The Red Room

53

Getting into trouble is not so difficult,” Grace’s army intelligence instructor once said in a lecture. “It is getting out of trouble that requires effort.”

Grace has climbed three flights of stairs. Is tempted by the thought of an elevator, but knows better. Wishes she had not abandoned the scrubs so quickly, for now she elects to cross the eleventh floor to an opposing set of stairs. She is as much a target as Knox, and they both know it. Any of the interested parties would welcome the chance to dangle her as bait, reel him in.

She wonders if John has a plan. Doubts it. She has gone along with him because he has a knack for thinking on the fly. Given thirty minutes, she could come up with an exit strategy better than his. But she knows she wouldn’t have thought to pass a business card to David, to scent the hounds in his direction. A stroke of genius, so typically John Knox, and one that may have bought them enough time to find their way out of Istanbul.

Grace finds the memory of the bloodied taxi and Ali’s unmoving corpse unshakable. Distracting. The same instructor warned her about losing one’s focus. One can stumble into trouble, but then one must plot a course to find the way out. She feels she is stumbling as she lowers her chin perhaps too far and holds back her stride to avoid running. Still, she senses the deliberateness of her movements, the telegraphing of her intentions. Poisoned by doubt, she begins to crumble, pieces of her confident façade falling to the tile floor. She wants to reach out and hold on, but it would be like trying to catch snowflakes.

Patience! Constant dripping wears away even a stone, her maternal grandmother would remind her.

Mashe Okle’s advice to barter his business card with the authorities calls into question what authorities he had in mind. Is he aware of all the players? The problem with spycraft is facing a faceless enemy, she thinks. Grace doesn’t appreciate being distracted by such regurgitation. Takes it as a bad sign and curses her culture for instilling in her such a strong belief in bad signs. But the point is taken: she and Knox are hindered by having so little idea who, or how many, are pursuing them. It could be three or four; it could be a dozen or more. They might have shown their faces more than once; this might be the first time she and John have seen them.

Yet the opposite is just the opposite — she wears a bull’s-eye, front and back. The only upside: she finds it impossible to fear a faceless enemy. Her situation fuels paranoia, suspicion and distrust, but she’s not afraid.

Three corridors, a lot of weaving through the chaos of medical practice, and Grace arrives at a set of stairs on the north side of Nightingale. Orthopedics. She hesitates, hoping for someone using the stairs. It pays off. She follows behind two nurses. They leave her at the landing on nine. Her feet pick up the pace of her descent automatically. She pulls on the reins. Anxiety produces boogeymen, jumping out at her unexpectedly. They don’t come; it doesn’t happen. Her thoughts settle: of course it doesn’t happen. They’re waiting for her at the bottom in order to limit her options. Either just before she leaves the building, or on the other side of the exit door.

On the second floor, she leaves the stairwell, rejoining a hospital ward. Pediatrics. She feels the cameras burning against her shoulders like the sun after too long on the beach. Think!

Only three entities could be monitoring the hospital security cameras: the Israelis, the West or the Turks.

The Israelis will want to protect her and John, will want to see their pacemaker op through to its rightful completion. Western agents will want the contents of the business card, and will go to great lengths to obtain it. The Istanbul police, if present, will want answers about the murder of an innocent taxi driver. The accountant sees the cameras as two-thirds against her, so abandons any consideration of appealing directly to them.

Considering it more dangerous outside than in, yet feeling eyes upon her and unable to leave, Grace begins to feel dizzy. As she was once taught, she free-associates, something that does not come easily nor endure for very long.

Hospital. Health. Patients. Doctors. Healing. Chaos. Order. Patience. Panic. Operations. Prescriptions. Tests. Privacy. Tears. Crying. Diagnosis. Terminal. Cancer. Viral. Bacteria. Flu. Insurance.

She has it: a way out.