maggie Payton and get the names of the patients with failed grafts who were being seen in the Medical School clinic, instead of the Epi Clinic. Jeanette would bet her last dollar that the names would be on the billing list, but their files wouldn't be in her system, nor their data in the stats given out by Dr. Rutherford.

She didn't expect to be on the dole anytime soon. She only bet on sure things.

CHAPTER TEN.

"Jeannie! What are you doing here?"

She turned around to see Scott hailing her from across the small deli restaurant located in the Medical Professional Building attached to Charity Hospital. Not seeing her luncheon appointment, she moved toward Scott and his companions.

"Hi, Scott."

"Jim, Pete, and Andy, this is Jeanette LaFleur. Jeannie, meet the guys."

"Hi, guys." A mumbled chorus of greetings came from the residents rapidly shoving food into their bodies. They ate as if they hadn't eaten for a week. "Busy day?"

Scott answered for the table. "Bad accident on I-10. We've been patching and stitching since 6:30 this morning. What are you doing in our neck of the woods?"

"I'm meeting one of the Eye Bank Board members here, Dr. Fred Beaton. Know him?"

"I do." Either Pete or Andy raised his fork. "Nice guy. In fact, he just walked in."

Pete-Andy pointed his fork toward the doorway. "Big guy with the lab coat."

Jeanette turned and waved at Dr. Beaton. He nodded and pointed to a booth near the salad bar, then headed that way.

"Guess he reserved a table." Jeanette turned back to Scott and his colleagues.

"That's his regular table," Pete-Andy said. "He eats here everyday."

"Why are you meeting him?" Scott asked. "Dumping Charles?"

"For God's sake, Scott. I'm not dumping Charles. Why would you think such a thing?" Jeanette cringed at her knee jerk reaction to Scott's question. Why was she so defensive?

Scott shrugged. "Not sure. I guess it's because Dr. Beaton has a rep as a ladies' man and Little Bits tells me that Charles hasn't been around for a while."

"Not that it's any of your business, but Charles is taking me out to dinner tonight." Jeanette turned to go, then paused. "And my meeting with Dr. Beaton is work-related."

Before she could leave, Scott grabbed her hand and pulled her back. "What's wrong, Jeannie?"

"Wrong? There's nothing wrong. Why would you think so?"

"I know you, Jeannie. You're tense." Scott pulled her down next to him in the booth and whispered in her ear. "Little Bits has been giving me updates. She says you aren't sleeping, are barely eating, and she's caught you crying. What is it, 'cher'? Is it Paul?"

She blinked the moisture from her eyes. "No. It's not Paul, although I do miss him terribly. It's not Charles, either. There are some things I need to work out -- about my job. Once I get all the facts, I'll tell you. I promise."

Scott's arm went around her shoulders. He gave her a quick squeeze and a light kiss on the cheek. "Okay. I'll give you some time and space, but not much. Little Bits is worried -- and honey, so am I. You look so pale. Now, get on over there. Do your business. And eat!"

Jeanette forced a smile and nodded. "Yes, doctor."

"That's my girl."

"Friends of yours?" Dr. Beaton angled his head toward Scott and his companions as they passed the corner booth on their way out of the restaurant.

"One of them is. Dr. Fontenot."

"Good man from what I hear." Dr. Beaton applied his attention to his Caesar salad. "He didn't rotate through my area as an intern. Surgery resident, right?"

"Yes. He's interested in trauma surgery."

"Ah, an intensivist."

Dr. Beaton had a way of talking and eating at the same time, probably a holdover from residency. Jeanette knew she couldn't do both, so she sat with her hands in her lap while her seafood gumbo rapidly cooled. Not that she wanted it, but she'd gotten it so Scott wouldn't make a scene before he left the room.

"Mrs. LaFleur?"

"What?" Jeanette shook her head. 'Wake up, Bootsie. The sooner you ask the questions the sooner you can get ahead to the next step.' "I'm sorry, doctor. I was woolgathering."

