The following morning, Segura was in a pensive mood. While Marcus had a coffee in bed, she was wrapped in a silk dressing gown, preparing for her day.
“As much as I enjoyed our night, I want you to leave Spain,” she said, taking a travel bag from her closet.
“Why is that?”
“I don’t want you to be hurt. Or worse. You’re up against a determined and well-funded adversary, whoever they are. Twice! Twice you were almost killed. You don’t have the resources of the American government behind you. You don’t even have a powerful employer behind you. You only have yourself.”
“Not true. I have a buddy in the Italian police. And I have you.”
“Stop kidding around, Marcus. This is serious. Leave this with the police where it belongs. The girls will be found.”
“Their names are Victoria and Elizabeth. They call me Uncle Marcus. I’m going to find them.”
She began going through her drawers and tossing clothes into her bag. “You know why you’re doing this, don’t you? You want to be vital again—although, if you ask me, you were plenty vital last night even with a skin of Glenlivet in you, and a stiff shoulder. Your last tango ended badly—by the way, did you know that Burakov had a fatal heart attack last year?”
“Good. I hope it hurt.”
“You’re guilty about Alice and it’s still eating you up. You think that being the hero today is going to assuage that guilt. It won’t.”
“Thank you, Dr. Freud. How much do I owe you?”
“You’re not going to drop this, are you?”
He swung his feet over and got his cigarettes from his trousers.
“You’re not going to smoke in here,” she scolded.
He got up and unlatched the French doors. “Balcony.”
“Fine, but put something on. I don’t want my neighbors to see a naked man.”
He obliged her and sat outside at a little wrought-iron table with his phone to his ear.
Lumaga didn’t sound fresh.
“Anything on your end?” Marcus asked.
“I already talked with the French police this morning. Other than a bucketful of 5.56 shell casings from a Slovakian manufacturer on the floor of the helicopter, there were no fingerprints or useful evidence. CCTV picked up a green SUV on a road near the landing site that was later recovered about fifty kilometers away. It was stolen a couple of days before. The trail ended there. The autopsies from Monte Prelà and Villa Shibui were concluded. No surprises—you know how everyone died. We’ve had people looking at surveillance from all the airports, all the land crossings to France, Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia, and all the seaports for signs of the girls and there’s nothing. That’s it. I don’t have anything more.”
“I need your help with something,” Marcus said.
“Of course, anything.”
“I can’t march into some administration office at the La Paz Hospital and expect to get personnel information about Celeste and Ferruccio Gressani. Can you go back to Ferruccio’s friends and family and see if you can find out where he worked there? A department? A boss’s name? A co-worker?”
“Sure. I’ll try. Later.”
Segura had to fly to Brussels for a NATO security conference. She offered Marcus the use of her car. Like a couple, they parted with a kiss when her driver arrived, and he retrieved the BMW from the garage underneath her building.
*
Fabiana Odorico returned to the pretty house with red shutters and flower boxes in Cessaniti. Manuela Gressani was expecting her and was ready with coffee and cookies. Her scoliotic spine bowed her black mourning dress and Odorico insisted on carrying the tray from the kitchen.
“Is there any news about who killed my Ferruccio?” she asked.
“Nothing, but we are actively working on it. That’s why I’m here.”
“Tell me,” the woman said. “How can I help?”
“We need to know more about where Ferruccio worked in Madrid.”
“I found the name of the hospital for you, don’t you remember?”
“Yes, I have that. What I mean is—at the hospital, which department did he work in? Or if you have it, the name of his boss at the hospital.”
“I don’t think I know these things. Why would he tell me?”
“Did he write you using hospital stationery? Give you a hospital return address on a letter?”
The elderly woman shook her head, then asked if Odorico could pick up the tray again.
“I’m sorry,” Odorico said, “did I do something to offend you?”
The woman cackled, “Oh no! We just need to go to the dining room.”
Odorico understood when she turned the corner. Laid out on the dining room table was a scrapbook into which Ferruccio’s mother had been pasting photos and memorabilia.
“Ferruccio’s life,” the woman said sadly. “From his birth to his death. What else can I do? I haven’t pasted the recent photographs yet he sent me from his years in Spain. You’re welcome to look at them.”
