Dead Heat - By Dick Francis & Felix Francis Page 0,103
balls were significant. How exactly they were significant, I hadn’t yet worked out. And secondly, if some of his staff were anything to go by, Mr Komarov was definitely not on the side of the angels.
*
By the time I got back to the Hyatt Hotel my arm was hurting like hell. I pulled up at the valet parking booth and received some very strange looks from the staff. I ignored them, picked up the polo mallet from the back seat, and went into the lobby. I tossed the car keys to the concierge and explained to him that some of the glass had got damaged and would he deal with it with the rental company.
‘Certainly, sir,’ he said. He looked briefly at the polo mallet. ‘Right away, sir.’ Absolutely nothing phases a good concierge.
I went up in the lift and lay on Caroline’s bed. The bedside clock showed me that it was three o’clock. The orchestra were just starting their second rehearsal. I realized that I wasn’t very comfortable so I removed everything from my pockets and put it all on the bedside table: wallet, money, room key, handkerchief and a shiny metal ball about the size of a golf ball and made in two halves that was somehow crucial to the bombing of Newmarket racecourse some four thousand miles away.
Mrs Schumann hadn’t been at all pleased to hear that I had already lost the ball that she had been so insistent that I should keep safe. However, I eventually managed to coax her into handing over another ball, but only after I had convinced her that it would be decisive in finding out why her Rolf had been so badly injured.
Maybe I had been convincing myself too.
CHAPTER 17
Caroline returned between the final rehearsal and the evening performance to find me still lying on her bed, and in a bad way. In spite of me swallowing copious painkillers, my arm was so sore that every movement caused me to wince.
‘You need a doctor,’ Caroline said. She was very concerned and not a little frightened.
‘I know, but I don’t want to use my credit card to pay for it:,’ I said.
‘Do you really think someone can trace you from your credit card?’ she said.
‘I’m not taking the chance,’ I said. ‘Especially after today. Who knows what Komarov is capable of. I think he’s somehow responsible for killing nineteen people at the Newmarket races. He won’t worry about killing one more.’ Or two, I thought, and I didn’t like it. ‘How long have you got before the performance?’
‘About an hour before I have to go,’ she said.
‘It will have to be enough,’ I said. ‘Come on, let’s go, and bring your credit card with you.’
‘How do you know they can’t trace mine as well?’ she asked, suddenly alarmed.
‘I don’t,’ I said. ‘But I think it’s less likely that they will search for Miss Aston when trying to find Max Moreton.’
We went by taxi to the Northwestern Memorial Hospital emergency room on Erie Street with me biting back a scream with every bump, with every pothole.
As at any accident and emergency department in England, there were endless forms to fill and lots of waiting time. Here though, as well as the appointments with the medical staff, there was also the all-important one with the hospital cashier.
‘Do you have insurance, Mr Moreton?’ asked the casually dressed young woman behind the counter.
‘I believe I do have some travel insurance but I can’t find the details,’ I said.
‘Then I’ll put “no” down on the form,’ she said. ‘Do you therefore intend to self-pay for your treatment?’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘At least for the time being.’
She worked away for a while. ‘As you are a non-US citizen, I will need full prepayment of this estimate before you can be treated,’ she said.
‘How much is it?’ I asked her. She pushed a piece of paper towards me with her final figure at the bottom. ‘I only want my arm seen to,’ I said, reading it. ‘I don’t want to buy the whole damn hospital.’
She wasn’t amused. ‘Full prepayment of this estimate will be needed before any treatment is given,’ she repeated.
‘What would happen if I couldn’t pay it?’ I asked.
‘Then you would be asked to go someplace else,’ she said.
‘How about if I was dying?’ I said.
‘You’re not dying,’ she replied. But I got the impression that, if I had been, and couldn’t pay, I might still be expected to go and die someplace else, preferably another hospital.