Forever (76 page)

Colonel Valerio's face was expressionless,
though his mood bordered on euphoria. He was thinking how he
couldn't have planned things better himself. Stephanie Merlin's
right where I want her. Trapped at Sftto da Veiga, the one place on
earth from which there is no escape. Capturing her will be as easy
as netting a guppy in a five-gallon tank. Even easier, perhaps.

Soon, Colonel Valerio thought as he watched
the ground fall away and the earth tilt. Soon she will be mine. And
then I will bring her back to the island, to my private hunting
preserve where she will be fair game.

He smiled thinly to himself. And then . . .
what was it the Roman emperors used to say? Let the games
begin.

How appropriate, he thought.

Sao Paulo, Brazil • Inflight • Sitto da Veiga,
Brazil

Eduardo snapped his gaze from the glittering
view of Sao Paulo and swivelled his chair back around to face the
six men seated on the other side of the massive conference table.
'I hate to disappoint you, gentlemen,' Eduardo said.

Their smug expressions turned to shocked
disbelief.

He looked from one of them to the other. 'If
you think a hostile takeover of Machado S.A. is such a good deal,
then by all means.' He spread his hands in a gesture. 'Go ahead and
do it. But I'm sorry, gentlemen. Grupo da Veiga will not get
involved in any phase of it. Nor will I allow our banking division
to help finance your project.'

The men stared at each other, feeling
outraged and mocked.

'My decision is final.' He pushed back his
chair, signifying that the meeting was over.

When he returned to the office he maintained
on the penthouse floor, MIrtia, his secretary, looked up. She said,
'Senhor Machado arrived ten minutes ago. He and his two attorneys
are waiting in the inner office.'

Eduardo had started past her when he stopped
and said, 'One more thing, MIrtia, place a call to Sitto da Veiga.
I want to speak to Ms Monica Williams.'

'I'll get on it right away.'

'As soon as you have her on the line, buzz
me. Otherwise, I don't want to be disturbed.'

'Yes, sir.'

Eduardo continued on into his office. 'I'm
sorry to have kept you waiting, gentlemen,' he said to the three
men.

'That is no problem,' Jorge Machado, the
older of the men said, it gave us the opportunity to read through
the contracts once more.'

'I take it you find everything
satisfactory.'

The old man looked at his lawyers, who
nodded imperceptibly. 'Yes,' he said.

Eduardo didn't waste any time. 'In that
case, let me get my lawyers in here to witness the signing.'

Eduardo took a seat and crossed his legs
casually and made small talk. Neither his face nor his body
language gave away the triumph he felt. By coming to him, the
consortium had alerted him to Machado's real worth, and his own
subsequent studies had borne their information out. By stringing
them along, they had done half the work for him. And by going
behind their backs and cutting them out of the deal completely, he
had not only saved a fortune and gained control of Machado, but
even more important, he had no partners to answer to.

The men from the consortium had forgotten
the cardinal rule of the de Veigas. They never went into
partnership with anybody.

It was less than a half-hour later when
Senhor Machado and his attorneys left Eduardo's office. Then he
pressed down on his intercom button. 'Mirtia, have you tried to get
hold of Ms Williams?'

'Yes, sir,' his secretary's disembodied
voice replied. 'She is not in her quarters, nor does anyone know
where she is at the moment.'

He sat back. 'All right. Keep trying.'

'Yes, sir.'

The sleek silver Learjet streaked high above
the clouds. Colonel Valerio had pulled the curtains over the eight
large portholes. He preferred to sit in the dark. It made it so
much easier to concentrate on Stephanie Merlin without visual
distraction. He didn't need to consult his watch to know how much
flight time remained. One more hour.

The pain in his loins was almost
unbearable.

In some ways, it was like any hospital
anywhere. It even smelled like hospitals the world over, with that
combination of alcohol and disinfectants.

What was different, however, was the lack of
people. The waiting room was empty. The nurses' station was
deserted. There was no receptionist. And where were the doctors?
The patients? The nurses and the nurses' aides? Why did no gurneys
squeak on casters? No children squall?

