So much for the idea of flying to Masagua and beginning my search. That would come soon enough, though. I was counting on it.
I said, “X writes the e-mail, and sends it from someplace unknown to a library or school in Masagua. X’s partner then forwards it to the States under a Nicarado address.”
“Exactly.”
I checked my watch as I thanked Bernie for his help. I was eager to get into Pilar’s e-mail and see if Lourdes had sent her anything more.
There was nothing surprising about Pilar’s password. It was Ixku-ixku -another Mayan word that she was fond of, the name of an ancient goddess.
The guilt of a voyeur has an uneasiness attached; a slimy feel.. .
That was the sensation, scanning Pilar’s e-mail.
Pilar had something going with her jeweler friend Kahlil in Masagua. There were nearly a dozen unread e-mails from him in her in-box. Some of the subject headings were “Missing my love,” “My heart is with you,” “Long for your touch.”
Or maybe Kahlil just had it bad for Pilar. I hadn’t checked her Mail Sent file. Maybe her replies weren’t as sappy.
Not that I opened and read the man’s letters. Nor would I. I agree with Bernie: A person’s privacy is sacred. And I didn’t like that voyeur feeling.
There were two e-mails, though, that I opened immediately. Like the earlier e-mail Pilar had received from the kidnappers, the subject heading was blank, and both notes came from addresses that seemed to be a random series of letters and numbers. Both also came from the server Nicarado. org.
The first was dated the previous day, Wednesday, at 11:10 P.M. At that exact moment, I’d been on my way back from the Everglades after dealing with Balserio. The second e-mail had just now arrived; was delivered electronically only a few minutes before I sat down at the desk in my lab and signed on with Pilar’s password.
I was tempted to open the new e-mail first. Instead, I forced myself to read them in the order they arrived: Rich bitch. Florida called us and said you were being followed, which is so fucking stupid of you. Trick us again, the brat dies. No more warnings. Tomorrow night, drive to St. Petersburg. Be in the downtown area no later than 10 at night. Have the satellite phone, someone will let you know. If you threw it away, you’re the losers because you didn’t get our permission. The money better be packed in a hard photographer’s case exactly like you were told. Make sure of that. No more fuck-ups. Answer this message immediately so we know you have it.
I kept the e-mail as new and saved it to my filing cabinet, wondering about the photographer’s carrying case. Why was that so important? When Lourdes mentioned it on the video, I’d considered a couple of vague explanations, but didn’t linger long enough to think them through. Maybe the pick-up man would be posing as a photographer. Or… a camera case was rugged, durable, which made it ideal if they intended to bury the money until they were sure law enforcement wasn’t waiting to nail them. The cases were also shockproof. They could send us down some lonely road and have us throw the case out the window on command.
Tomlinson would be a good one to ferret other possibilities-if he and Pilar ever resurfaced.
I opened the second e-mail.
Maybe because I’d just gotten off the phone with Lourdes, I could hear his voice as I read: Big-shot scientist. The brat says you can do anything; well, let’s see. Your industrialist whores up there are paying for the bullets killing our peasants, so I feel good about you stealing the medicine to help keep some of them alive. One of our important people got hit bad and has an operation coming up, but the doctors say they don’t have the best medicine, and that’s where you come in. We want the following supplies, and you have until Sunday afternoon to get it, and don’t even ask for more time because the answer is “Fuck you.” When you get it, pack it good in the same kind of case as the money. The hard photography kind that seals tight without having to lock. Don’t go to St. Petersburg tonight because we’ll do the exchange all at the same time. Answer back fast.
A list of several drugs then followed. I was familiar with only a couple of the names. Because he demanded relatively small quantities, it seemed to support his story that they were needed for a specific operation.
Lourdes’ e-mail ended, You should have seen the look on your brat’s face when I told him you said we should go ahead and kill him, Papa didn’t want to pay all that money.
I thought to myself: Lake had to know it’s not true. That I said it only to get leverage.
I kept the e-mail as new, then forwarded it to my own business address at Sanibel Biological Supply. If I wanted to send him a question about the drug list, I wanted to be able to do it without going into Pilar’s account. As I did, I told myself that Lake understood, hoping the boy was secure enough and smart enough to know I had to play it tough from my end. Even so, it made me feel sick inside-and furious, too.
I’d thought about it before, but now I thought about it again: Praxcedes Lourdes would one day feel a tap on his shoulder and turn to find me standing there, the two of us off all alone.
Imagining the moment displaced the anger, made it fade.
I began to write a note confirming that I’d received his e-mail, but then stopped. Lourdes wanted a fast response, but it didn’t have to be that fast. Why not take a little extra time and maybe think of a way to make my reply work for me? Use it to my advantage if I could.
I knew nothing about several of the medicines he’d demanded, had no idea if I could get them-but Lourdes didn’t know that. I decided to do some cursory research. If I sounded authoritative, if I convinced him I knew what I was talking about, maybe it’d give Masked Man a little extra incentive to keep me happy.
There were several common antibacterials on the list. I didn’t bother with them. I went to work looking up the medicines that were less common. One was cyclosporine. He wanted five hundred 100 mg capsules, plus 50 mg of cyclosporine for intravenous infusion, packaged in 5 ml sterile ampules.
Another was prednisone. He wanted five hundred 20 mg capsules. He also wanted drugs named ATGAM and Thymoglobulin, and something called OKT3, all in intravenous infusion bags or ampules, plus the needles and tubes required as delivery systems.
Maybe one or all three of these were the experimental medicines he’d talked about.
My impression of Lourdes was that he was vicious and shrewd but poorly educated. This was an extremely sophisticated and detailed list of supplies, and he’d put it together very quickly. Who was he fronting for? Or who was supplying him with data?
Using internet search engines, I began to research the drugs one by one. I started with what might be the experimental types first.
In a medical journal, I read an article about OKT3: The antibody OKT3 blocks the functions of human cells that reject foreign bodies. We explored its effectiveness in treating the rejection of renal allografts. Of 123 patients suffering acute rejection of cadaveric renal transplants, those treated with OKT3 daily for a mean of 14 days, 73 percent experienced marked recoveries.
Cadaveric renal transplants? Lourdes wanted the drugs for someone who needed a kidney transplant?
Well… not necessarily.
I ran the names of the others. Except for the more common drugs on the list, the rest were antirejection or immunosuppressant drugs. They were medicines administered to patients either during or after receiving a transplanted heart, limb, liver, or lung, a skin graft, or any other procedure where a foreign organ is introduced.
Someone was getting a transplant. Soon, apparently. He needed the most powerful immunosuppressants available.
Ruined organs and lost limbs are not uncommon among battlefield casualties.
But something about the scenario bothered me. I’ve spent much of my life dealing with the military, and military people. For Lourdes to tell me, an American civilian, that one of their top military people had been wounded and was about to undergo a serious operation seemed to be a terrible breach of security. What kind of army was Balserio running?