“Did you hear me?” LeBrock was looming over me. “The fire? It convinced Carolyn she couldn’t trust Homeland Security, and—”
“Is Carolyn OK?”
“She was half an hour ago.”
“Thank God. But where does that leave us? Her? Me? You? The guys who were threatening you?”
“Come with me. Let me show you something.”
I levered myself out of the chair and followed LeBrock around the side of the staircase. The space under it was enclosed, and the wall had been painted to look like a Mondrian, with the metal beams taking the place of the black lines between the fields of color. LeBrock pressed the edge of the largest white panel and stood back, allowing it to open and reveal a little closet with two shelves. The lower one was bare, but on the upper one there were twin piles of money—serious, life-changing piles—and a pair of U.S. passports.
“Forty million dollars,” he said.
“In thousand-dollar bills? I didn’t know they still existed.”
“They do. But they’re rare. Collectors’ items, basically. Shows the kind of people I’m dealing with.”
“And the passports?”
“Take a look. See what you think.”
“Isobel Draper.” I flipped through the pages. “And Daniel Abbot. But there are no pictures. Who are they?”
“They were going to be Carolyn and me. My guy’s adding her picture on Monday.”
“You said there was nothing between you. Now you’re running away together under false names with a ton of cash?”
“Going away. With new names. But not together. Not like that. The money’s nothing. A drop in the ocean, compared to what I made in the auction. And anyway, I’m not going, now. What would be the point?”
“Staying alive? Hang around here, and those guys will come knocking again. You know they will.”
“I could run from them, Marc. Sure. But from a ghost? Two ghosts now? How would I do that? So, no. I’m going to stay. I’ve doubled my life insurance. Installed security cameras. Built a safe room—the best money can buy. And if there’s a price to pay on top of that, so be it. I’ve had enough.”
“Good for you, Roger. Very noble. But what about Carolyn? You can’t condemn her, too.”
“I’m not. Weimann’s death was the last straw. It convinced her to run. She’s saying some goodbyes, right now. Then she’s meeting me here tomorrow. To get her picture taken. She’s leaving on Monday, when the passport’s done. With her half of the money. All the money, if she wants it.”
I opened Isobel Draper’s passport again and imagined how it would look with Carolyn’s photograph in the empty space.
“Was I on Carolyn’s list of goodbyes, Roger?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t say. But she’ll be here tomorrow, at noon. For maybe half an hour. If you haven’t heard from her, come over. Tell her goodbye yourself.”
Saturday. Late evening.
LEBROCK HAD SWORN I COULD DEPEND ON HIS DRIVER, AND I prayed he was right as I asked the guy to stop the car half a mile from the Rotunda Inn and wait while I stepped out to use the phone.
The first number I dialed was McKenna’s.
“Marc?” He picked up immediately. “Is that you?”
“It is. Are you at the hotel?”
“Which hotel?”
“The weird round one.”
“No. Why? Are you?”
“No. How soon could you be there?”
“Say, ninety minutes?”
“That’ll work. I want to meet. I have something for you. Another memory stick. One final copy. My wife had it. I’m hoping that’ll balance the books, after I skipped out on you.”
“OK.” He paused. “Have you still got your key card? For the room?”
“Yes.”
“Good. The reservation’s paid for through tomorrow. If you’re there before me, just let yourself in and wait.”
“Hold on. I have a condition. I need a promise from you, first.”
“What?”
“That you’ll come alone. Just you. No tricks. Otherwise the deal’s off. I’ll disappear and you’ll never see me or the memory stick again. Deal?”
“Deal.”
“I need your absolute guarantee, Agent McKenna. I’m dead serious.”
“You have it, Marc. See you in ninety.”
MY NEXT CALL WAS to Peever, and I offered him the same terms. I’d hand over the last remaining memory stick, but only if he met me alone at the Rotunda in ninety minutes. He agreed, too, with no hesitation. And finally I called News 12. I told the duty editor I was a limo dispatcher, and I’d just overheard my boss on the phone. He’d taken a top-secret job to meet a pair of mystery celebrities from England at Valhalla train station, sometime in the next two hours. He’d mentioned the Secret Service. A rendezvous with a private plane at Westchester airport. An official car that had broken down. And two names.
Catherine. And George.
Finally I dropped the phone in a little cardboard box I’d taken from the bakery van before leaving LeBrock’s. I gave it to his driver with instructions to deliver it to the guy running the coffee cart at Valhalla station, or to leave it behind the rear wheel if no one was there. And then I set off toward the hotel on foot.
I MADE IT TO my old room undetected, and was surprised to see my suitcase sitting on the floor. I’d forgotten that’s where I’d left it. My two laptop computers were still inside so I pulled them out, set them at the foot of the bed, turned on the TV, and found the News 12 channel. It was in the middle of a documentary about how Westchester residents had campaigned to save a local arboretum, but after ten minutes the picture changed. The show was replaced by a special news report.
An outside broadcast.
I recognized the exterior of Valhalla station, behind the reporter’s head.
I leaned in closer to the screen, scanning for every detail, but there was no one of interest to be seen. The commentary was banal, and I realized the station was reluctant to make any bold promises on the strength of my call. The guy I’d spoken to mustn’t have swallowed my story the way I’d hoped. My heart sank. How long would the report continue? What if they lost interest, and switched back to their regular programs? Or worse, if the sight of the cameras frightened off my prey?
Had I made a fatal miscalculation here?
The reporter filled the airwaves with drivel for another five minutes, then the camera pulled in close for the wrap. And without meaning to, the director did me a huge favor. Because along with his star’s face, the view through the station entrance was also magnified. Just enough for me to make out a pair of familiar figures, lurking nonchalantly near the unmanned coffee cart and pretending to be deep in conversation.
Peever. And the other agent I’d seen at the supermarket.
Liars.
Which just left McKenna to worry about.
Saturday. Night.
I COULDN’T BEAR THE RETURN TO REALITY, SO I SWITCHED OFF the TV and lay down to wait.
My head was immediately filled with thoughts of Carolyn. All the things I wanted to say to her. All the ways I could try to apologize. I dreamed up and discarded dozens of possibilities, and when McKenna knocked on my door thirty minutes later I was still no closer to settling on anything even remotely adequate.
McKenna’s hair was wet, even though it wasn’t raining, and one of the buttons had fallen off his jacket since I’d last seen him. He nodded to me, then sat on the bed next to the laptops and leaned back until half his face disappeared in the shadow thrown by the room’s single, low-wattage bulb.
“Talk to me.” He picked at a loose thread from the bedspread. “Where have you been?”
“I went to find my wife. I was mad at her. I was mad at you, too, if I’m honest. But I found out some stuff that changed things. See, she was being blackmailed. Her, and Roger LeBrock. AmeriTel’s CEO. I convinced her that giving in to these guys was the wrong thing to do. And that if she cooperated with you instead, you’d protect her. She had one more copy of the stick. She’d kept it as insurance. She handed it to me to pass on to you. As a gesture of good faith.”