The Avenue of the Dead (31 page)

‘You're too full of fire, my friend,' O'Farrell said. ‘Remember our work here. Think of how many comrades have benefited from this clinic in the last five years – new faces, a chance to fight again. And now – Quetzalcoatl. The rest is unimportant.'

‘How is she?'

‘Better,' was the answer. ‘Still screaming for a drink now and then, but she's dried out. I told her this morning, the quicker you clean the alcohol out of the system, the quicker I can operate and you can go.'

‘It's a mistake,' Felipe said. ‘I don't understand our orders.'

‘We don't have to understand them,' O'Farrell said sharply. ‘We just obey them, that's all. We will run a check on these Maxwells. Photographs and fingerprints. Telex them through to New York immediately. Probably we are being too cautious, but as long as we have the Plumed Serpent here, we can't risk anything.'

‘What time will you see Mrs Maxwell?'

O'Farrell glanced at his watch. ‘Two-fifteen. Ask her to come to my office here. I'll get the fingerprints and a photograph. You deal with the husband.'

Davina met Lomax in the grounds. They strolled towards the swimming pool.

‘It's shaped like a horseshoe,' he said. ‘All low-level bungalow-type buildings connected by corridors. And outside the perimeter of the horseshoe there's a smaller building – I'd say it was medical rather than residential. There are no windows outside, but probably a skylight.'

‘That would be the operating theatre?'

‘Could be, but I don't see why they'd bother with daylight. More like a studio. I didn't hang around. I jogged all over the place and took in as much as I could. But that place interested me. I'd like to take another look.'

‘You'd better not. I'll walk round there this afternoon. If there's overhead light and no windows, what do they use it for?'

‘Perhaps our famous surgeon paints his subjects.'

‘I'm seeing him in ten minutes,' said Davina. ‘I'll try and find out.'

A nurse came to take her to the office. Some of the staff were Mexican, but there was a high proportion of Americans among them. This was a pretty blonde girl with a Texas drawl. Davina slowed her pace and started to talk to her. The nurse said she'd been there for a year. ‘It's great training,' she said. ‘I aim to go back home this fall and open a clinic of my own, Daddy's going to finance me. Not surgery, but general beauty and health care – diet, massage.'

‘Do you get a lot of clients for surgery?'

‘Oh, we sure do. But not so much this time of year. You know, Mrs Maxwell, ladies like to have it done in the late fall or the winter. Then they come out looking beautiful and some say they've been on a cruise.' The nurse giggled. ‘Or just lost a little weight, and my, just look what it's done for my chin. I shouldn't laugh about it; some of it's sad. I've been on surgery duty, and one or two of these ladies made me cry. They get divorced and they want to start a new life over with a new face. Doctor O'Farrell is just a magician when it comes to making a person look good!'

‘So I've heard,' Davina said. ‘Have you had anybody come in lately? I'm thinking of having something done myself, and I wouldn't want to be the only one around.'

The Texan said, ‘You wouldn't be alone – there's two here. Two ladies, both facials, as we call them. One's waiting for her operation, the other had it a few days ago and she's out of bandages now.' Davina's heart lurched with alarm. Don't, for God's sake, let it be the fake Elizabeth who's had the operation. If we're too late … ‘You mustn't mind me asking you all these questions,' she said. She stopped in the corridor. ‘I'm a bit nervous, that's all.'

The girl smiled and – said in her treacle-coated voice, ‘Don't you worry, honey, you ask me all you want. What are you going to have done?'

‘My nose,' Davina admitted. ‘I'd like it shorter, more like yours, actually. But how long do I have to wear bandages? How long before I could go out and nobody would notice?'

‘Oh, for a nose, not long at all – say two weeks. Depends on how much bruising there is – it's not like a full face lift, and Doctor O'Farrell does it so well there's never a scar left. But I don't think that kind of nose would suit you, Mrs Maxwell. It wouldn't balance with your face. Hey, we're late already; he doesn't like people to be late.' She glanced at Davina and said in a low voice, ‘For a Mexican he's mighty punctual. Here we are.'

