Terminal. Part 12

'Yes, I do. Why?'

'I guessed as much. This place smells of a closed community - a community locked away from the normal world. I suppose they do let you out,' he continued with a trace of sarcasm.

'During my off-duty hours I do what I like...'

'Don't sound indignant. But so far we haven't exactly felt welcome inside this place. I repeat. I insist on meeting you - so suggest somewhere. Thun would be closest?'

'I suppose it would be.' Novak sounded dubious. 'I don't see why I have to meet you anywhere..

'Don't you?' Newman, observing what was happening behind Novak's back, kept talking fast. 'You're not compelled to, I agree. But then I could start writing articles about this place - naming you as my informant...'

'For Christ's sake, no...'

'No smart lawyer will get me for libel. I'm an expert at hinting at things and I know just how far I can go. Be honest with yourself, Novak - you're desperate to talk to someone. I sensed it within minutes of meeting you...'

The Hotel Freienhof...' The words tumbled out. '... in Thun on the Freienhofga.s.se... it overlooks the Inner Aare... a stretch of the river flowing in from the lake... the cheaper restaurant... do you know the place?'

'I'll find it. Tomorrow suit you?'

'Day after tomorrow. Thursday. Seven in the evening. It will be dark then ...'

While Newman distracted Novak's attention Nancy had been talking to her grandfather, who suddenly woke up, his eyes fierce and alert. She leaned close to him so they could whisper and he spoke without any trace of being drugged.

'What are they doing to you here, Jesse?'

'It's what they're doing to the others. I never wanted to come to this place. That b.a.s.t.a.r.d Dr Chase shot me full of some drug in Tucson after I fell off the horse. I was hustled aboard a Lear jet and flown here.

'What do you mean - what they're doing to the others?'

'The patients. It's got to be stopped. They're carrying out some kind of experiments. I keep my ears open and they talk when they think I'm doped out of my mind. The patients don't survive the experiments. A lot of them are dying anyway - but that's no reason for murdering them...'

'Are you sure, Jesse? How are you feeling?'

'I'm OK. As long as I'm inside here you've got a pipeline into this place. Don't worry about me...'

'I do,' she whispered.

'Nancy.' Newman had left the window and was walking round the bed. 'Maybe it would be better if we came back another day when your grandfather isn't sedated ...'

She looked up at him and saw him stop suddenly. Her expression was a mixture of pathos, anxiety and puzzlement. Newman put a finger to his lips to hush both Novak and Nancy. Jesse lay inert in the bed, his eyes closed. Newman bent down close to the head of the bed and listened. No, he had not been mistaken. He had caught the sound of a whirring noise, of machinery working.

Lee Foley had followed Newman at a discreet distance until he rounded a bend on the s...o...b..und hillside in time to see Newman turn off along the narrow road leading to the Berne Clinic. He drove the Porsche straight past the turn-off and continued up the slope towards the fir forest.

As he ascended higher and higher he looked down on the buildings of the Clinic. He continued climbing until he reached the forest where he swung off the road, wheels skidding dangerously, heading for a narrow opening between the towering black firs. Always take the high ground.

Turning the Porsche through a hundred and eighty degrees - ready for a quick departure - he switched off the engine. On the floor of the empty seat behind him lay a pair of powerful binoculars in a leather case. He extracted them from the case, climbed out of the car and stood half-behind the erect trunk of an immensely tall tree.

Lifting the binoculars he adjusted the focus and slowly swept the lenses across the view far below. Within half an hour he had memorized the entire layout of the Clinic, the weird covered tunnel connecting it to the laboratory complex, and the laboratory itself. Then, ignoring the bitter east wind which scoured his craggy face, he settled down to wait, taking a nip of whisky from his hip flask.

Lee Foley was not the only watcher who took an interest in the Berne Clinic that wintry afternoon in mid-February. The rider on the scooter who had - by driving the machine to the limit - kept up with Foley, took a different route.

The scooter proceeded up the hillside to the point where the sign indicated the turn-off to the Clinic. Here it swung right, following the road taken earlier by Newman. Instead of stopping at the gatehouse, it went on past full tilt, so fast that the Dobermans, again released, had no time to reach the gate.