Odorico sat down and munched sugar cookies while sorting through the small stacks of photos. She stopped at one of them of a young, bearded man wearing a lab coat.
“That was soon after he arrived in Madrid,” his mother said. “See how handsome he was?”
“Yes, I see. May I take this?”
“I’d prefer you didn’t. I don’t know if I have another with such a warm smile.”
“Then I’ll just take a photo of it, if that’s okay.”
“Yes, please, go ahead. I can see why you want that one. Ferruccio never looked better.”
*
The Biblioteca Pública Municipal Eugenio Trías was a modern public library within Retiro Park occupying two large pavilions at the site of an old zoo. Marcus tried to resurrect his limited Spanish vocabulary, but the woman at the information desk took pity on him and replied, “I’m sure it will be easier for you if I speak English.”
“Yes, I’m sure it will. I’m looking for old Madrid phone directories.”
“How old?”
“Modern, actually. Past decade.”
“Certainly. You’ll find what you want here,” she said, handing him a printed floor plan with her notation.
He found the Madrid municipal phone books and began with the current year. There was no listing for Celeste. He marched back in time, year by year, until six years back, there she was. C. Bobier, 45 Calle de la Villa de Marín, #719. He gave the woman at the information booth a thumbs-up on his way out and went to retrieve Segura’s parked car.
The sun was finally out and the park looked lovely in yellow light. Retirees were strolling the walkways, mothers were pushing prams, tourists were taking pictures.
He stopped noticing his surroundings.
A text from Lumaga made everything disappear.
The attached photo, Lumaga explained, was of Ferruccio Gressani at the Le Paz Hospital. In it, the young, bearded man wearing a long white lab coat, was standing in a hospital corridor in front of a sign:
Instituto de Genética Médica y Molecular
Marcus began taking long, fast strides toward the car.
*
The hospital complex, north of the city, was hugged by the busy M-30 motorway. The Institute of Genetics and Molecular Medicine was in its own modern building at the heart of the medical area. Marcus found the administration offices and asked to speak with the director. He didn’t think his Spanish was going to cut the mustard, so he asked in English.
“Dr. Gaytan?” the receptionist asked back.
“If Dr. Gaytan is the director, then yes.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, “do you have an appointment today?”
“I don’t actually, but it’s important that I have a brief word with him.”
“This isn’t a patient area, sir. If you go down to the lobby, they can show you how to get to the clinics.”
“I’m not a patient. It’s a personnel matter I need Dr. Gaytan’s help with.”
“Without an appointment, I’m afraid that won’t be possible.” She scribbled a number on a card and handed it over the counter. “If you call this number and leave a voice message, Dr. Gaytan can decide whether he can call you back.”
He could tell if he persisted on the same track that she was only a couple of steps away from calling security. In the parking garage, he had prepared for a brick-wall moment by pulling out a relic from his wallet, an old, worn business card.
Central Intelligence Agency
Marcus Handler
George Bush Center for Intelligence
Langley, Virginia 22101
He presented it and repeated that it was urgent that he speak with the director. She looked at it wide-eyed, excused herself, and disappeared through a door. While he waited, he wondered how many laws he had just broken. She quickly returned and asked him to follow her. At a corner office overlooking hilly parkland further to the north, a man Marcus’s age got up from his desk and slipped on a figure-hugging suit jacket that had been draped over his chair.
“Mr. Handler, I am Dr. Gaytan,” he said. “Please come in.”
Gaytan had luxuriously thick, black hair, graying at the temples and a film-star tan. Marcus never paid much attention to another man’s physical attributes, but there was no denying that this was a good-looking fellow. He offered Marcus a coffee and when he accepted, Gaytan picked up his phone.
He returned Marcus’s card, presented one of his own—Dr. Ferrol Luis Gaytan, director of the institute, and said, “How may I assist you, Mr. Handler? It’s not every day that I get a visit from the CIA.”
“I’m looking for information on one of your former employees.”
“This is a very large facility with hundreds of employees, but if I don’t know the individual personally, I can make inquiries within the appropriate group.”
A stylish female administrative assistant materialized with the coffees and when she left, Marcus said, “Ferruccio Gressani. He was a laboratory technician who worked here about six years ago.”
