BACK AT THE HOTEL, CARRINI SAID, “Let me buy you a drink.”
“Thanks,” Ross said, “I’d rather not.”
“Very sour of you, Doctor. You seem unhappy.”
“Me? Unhappy? Just because you threaten to murder me, then whisk me off to perform an autopsy, and then right in the middle you—”
Ross stopped. Carrini was frowning angrily. “You have done nothing illegal. You performed a straightforward autopsy, and you wrote a straightforward report. Nothing else happened.” He gripped Ross’s arm tightly. “Nothing. Now: a drink?”
“A drink,” Ross said.
They went into the bar and sat down. Carrini relaxed, his anger gone as quickly as it had come. “Tell me,” he said pleasantly, “what are your future plans?”
“Well, I’m still on vacation,” Ross said.
“Then you will remain here?”
He shrugged. “Until the conference.”
Carrini’s body tensed slightly. “Conference?” he asked, lighting a cigarette.
“Yes. There’s a conference in Barcelona in a few days. The American Society of Radiologists.”
“I see,” Carrini said slowly. “And you are attending?”
“Yes. I’m giving a paper.”
“I see.”
“Does that surprise you?”
“Surprise me? No, indeed. I congratulate you. I had no idea you were so distinguished.”
The drinks came. Carrini raised his glass. “Your health.”
They drank. Carrini finished his quickly, then said, “Oh, there is one other thing. I owe you some money.” He reached for his checkbook.
“You owe me nothing.”
“I thought we agreed—”
“Let’s just say,” Ross said, “that I did it out of friendship.”
Carrini smiled. “You are a fool. Take the money. You deserve it.”
“No.”
“But I insist.”
“No.”
Carrini sighed. “As you wish.” He stood to go. “Then it seems our business is concluded.”
“I hope so,” Ross said.
“So do I,” Carrini said, and his voice was coldly serious.
He found her on the beach. It was late afternoon, and the sun was falling, turning the water to lapping gold. An evening breeze was blowing up; she had goose pimples.
“Where have you been? I looked everywhere for you.”
“I’ve been to the sanatorium.”
“The what?”
“The Heitzman Sanatorium. North of Barcelona.”
“What for?”
He sat down on the sand. “For an autopsy,” he said.
“You did it?”
He nodded.
“What happened?”
“Nothing. It was just an autopsy. Two bullet wounds. He was pretty dead.”
She shivered. “Don’t tell me about it,” she said. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“You look frightened.”
“Just confused. I don’t think there’s any danger now.” He stared out at the ocean and the reddened, angry sun.
“I hope not,” she said.
He nodded. She took his hand.
“Anything I can do for you?” she asked.
He looked at her, her dark hair, her tan, the outrageous pink bikini, and her goose pimples.
“Maybe,” he said.
She kissed his ear. “Now?”
He considered. “It’s pretty cold out here.”
“I didn’t mean here.”
“Then where did you mean?”
“I meant,” she said softly, “somewhere else.”
Much later, while she was taking a shower in his room, he remembered the note. He searched through his pockets and found it, a small, carefully folded piece of paper. The words were hastily scrawled.
CALL ME BARCELONA
K BRENNER
He stared at the note and thought about the frightened girl. He thought about Carrini, and then he found himself thinking about everything, the whole business.
Angela came out of the shower, wrapped in a towel. She grinned at him.
“And now, the latest creation. Straight from the greatest couturier collection of all. We call this one ‘Thirteenth Rib.’”
She threw the towel away and pirouetted for him.
“Blasphemy,” Ross said.
“It’s the basis for the new line this year,” she said. “It’s supposed to appeal to men. Doesn’t it?”
“It does.”
“It comes in a variety of styles to suit every occasion.”
“I’ll take it just as it is,” he said.
“Will you?” she asked, raising an eyebrow.
“I will,” he said.
It was over dinner that Angela, looking radiantly happy, said, “Maybe we should go somewhere else for a few days.”
