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.
I am willing to risk anything.
Did she really feel that way, she wondered now. Did she really not care to see her life play out — to learn her destiny?
Before the answer became any clearer, a shot rang out, and an instant later, a siren began wailing from not far away. Without hesitating, Natalie activated the stopwatch mode on her wristwatch and sprinted forward to the shed, slipped inside, and dropped to one knee, breathing heavily. In moments, the siren stopped. By then, she had located the heavy wooden trapdoor and swung it open. Eight stairs led down to a concrete floor that crossed over to the hospital — maybe a hundred feet, she estimated.
She followed the flashlight beam to the far end of the tunnel, mounted the ladderlike stairs to the trapdoor, and pushed it open, struggling to maintain control of it. Above her, she hoped, Santoro and the policeman Barbosa had left the hospital and, guns drawn, were cautiously searching the grounds and the forest beyond.
The heavy aroma of mixed spices and foods told her that Luis had once again been absolutely accurate. She cut the flash and pushed herself up into a rather large, cluttered space, twelve by twelve, stocked floor to ceiling with food and supplies, and faintly lit through a glass panel in the door. Closing the trapdoor and replacing the mat that covered it, she crawled quickly across the dining area and lounge. The room was airy and comfortable, with seating for twenty-five — ten more counting the lounge. For the moment, the entire area was dimly illuminated from the corridor beyond the wide, open arched doorway to the hospital. When she reached that arch, she paused just long enough to listen, then moved ahead. From what Luis had said, there was no sense in checking either of the small examination rooms to her right, so she moved down the main corridor.
The two nearly identical recovery rooms were small but well appointed with state-of-the-art, wall-mounted monitors and electronic IV infusion pumps. One glance at the crucifix over the door of the first room, and the clock on the wall to the right of it, and Natalie knew that she had been in that room before. So much for Santa Teresa. There were no filing cabinets in either room, nor did she expect there to be.
Four minutes.
The first operating room was incredibly large and technologically well equipped, with a cardiopulmonary bypass machine and elegant operating microscope. Between it and the next OR was the prep room where the surgeons and OR nurses scrubbed in. The second OR had no bypass ma-
chine, and less sophisticated equipment. Natalie felt certain that this was the room where her lung was removed. The questions resonated louder and louder. How did she get here from Rio? Why was her damaged lung removed, and not the good one? And perhaps most perplexing, why was she allowed to live?
Seven minutes.
The solid doors of the two offices to the left of the second OR were both locked. One was labeled with a bronze plaque reading DR. XAVIER SANTORO, and the other departamento da cirurgia — department of surgery. Natalie felt herself sink. She had eleven minutes left, thirteen at the outside, before Luis feared he would not be able to maintain his diversion, and the records she was seeking, if in fact such records existed, were almost certainly behind one of those two locked doors. Was it worth trying to break one of them down? She hesitated, aware that the seconds were ticking past. Finally, almost in spite of herself, she moved on to the final room off the hallway — the electronics room, as Luis had described it. The door, like of the other offices, was closed. The brass plaque read simply, DR. D. CHO.
Ten minutes.
Expecting the worst, and prepared to race back to the pantry, Natalie tried the knob. The door swung open. She stepped inside and closed it be hind her before turning on the flash. A quick scan showed no windows, so she found a switch on the wall by the door and flipped it on. Instantly, brilliantly bright fluorescent light filled the room,