The rider headed towards Thun, then turned off along a side track leading up the far side of the plateau. The surface of the track was diabolical but the rider continued upwards with great skill until, a snow-covered knoll to the left and close to the track obscured the grounds of the Clinic. The rider stopped, perched the machine against a pile of logs and used both hands to remove the helmet.

A cascade of t.i.tian hair fell down her back in a waterfall, was caught in the wind and streamed behind her. The girl opened the carrying satchel and took out a camera with a telescopic lens. She strode up the side of the knoll, her black leather pants sheathing her long, agile legs. At the summit she peered over. The entire, huge estate comprising the grounds and the buildings of the Berne Clinic spread out below.

Crouching down, she raised the view-finder to her eyes, scanning the laboratory complex, the igloo-like tunnel linking it to the side of the Clinic, the main building of the Clinic itself. Deftly, she began taking pictures, swivelling the lens, clicking almost continuously.

Inside Jesse Kennedy's room Newman, who had acute hearing, remained stooped as he searched for the source of the continuous whirring sound. Then he saw the metal, louvred grille set low down in the wall. It looked like an air-conditioning grille.

He knelt on the floor, pressing his ear against the louvres. The sound was much louder - a whirring noise with an occasional click at regular intervals. Putting a finger to his lips again to keep them quiet, he stood up. Facing Nancy and Novak, he gestured towards the grille and mouthed the words. Tape recorder Tape recorder.

Walking a few feet away from the grille, he started talking, raising his voice. His manner was aggressive, his target Novak.

'Now listen to me, Dr Novak - and listen well. We're leaving total responsibility for Jesse Kennedy's welfare in the hands of the Berne Clinic. You understand that clearly? Answer me!'

'That has always been the situation,' Novak replied, playing along with Newman. 'Nothing will be changed by your visit - and you can rest a.s.sured Mr Kennedy will continue to receive every care and attention...'

'He'd better.' Newman stabbed a finger into Novak's chest. 'I don't know whether you're aware of the fact, but in a few days' time a major international medical congress is being held - including a reception at the Bellevue Palace. If anything happened to Jesse I'll shout my head off at that reception. We haven't exactly had the red carpet rolled out for us since we arrived at this place...'

'I do a.s.sure you...' Novak began.

'You'd better talk to Kohler and Grange and get their a.s.surances, too. I blew the Kruger case wide open and I'm a man who can make a lot of noise. We're leaving now. Nancy...'

'Dr Novak, we'll be back - and very soon,' Nancy said firmly as Novak produced his key card.

Newman was close to the door when it slid back and he was looking beyond it.. Two men in white coats walked past the opening, pushing a long trolley. Something lay on the trolley, something covered with a sheet which protruded upwards at the rear end - at the end where a patient's head would be. The silhouette was very large and shaped like a cage. From underneath the sheet a hand projected, a hand which moved in a grasping movement.

'Excuse me...'

Newman pushed in front of Nancy and Novak and turned right, away from the exit. The man behind the trolley glanced over his shoulder and the trolley began to move faster on its well-oiled wheels. Newman quickened his pace. As he had pa.s.sed the door leading into the room with the mirror in the wall the door opened and behind him he heard Astrid call out. He ignored her and quickened his pace further. The two men with the trolley were almost running and had reached the point where the corridor became a downward sloping ramp. The trolley increased its momentum and Newman started running.

Reaching the corner where the corridor curved he saw ahead a steel door lifting. The trolley pa.s.sed under it and the door began to descend. He arrived just as the steel plate closed with a hydraulic purr. Beyond he had caught a glimpse of the ramp descending steeply into the distance. To his right, set into the wall, was another of those infernal computer- operated slots. He heard a shuffling tread and turned to face Astrid.

'You have no business here, Mr Newman. I shall have to report this act of trespa.s.s...'

'Do that. What are you trying to hide? Report that remark too...'