“Like where?”
“I don’t know. Anywhere. France, or Majorca, or Tangier. Even Barcelona.”
He nodded. “Perhaps you’re right.”
“Barcelona’s fun. Ever been?”
He shook his head.
“Then why don’t we?”
“All right,” he said. “Let’s.”
They left in the morning.
Barcelona: the largest city in Spain, the wealthiest, the most vibrant. Sprawling along the coast and back into the hills, by turns peaceful and raucous, elegant and tawdry, serene and violent. The port, at the end of Calle Ramblas, was crude, noisy, filled with whores, brawling sailors, day laborers. Back in the hills, near the modern university, the residential sections were fashionable and secluded.
They stayed in the center of town, in a large hotel off the Plaza Cataluña, with a room with a balcony overlooking the fountains.
Angela said she wanted to shop, but Ross refused to accompany her, saying he hated to shop with women; it was a personal thing, no offense intended. She grinned at him.
“And what are you going to do while you’re alone?”
He shrugged. “Walk around. Sight-see.”
“Meet me back here in two hours? For lunch?”
“Of course.”
“Promise?”
“Yes,” he laughed.
“If you’re late,” she said, “I’ll seduce the bellboy to occupy the time.”
“You won’t.”
“I will.”
“Spaniards,” he said, “are known to be humorless people.”
When she was gone, he hunted through the telephone directory for Karin Brenner’s name. He found it, at an address in the north of town.
He called. The phone rang six times, and then a cautious voice answered.
“Yes?”
“Miss Brenner?”
“Who is calling?”
“Dr. Ross.”
“Oh,” she said, with a little sob. “Oh, I’m so frightened, Doctor.”
“Why?”
“I must talk to you.” Her voice was quavering, on the edge of hysteria.
“What’s the matter?”
“Oh, I’m so frightened.” A little gasp. “I know what has happened.”
“What?”
“The thing you put in the body. I know what it is.”
“How do you know about that?” Ross was frowning.
“Before, I was listening to the cousins. It was an accident; they did not know I was near. I heard them argue. About X-rays. What would happen if the body was X-rayed. I heard everything. I must talk to you.”
“All right. When?”
“Immediately,” she said. “I have just come from the library, and I am beginning to understand.”
“Understand what?”
“Come,” she said. “We will talk.”
He hung up and took a cab to her apartment. It turned out to be a huge, modern high-rise in the northern suburbs. Her apartment was on the tenth floor. He took the elevator up and knocked on the door.
No answer.
He knocked again and waited.
No answer.
“Karin? Are you there?”
He tried the knob. The door was unlocked. He went in. The living room was empty, but very tidy and neat, with unmistakable feminine touches. There were bright pillows on the couch, a rack of fashion magazines, mostly French.
“Karin?”
He went into the next room, a small bedroom with barely room for a single bed. The bed was unmade and empty, the rumpled sheets contrasting oddly with the neatness of the living room.
Behind him, the door slammed. He felt a cold, sharp point against the base of his neck.
“Don’t move.”
He did not. A moment later, the point was removed. He heard sobbing and turned around. It was Karin. She was leaning against the door, crying. The knife had dropped to the floor.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “So sorry. But I was afraid …”
“It’s all right now,” he said, comforting her. He took her back to the living room, made her sit on the couch, and poured her a brandy. Then he locked the front door. When she had sipped the brandy and wiped her eyes, she seemed better.
“You all right?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“Can I get you something else? Coffee?”
She nodded. He went into the kitchen to make it. In the kitchen, he found a half-finished cup of coffee next to the stove. Nearby was an ashtray with several stubbed-out cigarettes. And five books in a careful stack.
They were old books, dusty. He looked at them: they were library books, from the University of Barcelona. The titles stopped him.
Prescott: The Conquest of Mexico. He opened the book; a marker had been placed in the section concerning “The Marriage of Cortez.”
He looked at the others.
Henriques: Aztec Civilization.
