The Lost Labyrinth

II

'You're kidding,' said Knox dazedly. 'Petitier had found the golden fleece?'

'That's not what I said,' replied Nico carefully. 'And it's not what he said either. At most, he implied that he'd found it, or something to do with it. He left himself plenty of room to back away from it, if he so wished. He could have put it down to a misunderstanding. He could have claimed it was pure coincidence that those were the only two words on the seals that we could read.'

'He was a Minoan scholar. No one would have believed him.'

'No,' agreed Nico. 'Which is precisely why I agreed to step aside so that he could give his talk.'

'And Augustin knew about this?'

'I can't say for sure, but it's certainly possible. You see, I-' He broke off as the BMW bumped onto the kerb and pulled up outside an imposing-looking building.

'Evangelismos Hospital,' said Charissa economically. 'You all go on in. I'll find somewhere to park.'

Nico shook his head. 'I have to leave you, I'm afraid. I need to go to the hotel, tell all our delegates about tomorrow's revised programme.' He pulled an anxious face. 'You do understand?'

'Of course,' said Knox. 'But maybe we could meet up later? For dinner, say?'

'Excellent idea. Do you know the Island?'

'No.'

He kissed his fingertips. 'It's in Exarchia. Charissa knows where. The best seafood in Athens, and not too expensive. Not for what it is, at least. I'll book us a table, if you like.'

'Sounds perfect. What time?'

He checked his watch. 'Nine-thirty, say. That should give me enough time. If I can find a taxi, at least.'

'You two go on in ahead,' said Charissa. 'I'll drop Nico at the hotel, then come back.'

Knox and Gaille made their way through an archway into the staff car park. A TV crew and a couple of journalists were having a cigarette and a laugh together at the foot of the front steps, waiting for something to happen. In the evening gloom, it was easy enough for Knox and Gaille to slip past them and up the marble steps. The woman behind the information desk was remarkably square-looking, as though someone had thrown a rug over a washing machine. They asked her about Augustin. She directed them to ICU One, but warned that the police weren't allowing him any visitors other than his fiancee.

Bulbous lamps glowed like multiple moons in the high, wide corridors. Hard heels clacked like dominoes on the meander-patterned tiles. Monitors, gurneys, laundry baskets and other hospital paraphernalia were stacked against walls painted pastel yellows and blues, a worthy attempt at cheerfulness that had long-since faded into drabness. A wail pierced the hush: someone struggling with fear or grief. Knox flinched at a decade-old memory, walking to another ICU unit in a different Greek hospital, saying goodbye to his sister Bee on the day he'd been told she was going to die. The muffled, oppressive echoes of these places, the brutal whiteness of the equipment, that numb, dreamlike sense of wafting rather than walking, of being unable to protect the ones you love.

A policeman was sitting on a hard chair outside the ICU's double doors, reading a magazine. 'Damn,' muttered Knox. He'd hoped the police had merely issued edicts against visitors, not actually put someone on watch. A heart-monitor was on a trolley against the wall. 'Distract him,' he told Gaille, as he grabbed it.

She nodded and went to ask a question. The policeman shook his head. She asked him something else, smiled and touched his arm. She had the most disarming smile, Gaille. It could melt glaciers. The policeman rose to his feet and walked a little way with her, then pointed her up the corridor, laughing and waving his hands, barely glancing at Knox as he ducked his head and pushed the monitor through the ICU department's double doors. He left it against the wall, washed his hands with gel at a basin, dried himself off, opened the door to the ward itself. Two nurses behind the reception desk were squabbling in hushed low voices; he caught something about missing supplies. Claire was in the far corner, sitting on the far side of one of the four beds. Even though Knox had braced himself, it was still a shock to see Augustin, the tubes and monitors of life-support, the cage over his chest to keep the bedclothes off his upper body, the white bandaging around his skull, the oxygen mask over his mouth and nose, his cheekbone swollen and tinted lurid inhuman colours.

Claire must have sensed his arrival, for she looked up, haggard, grey and harrowed, no remnant of her earlier joy. She frowned and blinked to see him standing there, as though struggling to place him. Then she touched a finger to her lips, got to her feet and came to join him outside.

'How is he?' he asked.

'How does he look?'

Knox didn't know what to say, what Claire needed from him. Situations like these rendered normal language and the conventions of human behaviour inadequate. He put his arms around her, held her against him, stroked her hair. It took a moment for the sobs to arrive, but once they'd started she couldn't stop, her shoulders shaking with grief, anxiety and fear-and not just on Augustin's account, he imagined. It was one of the crueller aspects of tragedies like this, that they made good people like Claire worry about their own futures, so that they'd later lacerate themselves for their selfish thoughts while their loved ones lay dying. He put his mouth close to her ear and murmured: 'It's going to be all right. I promise.'

She stiffened at once, so that he knew it had been a mistake. She broke away, took a step or two back, wiped her eyes. 'All right?' she asked. 'Are you an expert on traumatic brain injury, or something?'

'I didn't mean-'

'Augustin's skull has almost certainly been fractured, and his parietal and frontal lobes violently traumatised. His blood-brain barrier will have broken down. Cerebral oedemas are going to form. Do you know what they are?'

'No.'

'They occur when blood and other fluids are pumped into the brain faster than they can be removed. The whole head swells up, like a sink filling when the plughole is blocked. First it will affect his white matter, then his grey matter. It's one of the most common causes of irreversible brain damage, and it's happening to Augustin right now, and there's nothing I can do about it, except hold his hand and pray. And you're telling me it's going to be all right.'

'I'm so sorry, Claire.'

She nodded twice, wiped her eye again with the heel of her hand. 'I've worked in a hospice,' she told him. 'I've seen car-crash victims and gunshot victims and people with brain tumours. You think I haven't gone through this before? The doctors are putting Augustin into an induced coma: who knows if and when he'll come out of it? And then what? Traumatic brain injuries don't kill at once. Did you know that? They take their own sweet fucking time about it, while the body just falls apart piece-by-piece around them. And even if he should pull through, he'll be at increased risk for the rest of his life from tumours, depression, impotence, epilepsy, Alzheimer's, headaches, you name it. So please explain to me just how it's going to be all right.'

'I'm so sorry,' repeated Knox helplessly.

'What good is that? What good is being sorry? What are you going to do about it?'

'Everything I can.'

She nodded briskly, as though this was what she'd been working for. 'One of the nurses overheard the police earlier. They want to move Augustin out of here. They want to take him into custody. He'll die in custody. That's what they want, of course. They want him to die, because they think this whole incident will go away with him. So if you really want to help, do something about that. Stop them from moving him.'

'I'll do my best. I promise.'

'Your best? Like when that fucking monster was beating Augustin half to death?'

'What do you mean?'

'I mean you could have at least tried to stop him. You could at least have tried. He would have done, if it had been you. He'd have done anything for you. But you just stood there.'

Silence fell. Knox looked helplessly at her, feeling sick. 'I'm sorry,' he said again.

But she turned her back on him and didn't look round until after he'd left the ICU.