O'Farrell was sitting behind a plate glass desk. The grey eyes were a shock in the bronze face, set like stones on either side of the broad Indian nose. He spoke with a slight American accent. Davina explained what she wanted while he sat, hands folded in front of him, impassive as an idol.

‘I'm very nervous,' she said. ‘I don't like the idea of surgery at all. But I've always wanted this done and if I don't pluck up the courage now, I never will. I want you to tell me everything, please, doctor, and before I decide to go ahead, I'd like to see the accommodation, and if there's anybody who's recently been done, perhaps it would help if I could ask them about it?'

‘I have only one patient at the moment,' he said. ‘This is not a busy time of the year. She has had some eye work done, the removal of pouches. I would have to ask her if she'd see you; we respect our clients' wish to be private, and some of them are very sensitive about having cosmetic surgery at all. But I can show you where the rooms are, and if you wish, the operating theatre.'

‘Thank you,' Davina said. ‘That would be a great help.' She smiled slightly. ‘You must think I'm very silly making such a fuss over a small thing.'

There was no answering smile. ‘Not at all, Mrs Maxwell, I am used to nervous people and I have a lot of sympathy with them. If we are going to do this, we will need to photograph you from different angles. I would like to take two or three preliminary pictures and study them.'

Davina got up. ‘I'd rather make up my mind definitely first,' she said. ‘Then you can take pictures, otherwise it's a waste. Could I see the rooms now?'

He looked squat and heavy behind the desk, but when he stood he was surprisingly tall. ‘I will take you myself,' he said.

‘He wouldn't show me the room with the glass roof,' Davina said. They were sitting on the big terrace with the fountain in the centre, and drinking iced fruit juice. Lomax had discouraged the attempts of some Americans and a Mexican couple to join them.

‘I saw everything else, including the operating theatre, but not that studio, or whatever it is. And there aren't any windows; all the light comes from above. I asked him what it was, and he said it was where he worked on sketches for clients with facial problems. Then he said “My real work is in my hospital in Mexico City. There I operate on really disfigured people, poor people who have suffered in fires and other dreadful accidents. This work here is my hobby. I bring my photographs and sketches here from the hospital, and I work in the studio. If I showed you that room, Mrs Maxwell, and what is in it, you wouldn't want plastic surgery!” It was the same feeling I got with the young doctor. Hostility and contempt. I don't believe a word about the studio. That's where
she's
hiding out. And from what he and the little nurse told me, they can't have operated yet. He tried to take photographs of me, but I wouldn't let him. I saw a telex machine in that office.'

‘I put a stop on both our bedrooms. It'll be interesting to see if they've disturbed them.'

‘They won't find anything in my room,' she said.

‘Nor mine,' he agreed. ‘Except fingerprints, and that won't help them. They wouldn't have any record. But they would have yours, wouldn't they?'

‘And they'd be winging on their way if they dusted out my room. We've got to move very fast on this one. I told him I'd think about plastic surgery but I didn't sound very enthusiastic and he didn't seem surprised. Or perhaps I'm imagining the whole damned thing and they don't suspect …'

‘Let's go and check on our rooms,' he suggested quietly. ‘That'll tell us something.'

They went to Davina's first. Lomax didn't bother with the door into the corridor. He strode across to the cupboard, Davina following.

‘I can't see anything,' she said. ‘What did you use, a hair?'

‘That's for films, my darling,' he said. ‘We have better methods. Yes – somebody's been in and opened it. Look.' There were white flecks on the floor. ‘Toothpaste,' he explained. ‘Dead simple; you squeeze a bit on the lock of any door and shut it. It hardens, and when you open it it flakes off. On an off-white carpet like this you'd never notice it unless you knew what to look for. There's some inside too. Now, let's just check on the chest of drawers.'

Lomax opened the top two drawers and examined the clothes inside. ‘When you search,' he said, ‘you make sure the top layer is exactly as you found it. I arranged one item on the bottom in each drawer, and they've been moved. So that's it. They'll have been through my room too.' He saw the question in her face and said, ‘I carry my equipment with me. All the time. They won't have found a thing.'