Dr. Beaton laughed. The warm, rumbly sound made Jeanette feel better, invited her to laugh with him. She saw why a woman might be attracted to Fred Beaton. From his casually tousled hair, to the starched and crisply pressed lab coat, and down to his Gucci loafers, the man could be an advertisement for the medical version of Gentleman's Quarterly. But it was more than grooming that attracted her to Fred Beaton. His eyes were warm, little wrinkles around them evidence that he smiled a lot. A man who enjoyed life and wanted to share it with others. He had charisma.

"Guess that puts me in my place." Dr. Beaton pushed his plate aside. "I'm used to being the focus of my dining companion's attention." He winked at her, then laughed at his own conceit. "It's obvious you aren't hunting, so exactly what can I do to help you? You were rather vague on the phone."

Her face burned. "You mean ... you thought ... oh my God!" Jeanette couldn't believe he thought she was chasing him. Well, she knew that some women in hospitals pursued doctors. And if one wanted to pursue a doctor, then this one would be a Grade A choice. "Doctor, I assure you I have no personal interest in you ... not that you aren't attractive. You are. It's just that..." She moaned and covered her face with her hands.

"It's okay, Jeanette." Dr. Beaton reached over and pulled one of her hands away from her face, then gently squeezed it. "No need to blush. My colossal ego totally misread the situation. Can you forgive me for jumping to conclusions?"

"Yes. Thank you." Jeanette pulled her hand away while dropping the other one from her face to her lap. "I needed some information and thought you might be able to help me."

"I'll try. What kind of information?"

"About the Eye Bank donor tissue program."

"What about it?"

Jeanette wasn't sure where to start. Her confusion must have been obvious, because the doctor once more leaned forward.

"It's okay, Jeanette," he said. "I don't bite. Really."

"No, no, it's not that. It's just that I don't know where to start."

"The beginning might be nice."

The beginning. And that's where she started -- back at the convention. She brought him forward in time, leaving out her suspicions about the fraud, but laying out her concerns over a possible mix-up in the tissue coming to the Epi Study and how it was invoiced.

Basically, she lied through her teeth.

"So, you see. I'm not sure what kind of tissue we are using in the program. Is it donor tissue or is it tissue supplied to the Eye Bank from Silver River?" Jeanette paused. He wasn't buying it. "I mean I'm not sure what to tell my billing clerk. If it's donor tissue, then it should be billed at a processing fee. If it's commercial tissue, then the Study has to write it off, since we can't pass the costs to..."

"You lie charmingly." Dr. Beaton's smile took the sting out of the accusation. "But you don't have to protect Dr. Rutherford. I've known Byron a long time. Lots of us at the Eye Bank have his number, my dear. So why don't you tell me what the real problem is?"

"I don't know what you mean." Jeanette winced. Sister Mary Cecille had always said she couldn't lie. Her eyes always gave her away.

"Let me tell you how it works, then. Byron has told you -- or maybe his paid lackey, Walter, whom he planted in the Eye Bank, has told you -- that the Eye Bank supplied the tissue for the Epi Study. In the beginning that was true, but as of the time of the convention it was not. What you heard Stu Thomas tell the crowd was the truth. SRP has been supplying one hundred percent of the tissue for a long while. Ah, ah , ah..." Dr. Beaton wagged his finger. "Don't interrupt, let me finish. There could be an occasional donor cornea slip through the Eye Bank to your clinic, but that would only happen if Walter was on duty. He is under strict instructions 'not' to send donor tissue to Byron. But we aren't able to police him 24/7."

Beaton grimaced, then shrugged. "The politics of the situation are such that we can't fire Walter. His salary is paid by Dr. Rutherford and tied to a grant made by the Medical Center to the Eye Bank. The grant runs out at the end of the year, then it will be bye-bye Walter. Until then, we tolerate him. Ethics and manners aside, he's an excellent technician."

