With an effort, Field raised his head. Caprisi was looking at him, concerned.
“Had some bad news?”
Field sighed. “In a way.”
“Want to tell me about it?”
“Not really.”
Caprisi smiled. “Then we’d better get going.”
Field watched him walk away, then stood, took off his jacket, and adjusted his holster. He followed the American out onto the stone steps. The dark cumulus had been replaced by a limitless azure sky and scalding heat.
They climbed into the back of the Buick.
Field assumed that they were going to the Russian church, as Caprisi had suggested earlier, but the driver continued on past its distinctive spires to Route Pere Robert and the imposing modern stone building that housed the Hopital Ste.-Marie. He parked by the wide, circular veranda at the front. Field squinted as he stepped out into the sunlight.
“All right?” Caprisi said as they entered the cool hallway.
“Fine.”
“You seem tense.”
“I’m fine.”
Caprisi shrugged, leaving it.
They stood before the reception desk. With its black-and-white-checkered floor and swaying tropical plants, the hospital reminded Field of the police stations they’d visited in the Concession.
The French receptionist directed them up the wide stone steps to the floor above. They passed two nurses in starched white uniforms helping a man in pajamas with a broken leg and then another lying on a makeshift bed, fast asleep. The landing was tall and airy, enormous windows on their right open to the barely perceptible breeze.
Chen’s room was at the far end of the building. He was asleep. A tiny woman sat by his bed, her head bent. As soon as she saw Caprisi, she stood, bowed, and began to speak with machine-gun rapidity in Shanghainese. Field understood enough to know that she was thanking Caprisi and that he was trying to say it was nothing.
Chen suddenly awoke and spoke sharply to her, and she bowed once more, eyes down, and darted from the room, closing the door quietly behind her.
Chen pushed himself up. He pulled the pillows up behind him. The windows were large in here, too, the whiteness of the walls and sheets making Field squint again.
“I’m sorry for my wife,” Chen said. “She is most grateful.”
Field nodded, not understanding what she was grateful for.
In the silence that followed, Caprisi took out his cigarettes, lit one, and then tossed the packet to Chen.
“Better not,” he said. “The nurses.”
“French nurses,” Caprisi said. “You lucky bastard.”
Chen smiled.
“How is it?” Field asked.
Chen nodded.
Field wondered how much Chen knew of Lu Huang and what exactly Caprisi had meant about them growing up together. “I guess you’ll need a long rest,” he said.
“Not long.”
“A long rest,” Caprisi repeated.
“Not long.”
“If you think we can’t get along without you, you’re wrong.”
“I’m not wrong.”
Caprisi smiled again. “You’re an obstinate bastard.”
“We must survive.” Despite his determination, Chen was clearly still weak. He kept closing his eyes and letting his head rest against his pillow before remembering they were there and snapping them open again.
Eventually, he did drift off to sleep and they let themselves out.
Chen’s wife was sitting on a bench in the corridor. Caprisi spoke to her briefly, but her gratitude began to embarrass him, so he touched her shoulder and they went down to the main hall.
“I guess,” Field said as they emerged into the sunshine, “the commissioner does take care—”
Caprisi looked at him sharply.
“It’s not the cheapest hospital,” Field said.
“The commissioner doesn’t pay for a thing.”
Field frowned.
