Chapter Fifteen

The expression on his face almost made her smile. Almost. Just not quite.

Even through the mask, he looked terrified, his eyes wide. He’d come to a standstill, his body locked in place, as though scared to move closer. Poor man. At a guess, he wasn’t used to dealing with weeping women, and the idea clearly filled him with horror. She gave a last sniff and wiped her face with the towel she had clutched on her lap.

Why was he even here? Maybe he had some good news. Maybe he’d found a cure and there would be an end to this. Somehow, she thought that unlikely. He didn’t look like the bearer of good news.

“Are you all right?” His voice was muffled beneath the mask and breathing apparatus.

She stood up and wiped her hands down her skirt. Was she all right? Her head pounded and her hands shook. Of course, that might be just tiredness. She forced herself to swallow, and there was no problem with that. Yet. “I’m fine. Well, as good as can be expected.” She sniffed and waved a hand across her face. “Sorry, I don’t usually cry, but…”

“But…?”

“I just came from Maria’s. She’s gotten worse. They had to tie her to the bed, and her children were there, and the little one saw. I had to tell her…” She shrugged. “I told her that her mother was going to be fine. I lied again.”

He smiled. “You’ll no doubt go to hell for that.”

She studied what she could see of his face through the mask. “I have a feeling, Dr. Vance, that you don’t believe in either heaven or hell.”

He took a step closer. “Call me Eli. And you do? Even after all this?”

She’d had so many doubts lately. Right now, she could do with a big dose of blind faith, but it was hard to bolster up her flagging faith with the memory of Rosita’s death so clear in her mind. And Paco. And soon Maria. “Sometimes. Chances are I’ll find out sooner than I’d like.” She shook her head to dismiss the images from her mind. “How can I help you? I presume you’re here to see me.”

“Yes. Do you want to sit down?”

“Not really.” What she really wanted to do was run as far and as fast from this place as she could. But there was no running away from what was inside her. He’d moved closer, huge in his yellow hazmat suit, and she had to crick her neck to look into his face. “Am I going to need to sit? I’m guessing this isn’t good news. You haven’t miraculously found a cure, have you?”

He shrugged. “I’m afraid not. But in a way, it’s good news for you.”

When she didn’t sit, he shuffled past her and lowered himself gently onto the pile of supplies she’d recently been sitting on. She was curious. What could he want?

He held out a small plastic bag filled with candy. “These are a sort of vice of mine.” He shrugged. “I thought you might enjoy them.”

She took them from him and smiled. “You’re a nice man, Eli Vance.”

Beneath the mask, he scowled. “No, I’m not. It will just save me from getting fat.”

“You’d rather I got fat instead?” Wouldn’t the chance be nice? She tucked the bag in her pocket. “I’ll have them later. So why are you here, besides giving me candy?”

“There’s an ambulance coming to pick you up first thing in the morning. It will take you to Mexico City, where a plane with quarantine capabilities will be waiting. It will fly you home.”

She had an inkling where this was coming from and decided to sit down after all. There was a chair with a box of restraints, which she picked up and placed on the floor, then sat down. “And will this plane be taking anyone else?”

“Just you.”

She should have known her father would poke his nose in. While they hadn’t spoken in five years, she was aware he kept tabs on her. In his own way, he loved her.

“You’re the only U.S. citizen in the village,” Eli said.

“That’s not why, though, is it?”

“I gather your father is worried about you and would like you home safe.”

“And what my father wants, my father usually gets.”

“I doubt that’s true. Otherwise, I’m guessing you wouldn’t be here, wearing that godawful outdated outfit, playing nurse, and kowtowing to a God I think you’re beginning to suspect doesn’t exist.”

She smiled. “My father nearly went into apoplexy when I told him.”

“Is that why you did it?”

“Maybe in part. Mostly I believed I had a genuine calling.” She glanced down at herself. “So you don’t like my clothes?”

He snorted but didn’t reply.

Actually, the habit wasn’t too bad. It was their tropical outfit. She would have died of heat overdose in the heavy black robe and headdress she wore in the States. She rubbed at her forehead, then adjusted her veil as she thought of what to say. Of course, he was right. She was sure Eli Vance was usually right, and she didn’t want to pander to his—no doubt—oversize ego.

“Why don’t you like God?” she asked instead, having learned at an early age that offense was the best method of defense. Her father had taught her that. See, he had been good for something.

For a moment, she thought he wasn’t going to answer. He glanced away and his gloved hand rubbed at his knee. The he gave another shrug.

