Days of the Dead. David Monnery

Thanks for trying,’ Shepreth said coolly.

      ‘Any time.’

      Shepreth put the phone down. He’d have to check it out in person, which shouldn’t be too difficult – the fax machine in question was almost certainly in the office on Calle 35, the one to which he had trailed the freighter captain earlier that month.

      He would pay it a visit later, once the Panamanian evening got into its undeniable swing. Then Whitehall would get its t’s crossed, and there would be more proof for the Americans to ignore.

      In the other room the celebration of a penalty shoot-out win had already begun, and while HM’s Consul waxed eloquent about Sheringham’s intelligence – ‘He thinks before he kicks the ball,’ he gushed, slurping his G&T – his number two seemed to be contemplating another goal altogether, his eyes locked on, like heat-seeking missiles, to the valley between the younger secretary’s ample breasts.

      Victoria looked healthier than Carmen had expected, and very obviously pregnant. If it weren’t for the eyes, which seemed to be watching from a great distance, she would have found it hard to believe that the young woman in front of her had gone through a succession of terrible experiences.

      The institution in which she was housed seemed more true to type; situated in one of Miami’s less salubrious inner suburbs, it felt more like a prison than the hospital it supposedly was. Closed-circuit cameras had watched Carmen all the way to this fourth-floor room, and the nurses all seemed cold-faced and unsmiling. Detective Peña, who had driven her out here in his lunch hour, had warned her it wasn’t exactly a rest home, and he’d been right. Victoria’s room contained a bed, a basin and a single chair. The door was locked from the outside at all times.

      For her part, Victoria eyed this new visitor with more trepidation than warmth. She might look vaguely familiar, but she would probably want to ask questions, like the police detective who had been to see her several times. He’d been quite nice, but she knew he hadn’t believed that she couldn’t remember anything. And of course he was a man. At least this one was a woman. And maybe she wouldn’t stay long – it was so wonderful being alone.

      ‘Victoria, do you remember me?’ Carmen asked her, and could tell from the look of alarm that she didn’t. ‘I’m Carmen, Marysa’s sister.’

      Tears formed in Victoria’s eyes and started rolling down her cheek. She was beginning to think she would dehydrate herself.

      ‘How are you?’ Carmen asked. ‘How do you feel? Are the people here good to you?’

      ‘Oh yes. They’re good to me. They leave me alone.’

      Carmen ignored the reproachful look which went with the last statement, and sat down on the bed beside the other woman. ‘Do you remember Cartagena?’ she asked gently, half expecting the flow of tears to increase. ‘The college?’

      Victoria gave her a strange look. ‘What does it look like?’ she asked.

      ‘The college?’ Carmen asked, surprised. ‘It’s a park full of white buildings, with a hill behind it. There…’

      ‘Can you see the sea from it?’ Victoria asked.

      ‘Yes, you remember…’

      Victoria shook her head. ‘No, but I have dreamt about this place.’

      Carmen waited for her to continue but she didn’t. ‘Do you remember the dream?’ she asked.

      ‘Oh yes.’

      ‘What happens?’

      Victoria tilted her head to one side, and Carmen could see what Detective Peña had meant about a six-year-old. ‘Nothing happens really,’ she said. ‘I am eating and walking and reading a book and looking at the sea – things like that.’

      ‘Are you alone?’

      ‘No, I have friends. Marysa is there,’ she said, and smiled at Carmen, as if she had finally realized who her visitor was.

      Carmen took a chance. ‘Do you ever dream of going on a picnic?’

      Victoria’s eyes first widened with surprise and then darkened. ‘That’s a bad dream. How did you know about it?’

      ‘I don’t know. Why don’t you tell me about it? Then maybe it won’t seem so bad.’ Victoria looked at her – almost hopefully, Carmen thought. ‘Tell me what happens,’ she said again.

      ‘It’s a bad dream,’ Victoria repeated. ‘We’re having a lovely time, swimming and sunbathing and talking. We have some wine and Placida is pouring it into the paper cups and the men come out of the trees and they have guns. We have to go with them in their cars and then the car turns into a plane and we’re in the sky above this island, looking down. And the plane comes down to land and the wheels hit the runway and there’s a big jolt which wakes me up. It always wake me up, and then I feel better, knowing it’s just a dream.’

      As if in contradiction of the words, the tears were flowing once more.

      Carmen wanted to take the other woman in her arms, but she pressed on relentlessly. ‘The island in your dream – is it big?’

      ‘I don’t know. It’s not small. There’s a mountain in the middle and little towns by the sea. It’s shaped like an egg. And there’s another island – much smaller – at one end, with a bridge between them.’

      It was a good description, Carmen thought triumphantly. There couldn’t be many islands in the Caribbean which fitted it. Victoria was looking at her expectantly, but Carmen had no idea what she was expecting. ‘Do you remember any other dreams?’ she asked.

      Victoria seemed to retract her limbs, to pull her body closer together. ‘Yes, but they are evil dreams.’

      ‘Evil…You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.’

      Her voice apart, Victoria seemed turned to stone. ‘I am with men. They are doing things to me.’

      ‘Who are they?’

      ‘They’re his men.’

      ‘Who is he?’

      She looked straight at Carmen. ‘He told me he was the Angel of Death, but he laughed when he said it.’

      ‘Is he the father of your child?’

      It was the wrong question. Victoria shook her head violently, and started crying again. Carmen took her in her arms, held her close, and slowly felt the tension in the younger woman’s body begin to lessen.

      ‘Is Marysa in these evil dreams?’ Carmen asked after a while.

      ‘Sometimes,’ Victoria admitted. ‘But I don’t want to talk about my dreams any more,’ she added.

      ‘All right,’ Carmen agreed. She’d thought she was ready to hear the worst, but she’d been wrong. ‘So what shall we talk about?’ she asked.

      ‘Nothing,’ the other woman said. ‘Let’s just be quiet together.’

      And for the next twenty minutes they sat next to each other on the bed, with Victoria’s head cradled on Carmen’s shoulder. At the end of that time the younger woman made no attempt to deter Carmen from leaving, but she did seem at least slightly pleased by the prospect of another visit the following day.

      Carmen had intended to talk to the doctor in charge about Victoria’s prospects, but decided to leave that until her next visit – she felt too distressed herself to fight for her sister’s friend. Instead she just stumbled out on to the street and started walking, and it was only after a couple of cruising drivers had slowed to offer her remuneration for services to be rendered that she realized what sort of neighbourhood she was in. Luckily a crowded bus stop soon presented itself, and half an hour later she was back downtown. There she walked into the first bar she came to, stonewalled the hopeful greetings of the male clientele and ordered a large tequila.

      In