Niceville

then walked around to Elevator Bank A, where he waited in silence, surrounded by a chattering cluster of pretty young girls who smelled of hair spray and bubble gum.
    While he waited, he sensed a presence behind him and turned around to see the old man from the Blue Bird standing there, staring at the needle indicator as the elevator descended.
    Merle looked at him, and the man looked back, blinked once, and then spoke for the first time.
    “He’s on the fourth floor,” said the man, his voice pitched low, a hoarse whisper, as if he didn’t want the girls to hear.
    “Who is?” asked Merle, cocking his head.
    “You’ll see,” said the man. “You’ll have to wake him. He’s sleeping. Clara will show you.”
    There was a low musical
bong
, and the elevator doors, ornate bronzed bars over a thick sheet of stained glass, pulled back with a groan and a flood of staff and visitors poured out. The man let the crowds push him back away from Merle, never breaking eye contact.
    “A major loon,” said Merle to himself, although the fourth floor was where he was supposed to start looking, according to Glynis.
    He rode up with the chattering girls, and got off on the fourth floor, stepping out into a shadowy darkness, a long narrow hallway lit only by tiny amber sconces set into the wall every few feet.
    At the far end of the darkened hall there was a pool of cool white light, and a nurse, at her desk, leaning over a computer, staring intently at something in front of her.
    Merle came down the hall, walking as quietly as his boots would let him, passing half-open doors with numbers on them, getting fleeting glimpses into darkened rooms where mounded figures huddled under blankets, shadowy spaces full of the beep and rush of machinery, all the drapes drawn tight against the sun.
    As he got close to the nursing station, the woman lifted her head and smiled at him. She was young and very lovely, with pale auburn hair and a full sensual figure.
    She wasn’t in a uniform, but she had on a pale green summer frock that emphasized her curves and reminded Merle of soft dreamy summer nights in exotic places he had never been to.
    Her large hazel eyes were full of pale white light. She had a name tag on her breast: CLARA MERCER RN .
    “Sir, I’m sorry, but visiting hours are from five until eight.”
    Merle came to a stop at her station, gave her his best smile, which was pretty good, considering his dark sharp-planed appearance and his beak of a nose. “I realize that, Miss Mercer—”
    “Oh please. I’m Clara.”
    “Nice to meet you, Clara. I’m Merle. I’m sorry to just turn up like this. It’s just that I’m only in for the day, got a bus from upstate.”
    “Did you come in on the Blue Bird?” she asked, giving his farmhand clothes a quick up and down. The question surprised Merle. It was as if she had been expecting him.
    “Yes. And I’m not sure how long I have.”
    “Well,” she said, glancing back up the long dark hallway behind him, “I think I know why you’re here. We’re not supposed to … but no one’s around right now anyway. Everybody’s in a staff meeting and I’m just here to answer the phones. Who would you like to see? Would it be Rainey?”
    Merle said yes.
    Clara’s expression changed, grew more solemn, and the cool light in her hazel eyes got cooler.
    “Oh yes. It’s his time, isn’t it? Such a sad thing. Are you a relative?”
    “Yes. Distantly, but I would like to see him, if I can?”
    “He won’t know you at all,” she said, her voice pitched low. “He’s almost not here … and you can only have a few minutes with him. There’s a danger of infection, too, so you’ll have to wear a smock.”
    She pointed to a rack of white coats set in an alcove a few feet away. Merle crossed to it, found one, and pulled it on as the girl ticked something off on a chart. She looked up as he came back, smiled again, full of sympathy.
    “He’s in four eighteen. It’s a private unit, just down this hallway and through the glass door. Remember, you can’t go any closer than the white line. I’d come with you, Merle, but I have to cover the phones.”
    “I’ll be careful,” said Merle, already moving away, his heart thudding in his ribs and his throat closing up. He got to four eighteen, and stopped outside, looking through the heavy beaded glass window set into the upper half of the door, with the words CRITICAL CARE PRIVATE SUITE . Through the glass he saw a dimly lit