“My parents were missionaries,” he said in a voice that held no expression. “They would take my sister and me with them whenever they went to spread God’s word. I thought it was wonderful. We were helping those less fortunate than us, those not born under God’s all-loving embrace. When I was eight and Rachel was six, we were caught up in an Ebola outbreak in Zaire. Don’t worry, they said. God will look after his own. When my father was dead—I watched him die, bleed out from every orifice until even his skin was oozing blood—my mother clearly began to doubt that God’s plan involved her continued existence. She told me to get out of there, to take Rachel and hide in the bush. God would look after us. I remember thinking that even she didn’t believe that anymore. Maybe she didn’t want us to watch her die. I didn’t want to leave her, but Mom said that I had to look after Rachel. That I was the only one who could save her. Except I wasn’t and I couldn’t. I took her into the bush. I just wanted to get as far away from that place of death as I could. The wild animals seemed like a negligible threat when weighed against what I’d seen in that village.”

He was still speaking without emotion, though she suspected that was an act. He’d paused, gazing at the ceiling, lost in the memories. She wanted to know what happened. “I’m sorry.”

He turned his attention from the ceiling to her. “It was a long time ago. I was out there for a week. Rachel died after four days. Not Ebola—neither of us contracted the disease. She died of dehydration, because I got lost, and we had no water. After three days, I fell down a rambla and broke my leg. She couldn’t get down to me. I heard her crying and then not crying. It took me an age to crawl to her, and by then it was too late. I couldn’t save her. You might say I lost my faith at that point.”

“And never found it again?”

He snorted. “Never went looking.” He rubbed at his leg. “It still gives me trouble occasionally. Anyway, that’s why I don’t like God. Or rather, don’t believe He exists.”

“And don’t have a lot of time for people who do?”

“No. Not a lot of time. If people can still believe in some all-powerful being looking over us in this day and age, with the things that happen, then they are delusional.” He looked at her, and she could see his eyes narrowing behind his mask. “Or running away from something. Are you a coward, Sister Clara?”

“Maybe.”

“Are you hiding from real life?”

“Does it matter?”

“Maybe not.” He studied her for a moment. “So are you going to go quietly?”

Was she? She didn’t think so. “Are you and Captain Hawkins going to make me go?”

He got to his feet and closed the space between them, crouched down, and picked up one of the leather restraints from the box by her chair. He straightened and then dangled it from his hand. “I’ve just come from the autopsy of your friend Rosita,” he said. “She had wounds at her wrists and ankles. She’d been tied up at the end. Is that really what you want?”

“Will it make any difference? To me, I mean? To whether I survive this?”

“Right now, I can’t answer that. Tomorrow, we’ll know more. I suspect we’re going to see a lot more like Rosita. And a lot more deaths. It’s going to get so much worse.”

A shiver ran through her. She knew he was telling the truth and not just trying to scare her into going. “And if I go to the States, will there be treatment not available here?”

“Right now, we still don’t know what we’re dealing with, so there is no cure, no vaccine, and no treatment. As of yet. But the symptoms are similar to rabies, and there has been some success treating that by inducing coma to give the body time to fight off the virus. That’s not something we can do here. There just aren’t the facilities.”

“A coma sounds quite nice around now.” Just to have a dreamless sleep. Maybe that’s what death was.

“Do you want to die?” he asked.

“No.” She didn’t even have to think about her answer. “It’s just so unfair.”

“Life’s unfair. I can’t believe you’ve gotten to the age of…” He peered at her through the mask. “How old are you?”

“Thirty-seven.”

“And how much of that have you been wandering around in that ridiculous outfit?”

He really wasn’t impressed with her habit. “Fifteen years.”

“Time for a change.”

“You think I should go?”

“Really? I think it will make absolutely no difference to the people here if you go or stay. I think very soon, they are going to be beyond any spiritual help you can give them, and I suspect it will make no difference to you. But it might make your father feel a little better that he did everything he could.”

He thought she was going to die whether she went or not. She tried not to think how that made her feel. She’d store it away for when she was alone. “I’ll consider it.”

“Good. I hope you decide to go. I don’t want to do an autopsy on you.”

“Aw, you like me, don’t you? Despite my ridiculous outfit.”

“It doesn’t matter whether I like you or not,” he grumbled, heading for the door. “I can’t save you.”

“What about you?” she called after him, and he paused, hand on the door. “Don’t you want to get out of here?”

“I didn’t want to come in the first place. But I’m here now, and I suspect I’ll remain here to the bitter end and beyond.”

“Just like when you were eight and you couldn’t save your sister?”

“Not quite. While saving you might be beyond me, I’m not completely without weapons. This time, I just might beat the fucker… Sorry for the language. All I need is time.”

As he opened the door, she spoke again. “Not that I don’t appreciate it, but why did they send you to talk to me?”

He glanced back over his shoulder. “Because they think you like me.”