Forever (46 page)

Using her right hand as a visor, Stephanie
shielded her eyes from the flashes and drew instinctively closer to
the monitor, her attention riveted by a round, wire-mesh basket
which had been suspended inside the red-and-white container. After
the doctor had lifted it out, Stephanie noticed two sealed glass
tubes, like bulb basters without the bulb, nestled within the
plastic-coated mesh. Holding the basket up to the light, the doctor
inspected the tubes visually, nodded to herself, and set it back
down. Then, pulling out a drawer outfitted with a control panel,
she pressed one of a row of buttons and glanced up at the
ceiling.

Almost instantly, two identical robotic
arms, all shiny futuristic steel and taut cables and smooth
sprockets, descended into view from an unseen trolley overhead.
Stephanie could almost hear the soft whirr of motor-drive; was
oblivious now to the malfunctioning monitor.

The high-tech arms came to a stop, the
wrenchlike grips within a foot of the table.

Utmost caution now, Dr Vassiltchikov lifting
one glass tube from its nest and carefully placing it, thin
funnel-end up, in one of the robotic grips. Again, Stephanie had
the impression of soft whirrs as the finely calibrated wrench
tightened, holding the fragile tube without crushing it.

Her gaze swung to another monitor, opened
her perspective to a wide angle. She viewed Dr Vassiltchikov
sideways now, carefully lifting the second tube from the basket and
placing it into the grip of the other wrench. Stephanie marvelled
at the delicacy with which the steel claw tightened around it.
Watched the doctor hit another button -

-snakes falling!

No, not snakes! Thin, clear plastic tubing.
Nodding to herself, Stephanie thought she understood. It was some
sort of IV hookup.

She was proven right when the little doctor
opened another drawer, took out a thin packet, and broke the
sterile wrapper. She used a hypodermic needle to puncture the
funnel end of each glass container before breaking the sterile
packaging around the openings of the thin tubes. Then deftly, she
fitted the end of each tube over one of the pierced funnels.

More button tapping. The robotic arms
swiftly rose now, retracting, pulling the tubes up with them. Up,
up, higher, higher, not quite out of sight. Dr Vassiltchikov
switched to two small levers, moved them in tandem as if operating
a radio- controlled toy car.

The robotic arms obeyed, glided inaudibly
across the room, past the splatter of the de Kooning and the
raggedly-edged colours of the Frankenthaler. In a single neat
manoeuvre, the doctor parked one directly over each chaise.

Stephanie switched her attention to yet
another monitor. Zarah was naked now. Her body, thin and bony -
downright scrawny except for the high firm breasts! - seemed as if
it were viewed through a fun-house mirror; so gaunt it appeared
distorted, angular, unreal. Stephanie saw the tensing and untensing
of the woman's ribs and tight belly with every breath that she
took, the slightest movement magnified by the silence.

What's wrong with her?
she
wondered
. Is it cancer? Anorexia? Vanity? Perhaps she's one of
those fashion victims who gladly starves herself to be the perfect
clothes hanger? Unless . . . her lack of body bulk is the result of
illness, medication, or -

-- immortality!

Quickly her eyes skimmed from one monitor to
the next to appraise Ernesto from various angles. Front. Back.
Sides. He, too, was utterly naked and shockingly, unappetisingly
emaciated for his build! But most amazing of all, despite the
couple's nudity, and perhaps because of their very gauntness, there
was nothing at all sexual about their naked states. If anything,
they both seemed curiously asexual, somehow strangely
androgenous.

Onscreen, Zarah moved within camera range
and took Ernesto's hand in hers. Together, the couple walked
between the two narrow chaises, their lips moving, saying something
-

- What? Words of endearment, encouragement,
intrigue?

Stephanie felt like a voyeur, like some
sleazy rear-window peeping Tom. Which is exactly what I am, she
thought, helpless to tear her eyes away as Ernesto helped Zarah up
onto the smaller of the two chaises. She lay down on her back,
stretched luxuriously, reached for the headphones. He said
something to her and she smiled and touched his arm affectionately
before slipping on the earphones. Then he got on the other chaise
and reclined on his back, scooting up and down a little to get
comfortable.

