“How did that little bit of a thing get away from you and the guard and everyone?” Mr. Contreras demanded.

Lundgren didn’t look at us. “I wasn’t on duty when it happened. I was told she used her small size to follow behind the laundry cart, on the side away from the guard, and that she probably concealed herself in the cart when the janitor stopped to talk to someone. In theory the laundry would be inspected before leaving this ward, but in practice they probably let it go through without poking at it: no one wants to touch soiled linens. A number of the women have AIDS.”

“And you believe Aguinaldo escaped that way?” I asked, keeping my voice neutral. “Wasn’t she cuffed to the bed?”

Lundgren nodded. “But these girls have nothing to do all day long except figure out how to use a hairpin on their handcuffs. It happens now and then that one of them gets loose, but since the ward is locked it doesn’t do them much good. I don’t think there’s anything else I can tell you. If you’d like some time alone in the chapel before you set out, I can have an orderly show you to it. Otherwise he’ll escort you to the main entrance.”

I left my card on the table when we got up to leave. “In case something else occurs to you that you’d like me to know about, Nurse.”

On the way out, Mr. Contreras exploded with frustration. “I don’t believe it. A laundry cart, huh? Things ain’t bigger than a minute, and not even Nicola was that tiny. I want you to sue them. Sue them for—what was it you said—not taking due something?”

Veronica, the woman who’d had the baby, managed to be in the hall, cuffed to the orderly, who was escorting her back from the bathroom. “You know Nicola? What happened to her?”

“She’s dead,” I said. “Do you know why she was in the hospital?”

Nurse Lundgren appeared next to us. “You can’t be talking to the patients, ma’am. They’re inmates even if they’re in the hospital. Veronica, you’re well enough to parade the hall, you’re well enough to get back to the house. Jock, you can take these visitors out to the main entrance. Show them where the chapel is before you come back.”

Veronica looked momentarily furious, then, as if her powerlessness were something she’d just remembered, her shoulders sank and her face crumpled into despair.

Jock gave permission to the man behind the glass wall to release the doors. At the entrance to the main hospital wing, he pointed down a hall to the chapel.

Chapter 19: Power Dining

19 Power Dining