“For a while,” Manville said.
“Then you’ll have to stand it for the weekend,” Brevizin told him. “There’s nothing more to be done today. I’ll talk to some people, look into the situation. Assuming I don’t run across anything that suggests you’re a really accomplished liar and fantasist, you should ring me Monday morning at... eleven o’clock.”
“I will. Do you want to meet Kim? She’s three blocks from here, in one of the street cafes on the Mall.”
“Monday will do,” Brevizin told him. “I’ll probably want you to bring her with you then.”
“She wanted to make a phone call of her own,” Manville said. “To this guy Jerry Diedrich, from Planetwatch. They have an office down in Sydney, she thinks she can find him through there. I said I’d ask you, and she’ll call him if you say okay.”
“I don’t see why not,” Brevizin said, “if only on the concept that the enemy of my enemy is my friend. Diedrich is unlikely to betray either of you to Richard Curtis.”
“Very unlikely,” Manville agreed.
“And Planetwatch,” Brevizin went on, “no matter how much they might irritate my clients and me in other contexts, they do have an organization and they might be of help to you.” Brevizin rose, and reached across the coffee table to shake Manville’s hand. “Keep out of sight over the weekend,” he advised, “and ring me Monday.”
“I will. And thank you, Mr. Brevizin, you’ve given me hope.”
“Not too much hope, please,” Brevizin cautioned. “Not yet.”
7
Kim sat over her second cappuccino, now long cold, and watched the pedestrians surge endlessly by. It was as though two giant machines, just out of sight, one at each end of the Mall, kept spewing these people out, in their amazing diversity, and sent them striding or strolling forward along the Mall, finally to be gobbled up again by the machine at the other end, altered into new sizes and shapes, and pushed back out to do the same thing the other way.
The Mall was two long blocks of Queen Street, here in the heart of Brisbane, where motor traffic was not permitted. Stores and restaurants filled the buildings along the way, upstairs as well as down, and spilled out into open-air cafes like the one where Kim sat and waited for George to finish with the lawyer. Shoppers and tourists and simple strollers filled the Mall from end to end, as crowded and noisy and lively as the streets of the Gold Coast, but more upscale.
Kim wondered how much longer George would be. He’d left her forty Australian dollars, so she could go on ordering cappuccino forever, but that lost its charm eventually. Also, the Ace bandage, around her torso again, was beginning to feel too tight, and starting to itch; she’d love to be back in the little room in Surfers Paradise, comfortably naked. With George. She sighed, looked around at the people at the other tables here in the cafe — couples or families, she the only single — then looked out again at the schools of passersby, and saw the killer.
It was him. He walked with two other men she’d never seen before, he in the middle, talking intently, they listening intently, and she recognized him at once. She’d never forget that man, or how he’d looked when he’d taunted George, asking if he could shoot a human being, saying George couldn’t do it, and then George did it.
Of course he’s here. Brisbane is where the Mallory was coming, and the Mall is where everybody in Brisbane walks sooner or later. But why now? Why not half an hour from now, when I’m gone from here?
Kim looked down at her trembling hands in her lap, hoping to seem like someone searching in a handbag for a tissue or change or whatever, hoping the man would just keep moving by, keep on with his intense conversation, pay no attention to the world around him, and when she looked up she stared directly into his eyes. The three of them had stopped out there, like a rocky island in the sea of pedestrians, and they were all staring at her.
Everybody moved at once. The killer shouted something to the other two, pointed at Kim, and the three leaped forward, at the same instant that Kim jumped to her feet, knocked over her chair behind her, turned to her right, and ran.
Through the tables, through the tables, breathlessly apologizing to the people seated there, afraid to look back. Hedged planters marked the boundary of the cafe, with a narrow space between two. Too narrow; something plucked at the wraparound skirt, tried to pull it off her. She clutched at bunches of skirt at both hips and kept running.
Now she looked back and they were farther away, but still chasing her. They’d had to go around the planters, but they were moving fast, and they were big enough to simply knock people out of their way, while Kim had to duck and dodge around the strollers.
The Myer Centre. She ran in, snaking around shoppers laden with bags, nearly bowling over a girl trying to offer a perfume sample, dodging to the left only because the aisle ahead was too clogged.
She wanted to call for help, but who would understand? What would she say? She didn’t have time to think, only to run.
They were back there, behind her, two in the same aisle as her, one coming faster along a more open aisle to the right. One of them was shouting; the killer, straight behind her, he was waving his fist and shouting.
“Stop! Stop! Stop, thief! She stole my wallet! Stop her!”
No, no, that’s ridiculous, that isn’t real. But it is real. And if somebody were to stop her, hold her for them, they’d finish her off before she could explain. And already people were reaching for her, wide-eyed and astonished but with clutching hands to stop the running girl.
An exit. She had to get out of here, outside, away from confinement, narrow aisles, too many bodies. Brushing aside the hands that tried to hold her, she hurtled out the exit onto some different street, not the Mall at all, but a regular street with traffic through which she ran heedless, while astonished drivers slammed on their brakes and blared their horns.
An alley. It was Elizabeth Arcade, running between Elizabeth and Charlotte Streets, though she didn’t know that. She ran into it, past a hamburger restaurant called Parrot’s on her right and a sign for an upstairs vegetarian restaurant called Govinda’s on her left, and straight down the arcade.
Another look over her shoulder. They were still back there, still running hard, the killer still shouting his horrible absurd demand.
The end of the arcade. She veered left, because that way there were fewer people in her path. She ran, leaving a sea of startled faces in her wake, and at the next corner there was a crowded bus just taking on passengers, the last man pressing in, pushing himself on, the door about to close.
Kim ran full tilt into the bus, slamming into the last man’s back, shoving a whole phalanx of people deeper into the bus ahead of her, as the door snicked shut behind her, and the bus moved away from the curb. She ignored the comments and the dirty looks, ignored the crush, and managed to twist around just enough to look over her shoulder, out the window. They had stopped back there, panting, holding their sides, moving together to confer.
The bus was so crowded she had no opportunity to pay before it stopped again, not far enough along this street.
She jumped backward to the curb the instant the door opened, spun around, looked only straight ahead, and ran.
Two blocks later, out of breath, she slowed to a walk, and looked back, and they were gone. She stopped. She’d lost them.
And herself. Slowly catching her breath, she looked around at this new street. She hadn’t the slightest idea where she was.
8
She wasn’t there.
Manville double-checked, walked both ways along the Mall, frowning at the people at the tables in other open-air cafes, and she was at none of them. He’d been right the first time; there was where he’d left her, at that table in the middle of that particular cafe, where the young couple now giggled together like the newlyweds they no doubt were.