A door opened and shut down the hall. She ducked into the common room. She heard murmured voices, but the footsteps continued past. Aimée looked around, but none of the wheelchairs’ occupants had even opened their eyes. She heard the door to the hallway swing open, the footsteps trail away.
She knew she might regret this, have to lie her way out if she was caught, but she remembered the wooden wagon and knew she needed to see who was in that last room. The one with the closed door, the one the footsteps had come from.
After a quick scan of the empty corridor, she tiptoed out into the hallway and down to the last room. She opened and shut the door without making a sound.
Lying on the bed was a shriveled woman covered in white blankets, her shallow breaths punctuated by the rhythmic flow from the artificial respirator. Dim light illuminated the sparse grey braids spread over the pillow. Seeing how the cancer had ravaged her, had turned her into an old woman, Aimée gasped. But these were the same dark, deep-set eyes she remembered from photos, and from those visits fifteen years ago: there was no denying this was Drina Constantin.
The door opened.
She dove behind the bed and slid underneath it in time to see white clogs on the linoleum. The fluorescent light flickered on, shadows moved.
“Plug it in there.” A woman’s voice. “Near the floor.”
Lying on her stomach, she tried to make herself small. She saw the outlet an arm’s length away and panicked. Thick fingers fumbled for the outlet. Then she heard a snap. Several clicks.
The machine thrummed to life. A moment later she heard the flick of a switch. “We need to refill the oxygen containers …”
“You’re noting this down?”
“Everything. As instructed.” The door opened and closed again. They’d gone, leaving the light on.
Aimée crawled out from under the bed, her heart pounding. They’d be back any moment.
“Drina?” She touched the wrinkled cheek—cool. The sunken eyes remained closed. “Maybe you can’t hear me. It’s Aimée, Jean-Claude’s daughter. Nicu said you wanted to see me, to tell me about Papa.”
No movement. Just the pumping sounds, in and out, of the machine breathing for Drina through the tubes in her nose.
“Drina, you wanted me to make something right. I know you can’t talk, probably can’t hear me, but if you can …”
Only the rhythmic schwa, schwa of the pumping air.
“Drina, I found the roulotte Nicu carved for you. See?” She lifted it out of her jacket pocket. Put the little three-wheeled wagon in Drina’s stiff hand.
Aimée curled Drina’s worn fingers around it. “I’m sorry, Drina.” At least Drina looked peaceful, in no pain.
Of course the woman couldn’t hear her, and she didn’t know if it was true. But she said it anyway. “Nicu loved you like his mother, Drina.”
The fingers tightened around the wagon. A hard, bony grip.
Drina’s eyes opened. Her wide-eyed stare revealed dilated pupils. “I remember you …” Her hot, shallow breath wheezed, crackled. Aimée leaned in, putting her ear near Drina’s moving lips. “You weren’t big then. Jean-Claude said take care … make it …” Her whisper faded.
“Make it right, Drina? How?”
Drina’s eyes fluttered. “They want to keep me quiet … but I promised him …”
She struggled, seemed to be gathering her strength, determined. Her whispers were labored, and she gripped Aimée’s other hand tighter.
“Promised Papa what, Drina?”
“You should know … I saw those men in Place Vend?me. Who notices a begging Gypsy except to shoo them away? But now they know. But they find … me.”
Aimée’s chest heaved.
“You were there, Drina? On Papa’s surveillance?”
A nod. “Always toys for Nicu, he’d do that. Said if anything … tell his little girl …” Drina’s hoarse whispers roared in her ears. “They covered up Djanka’s murder, blew up his van …”
Drina lapsed into Romany. Desperate, Aimée squeezed Drina’s hand. Cold, now so cold. “You mean Djanka’s murderer killed Papa?”
Rattling sounded in Drina’s throat. More Romany, for a minute or two this time.
“Please tell me in French so I understand … Drina?” She rubbed Drina’s arm. “Why, Drina?”
Drina’s Romany trailed off. The only words Aimée caught made her blood run cold.
Tesla. Fifi.
“Who are they?”
Drina’s eyes blinked open. Stared at Aimée. Her pupils pinpoints. “You know.”
Drina’s grip loosened. Her lids lowered halfway. Aimée felt a presence, hovering, suspended. A current of air lifting her, pulling at her.
“Mademoiselle, Mademoiselle,” a voice was saying. “She’s slipped into a coma. You can let go now.”
She came back to the room, to the humming machines, to the hand cupping her shoulder. To a young nurse’s nodding face.
“She’s letting go now,” said the nurse. “You should too.”
Shaken, Aimée looked up at the young nurse, her thin face full of understanding. How long had she been there?
“I wrote down her words, the fragments I could make out,” said the nurse. “Like I was told.”
Like she was told? Aimée’s pulse quickened. On the side table lay a notepad.
“Who asked you? You mean someone was waiting for her to confess something?” Yet Drina had just told her they wanted to keep her quiet?
“I don’t know,” the nurse said. “I just did what the doctor asked. I wrote the Romany words as they sounded, but they were garbled.”
“I’m sure you did a good job,” Aimée said, picking up the notebook.
“Doctor Estienne’s coming back, he’ll want to see it.”
“I’ll give this to him myself, thank you.”
“The orders were—” said the nurse, starting to protest.
“Changed, Nurse.” She pulled out her cell phone. Hit René’s number. “I’m handling this now.”
“But Doctor Estienne and the monsieur—”
“Quel homme?” The nurse went to leave but Aimée caught her arm before she could reach the door. She could hear René’s tinny phone voice answering her call, but he would have to wait. “Which monsieur? Tell me before I report you for illegally recording a patient’s dying words.”
The nurse’s eyes batted in fear. “Who are you?”
“Special security.”