...Continued Part I: molto lento
Pascal interrupted--you could always depend on him to start speaking while he was still a way off to let you know he was approaching. It was a habit of his Bert could admire, as he hated being sneaked up on.
"Monsieur Bert, the doctor, he is here."
Bert and Nick rose to shake hands, but the young black man in street clothes waved them off. He wore a Karl Kani rucksack over one shoulder, as though he were a student on his way to lecture.
"Stockwell Winston," he introduced himself, one hand on his chest.
As usual, Nick tried to take control of the situation. "Well, Dr. Stockwell."
"Win. You can call me Win--and not Doctor, please. It should be clear--I've got no license or permits to practice in France."
"Well, Win," Bert smoothly ignored the man's unneeded confidence. Licensed practitioners rarely worked on the hush-hush. "How are you with ribs?" Bert unbuttoned his shirt to reveal the bloom of a deeply purple bruise.
Nick visibly winced at the sight of it, unable to let himself keep from projecting the pain of such a bruise onto on his own ribcage.
However, the sight of the limo door's earlier impact left their medical guest un-phased. "Coughing any blood, Mr. Myers?"
"Trying not to cough at all, actually." With Win's arrival Bert finally felt, for the first time since it happened, that he could give the pain in his side carte blanche, stop pretending it wasn't there.
"I'll take that as a no. Could we manage to get you up on a stool?" Win asked, and Bert gritted his teeth, but managed to straddle one on his own power.
Win poked and prodded Bert, opened his rucksack to reveal a well-outfitted surgical kit, and asked a few more questions. Casually, as though they were discussing the day's weather, or stock report--something far more remote than a body.
"I do agree with your diagnosis on number eight, Mr. Myers, but I'd like to take an X-ray--if I could--to be certain about numbers, um, seven and six."
"What--here?" Bert and Nick asked in chorus.
Win stuck a hand into the bag and withdrew a wand that looked more like a black light than anything else--the kind counterfeiters used to check for watermarks and holograms. Along with it he also took out a folded posterboard-like screen, that unfolded to be quite large, and he asked Nick to stand behind Myers holding it up as he used the tiny light for a moment, scanning deliberately up and down Bert's side.
"Well done." He had finished. He detached something from the screen about the size of an 8x10 and pulled a film off of it, like old instant Polaroid film.
Skeptical of the proceedings thus far, Nick entered into his own ham-handed version of small-talk. The kind of small-talk that had gotten him in to trouble with Claudia earlier because it had sounded so much like interrogation. It still did. "So, if you're not licensed in France--then where?"
"Cote d'Ivoire," Win answered evenly. "There was some--trouble there."
"Naturally." Bert answered for Nick, wincing at the cop-like mentality his friend had that simply did not fit into his world--this world. Asking an underground doctor about his past--questions like that had gotten better men (and more discreet men) than Nick Wolfe killed. Bert made a note to remind himself to try and touch base with Nick about such protocol later, and he prayed that Win, here, hadn't been offended by the upright Superman to his left.
"Well," Win said, holding the film to the light, "you're no stranger, I see, to broken or cracked ribs. It is only the eight after all, just as you said--though I think the nine is bruised enough not to mind some TLC on your part. We'll wrap you and--just get in touch with someone in a few weeks. I'd be glad to take the call, but--whatever."
He produced a length of ACE-like bandages, and a pillowcase. Which will it be?" he asked. "While I understand the clinical appeal of traditional bandaging, I've found that a good 400-thread count cotton sham is really where it's at in the comfort department."
Myers, Nick, and Pascal stared at him quizzically.
"It's easy enough to do, and it'll still be around for the," Win cleared his throat, "next time." He pulled out a tape measure and asked Bert to exhale, which he did. After taking the measurement, he used a curved stitching needle and began to fit the pillowcase to the circumference of Bert's chest. "Only take a moment."
And it did. The case fit as perfectly as the bandages might have--with all the support needed and none of the tiresome wrapping and winding that Bert would have found it difficult to accomplish in the coming days on his own.
"Excellent, Win. How much?" Bert preemptively pointed Pascal toward the elevator. He'd have to go up to the office safe to secure the payment. "Will francs do, or do you have another currency preference?"
"Francs--" Win withdrew a PDA and consulted it for a moment. "Francs this week will do nicely." He smiled and began to pack up.
"Did you hear the man, de Vergesse? Bring it in francs."
Pascal closed the grate and gripped the lever as he ascended out of sight.
Bert cocked his head to Win. "And how could I contact you again?"
"Pascal knows where to find me."
"Good enough."
They shook hands.
"You know, I haven't been here since--well, a man named Korda was the owner. Nice to know the new proprietress--what's her name? Hasn't changed the place too much."
"Amanda. Her name's Amanda," said Bert, and inwardly his earlier grimace of pain had returned.
...to be continued...
***********DISCLAIMERS: The characters in this story are not my property, never have been, and I'm just borrowing them for a few pages. No money is being made, etc.
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