It was positively eerie, this silence,
overwhelmingly creepy, as though the world had suddenly been put on
hold or aliens had beamed everyone up. Stephanie stayed close
behind Johnny. She felt helpless and out of her element, and was
unable to suppress the sensation that she, like Alice, had slid
down a rabbit's hole and would find events were beyond her control.
She couldn't shake off the feeling that this wasn't a real
hospital, so much as a hospital set.

The hallway seemed interminably long, lined
by grey doors on both sides. Signs above some of them, which she
would normally have found reassuring, only seemed to add to the
surrealistic aspect of this place. Angiography. In three languages.
Neuroradiology. Also in three languages. Same with Pathology.

And still they didn't see a soul.

'What's this place staffed by?' Stephanie
wanted to know. 'Ghosts?'

Johnny smiled. 'I know it must seem that
way. But actually, the clinic on level one is kept pretty busy. You
know, minor cuts and bruises. Burns and scrapes. Sprains and sore
throats. All the usual walk-in emergencies. But down here it's
normally pretty quiet.'

They turned a corner and headed down yet
another high-gloss corridor. Although she wouldn't admit it in a
million years, she was glad she had Johnny beside her as a guide.
For without windows, or landmarks of any kind to refer to, these
door-lined halls were a maze, while the disconcerting silence would
have made her skin crawl.

She was acutely aware of the squeaking of
their rubber soles on linoleum and the sounds of their breathing in
the unnatural hush of this subterranean maze.

' What was that?' Her head whipped sideways
and she stared at Johnny.

'Shh.' Whatever it was, Johnny had heard it
too. He'd stopped walking, and cocked his head to listen.

Then, from somewhere up ahead, they heard it
again, as if someone - or something - were in great pain.

Thank God! Stephanie thought, offering up a
silent prayer of gratitude. So we're not alone down here after
all!

Johnny was hurrying now, heading towards the
sound, and she was walking swiftly beside him to keep up. Every so
often, just as they were sure they'd imagined the cry, it came
again.

They turned a corner, and there was the
sign, in Portuguese, French, and English:

Paediatrics

'It's coming from there I think,' Johnny
said.

As they moved towards it, the cry came
again. Stephanie frowned. From here, it no longer sounded like a
cry of pain so much as a moan of despair.

No longer considering any personal danger
they might be in, Johnny pushed on the swinging door to Paediatrics
with the flat of one hand and stepped aside 'Ladies first,' he
said.

Stephanie hesitated only fractionally. Her
eyes met his, and then she hurried past him and he followed her
inside.

Looking around, Stephanie could see that
this was another small waiting room. Moulded plastic chairs were
lined up against the walls. And on one sat a weary-looking woman
holding a hand over her mouth, as though to hold in her sobs.
Stephanie recognised her immediately. She had been on the Fairy
Godmother flight. The woman who'd accompanied the brave little girl
with the doll named Lourdes, she remembered.

Then Stephanie realised that the woman was
staring straight ahead. Right at us . . .no - through us!

Stephanie glanced at Johnny.
Doesn't she
see us
? she enquired with her eyes.

Johnny shrugged.

Just then, another half-muffled sob came
from behind the woman's hand. Embarrassed, Stephanie looked away,
and took the opportunity to survey the surroundings. Her inspection
showed five doors, one of which was open, and one whose sign
proclaimed it to be a toilet.

'Tell you what,' Stephanie said. 'This woman
could use some company. Stay with her while I check out these
rooms.'

First Stephanie went over to the open door
and looked in. She saw a large empty crib with mussed covers; the
doll named Lourdes lay on top of them.

Now for the closed doors.

She knocked softly on the first one.
Receiving no reply, she opened it and looked inside.

The light was off, but she could tell it was
empty and unused.

She closed the door again and knocked on the
one right next to it. She heard a man say,
'A pessoa a porta
sera o medico
,' and was surprised when it opened instantly.
'Sim?
'

The voice belonged to another familiar face
from the plane. The man who, with his wife, had accompanied the
young boy who'd been brought aboard on the stretcher, hooked up to
the IV.

