There was a gurney in the middle of the room and a beige body bag on it. There were also two sheets, white and folded.
He closed the door. “You know what to do?” he said.
“I know.”
“You’re very brave.”
“I just look that way. I’m terrified.”
“That’s how I feel every day,” he said. “You prepare yourself. I’m going to leave to give you privacy. When I come back in, I’ll apply some fine powder to your face and then some wax. I apologize but it will be necessary.”
“I understand,” she said.
He nodded. Then he turned and left the room. She drew a breath, then pulled off her dress. She stepped out of her slippers and removed her bra. Why, oh why in instances like this did she always absurdly think of her mother’s advice from twenty-five years ago:
Always wear clean underwear in case you’re in an accident…
She grabbed the first sheet and wrapped it around herself. She kept it snug, but not so tight that she couldn’t keep her gun in her palm.
She pulled herself up onto the table and slid into the body bag the way she had slid into a sleeping bag as a twelve-year-old kid at camp. She lay back. She heard voices in the hall and then a hand on the doorknob. She heard the door open but couldn’t see it.
Someone said something nasty-sounding in Arabic, and then the door closed. She hoped it was Dr. Badawi.
More footsteps. They approached the gurney where Alex lay flat and motionless, her eyes closed.
A hand settled on her shoulder. She was careful not to flinch.
“It’s all right, Josephine,” an Arab voice said. “Open your eyes.”
She opened her eyes a third of the way, then the rest. Dr. Badawi stood over her. “Your friends, Rizzo and his two cohorts, they’ve arrived. They will be viewing your body in a few minutes. You’re calm?”
“As much as possible under the circumstances,” she said.
“I’m going to dress your face slightly now,” he said.
“Go ahead,” she said.
“Keep your eyes closed, breath evenly and lightly.”
She closed her eyes. She tried to ease into almost a light trance. The doctor ran a brush with powder across all parts of her face, from the hairline down across the neck. He adjusted the sheet to shroud her neckline, then readjusted it.
“I’m going to put a piece of gauze in here also. That’s standard.”
He pulled it over her face.
“You can breathe?” he asked.
She gave a slight nod.
“Good,” he said. He pulled it away.
Then, distantly, she heard voices in the next room. She recognized Rizzo’s. It sounded as if he were arguing with someone. Not unusual. Dr. Badawi told her he was going to get an attendant to wheel the gurney. The attendant, he said, was a technician who was not in on the ruse. Alex would have to keep still.
She remained silent. The doctor zipped the bag. Alex felt the zipper slide over her face and head. She opened her eyes just enough to see a crack of light from a six-inch gap where he had left the bag open.
A wave of claustrophobia was upon her, almost as bad as the time she had been trapped in old tunnels under Madrid. She fought the feeling. She suppressed the deep desire to push her way out of this bag. Yet she had disrobed, wrapped herself in sheets, and climbed in voluntarily. And if everything went right, this would be over in ten minutes.
And if it doesn’t go right? she asked herself.
Don’t go there! she answered.
She heard Dr. Badawi walk away, leave the room, and then return a few moments later with a second pair of footsteps. She heard them talking. The doctor was with a woman and they spoke Arabic. Alex guessed that the woman was a nurse, maybe one of the suspicious ones she had passed in the corridors. Alex felt deeply vulnerable. She was in darkness but kept still.
Then the gurney began to move. She knew that she was going on display before Rizzo and two other men in the next room. She tried to steady her minimal breathing. At the same time she felt that her heart was kicking so loudly that they could probably hear it in Cairo, even above the din of traffic.
Then her gurney was moving on the uneven floor.
FORTY-SEVEN
She heard a steel door to the visiting room rattle and felt her gurney being pushed forward. The room tone changed.
She heard voices. First Rizzo. Then Colonel Amjad. Then the embassy guy whom she hardly knew.
She heard the door close, and she knew she was on center stage. The room fell silent, and the gurney stopped moving.
The doctor spoke in English as she heard the clinician step back and keep her distance.
“Which of you is-?” Dr. Badawi began.
“I’m Rizzo,” she heard Rizzo say, his voice slightly muffled and disembodied, listening as she was from within the bag. The interpreter from the embassy explained who everyone was. He spoke in Arabic and English, and Alex wished she could understand the Arabic.
“Who will do the identification?” Dr. Badawi asked.
“I will,” said Rizzo. “So let’s get it done.”
“As you wish.”
The doctor reached to the zipper. He pulled it gently open, lengthwise across the body. He stopped just past Alex’s chin. She held her breath. She kept her eyes closed as someone lifted the thin gauzy fabric away from her face. She felt a hand land on the gurney and assumed it was Rizzo’s.
“Oh, my dear Lord,” she heard him mutter low and in Italian. “Oh, no…”
“This is the woman you were working with?” Dr. Badawi asked. “The American woman who was missing?”
Several seconds of silence. She wondered if she could sneak a breath. She tried not to. Another moment passed. She heard Rizzo answer.
“Yes,” he said. “It is.”
“You’re certain?” the doctor pressed.
Come on, she thought. Get it over. She couldn’t hold her breath forever.
“Yes, yes,” he said. “I’m certain.”
“You knew her personally?” the doctor asked. “Or professionally?”
“Both,” Rizzo said.
Please, please, please. Close the canvas. At least put the gauze back.
“Oh, dear Lord,” she heard Rizzo say. There was more silence. She knew everyone was staring at her. Then something happened.
There was commotion. Colonel Amjad must have done something because she heard Rizzo getting very angry, and she could feel the vibrations of some sort of scuffle.
“Have some bloody decency, would you!” she heard Rizzo shoot back. “You keep your hands off this woman’s body or I’ll rip your arms out of their sockets! Understand me?”