Marston-Thomas: The Life of Cortes.
Quirnal: Artifacts des Aztecs.
And finally, a thick book in Spanish of genealogies. There were two markers here: one for a page describing the House of Arellano, the noble family of Navarre; the other, the House of Bejar. Neither name meant anything to Ross.
He looked at the library cards.
The books had all been checked out the day before.
Odd.
He put the water on to boil and returned to the living room. She was smoking a cigarette tensely.
“Now then,” he said. “What’s this all about?”
“I am afraid,” she said softly. “Because I know.”
“Know what?”
“Know everything,” she said. “I overheard the men talking. Do you know a man they call the professor?”
“The professor? What’s his real name?”
She shrugged. “They just called him the professor.”
“No,” Ross said, thinking. “Never heard of him.”
“And the count?”
He shook his head again.
“They talked about these two men,” Karin said. “The professor and the count. They made jokes about the shipment. They said the shipment would go to Portugal. And they laughed: The shipment would go to Portugal. And then something about America. Do you understand this?”
“No,” Ross admitted. “It doesn’t make any sense at all. What else did they say?”
“The object,” she said. “They talked about it. The object you put in the body. Can you describe it for me?”
“Not really. It was about the size of your hand, and very heavy, and square—”
“Square? Are you sure?”
“Well, at least it was in a square box of some kind.”
“You are certain of this?”
“Yes. But why? What was it? And what are all those books in the kitchen about Mexico?”
“They are about Cortez,” she corrected.
“Cortez?”
“Yes. Cortez is the key to everything.”
“Cortez?”
She nodded.
At that moment, the doorbell rang, with a low, musical chime. They both froze. Karin looked at Ross questioningly; he shook his head. The doorbell rang again, and then a heavy hand knocked on the door.
A muffled voice said, “Karin? You there?”
Neither of them moved. They heard a hand twist the doorknob, but the door was locked.
At that moment, the boiling water began a shrill whistle. Ross looked up in horror; Karin leaped up and knocked over an ashtray, which fell to the floor with a thump.
The knocking at the door began again.
“I must answer it,” Karin whispered. “Go to the kitchen.”
Aloud, she called, “Just a minute, please.”
She waited until Ross had gone to the kitchen and turned off the water; then she answered the door. Ross listened, ears straining, but he could hear only low voices. There seemed to be a whispered argument of some kind. Then there was a rustling, or a scuffling.
And then the door slammed shut.
He hesitated in the kitchen, waiting for Karin to come back to him. When she did not, he looked cautiously out into the living room.
Karin lay on the floor, not moving. Her face was blue-black, and there was an angry red ring around her neck. He bent over her quickly, feeling for a pulse. The pulse was there, but very slow. He saw that she was breathing. He shook her gently.
“Karin. Karin.”
She did not respond. He shook her harder, but there was still no response.
Then he heard sirens, at first in the distance, but coming closer. Somehow he knew the sirens were coming to Karin’s apartment. He got up and opened the door, peering out into the hallway. No one there. He made a dash for the elevators, punched the down button, and waited; the lights overhead showed the elevators were both on the ground floor. As he watched, he saw that they both began to ascend.
He ran to the service stairs. As he opened the door leading down, he heard the tramp of boots coming up.
Trapped.
Someone had set it up, set it up very neatly and carefully. And he had fallen into it.
He returned to the hallway and looked up and down desperately. All the doors were shut, except for one, which was slightly ajar. From the inside, he heard Latin music.
He glanced at the elevator lights. The elevators were already to the eighth floor. The police were closing in.
He had no choice. He knocked on the door that was ajar and pushed it open.
“Excuse me,” he said as he entered the room and closed the door behind him, “But I am afraid I—”
He stopped.
And stared, as anyone might, when faced with a beautiful girl, standing in the middle of her apartment at midday, wearing a very sheer nightgown, and beneath that, nothing at all.
“Lover!” she cried, and flung her arms around him.