Behind them, from behind the corner, came the sound of distant voices-echoing voices full of worry, then surprise.
The voices grew louder. As did the footsteps. Hard Gestapo heels.
At the end of the smaller corridor were French doors that yielded to the turn of a brass handle. Shmeltzer and Daoud ran out onto a stone landing guarded on both sides by reclining statuary lions, leaped down half a dozen steps, and found themselves facing the rear grounds of the hospital-neglected estate grounds, once elaborately landscaped, now just an expanse of red dirt bordered by the ragged remains of privet hedges and walled by tall old pines. Empty flower beds and patches of rusty earth interrupted by seemingly random copses of younger trees. To the far west of the ground was an enclosed pen for animals; all else was open space.
But the entire property was enclosed by three meters of chain link.
Trapped.
'Where now?' said Daoud, running in place.
Shmeltzer stopped, felt his knees aching, his heart pumping furiously. Thinking: Funny if I got a real heart attack.
He surveyed the grounds, looked back at the hospital. Much of the rear of the huge pink building's ground floor consisted of glass panels-more French doors leading out to a canopied sun porch. A solarium back in Mandate days-goddamned Brits sunning themselves while their empire rotted out from under them. Now the dining room.
The sun porch was unoccupied, but if anyone was inside the dining room looking out, he and the Arab would be easy to spot. A real mess.
Still, what was the alternative?
'Keep going,' he said, pointing to the north end of the property.
What had once been a rolling lawn was now dirt coated with stones and pine needles. They ran for the shelter of a copse of pines, ran through several meters of shade before exiting the trees and finding themselves on steeply sloping barren ground leading directly to the northern perimeter of the property-a cliff edge. A hinged rectangle had been cut out of the chain link, framing blue sky. A door to the heavens.
Hell of a view, thought Shmeltzer, taking in the distant cream-and-purple contours of the desert, the terraced hills of Judea, still coated with greenery.
Sapphire sky above; big dry blanket below. Hills for folds. Caves for moth holes.
Caves.
He looked back through the trees, saw two figures on the sun porch, one of them in khaki, the other in white. They stood there for a while, went back inside.
Who the hell cared about one sick old Arab?
Daoud had opened the chain-link door. Was gazing out at the wilderness.
'What's it look like over the side?' Shmeltzer asked him.
The Arab dropped to the ground, crawled to the edge, and peered down.
'Small drop, easy,' he said, surprised. 'Looks like a hiking trail.'
They lowered themselves over the side, Daoud first, Shmeltzer following. Landed on flat, soft earth, a wide terrace-three meters by two. The first of several oversized steps notched into the hillside.
'Like stairs,' said Daoud.
Shmeltzer nodded. Below the steps was a thick, coarse growth of water-spurning shrubbery. Ugly stuff, green-gray spikes and coils, some of it browning in the heat.
He noticed a split in the brush, a parting like the Red Sea. The two detectives climbed down the steps and entered it, edging through a narrow pathway, barely one person wide. Beneath their feet, flat surface rounded to a concave ditch; they sank suddenly and had to use their arms for balance. But soon they grew used to the concavity, were walking steadily and rapidly down the side of the hill. Bent at the waist to avoid being snagged by the thorny branches overhead.
Shmeltzer slowed and looked up at the branches. An arch of greenery-the classic Jerusalem arch, this one fashioned by nature. Opaque as a roof except for frayed spots where the sun shone through, letting in shards of light that cast brilliant white geometric patterns upon the hard-packed earth.
A tunnel, he thought. Leading straight down to the desert, but from the air or below you'd see only brush, a serpentine line of gray-green. Probably fashioned years ago by the Brits, or maybe the Jordanians after them or the Turks before them. An escape route.
'How you doing?' he asked Daoud. 'Still got the stuff?'
The Arab patted his middle. 'Still got it.'
'Okay, let's follow this. See where it leads.'
After a while, Nightwing got more open about herself, lying in his arms in the backseat of the Plymouth after she did him.
and talking about her childhood-growing up fat and pimply and unpopular, terrorized by an asshole father who crawled into her bed every night and raped her. The next morning he'd always feel guilty and take it out on her by slapping her around and calling her a whore. The rest of the family going along with it, treating her like scum.
Once he saw tears in her eyes, which nauseated him; hearing about her personal shit made him sick. But he didn't stop her from spilling it out, sat back and pretended he was listening, sympathetic. Meanwhile he was filling his mind with pictures: real science experiments on whimpering mutts, touching the stiffs in the path lab, memory slides of what he'd done to Fields, how the slimeball's head had looked all bashed to trash. Thinking: It's easy to be a shrink.