He walked past her and retraced his steps rapidly along the corridor to where Nancy and Novak stood waiting for him. The American looked worried and took a step forward to speak in a whisper before Astrid reached them.

I should leave here quickly if I were you...'

'It will be a pleasure...'

'First,' Astrid demanded, 'you must fill in the visiting forms at reception. It is the regulation...'

'It will be a pleasure,' Newman repeated.

The chill air of darkening night swept across the exposed plateau as they stood at the top of the steps outside the gla.s.sed-in verandah. But it was still daylight as Newman pulled on his gloves and Nancy shivered beside him. Novak had not come out to see them off, presumably to avoid any impression of intimacy.

'Cold?' Newman asked.

'This place gives me the creeps. My first impression - as soon as I saw the place - was right. There's something abnormal about the Clinic, Bob...'

'We'll talk about it in the car. With a bit of luck we should be back in Berne just before night...'

He drove down the curving drive slowly, again looking round to check the layout. A pallid light glowed over the stark and grim mountains on the far side of Thun. Nancy huddled herself inside her coat and turned up the heater. She looked out on both sides and then back through the rear window.

'There never seems to be anyone about - and yet I get the uncanny feeling unseen eyes are watching our every move. I'm not usually like this. Look - that's the sort of thing I mean...'

As they approached the gatehouse there were no signs of life but the gates opened. Newman drove between them, turned right and headed down the narrow road to the wider road where they had placed the sign to the Berne Clinic. She glanced at his profile.

'You've changed recently,' she remarked. date it from when we'd been a few hours in Geneva.'

'Changed? In what way?'

'You used to be so light-hearted, always smiling and cracking jokes. You look so terribly serious and determined. And why did you go running after that trolley when we left Jesse's room? Novak thought you'd taken leave of your senses.'

'What do you think was lying under that sheet?'

'Some unfortunate soul who'd just pa.s.sed away..

'Do corpses normally waggle their hand? Whatever was under that sheet did just that.'

'Oh, my G.o.d. The sheet was pulled right over the body...'

'And that's only done when the patient is dead. That one was very much alive. My guess is that whoever was spread out under the sheet heard us and was trying to signal. Now you know why I ran after them. They beat me to a door which closed in my face - an automatic door, of course. That d.a.m.ned place is more like a giant computer than a clinic.'

'You mean they were running from you? I thought the trolley's brakes weren't working - that the momentum was carrying it down that ramp. Where does that corridor lead to?'

'A good question. There's a complex of new buildings further down the slope. I think they have a covered tunnel leading there. The corridor runs into the tunnel.'

'What kind of complex?'

'That, my dear Nancy, is one of the things I plan to ask our friend Dr Novak when I meet him in Thun on Thursday night.

'He agreed to meet you! That's strange. Where are you seeing him? I can come, can't I?'

'The rendezvous is immaterial. It is strange that he agreed. And no, you can't come...'

b.a.s.t.a.r.d! Why do you think he did agree?' she asked as they came close to the bridge over the motorway and the slip road leading down on to the highway.

'I got the impression he's scared witless about something. I also think he's been waiting for the chance to contact someone outside that claustrophobic prison he can trust, he can confide in. And why are you so bothered about the Berne Clinic?'

'Did you notice the absence of something from Jesse's room?'

'I don't think so. I was too busy talking to Novak - to cover the fact you were talking to Jesse. What did I miss?'

'I'll tell you later,' she said, 'when we're back at the hotel. Do you think Jesse is safe in that place?'

Tor the next few days, yes. Didn't you get the point of my shouting the odds about the medical reception at the Bellevue? They have a tape recorder behind that grille...'

'It really is creepy...'

'My strategy,' he continued, 'was to frighten them to ensure they don't harm him. They'll be very careful with Jesse until that medical congress is over. By then we may know what's going on at the Berne Clinic. I was buying time...'

They had turned down the slip road and were now speeding along the deserted motorway back towards Berne. It was so overcast Newman had his lights on and they were approaching the point where another slip road entered the motorway beyond a bridge. In his rear view mirror Newman saw a black Mercedes coming fast behind him. It signalled and swung out into the fast lane prior to overtaking. Then all h.e.l.l broke loose on the motorway.

