Free Dr. Death by Nick Carter - [Killmaster 100] Page B

was sleeping in them. He followed me across the floor and out the door into the courtyard, where he stood blinking at me in the semi-darkness.
    "I won't waste any time, Diaz," I said. "We've received information that a smuggling ring is operating through the leprosarium. Storing smuggled goods here, for one thing. Drugs. And according to our information, you're up to your neck in the whole thing."
    "Como?"
said Diaz, a startled look replacing the sleepy one. "Smuggling? I don't know what you're talking about."
    "There's no use in playing dumb," I snapped. "We know what's going on and we know you're involved. Now are you going to cooperate or not?"
    "But I tell you, I don't know nothing," Diaz protested. "I don't know nothing about drugs or smuggling here or anywhere."
    I bored into him with my eyes. I didn't like to do what I had to do next, but I did it.
    "Diaz," I said slowly, "you have a choice. You can either cooperate with us and go free, or I can arrest you right here and now. That means I put you in jail. In solitary confinement, of course, since the other prisoners can't have a leper among them. And probably for a long time, since it may take us a long time to crack this case without you. And during that time, it will probably be impossible for us to provide the medication you need to keep your disease arrested."
    A look of terror crept into Diaz' eyes.
    "No!" he gasped, "You can't do that! I'll die! Horribly! I swear to you on my mother's grave, I know nothing of…"
    "It's your choice, Diaz," I said grimly. "And you'd better make it now."
    Diaz' ruined face had become coated with sweat. He began to tremble.
    "But I know nothing!" he pleaded. "How can I help you if I…"
    He paused. My nerves tensed. This could be what I was fishing for.
    "Wait," he said slowly. "Wait. Perhaps…"
    I waited.
    "Several months ago," he said, "it happened several months ago. Some strangers were here. Not lepers. Not doctors. But they were hiding something, or maybe someone."
    "Hiding it, or him, where?" I demanded.
    "Where no one would look. In the infectious section."
    "Go on," I said.
    "They left, after about a month. Taking with them whatever they had been hiding. That is all I know, I swear to you on the honor of my mother."
    "I need more information than that, Diaz," I said in a hard voice. "Where did they take what they had been hiding?"
    "I don't know, I swear it If I knew I would tell you. But…"
    He paused. An uneasy look came into his eyes.
    "Go on," I demanded.
    "Jorge. Jorge would know. He is a leper with an arrested case, who works as a male nurse in the contagious wing. He would have seen everything, perhaps overheard something of value to you. But…"
    "But what?"
    "In order to talk to him, we would have to go into the contagious wing. For me, it is nothing. But for you…"
    He didn't have to finish the sentence. I knew the danger. But I also knew what I had to do.
    "Can you get me a sterile smock, gloves, cap, the whole outfit?"
    Diaz nodded.
    "Do it," I said tersely. "And fast."
    He disappeared inside the building, and reappeared a few minutes later carrying what I had asked for. When I had put on the smock, cap, surgeon's mask, and gloves, he pushed a pair of shoes at me.
    "You must leave your own shoes outside the door. All these things will be sterilized when you have taken them off again."
    I did as he said, then started across the courtyard, holding my own shoes in my hand.
    "Can you get a key to the south wing?" I asked.
    Diaz smiled slightly, his missing upper lip turning it into a horrible grimace.
    "It is only locked from the outside,
Señor,"
he said. "To keep the lepers in. There is no difficulty in keeping others out."
    Diaz drew the bolt on another heavy wooden door, and stepped aside to allow me to go first. I brusquely motioned for him to go ahead. Again, the darkened room, but this time with a light at one end, where a man in white sat at a table, his head on his arms, sleeping. Again, the rows of cots,