"But why hasn't anybody heard about this? If they knew Dr. Rutherford was misrepresenting the tissue used, then why did they allow it to continue?"

Beaton chuckled. "You are naive, aren't you? The aforementioned politics, my dear. Dr. Rutherford carries a lot of weight at the Medical Center. His project is high profile. The Eye Bank is dependent on the kindness of strangers, to paraphrase the lovely Stella in 'A Streetcar Named Desire'. We can't afford to tick off the donating public -- money or eyes."

"But it's fraud."

"What is? The tissue is tissue. The donor doesn't know the difference. Is there something you aren't telling me? Something you might have glossed over? I thought you were only worried about the origins of the tissue."

"Well, it's the billing." Jeanette couldn't tell him all her suspicions -- not about the failed grafts and the stats. "A majority of the tissue over the past year, and especially since the convention, has been billed at more than a processing fee for donor tissue."

Beaton smiled tightly. "So, old Byron is making money at the expense of research patients, huh?"

"I think so."

"What are you going to do about it?"

"I'm going to get all the evidence I can and turn it over to the Institutional Review Board."

"Good. Let me know how I or the Eye Bank can help. We can document all the information I just told you. In fact, I can go one better. I'll let it out to the press that the Eye Bank has cut donor tissue off to Byron. That'll start the gossip machine. Maybe the IRB will come calling, huh?"

Jeanette sighed. "Thank you." She hesitated before asking her next question, but she needed to know. "Did you know that Stu Thomas was no longer at Silver River?"

"Yes. He was killed in a hit-and-run accident right outside the convention hotel. You didn't know?"

Jeanette shook her head. "Did they find who did it?"

"No, they never found the driver as far as I know." Beaton's face turned dark. "Coincidental, wouldn't you say?"

"Coincidence?" Jeanette didn't know what to think. Beaton couldn't mean what she thought he did. "It had to be, right?" Please, she thought, say I'm right.

Beaton must have heard the pleading in her voice, because he smiled. "Stu was an irritating horse's ass, but that's no reason to kill him. My dear, it was a hit-and-run. Happens all the time in the Quarter. He was just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"A coincidence." Jeanette found a shaky smile somewhere from inside her. "Yes, it had to be."

Of course, neither one of them believed it was truly coincidence, but the alternative was too horrible to imagine, let alone say out loud. As long as it was kept quiet, not allowed to live through the spoken word, it could be ignored as untrue. A polite fiction.

Jeanette threw off the dark lethargy threatening to smother her.

"But his death leaves me in a bind," she said. "I can't prove what he said."

"How so? A dozen others heard Stu bragging about the sales to the Epi Study, so he definitely said it."

"But I need to get the sales invoices or shipping records to prove it." Jeanette leaned forward. "If I don't have those -- and I haven't found anything like them yet -- then it will be hard to prove that the tissue actually came from SRP."

"The amount of tissue used will prove your theory. The Eye Bank could never have supplied the Epi Study with all that tissue. To assert that it did would be fallacious. Our records would back you up. So, 'ipso facto,' we didn't supply it. Someone else had to. Besides, you told me earlier about the SRP labels on Dr. Rutherford's bottles."

"Yes, but they're gone now."

"Gone?"

"I had them locked in my office. I checked this morning, and they're gone.

And now the bottles are coming with just refraction data on them."

"Jeanette." Beaton grabbed her hand and squeezed gently. "Be careful."

"So you believe me now." Maggie Payton smiled a superior sort of smile.

"Poor little Jeanette. Her idol has feet of clay."

"Yes." What else could she say? Dr. Payton was right. Dr. Byron Rutherford wasn't what he seemed to be. "But I'm not the only one he's fooled."

"No, you're right." Maggie laughed. "How can I help you?"

"You mentioned seeing some failed grafts in your clinic."

Maggie nodded.