Black Diamond - Martin Walker [109]
“You damn fool,” Albert was saying from a great distance. “I told you to stay on the ground floor.”
There was white foam all over him, and then a familiar face was looking into his eyes. It was Fabiola, pulling open his jacket to put a stethoscope against his heart.
“The kids will be all right, Bruno,” he heard her say. “You got them out in time.”
27
Fabiola stood beside him with a glass of milk, saying it would soothe his throat and nourish him. He felt his chest burn with every breath. He was in a strange bed, lying on his back, but he could see his feet. Both his legs were suspended in the air, a light gauze dressing on them. Dr. Gelletreau was at the foot of the bed, looking up from a chart to smile at him. Fabiola raised his head and eased a straw into his mouth. Bruno drank, realizing with relief that he was at the medical center in St. Denis. If he’d been badly hurt, they’d have moved him to the big hospital in Périgueux.
“You’re a lucky man,” Gelletreau said. “Mainly second-degree burns, including some bad ones on the back of your calves. The smoke inhalation doesn’t seem too bad. A few days rest and you’ll be fine.”
“I have to be in Bordeaux at three this afternoon,” Bruno said.
“Too late,” Gelletreau said. “It’s almost three already.”
Bruno looked out the window. It was bright daylight, and he could see the sun on the stone of the mairie across the river.
“Don’t worry,” said Fabiola. “J-J knows all about it. Everything is taken care of.”
“The Chinese girls?” he asked. His voice sounded hoarse and it hurt to talk.
“A boy and a girl,” Fabiola said, but her face was grim. “They’ll be okay.”
“A boy? I’m sure I saw two girls when we were there.”
“You did. We both did. One of the girls didn’t make it.”
“Did I leave her in the room?” he asked, dreading the answer.
“No, she was in the front of the house. She’d have been dead before you arrived. You saved what there was to save, but Albert says he’s never letting you near a fire again.”
“Fine with me,” Bruno said, waving away the milk and sinking back onto the bed.
“There’s something else,” Fabiola said. “Those Chinese children, when I examined them, they’d been abused, sexually abused, not once but repeatedly and over a considerable time. We’re waiting for a Chinese translator and a child psychiatrist to try and find out what happened to them.”
Bruno closed his eyes. That meant they can’t have been Minxin’s nieces. If only he’d gotten the children registered and into school he might have prevented all this. He’d been meaning to do that ever since he saw the girls at the restaurant.
“The girl who died,” Fabiola went on. “She wasn’t alone. There was a big adult male with her. They died in bed together from the smoke.”
“Do we know who he was?”
“They’re checking the teeth with local dentists. It’s the only way he’ll be identified.”
Arson and a double murder, thought Bruno. The Vietnamese were in trouble. He hoped Tran and Bao Le had not been part of it.
“You’ve got some visitors,” Gelletreau said. “I think you’re well enough to see them.”
Fabiola opened the door and the mayor came in, then stood to one side and held the door wide open. A camera flashed from the outer room. Philippe Delaron again, thought Bruno wearily; he’s making a living out of me.
“Look at these, Bruno,” said the mayor, coming to the bed and leafing through some prints. “By the way, I fed your chickens and dog and gave him a walk. In fact he’s in the back of my car.”
He thrust one of the photos close to Bruno’s face. It showed him leaning out of the window, handing one of the children to a waiting fireman while fires leaped from a lower window. There was another, with Bruno swinging on the firemen’s ladder and silhouetted against a ball of flame erupting from the room behind him.
“Tomorrow’s front page, and Philippe says he’s also sold them to Paris Match. That’s why he wanted the picture of you in the hospital, to round out the story.”
“Did you know that young Pons has been arrested?” Bruno said.
“J-J called to tell me. That means I win the election,