There is a moral in this, Clete thought, wincing at the pain: When you shoot someone in the forehead, be sure of your backstop.
He smiled at his own wit. The doctor smiled, very insincerely, back at him.
Jesus Christ, you must be losing your marbles. You killed a man, and that’s nothing to smile about. Not only killed him, shot him in cold blood. Well, maybe not cold blood. You were pretty goddamned pissed after seeing what they did to Señora Pellano. But the bottom line is you killed a defenseless man.
He closed his eyes and kept them closed until he sensed the doctor stand up after he finished working his way down his body with the scalpel and tweezers.
The large nurse then appeared with a stainless-steel bowl and what looked like a small paintbrush. She carefully wiped each small wound with an alcohol towel—it stung painfully. And then she painted each wound with the purple substance that was in the stainless-steel bowl—it stung even more painfully.
The doctor looked down at him once more.
“Thank you, Doctor,” Clete said.
The doctor ignored him and disappeared.
The large nurse nudged him again, and he slid off the operating table back onto the gurney. The thin cotton blanket was once more draped over him, and the gurney was wheeled out of the operating room and down the corridor.
The man with the barely concealed .45 marched alongside.
“Wait!” he ordered curtly.
“I have inspected the room, Sir,” another man said.
The man with the .45 grunted, and went into a room to conduct his own inspection. He came back out, carrying a telephone.
“You inspected the room, did you?”
The second man looked sheepish. The man with the .45 shook his head at him in tolerant disgust, then motioned for the gurney attendant to push Clete into the room.
“In the bed, please, Señor,” the man with the .45 said.
“I have to urinate,” Clete said.
“Over there,” the man said.
Clete walked naked to a small room equipped with a toilet, a bidet, and a shower.
When he returned, the room was empty.
It was also hot. The heavy vertical shutters had been lowered. When he went to them, he saw that the lowering belt had been padlocked. It could not now be moved.
Shit!
He went to the door. It was locked. He banged on it, and finally it was opened. There were two men, obviously armed, in the corridor. The man with the .45 who had been in the operating room was not there.
“I want the window open,” Clete said. “It’s as hot as a furnace in there.”
“Sorry, Señor,” the taller of the two men replied. “That is prohibited.”
“By who?”
The man shrugged.
Clete went back inside, and as he walked to the bed, heard the door being locked.
He lay down on the bed, put his hands under his head, and started to wonder about what was going to happen next. Then he heard the door being unlocked again. It opened, admitting a hospital attendant who handed him a small gray paper-wrapped package and left. The door was locked again.
Clete opened the package and found it contained a tiny bar of soap, a tiny towel, shaving cream, a razor, toothbrush (no toothpaste), a glass, a hospital gown, and cotton slippers.