I ran away from the intense heat and light into the darkness, working my way towards the meeting point with Greenway. There was a lot of noise-men and women shouting and one of the alarms was still ringing. I heard glass break. Ahead I saw a flash of white and a crouched, fast moving figure.
‘Greenway?’
‘Here.’ He was carrying a bundle of paper, struggling to keep the flapping sheets under control. ‘What the hell did you do?’
‘Later. Let’s go!’
We raced up the slope towards our exit in the fence. I sneaked a look back before we scrambled through: the fire was dying down in the swimming pool; the front gate was open and the patrol car had pulled up in front of Smith’s flat. Lights were on everywhere-in the flat, in the wards and in the administration building.
We were both panting when we reached the car. Lights showed in some of the houses; shapes moved at windows. No time to hang about. I threw the bag into the car and gunned the motor. Greenway clutched his paper to his chest as we took off fast, the way the old Falcon never would.
We travelled a few minutes in silence. The eye I’d damaged a few years back that sometimes gave me trouble when I was under stress was aching now and watering. I slowed down. ‘There’s a flask of rum in the tool bag,’ I said. ‘Let’s have a drink.’
Greenway gave me first swig and then took one himself. ‘We did it!’ he said. ‘What was burning?’
‘The swimming pool. You don’t think I’d set fire to a hospital, do you? Did you find out what we wanted?’
‘Some of it. I haven’t exactly had time to analyse it thoroughly… ‘ He giggled and took another drink.
‘Okay. We don’t want you going into shock. Calm down.’ I could feel him glaring at me as I drove and I realised that the sarcasm was my expression of relief. I reached across for the rum. ‘We’ll stop somewhere soon and take a look. You did pretty well.’
He was glad to be mollified. ‘So did you. Some diversion.’
‘Yeah. I hope nobody got hurt. Have another small swig.’
We stopped at a take-away chicken place wedged in between the car yards in Kirrawee. I bought some chicken and Coca Cola and took it to one of the two tables. The tired-looking girl serving eyed me suspiciously. She pushed back her orange-dyed hair and rested her hip against the counter. ‘How long youse goin’ to be?’
‘Why?’ I said.
‘I’m closin’ up in twenny minutes.’
‘That’s long enough.’ I realised I was hungry. I ate the chicken and sipped the Coca Cola, after I’d put rum in it. Greenway was sorting papers. He ate some chicken; he had natural good manners and was careful not to get grease on the sheets. ‘What did you get?’
‘The patients are or were, Michael McCleod, Renee Riatoli, Eddy Forster and John O’Brien.’
‘Why were they there?’
‘Drugs.’
‘What? Drugs!’ The girl looked sharply at us and checked her watch. I dropped my voice. ‘Drug problems and they were operated on?’
‘That’s what it looks like. There’s a lot of psychology stuff-depression and all that, but when you boil it down… ‘
‘Shit! Where are they now?’
He shrugged. ‘Don’t know. I didn’t have much time and getting into some of the files was complicated. They sort of… exited the filing system. The codes’re a bit difficult to follow. I printed some of it out. I tell you, the printer sounded like a machine gun in there.’
‘What about the staff and the money angle?’
‘Nothing on the money. It’d have taken all night to get into that. The staff stuff’s strange, man. It’s as if files are being kept on them too, like the patients. Some of it’s stuff they wouldn’t like everyone to know. Kinky…’
‘Spare me. Is there a doctor with “K” in his name?’
‘Several. Some of the files are hard copy, I mean paper. The personnel stuff has photographs, good ones.’
‘That’d be in filing cabinets. How’d you handle that?’
‘In for a penny in for a pound. I jemmied them with a metal ruler. I took a chance and used the Xerox machine.’
‘That must’ve been the light I saw.’
‘There was no way to shield it.’
Greenway drank, and ate some more chicken; he licked his fingers and I noticed that his hands were steady. He’d handled himself very coolly throughout. ‘It doesn’t matter now,’ I said. ‘Let’s see the pictures.’
He arranged them on the table. I glanced at the seven faces quickly and then examined each in turn closely. I held up the third. Greenway nodded.
‘Dr Bruce Krey. He fits physically. Bald, see. No moustache but look at his shoulders. And his personal file’s a beauty. He’s had a fair bit of treatment over the years. Boy, does he have problems. I copied a fair bit of his file, didn’t bother with the others. Hardy?’
I was scarcely listening. The face was that of the doctor who’d examined me as I was regaining consciousness at the hospital on day one. His bald head had been covered then by some kind of cap. I’d misheard his name as ‘Grey’.
Greenway was looking pleased with himself. ‘Here’s the trump card. Shit, where is it?’ He shuffled the papers frantically.
‘Closin’ time,’ the girl called.
‘Christ, I can’t find it!’
I stood and collected the papers. ‘Take it easy. It’ll be there. This kid’s shagged, she wants to knock off.’ I left two dollars under the chicken tray and the girl gave me a smile as we went out the door. In the car I used a torch to help Greenway locate what he wanted. A single photocopy sheet.
‘It was on the boss’s desk,’ he said. ‘Look. Krey resigned today.’