Craning her neck to see past him, Stephanie
caught the eye of his worried wife, who was seated on a chair
beside the bed holding the hand of her four-year-old son. He was
hooked up to another IV.

'Desculpe me
,' Stephanie said
guiltily, relying on the little Portuguese she had retained from
her lessons and hoping it was the suitable response.

The man nodded and shut the door
quietly.

The next door led into the toilet.

Now for the door directly on the other side.
Stephanie rapped on it with her knuckles.

'Sim?
' a woman's voice called
out.

Stephanie opened it part way and looked in.
It was the uniformed nurse who'd been on the plane; her charge, the
emaciated, premature baby had been transferred from the temporary
incubator to a regular one.

'Desculpe me
,' Stephanie murmured
again, and quickly ducked back out and closed the door.

Now she tried the fifth and last door. That
room, too, was empty.

Johnny was looking at her, eyebrows raised
questioningly.

'We've found the children,' Stephanie said.
She paused and added, 'At least, I can account for two out of
three.' She looked at the sobbing woman and then went over to her
and squatted in front of her. '
Senhora
,' she said softly,
taking the woman's hands.
'Senhora'

The woman sniffed, pulled one hand loose,
and wiped her eyes.

Stephanie said,
'Fala ingles?
'

The woman shook her head.

Stephanie sighed.
'Eu nao falo
portugues
: she said. Then she had a sudden inspiration. She
turned to Johnny. 'You wouldn't happen to speak any Spanish, would
you?'

'Yes,' he said. 'A little bit.'

Stephanie had remembered that if you didn't
speak Portuguese, a knowledge of Spanish, although certainly no
substitute, could come in handy.

Stephanie urged Johnny, 'Go ahead, ask her
in Spanish where her daughter is.'

'Donde esta la pequena?
'

The woman frowned and Johnny repeated the
sentence slowly.

'Ah.' The woman nodded.
'Tem havido
discussoes em torno a uma nova operacao
.'

Johnny frowned.
'Operacao
,' he
murmured to himself. ' . . .
Operacao
. . .' Then he said,
'Ah!' and clicked his fingers.
'Operaciones
in Spanish,
operacao
in Portuguese.' 'Which means what?' Stephanie asked
urgently. 'The girl's in the operating room.' Stephanie felt
suddenly sick.

'Johnny -' She found it difficult to speak.
'We've got to get to O.R. Now! Before it's too late!' Before he
could reply, Stephanie was already gone.

At six o'clock, Eduardo pressed down on his
intercom and asked Mfrtia to come into his office.

The door opened silently, and Mirtia stood
in the doorway.
'Senhor?
' She had her dictation pad and
pencil in hand.

He looked over at her and shook his head,
then gave her a questioning look. 'Did you keep trying to reach Ms
Williams?'

'Yes,
Senhor.
And I left several
messages.'

'I see.'

She stood there, waiting, is there anything
else I can do?' she asked.

'Yes. Call down to the garage and tell the
chauffeur to have my car waiting out front. Then call the pilot and
tell him to have my plane ready for takeoff. I'm flying back to
Rio.'

Mirtia nodded. 'I'll get on it right
away.'

'Thank you. As soon as you've made the
calls, lock up and go home. It's already an hour past quitting
time.'

'Thank you,
Senhor
.''

Ten minutes later, Eduardo was in his
limousine, heading to the airport. He tried to call Stephanie twice
from the cellular car phone, but no one answered in her room. And
an hour later, streaking northeast to Rio aboard his company jet,
he tried calling her twice more. Still to no avail.

She must have a thousand things to do, he
kept telling himself, but it didn't help. He was beginning to
worry. All afternoon long, I left messages for her to call me.
Surely she's had the opportunity?

It was all Stephanie could do to keep up
with Johnny; he was literally racing down the corridor. Past him,
at the far end, she could make out the signs above a pair of
swinging doors. The sign both drew and repelled her.

Operating Rooms