Chapter 19 Chapter Nineteen

Hillary was woken up in the middle of the night, she stretched her arms and looked up to listen: "Tom, did you hear that?" "Yeah, planes fly low, nothing. They always do." "I don't understand..." She didn't finish her sentence. She lay there reminiscing over her strange meeting with Aristides. The old man had an incomprehensible affection for her. Can she take advantage of this? Can she finally rely on him to get her out? The next time he came, if he came to call her, she would try to get him to talk about his dead red-haired wife.He cannot be moved by physical temptation.The blood in his veins was cold to these loves between men and women.Besides, he had two young girls.But the old man likes to remember and is willing to talk about the past years...

Uncle George, who lived in Cheltenham. Hilary smiled in the dark, remembering Uncle George. Would Uncle George be very different at heart from this millionaire Aristides?Uncle George has a housekeeper...she's a nice person, reliable, doesn't like to dress up, and has no problem with style.Good-looking, not good-looking, but clear-headed.At last Uncle George married this good-looking man, much to the displeasure of the whole family.This woman pays attention to what others say... What did Hillary say to Tom? "I'm going to find a way to get out of here." It would be strange if the way out had to go through Aristides...

"There's news!" said LeBlanc. "There's news at last!" His correspondent came in just now, and after saluting, handed him a document.After opening it, he said excitedly: "This is a report from our reconnaissance pilot. He was operating over a selected area of ​​the Atlas Mountains. At a certain point in the mountains, he found a signal. The signal was repeated twice in Morse code. Yes, it's all here." He handed Jessop the sealed envelope.It reads: COGLEP ROSI-ESL. He marked out the last two letters with a pencil and said: "SL—this is our password, which means 'don't answer.'"

"The COG at the beginning is our identification signal," Jessop said. LeBlanc stroked out the remaining letters in the middle and said: "This is the actual content." Jessop read the words and said, "It's 'leprosy.'" LeBron asked, "What do you mean?" "Have you any knowledge of any important or minor leprosariums?" LeBron opens a large map.He pointed with his stubby fingers, yellowed from smoking, and said, "This area is where we pilots operate. Now let me see, I remember..." He left the room and returned soon after.

He said: "I know. There is a famous medical institute in this area, which is built and researched by some very famous philanthropists. It is a deserted area, by the way. In the study of leprosy , valuable work is done here. There are two hundred people in a leprosy asylum, a cancer institute, and a tuberculosis sanatorium. These are all very reliable, understand! This institution has a high reputation, and its patron is The President of the Republic himself." Jessop said appreciatively, "A job well done!" "It can be visited by the public at any time, and people in the medical field who are interested in this aspect often come."

"But they don't see what they're not supposed to see! Why shouldn't they see it? The best disguise for a shady business is the most respectable surroundings." LeBlanc said: "I think it may be a place where some group of travelers stop halfway, and perhaps one or two doctors from central Europe have made such an arrangement with success. Perhaps a small group People, like the one we're following, may hide here for a few weeks before continuing their travels." "I think not only that, but it could be the end of the journey," Jessop said. "You think this place might...not be simple?"

"It seems that the leprosy hospital is very inspiring to me... I think that under modern medical conditions, leprosy is now treated locally." "It may be so in a civilized country, but not in this country." Jessop said: "The word leprosy is still associated with the concept of the disease in the Middle Ages. At that time, alarm bells were hung on the lepers to warn passers-by. Idle curiosity does not drive people to come to the city. Look at the leprosy hospital. As you say, only medical scientists who are interested in this field will come, and maybe some social workers, who want to know the living conditions of lepers, these are of course respectable Yes. But behind philanthropy, anything can be done. By the way, who does this place belong to? Which philanthropists financed the building of this leprosy house?"

"It's easy to find out, wait a minute!" LeBron returned quickly, with an official reference in hand.He said: "It is run by a private company. The leading philanthropist is called Aristides. You know, he is a millionaire. He is willing to give generously to charity. He is in Paris and Seville in Spain. Yadu built the hospital. The place is actually dominated by him...the other philanthropists are just his helpers." "So it was Aristides' business. When Olive Betterton was in Fez, he was there." "Aristides!" LeBlanc caught the full meaning.He shouted in French:

"This is no small matter!" "yes." "This is unbelievable!" "certainly." "Anyway, it's terrible!" "Indeed." LeBron waved his index finger excitedly in front of the other party and said: "Do you realize how terrible this is? This Aristides is involved everywhere. He is the backstage of almost everything, banks, governments, manufacturing industries, armaments, Transport! He never shows up, people don't even hear about him. He sits smoking in a warm room in a Spanish castle. Sometimes he scribbles something on a little piece of paper and throws it on the floor, and a secretary Crawled over and picked it up, and a few days later an important banker in Paris committed suicide. That's how it went."

"LeBlanc, you speak so eloquently that there is nothing strange about him actually. Presidents and ministers make big announcements, bankers sit at their stately desks and give rhetoric. . . but people don't Strange that behind all this, a little old man was the real driving force. The fact that this Aristides was the general backstage behind all these disappearances of scientists is certainly not surprising at all, in fact, if we were sensitive, we would have He should have been thought of. The whole thing was a massive commercial rip-off and it was completely apolitical. Now the question is, what do we do?"

LeBron's face darkened.He said: "You know, it's not easy. If we're wrong ... I can't even think about it! Even if we're right, we have to prove we're right. If we do investigations, the higher ups might drop them, You see! It's not easy... But," he said, wagging his stubby forefinger, "we'll do it anyway!"