Page 67 of The Midnight Secret

They waited as Landon got out of his car and walked back to them. James wound down the window.

‘That’s it,’ he said, nodding towards the grain store, a cigarette dangling from his lower lip.

James looked first at the building, then at him. ‘It’s a storage facility.’

‘Was. It was converted a few years back. Clearly, we couldn’t keep the sick in the same building as the healthy detainees.’

‘No, I suppose not.’ Typhus, typhoid, diphtheria, TB, cholera...all were highly infectious.

‘Stay here. Don’t leave your car,’ Landon said to James. ‘Your wife can follow me.’

James reached over and clasped her hand for a moment. ‘You can do this,’ he whispered.

Landon flicked the cigarette away and sauntered across the street as Flora shrugged off her overcoat – walking through the hotel lobby dressed as a nurse would have drawn far too much attention.

She hurried after Landon, who now stood by a door at the back corner of the building.

‘Take this.’ He pulled a patient file from his overcoat and handed it to her.

‘What’s it for?’

‘Appearances.’

She opened it – empty.

He glanced up and down the deserted street to check no one was around. ‘Right, this is what we’re going to do. I’m going to let you in, and you’ll find yourself in a long corridor. You walk along that—’

‘Wait – aren’t you coming in with me?’

He sighed, shaking his head at her. ‘How would we explain me, a civilian, being in a restricted medical zone? You’re the one in the disguise.’

Flora blinked, feeling her nerves peak.

‘Just walk along the corridor until you see a staircase on the right. Go up two floors...’

She listened intently, but her heart had gone into a gallop. Somehow, walking into an empty corridor felt more daunting than stepping out on stage in Paris to face eight hundred people.

‘Take a left at the top. The room’s halfway down on the right. Room 237. You got that?’

‘Up the stairs. Two floors. Turn left. Room 237, on the right.’

He nodded. ‘Very good.’

‘What should I do if I see someone?’

‘Keep your head down and hold the file against your chest. Remember, you look the part. There’s no reason for them to suspect you.’

‘But if they say something to me—’

‘Nod in greeting if you have to, but don’t speak. If they hear you’re foreign...’ He drew a line across his neck, which she understood to be a bad thing.

‘...And you’re sure it’s...safe to see her?’

‘She’s three days off being medically cleared. No symptoms for eighteen days now.’ He put a key in the lock and opened the door, handing the key over to her. ‘Lock up again when you leave and put the key in the bag with the uniform. Leave it at your hotel reception for me to collect this evening. You’ve got ten minutes before they start making the rounds...Now go.’

Flora stepped inside. As he had told her, she was indeed at the end of a long corridor. If any of the doors running along either side were to open, she would be in plain sight with nowhere to hide. Quickly, she covered her lower face with the mask and hurried forward, clutching the file to her chest, her rubber-soled shoes squeaking on the floor. There was a strong smell of disinfectant and a pervasive silence. Quarantine meant isolation, but it was almost as if there was no one else here. Glass windows should have provided a view into therooms, but most were obscured by curtains that had been drawn over.

She could hear voices up ahead and felt a rush of panic as she looked for the stairs.Where...?She saw them and climbed the two flights, running up the steps two at a time. At the top, she took a left and scurried down the passage, scanning the room numbers.

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