A helmeted figure appeared behind Newman on a scooter, sounding the horn in urgent, non-stop blasts. The Mercedes had not yet drawn alongside. Newman frowned, his eyes moving from side to side. At the exit to the slip road ahead a giant orange-coloured snowplough was moving slowly forward, its huge blade raised to its highest arc. The scooter horn continued its blasting sound.

'What's the matter with that man?' Nancy asked.

She was speaking when Newman signalled - signalled that he was turning out into the fast lane ahead of the oncoming Mercedes. The snowplough emerged from the slip road like some monstrous robot, moving straight into the path of the slow lane. Newman rammed his foot down, swinging to his left. The Mercedes began sounding its own horn. He ignored it. 'Hang on!' he warned Nancy. 'Oh, Christ!' she muttered. The snowplough was almost on top of them. Like a guillotine the ma.s.sive steel blade descended. Nancy saw it coming down. She froze with horror. It was going to slice them in two. The Citroen was now moving at manic speed, way above the limit. The blade flashed past Nancy's window, missed hitting the Citroen by inches. She flinched. The Mercedes jammed on its brakes to avoid the coming collision. In the fast lane Newman accelerated. The scooter pa.s.sed the Mercedes, still speeding in the slow lane, weaving past the now stationary snowplough.

Behind the wheel of the Mercedes Hugo Munz swore foully to his pa.s.senger, Emil Graf. He reduced speed, checking in his mirror for any sign of a police patrol car. The motorway was still deserted.

'You should have hit him,' said Graf.

'You're crazy! I could have bounced off, hit the steel barrier and we both end up dead. That scooter warned him...'

'So,' Graf replied in his toneless voice, 'he's better organized than we gave him credit for. We'll have to try something else.

Fourteen.

Blanche Signer sat waiting at a corner table in the bar of the Bellevue Palace while Newman fetched the drinks. She had paid a brief visit to the cloakroom to comb her t.i.tian hair, to get her centre parting straight, to freshen up generally for the Englishman after her dangerous ride back along the motorway on the scooter.

Thirty years old, the daughter of a colonel in the Swiss Army, she ran the most efficient service for tracing missing persons in western Europe. She was the girl who had secretly helped Newman to trace Kruger when the German had gone underground. She was determined to take Newman away from Nancy Kennedy.

'A double Scotch,' Newman said as he placed the gla.s.s before her and sat down alongside her on the banquette. There was not a lot of s.p.a.ce and his legs touched hers. 'You've earned this. Cheers!'

'You know, Blanche,' he went on after swallowing half his drink, 'you took one h.e.l.l of a risk back there on the motorway. I was scared stiff for you...'

'That's nice of you, Bob. Any risk of Nancy finding us here?'

'She's taking a bath. If she walks in you tried to pick me up. I think we have half an hour. What happened?'

I waited at the Savoy as arranged. Lee Foley did follow you to the Clinic, then drove on past the turn-off and went on higher up the hill. I suspect he was doing what I did - checking out the layout of that place. It's peculiar. I've got a host of photos for you...' She squeezed her handbag. 'The film is in here. I can get it developed and printed overnight. I know someone who will do that for me. I'll get them to you tomorrow somehow...'

'Leave them in a sealed envelope addressed to me with the concierge. Now, what did did happen? You probably saved my life.' happen? You probably saved my life.'

'It was simple, really, Bob. I took the photos, got on the scooter and started back to a place where I could wait to pick up Foley if he followed you back. I saw this car leaving the Clinic and decided to follow that. Pure hunch. The driver, a nasty-looking piece of work, knew what he was doing. He drove to where a snowplough was clearing a slip road. He got out, walked up to the snowplough operator and pointed something in his face. I'm sure it was a hair spray. The man grabbed for his eyes and Nasty hit him. It was pretty brutal. The poor devil's head came into contact with a steel bar - my guess is his skull is cracked. The driver from the clinic then put on the snowplough man's overalls and guided the machine down to the end of the slip road - just before it turns on to the motorway.'