Stephanie's mind flashed upon human
sacrifices on pagan altars.

Abruptly Dr Vassiltchikov passed in the
forefront of the screen, startling Stephanie, who did an eyesweep
of the other monitors, avoiding the malfunctioning one. After
glancing at them all, she concentrated on the top row, second
screen from the right: Zarah, earphones on, lying peacefully with
her eyes closed, a forefinger conducting a rhapsody only she could
hear.

Stephanie's eyes snapped to the screen
beside it: Ernesto fiddling with electronic controls on the side of
his chaise, making it move in three sections, like a hospital
bed.

And, on a monitor diagonally below, Dr
Vassiltchikov. Head tilted back, arms outstretched as though
orchestrating the slowly descending robotic arms, which stopped two
feet above the chaises, where the wrench-grips automatically
rotated in their sprockets until the glass containers were upside
down. Stephanie watched as the doctor pulled down the plastic
tubing of Zarah's IV, tore open another sterile needle packet, and
inserted a long hypodermic in the end of the tube. She started the
IV flow to clear it of trapped air, gently lifted Zarah's arm, and
-

'Ouch!' Stephanie vicariously felt the pain
in the crook of her own elbow.

Curiosity, morbid fascination, and now
repulsion - all kept Stephanie glued to the screen, like a willing
spectator at a horror movie, at once recoiling, yet at the same
time unable to tear her eyes away. Her face mirrored her personal
distaste as clearly as her voice had involuntarily expressed the
stab of pain in Zarah's arm.

On another screen the little doctor repeated
the IV ritual with Ernesto. The IVs dripped slowly. The doctor went
back and forth, adjusting the flow ... the lights in the room
slowly dimmed until only the paintings were awash with light . . .
and the two patients lay there, cosseted by luxury even while
undergoing medical treatment, even as intravenous tubes fed them -
what?

But now was not the time to ponder or
loiter: on the monitors, Stephanie saw Dr Vassiltchikov heading for
the door.

Prudently taking her cue, Stephanie left as
mouselike as she had come. Only once she reached the staircase with
its crystal columns did she permit herself to rush. Eduardo was
waiting, and she really had no idea how long she had been gone. Too
long, surely, to use going to the bathroom as an excuse. I'd better
think up something fast, she told herself. I mustn 't arouse
suspicions.

The call came in to the yacht's hospital as
Dr Vassiltchikov was on her way out. She picked up the remote
telephone. 'Vassiltchikov.' She listened for a moment. 'One moment,
Captain,' she said, and punched the HOLD button, it is for you.'
She brought the remote over to Ernesto.

He took it from her. 'Thank you,
Doctor.'

Dr Vassiltchikov nodded briskly and left the
treatment chamber and went out to her workstation at the video
monitors.

Ernesto released the HOLD button.
'Sim,
Capitao?
'

'It concerns the vessel which is following
us,' Captain Falcao informed him.

'And?'

'Our radar shows it is still eighteen
kilometres behind us. Is there anything you would like me to
do?'

'One moment,
Capitao
.' Ernesto turned
his head and looked at Zarah. She was lying back, eyes closed,
listening to her favourite music over the headphones: her own
recently digitalised recording of Der Freischutz, from 1949. She
was in a world of her own.

'Nao, Capitao
,' he said softly into
the telephone. 'I still do not think it necessary to do anything.
But let us keep this matter between ourselves, shall we? There is
no need to cause anyone undue alarm.'

'I understand perfectly,
Senhor
.'

'And
Capitao?
'

'
Senhor
?'

'Continue to keep me apprised of the
situation,' Ernesto told him. if the distance between that vessel
and ours closes, let me know at once. Otherwise, do nothing.'

When Stephanie returned to the sundeck, Zaza
and the wheelchair were gone; so, too, were the dirty dishes and
the buffet. All evidence of lunch had been cleared away.

Eduardo rose from inside the tent as she
approached. 'I was ready to send out a search party,' he said,
grinning.

She thought, Merlin's law: If a lie is
called for, one might as well make it a useful one.

'I stopped in my stateroom to fetch my
camera,' she said, 'but I couldn't find it anywhere. It seems to be
missing.' She sat down. 'You don't think it was left behind in
Marbella, do you?'