Gaytan frowned and said, “I don’t recognize the name. How old is he?”
“The question should be, how old was he? He was thirty-two.”
“He’s dead?”
“Murdered.”
“May I ask why the CIA is interested in this man?”
“I’m not at liberty to discuss that.”
“Which can only mean some sort of terroristic association. It’s important for you to know about his employment at the institute?”
“It is. And to see if anyone knows where he went when he left here.”
“Then, I will find out. Let me make a call.”
Gaytan called his assistant and asked to be transferred to the human resources office where he inquired after the personnel file of a Ferruccio Gressani who left employment in the time frame Marcus stipulated. Marcus sipped coffee and tried to make out the Spanish of Gaytan’s end of the conversation.
“He was an Italian national? The cytogenetics lab? Who was his supervisor? Me? It couldn’t have been me. Ah, Lopez was the lab manager. Yes, I was the acting head of the lab back then. Wait a minute, I remember the boy. Yes, yes, now I remember. Yes, I refused to write a letter of reference when he left. For obvious reasons. Was there a forwarding address of any kind? I see. Look, you’ve been very helpful. I appreciate it.”
Gaytan hung up and shook his head.
“I understood some of that,” Marcus said. “I was stationed in Spain for a few years.”
“Good, good, then you heard that my memory was prodded and I realized I knew Gressani. He was a charming boy, a low-level technician who operated some of our analytical instruments. Sometimes he made a joke about the similarities in our first names—Ferruccio and Ferrol. I found it a little forward, but I never paid it much attention. He was dismissed. Fired. The laboratory manager discovered a piece of machinery was missing and it seems Gressani stole it. When confronted with the evidence, he admitted the theft and returned it. It was suspected that he had a drugs problem. We agreed to not report him to the police in return for his immediate resignation. The institute just wanted to be done with the situation. His file doesn’t have any information on where he might have gone. You say he was murdered?”
“In Italy.”
“I see. It seems his life took an unfortunate turn. I’m sorry I couldn’t be more helpful, Mr. Handler.”
Marcus sighed. Another dead end. “Do you think you could steer me toward the human resources office. I’ve got another person I’m working on. She could have worked anywhere in the hospital. Her name is Celeste Bobier.”
Gaytan’s face registered his surprise. “Celeste? I knew Celeste. She was a research nurse for a short while. She was involved in clinical trials of experimental therapies on our in-patient wards. She wasn’t here long, but she was a woman who is hard to forget, if you understand my meaning. She’s all right, I hope—not in any trouble.”
“I’m sorry to say that she’s dead too.”
“My God! What happened?”
“Also murdered. Again, I can’t discuss any of the details.”
“What in God’s name is going on here?” Gaytan said, shaking his head. “Has the world gone mad?”
“What can you tell me about her?”
“Well, she was French—from the south of France, if I can recall. She was very competent, energetic, a good sense of humor. And as I implied, she was also something of a beauty. She turned heads.”
“Did you know her socially as well as professionally?”
“Heavens, no! Did I give you that impression? Just professionally, I assure you.”
“When did she leave?”
“I don’t recall exactly. Four years ago? Five?”
“Why’d she leave?”
“My recollection is that she needed to return to France. A sick mother, perhaps?”
“You had no further contact with her?”
“None whatsoever.”
“Would you have given her a reference?”
“It’s quite possible. She was an excellent nurse. I can check my files.”
“Do you know if she and Gressani knew each other when they worked here?”
“I have no idea about that. You’re sure you can’t tell me what happened to Celeste? This is deeply shocking news.”
“I wish I could. Listen, could I trouble you for one last thing? Could you also check with your human resources people and see if she left a forwarding address?”
Gaytan stood and pointed to his thin, gold watch. “I have a meeting now, but I’ll be happy to look into this further. I didn’t see a contact number on your business card. How can I reach you?”
Marcus asked for a piece of paper and wrote down his mobile number.
“You’re staying in Madrid?”
He said he was and mentioned his hotel.
“I think I’ve heard of it,” Gaytan said with a bemused smile. “I think maybe the CIA doesn’t give you a big expense account.”