The worker called after he had spoken to the advocate, not when Eli wanted him to.
He would discuss what he had heard about the dam with the shelter volunteer present. He would not give a public statement that night, allow the shelter’s rooms to be searched or disclose the route by which Mira had brought him there. He wanted Tessa at the conversation because the question about missing patients mattered to him.
Eli read the conditions and felt, with an impatience he disliked, that every person they needed had acquired the power to slow them down. Then he thought of the man’s wrists and the exit he had tried to reach when he saw Sera’s license.
They went to an outer meeting room chosen by the worker. Sera did not resume watching the building. She delivered her corrected notes to the private contact he had approved, then stayed at the clinic with the response calls. Eli and Tessa entered with the revised map, the current aggregate count and no request for a photograph.
The worker sat close to the shelter volunteer. A cup of water stood untouched before him. He looked at Tessa’s folder first.
“Those are the people you said were missed?”
