Day Of Confession

46

Pescara. Via Arapietra. Saturday, July 11, 7:10 a.m.

Thomas Kind sat behind the wheel of a rented white Lancia and waited for someone to open the door to number 1217, the private ambulance company across the street.

Glancing in the mirror, he smoothed his hair, then looked back to the storefront. The shop opened at seven-thirty. Just because he was early, why should he expect anyone else to be, especially on a Saturday morning? So he would wait. Patience was everything.

7:15

A male jogger passed on the sidewalk in front of number 1217. Seventeen seconds later, a boy on a bicycle went by in the opposite direction. Then nothing.

Patience.

7:20

Abruptly two policemen on motorcycles appeared in his rearview mirror. Thomas Kind did not flinch. They approached slowly and then passed. The door across the street remained closed.

Leaning back against the leather seat, Thomas Kind thought about what he knew so far – that a late-model beige Iveco van with the Italian license plate number PE 343552 had left Hospital St Cecilia at exactly ten-eighteen Thursday night. It had carried a male patient, a nun who was apparently a nurse as well, and two men thought to be male nurses.

The information he had requested and received, finally, from Farel had shown that Hospital St Cecilia was one of only eight hospitals in all of Italy that, in the last week, had admitted an anonymous patient. More specifically, it was the only hospital whose patient had been male and in his early to mid-thirties. And that patient had been discharged shortly after ten the evening before.

Arriving just after noon yesterday, he had gone directly to St Cecilia's. A brief look around confirmed what he had suspected and prepared for; that the private hospital had in place a system of security cameras covering not only the hallways and public rooms but also the exits and entrances. It was, he hoped, as extensive as it appeared.

Directed to the administrative offices, he produced a business card identifying him as a sales representative for a security systems company based in Milan and asked to see the hospital's chief of security.

The security chief was out, he was told, and not due back until eight that evening. And Thomas Kind had simply nodded and said he would return then.

By eight-fifteen the two were chatting amiably in the security chief's office. Turning the conversation to business, he asked whether, in light of the bombing of the Assisi bus and the assassination of the cardinal vicar of Rome in what the government feared might be a new wave of terrorist attacks, the hospital had done anything to increase its security situation.

Not to worry, he was told by the assured and surprisingly young security chief. Moments later the two men entered St Cecilia's security operations center and sat down at a bank of sixteen television monitors taking live feed from surveillance cameras throughout the building. One, in particular, caught Thomas Kind's attention. The one he was looking for. The camera covering the ambulance dock.

'Your cameras operate twenty-four hours a day, every day,' he said.

'Yes.'

'Do you keep videotape of everything?'

'There.' The chief of security pointed to a narrow closet-like hallway where red recording lights of video recorders glowed in the dim light.

'The tapes are kept for six months before they are erased and reused. I designed the system myself

Thomas Kind could see the pride the man took in his accomplishment. It was something to be applauded and then exploited. And Thomas Kind did, saying how impressed he was with the setup, enthusiastically pulling his chair closer, asking for a demonstration of how the system's video retrieval worked. Asking, for example, if the security chief could pull up a videotaped record of someone arriving or leaving by ambulance at a specific time on a particular day – say, oh, last night about ten.

Only too happy to oblige, the security chief grinned and punched in a number on the master board. A video screen in front of them snapped on. A time/date code showed in the upper right-hand corner of the screen, and then a video of the ambulance dock at the hospital's rear entrance came to life. The security chief fast-forwarded, then brought the tape back to speed as an ambulance arrived. The vehicle stopped, attendants got out, and a patient was taken from the ambulance and disappeared into the hospital. Clearly seen were the faces of the attendants as well as that of the patient. A moment later the attendants returned and the ambulance pulled away.

'You have stop motion,' Kind said. 'If there were a problem and investigators needed a license plate number-'

'Watch,' the security chief said, punching reverse and bringing the ambulance back. Then letting it go forward again in stop motion to freeze and hold a frame on a clearly identifiable license plate number.

'Perfect.' Kind smiled. 'Could we see a little more?'

The tape ran forward, and Kind, with his eye carefully on the running time code, engaged the security chief in conversation through the comings and goings of several more ambulances, until, at nine-fifty-nine, an unmarked beige Iveco van pulled in.

'What is that, a delivery truck?' Kind asked, as he watched a heavy-set man step from behind the wheel and walk out of the camera's view into the hospital.

'Private ambulance.'

'Where is the patient?'

'He's picking one up. Watch.' The tape fast-forwarded, then came back to speed as the man returned, this time accompanied by a woman who looked like a nursing nun, another man, who appeared to be a male nurse, and a patient on a gurney, heavily bandaged with two IVs hanging from a rack overhead. The heavy-set man opened the door. The patient was put inside. The nursing nun and male nurse got in with him. Then the door was closed and the heavy-set man got behind the wheel and drove off.

'You can retrieve that license number, too, no doubt,' Kind said, stroking the security chief again.

'Sure.' The security chief stopped the tape, then backed it up. Then forwarded in stop motion and froze. The license number was clearly visible – PE 343552. The time/date code in the upper corner – 22:18/9 July.

Kind smiled. ^'PE is a Pescara prefix. The ambulance company is local.'

'Servizio Ambulanza Pescara.' The security chief's pride showed again. 'You see, we have everything under control.'

Smiling in admiration, Thomas Kind pushed the chief's pride button one more time and retrieved the name the anonymous patient had used – Michael Roark.

The square boxed ad in the telephone book gave Thomas Kind the rest. Servizio Ambulanza Pescara was headquartered at 1217 Via Arapietra, directly across the street from where he waited now. The ad also listed the name of the company's direttore responsabile, its owner, Ettore Caputo, and alongside showed his photograph. Beneath it were its business hours. Monday through Saturday. 7:30 a.m. to 7:30

P.M.

Kind glanced at his watch.

7:25

Suddenly he looked up. A man had turned the corner across the street and was walking down the block. Thomas Kind watched him carefully, then smiled. Ettore Caputo was four and a half minutes early.