Читать книгу Night of Error - Desmond Bagley, Desmond Bagley - Страница 14

I had nightmares that night.

I dreamed of a lovely Pacific island with white beaches and waving palm fronds where I wandered quite happily until I became aware that the sky was darkening and a cold, icy wind had arisen. I started to run but my feet slipped in the soft sand and I made no progress. And I knew what I was running from.

He caught me at last with my back to a palm trunk, and came nearer and nearer, brandishing a rusty kitchen knife. I knew it was the Dutch doctor, although he was screaming in Spanish, ‘Emplead cuchillo – cuchillo – cuchillo!’

He was drunk and sweaty-faced and as he came nearer I felt powerless to move and I knew he was going to stick me with the knife. At last his face was close to mine and I could see the individual beads of sweat on his shiny forehead and his lean dark face. It was the face of Kane. He drew back his arm and struck with the knife right into my guts.

I woke with a yell.

I was breathing deeply, taking in great gulps of air, and I could feel a slick film of sweat all over my body. The knife-scratch in my arm was aching. And I knew at last what was wrong with Kane’s story.

The bedroom door opened and Geordie said in a low voice, ‘What the devil’s going on?’

I said, ‘Come in, Geordie; I’m all right – just a nightmare.’

I switched on the bedside light and Geordie said, ‘You gave me a hell of a fright, Mike.’

‘I gave myself a hell of a fright,’ I said and lit a cigarette. ‘But I discovered something – or remembered something.’

‘What?’

I tapped Geordie emphatically on the chest with my forefinger. ‘Mark had his appendix out years ago.’

Geordie looked startled. ‘But the death certificate …’

‘I don’t know anything about the death certificate. I haven’t seen it yet, so I don’t know if it’s a fake. But I know that Mr Bloody Kane is a fake.’

‘Are you sure about this?’

‘I still know the doctor who operated on Mark. I’ll give him a ring and check on it – but I’m sure.’

‘Perhaps this Dutch doctor made a mistake,’ offered Geordie.

‘He’d be a damned good doctor who could take out an appendix that wasn’t there,’ I said acidly. ‘Doctors can’t make mistakes like that.’

‘Not unless he was covering up. Lots of doctors bury their mistakes.’

‘You mean he was incompetent?’ I thought about that, then shook my head decisively. ‘No, Geordie, that won’t wash. He’d see the old operation scar the moment he made his examination, and he’d know the appendix had already been removed. He wouldn’t stick his neck out by signing a certificate that could be so easily disproved – no one is as incompetent as that.’

‘Aye. If he wanted to cover up he’d put down the cause of death as fever or something like that – something you couldn’t prove one way or another. But we don’t know what he put on the certificate.’

‘We’ll soon find out. They sent it to Helen. And I want to find Kane more than ever – I want to nail that lying bastard.’

‘We’ll do our best,’ said Geordie. He didn’t sound too hopeful.