He suddenly had trouble concentrating. The pain in his skull increased. His bullet wound throbbed. He felt something warm and wet seep from the towel that formed a pressure bandage over his wound. He didn’t need to look to know that the towel, held in place by his belt, was becoming saturated and starting to leak.
His vision became alarmingly hazy. At once, it cleared as he tensed, hearing footsteps beyond the door.
The footsteps echoed slowly, hesitantly, along the concrete corridor, increasing in volume. They stopped outside the door. Buchanan sweated, frowning when he saw and heard the doorknob being turned. As a matter of course, he had locked the door after he’d entered the room. Even so, whoever was out there presumably worked for the hotel and might have a key. Someone out there pushed at the door. When it wouldn’t open, the person shoved harder, then rammed what probably was a shoulder against it. No effect.
“Who is in this room?” a gruff male voice demanded in Spanish. Knuckles rapped on the door. “Answer me.” A fist pounded. “What are you doing in there?”
If he’s got a key, now is when he’ll use it, Buchanan thought. But what made him come down here and check this particular room? The hesitant footsteps I heard along the corridor. . the man seemed almost to be looking for something.
Or following something?
As Buchanan shifted quietly toward the side of the door where he could shut off the light and grab the man if he used a key to enter, he glanced down and realized that the man had indeed been following something. Buchanan’s drenched clothes had dripped on the concrete, making a trail.
Buchanan listened nervously for the metallic scrape of a key that the man would shove into the lock. Instead, what Buchanan heard was more pounding, another indignant “What are you doing in there?” and sudden silence.
Maybe he doesn’t have a key. Or else he’s afraid to use it.
Abruptly the footsteps retreated, clattering along the corridor, diminishing up the stairway.
I’ve got to get out of here before he has time to come back with help, Buchanan thought. He freed the lock, opened the door, checked the dim corridor, and was just about to leave when he noticed what seemed like rags on one of the shelves. The rags were actually a rumpled, soiled cotton work jacket and a battered, stained baseball cap from which the patch had been torn. He grabbed them. After using the jacket to wipe his fingerprints from everything he’d touched, he hurried along the corridor and up the staircase, seeing the wet trail he’d made.
The trail didn’t matter now. All that did was getting away from the hotel before the worker came back with help. They’ll probably call the police about a prowler. The police will be so frantic to arrest a suspect for the three killings that they might decide this incident is related. They’ll focus their search in this area.
Buchanan swung toward where the shadowy beach would eventually take him near downtown Cancun. Heading north, he ran midway between the white-capped waves and the gleaming hotels. A fragrant sea breeze cooled the sweat on his brow and cleared the utility room’s foul smell from his nostrils. The breeze had sufficient strength that it might even dry his wet clothes.
But abruptly he stumbled, losing his balance enough that he almost fell. It wouldn’t have worried him so much if he had tripped over an unseen object. However, he had stumbled for the worst reason he could imagine. Because he was weaker. His wound pulsed, soaking the towel with blood. His skull throbbed from the sharpest headache of his life.
Wedged between his right arm and his side, he had the rumpled cotton work jacket and the stained baseball cap. Gingerly, he set the cap on his head. The cap was battered enough that it might attract attention, but without it, the blood that it hid would certainly attract a lot more attention. Breathing with effort, he draped the soiled work jacket over his right shoulder, hiding the bloodstained towel strapped over his wound. Now he could take the chance of showing himself in public. But as he pushed a button on his watch and looked at the digital time display, he discovered to his shock that almost an hour had passed since he’d phoned his case officer. That’s impossible! I left the utility room just a little while ago.
You think.
Pal, you must be having blackouts.
Buchanan’s thoughts became more urgent. He would have to veer between hotels and get a taxi on the thruway. Otherwise, he’d never be able to reach the rendezvous site in time to meet his case officer. Unsteady, he left the beach.
He’d been right about one thing at least-the breeze from the sea had dried his clothes sufficiently that they didn’t stick to him.
But the breeze no longer had any effect on the sweat that dripped from his brow.
4
“Jesus,” Buchanan’s case officer said, “that wound needs stitches. Take off your cap. Let me look at. . Yeah, oh, man, that gash on your skull needs stitches, too.”
They were stopped at an abandoned gas station on Highway 180, thirty kilometers west of Cancun. After taking a taxi into the downtown part of the city, Buchanan had waited no more than half a minute at the rendezvous site before his case officer stopped a rented Ford Taurus in front of the busy cantina and Buchanan got in.
The case officer was in his fifties, slightly balding, slightly overweight. His clothes-sandals, a lemon-colored Polo shirt, and lime-colored shorts-matched his cover as a tourist. He and Buchanan hadn’t worked together before. Buchanan knew him only as Wade, which Buchanan assumed was neither his real name nor his usual cover name.
After Buchanan explained, Wade exhaled. “Shit. It’s completely unsalvageable. Damn it to hell. God. . Okay, let’s think a minute.” He tapped his fingers on the steering wheel. “Let’s make sure we. . The police’ll be watching the airport in town and probably the one on Cozumel. That leaves us the next closest option.”
“Merida,” Buchanan said.
Wade increased speed as he drove from Cancun. “That’s assuming our best move is to get you out of the country. Maybe you ought to hole up somewhere. Go to ground. Hey, all the police have is a description that fits a lot of Americans. It’s not like they have a photograph. Or fingerprints. You said you took care of that.”
Buchanan nodded, feeling nauseous. “Except for the glasses I drank from in the restaurant. I couldn’t do anything about them. The odds are they were taken to the kitchen and washed before the police thought to check them.” Buchanan raised his uninjured left arm and wiped increasing sweat from his brow. “The real problem is, everybody in the restaurant heard Bailey call me Crawford, and me insist that I was Ed Potter. So the police have a name that Mexican emigration officers can watch for at airports.”
“That doesn’t bother me,” Wade said. “I brought an alternate passport and tourist card for you. Another pseudonym.”
“Good. But the police also have Bailey himself. They’ll insist he help one of their artists prepare a sketch, and once copies of that sketch are faxed to every airport and every emigration officer, anybody who resembles the sketch will be stopped when he turns in his tourist card and pays his exit fee. I have to get out of the country before that sketch is distributed. Plus. .” Buchanan stared at the fingers of his right hand. They were twitching again, an unwilled motion, as if they weren’t a part of him. His wounded arm seemed on fire. Blood soaked the towel strapped to his arm. “I need a doctor.”
Wade glanced in his rearview mirror. “I don’t see any headlights behind us.” He peered ahead along the narrow forest-lined highway. “This deserted gas station is as good a place as any.” He pulled off the road, got out, took something from the backseat, and came around to Buchanan’s side of the car.