Michael Palmer - The fifth vial

"But…I was shot," Natalie said. "How could they transplant my lung when it had already been destroyed?"

"I do not know. I do not often see the patients — when they are alive, I mean."

"Luis, I am sure you are risking much by telling me what you have. Please know how grateful I am. Do you have a family here?"

"A woman only, Rosa. She is the only person in Dom Angelo who is tougher than I am. She knows — knew — my sister, and will be very upset at the news she has been murdered. Rodrigo Vargas was not a man she liked or trusted. She will also be willing to help you in any way she can. You should know that something is scheduled to be happening at the hospital over the next few days. I have been instructed to assemble a squad of eight guards — two shifts of four — to keep watch on the hospital beginning in the morning."

"In that case," Natalie asked, "is there any way I could get into the place tonight?"

Luis Fernandes thought for just a few seconds.

"As a matter of fact," he said, "there is."

You may bring your torch," Luis said, "but do not turn it on until I tell you it is safe to do so. Unless there is something happening I do not know, only Dr. Santoro and Oscar Barbosa, the policeman, are at the hospital right now. If this is a typical night, each of those men will have a woman with him."

"I will do whatever you say."

The night was moonless, and the forest as black as it was noisy. Initially, even though there was no discernible path and he was operating with one eye, Luis moved through the dense underbrush with the vision and stealth of a jaguar. At first, Natalie was able to keep pace. Soon, though, the altitude and her injuries weighed in, and she had to ask him to slow down. He did so without comment. He was armed with at least one handgun and a long, slender knife, sheathed just above his right ankle.

They moved south, then west, then south again, over rolling terrain that in the main continued downward. The air was cool and incredibly clean. How ironic to lose a lung in such a place, Natalie thought.

It was after midnight when they ascended the steepest grade of their journey. At the top of the rise, with Natalie breathing heavily, Luis raised a finger to his lips and pointed ahead. Below them, much closer than she had expected, was the hospital, bathed in the light from half a dozen lamps set on tall poles. It was a single-story structure of pristine, whitewashed clay, sprawling across a plateau, surrounded by a four-strand barbed-wire fence. There was a long wing extending away from them to the right.

"As you can see, the building is shaped like an L. The wire does not extend all the way around it," Luis said. "Now, I must ask you a serious question. How badly do you want to get inside?"

"That depends on how much time I will have once I am there."

"Twenty minutes. No more. Maybe less. Try for eighteen."

The hospital was hardly small. There were ten windows along the wall facing them.

"How many operating rooms are there, Luis? Remember to speak slowly, please."

"Two. Right in the center. Those windows you see open on a long corridor that connects all the rooms. There are also two hospital rooms right inside the third window from the right. I think they are recovery rooms for those who have had surgery. Next, right where the wing comes off, are the dining room and the kitchen, and beyond them, in the wing itself, are two small clinic rooms and the sleeping quarters — maybe ten rooms in all, but I really don't know exactly how many. The dining room has some couches and soft chairs at one end where families wait for the surgery to be completed."

"And at the other end, after the operating rooms?"

"Dr. Santoro's office and one other for the surgeons who fly in."

"Do you know if those offices are locked?"

"I do not. When I am around they are always open, but there are usually doctors all over the place."

"Is that all?"

"Yes. No, wait, there is one more room, at the far left. It is a large room, at least as large as the operating rooms, filled with electronic equipment. In the middle of that room is a chair — an elaborate chair like the kind you might find in a dentist's office. And screens — several television screens on the wall. I have only been there once or twice. They do not like me or my security people to be inside the hospital unless there is trouble. They do not have uniforms for us, and we are not clean enough for them as is."

Natalie studied the structure, trying to visualize beyond the windows and imagine how, in twenty minutes or less, she might go about finding any information filed away about her. Tomorrow, there would be people arriving. Word might filter down from someone in Dom Angelo to Santoro or a military policeman that a woman was in the village asking about Dora Cabral. Tomorrow might be too late.

"You asked a question, Luis, about how badly I wanted to get inside."

"Yes?"

"The answer is I am willing to risk everything."

"By everything, do you mean your life? Because Oscar Barbosa is a powerful pig of a man, who has more brawn than brains, and who is truly poisoned by his power."

Natalie wondered what she would have ultimately done had not the phone call come in from her insurance company, raising questions about Santa Teresa. It didn't seem then, nor did it seem now, as if she had very much to look forward to in her life — except answers.

"As I said, I am willing to risk everything."

"You are a brave woman, Senhorita Natalie, but I already knew that. In back of the hospital, some distance from where the residence wing and dining area come together, is a swimming pool. Beside the pool is a metal shed. In the floor of that shed is a trapdoor covered by a reed mat. The tunnel beneath the door was built as an escape route to the airstrip. I am not certain why. When you mount the staircase at the other end, you will be in a pantry in the back of the kitchen. Clear?"

"Clear."

"There are electric eyes guarding the rear of the hospital, where you will be. The diversion you want will come when I shoot out the control box for those electric eyes. One shot. The moment the shot rings out, an alarm will sound and your time starts. Barbosa and Santoro may have women in their rooms, or they may have sent them back to the village, but no matter. The women will stay in their bedrooms no matter what while the men investigate. Twenty minutes is the absolute most I can keep them occupied. Your way out is the same as your way in. The control box will be damaged beyond a quick repair, so the electric eyes will not be a problem. Wait ten yards beyond the pool until you hear my shot. We will meet back here. Do you think you can find this spot?"

"I do."

"I will give you time to get in place. Take a wide route around the hospital."

"Thank you, Luis. Thank you for doing this for me."

"I do it for my sister," he said.

As directed, Natalie took a track well to the east of the hospital. The forest was so dense that at times she lost the spotlights altogether. Finally, though, she saw the pool — a small, dark rectangle surrounded on all sides by a concrete patio, and separated from the hospital by twenty yards or so. Lights from several windows washed across the broad courtyard. The corrugated metal shed was just where Luis had said it would be.

I am willing to risk everything.

Natalie's bold pronouncement echoed in her thoughts as she crouched in the brush forty feet or so from the shed. If she was caught, she would die. There was nothing more certain than that. Did it make any difference? No matter what, her life was going to be led as a cripple, probably because of her unusual transplant antigen pattern and her low lung allocation score, but also possibly from the side effects of the powerful meds that would keep her from rejecting a lung that wasn't closely matched to her in the first place. She would gladly have changed places with Odysseus, facing the monsters Scylla and Charybdis.