‘We'd better make our move tonight,' Davina said. ‘We can't allow them time to check up.' She noticed that he was balanced on the balls of his feet, swaying a fraction, and remembered the lightning attack in the Washington apartment that had saved her life. She knew at once what he was going to say.

‘I think you should go back to Tula and wait for me. I'll get her out of here. If there's trouble, you'll only be in the way.'

Davina flushed, but kept her irritation under control. ‘We want her alive and in one piece and if there is a shooting match, she'd be at risk. I know you, Colin. You go in like a rocket. I can cope with
her
if you're there to protect us. And when this is over, I want to go back to London and tell the chief he can find himself another fool to manipulate. I want the last word on this, and if you really care about me, you'll let me have it. I know the risks and they're worth it to me. And there's another reason. You'll think I'm crazy but ever since I've been here I keep thinking about Liz Carlton and what she must have suffered while they kept her locked up … The fact that I disliked her so much makes it worse. Can you make sense of that? I've got to pay her debt for her, Colin. Help me to do it. Then maybe I can think straight about my own life.'

‘If that's a bribe,' Lomax said quietly, ‘it's the first dirty trick I've ever known you play.'

‘It's not a bribe. And it's not a promise either.'

8

Dave Benson looked around him, skimming over the diplomats and State Department officials with their wives, bypassing the French Ambassador who was talking to his Dutch and Swedish colleagues. Benson hated the smell of expensive scents and flowers, and the endless tinkle-tinkle of glasses full of champagne. He hated the affluence and the self-satisfaction on the well-fed faces; the false laughter and the loud voices offended him. He couldn't see integrity anywhere among his own people and he profoundly distrusted all Europeans. Benson raised his fruit juice to his lips when he saw Edward Fleming come in and shake hands with the ambassador. He set his glass down on a moving tray as skilfully as a footballer passing the ball. He waited, watching, until Fleming had moved away from the ambassador's side. Then he stalked him round the room until he saw an opportunity when Fleming was not in conversation.

‘Mr Fleming? I'd like to introduce myself. I'm Dave Benson,
America Today.
'

Fleming knew the name and the reputation of the magazine. He stiffened. ‘Glad to know you,' he said. He forced himself to sound friendly. No one in his right mind went out to make an enemy of Benson, but only a fool stood around and talked to him. ‘I enjoy your pieces,' he said.

‘Thanks,' Benson answered. He had placed himself directly in front of his quarry, so that Fleming would have to push past him to get away. ‘I hear you haven't been too well lately,' he remarked. ‘You look recovered – are you? You don't mind my asking, but my editor would like me to do a profile on you some time?'

‘I'm flattered,' Fleming said. He wondered if the journalist could hear the horrible judders his heart was making.

‘What exactly has been the nature of your illness, Mr Fleming? I've heard talk of an ulcer – is that correct?'

‘No.' Fleming managed a laugh. ‘Just a dose of food poisoning. I shan't eat shellfish again in a hurry!'

‘Did you have it checked in the hospital?' Benson enquired.

‘There was no need,' Fleming answered. He felt the juddering accelerate and his hands dripped sweat. They warned me, he reminded himself, they warned me something like this could happen. He may be a plant or he may just be nosing round for something to pay his expenses down here. If he sees you're nervous he'll home in on you like a missile …

‘I don't see your wife,' said Benson. ‘Isn't she here?'

‘No; she's away on a trip. Now, Mr Benson, if you'll excuse me – there's a man I have to talk to over there.'

Dave Benson didn't move. ‘Is it true that she's left you?'

Fleming felt suddenly so angry that his clammy hands bunched into fists. He longed to swing one of them into the middle of the prying, hostile face in front of him.

‘No comment on my private life. Excuse me!' He stepped round the reporter.

‘There are other rumours. Maybe I'd better ask you about them in your office. Can you give me an appointment, Mr Fleming?' Benson was walking step by step with him, dodging round drinking couples as Fleming tried to escape. Edward Fleming stopped.

‘I have no free time for interviews,' he said. ‘I'm sorry, but your profile will have to wait.'