The show ward turned out to be very impressive, and utterly artificial. Neat patients in neat beds, none of them suffering from anything unsightly or upsetting, attended to by very attractive young nurses in starched white uniforms. There were flowers everywhere, and even the antiseptic in the air had a trace of perfume in it. Lots of light, lots of space, and no-one in any pain at all. A complete dream of a hospital ward. We weren’t actually allowed to talk to any of the patients or nurses, of course. The intern did his best to blind us with statistics about recovery rates, while I looked around for something, anything, out of place. The ward looked absolutely fine, but... something about it disturbed me.

It took me a while to realise that the whole ward was simply too normal for the Nightside. If this was all the rich and powerful patients wanted, they could get it in Harley Street. The clincher was that not one of the patients or the nurses so much as glanced at me, or Suzie. And that was very definitely not normal.

Dr. Dougan broke off from his speech when the doors burst open behind us and half a dozen security men moved quickly forward to surround us. Large men, with large bulges under their jackets where their guns were holstered. Suzie looked at them thoughtfully.

“We’re not here to make any trouble,” I said quickly. “We’re just looking.”

“Visiting hours are over,” said the largest of the security men. “Your presence is disturbing the patients.”

“Yeah,” I said. “They do look disturbed, don’t they? We’ll come back another day, when they’re feeling more talkative.”

He didn’t smile. “I don’t think that would be wise, Mr. Taylor.”

“Is he giving us the bum’s rush, John?” said Suzie. Her voice was calm and lazy and very dangerous. The security men held themselves very still.