He cleared his throat. 'I see that I must
have forgotten to tell you.'

'Forgotten to tell me?' She frowned. 'Tell
me what?'

His gaze became distant. 'My parents are
very protective of their privacy. I am afraid they are almost
pathologically camera- shy.'

She stared at him. 'So what are you telling
me?'

'Colonel Valerio always collects our guests'
cameras when they first board.' He smiled and shrugged helplessly.
'Obviously, since you crashed into our midst the way you did, he
was unable to inform you of this. He must have taken it upon
himself to lock it away for safe keeping.'

'I see,' she said. And thought: This gets
curiouser and curiouser . . .

He reached out, took both her hands in his,
and looked at her with concern. A passing breeze lifted her hair,
raising the sharp slices of bangs into raven's wings. 'I hope you
are not upset.'

'No,' she said. 'Now that you've explained
it, how could I be?'

'Good. And I am glad you returned in
time.'

'Why?' She tilted her head. 'Was I about to
miss out on something?'

He let go of one of her hands, kept holding
the other, pulled her to her feet and led her over to the port side
of the deck. A push of a button, and the Plexiglas windscreens slid
soundlessly aside in their motorised tracks.

He leaned over the deck railing and pointed
ahead. 'That,' he said, and turned to look at her, the breeze
ruffling his hair. 'You almost missed that.'

Now she leaned out over the railing. And
there, near the horizon, something hazy and bluish rose
dramatically out of the sea.

He stepped back and slid an arm around her
waist. Hugging her close, he said softly: 'Capri! Just think! It is
all ours to discover!'

Capri

It had been the island of Augustus and
Tiberius, this rough-cut gem of precipitous cliffs, olive trees,
holm oaks, tall pines, wild poppies, and fragrant broom and wild
sage. And it was still as magical today, this limestone Eden in
this peacock-blue sea, as it had been twenty centuries earlier when
it had been the playground of the Roman emperors. If ever a
romantic paradise for lovers existed, it was Capri.

Stephanie found it impossible not to fall
under its sunny spell.

She wondered:
Is it the island which so
bewitches? Or Eduardo?

Perhaps both?

On Capri, anything seemed possible.

They had started out at dawn, just the two
of them, long before the ferries and hydrofoils from Naples began
shuttling the hordes of day trippers over from the mainland.

Now, with the sun at its noonday height,
they were anchored off the needle-like rocks of the Faraglioni, the
sea as reflective as crumpled aluminium foil.

After the
Chrysalis
, the sleek
sixty-foot muscle boat, with its low rakish hull, wraparound
windscreen, and massive cushioned sunning area, seemed wonderfully
intimate somehow - their own plush island moored a stone's throw
from the paleolithic cliffs.

Sighing contentedly, Stephanie slipped off
the spaghetti straps of her bikini top, and rolled over onto her
stomach to bake without a tan line across her back. A bee from the
island, attracted by her lotion, swooped and hovered.

She smiled with bleary pleasure.

Eduardo lifted his Porsche sunshades an
inch. 'What are you smiling about?'

He was lying on his side next to her,
feasting on iced Dom Perignon, Beluga caviar, and her.

'Oh.' Stephanie turned her head sideways to
look at him. 'Only about what you said earlier.'

'I said many things earlier.'

'I know. But in particular, you called this
boat an upholstered motor.'

'Well, it is. Isn't it?' He tried for a
stern, righteous voice. 'Or, if you prefer it, a fibreglass
penis.'

She laughed heartily, is that what this is,
then? Your surrogate penis?'

'You tell me.'

'Then what about all your cars?' she asked
slyly. 'Ferraris, Lamborghinis . . .'

He gestured airily. 'An entire collection of
surrogate penises?' he suggested in amusement.

And they both laughed, immensely happy and
carefree as children.

'More champagne?' he asked.

'Mm.' She reached for her glass and held it
out for a refill. Then she held it to her nose, enjoying the
sensation of the popping bubbles. She stretched luxuriously.

Ah, she thought languidly, this is
definitely a life to which I could easily become addicted. And how
wonderful to be alone, with no crew to dance constant attendance,
no eyes and ears other than our own. Just him and me -