Sam grimaced as the window squeaked and protested at being opened, worried that he would wake Nina, but she only mumbled in her sleep and turned over. He remembered a remark Purdue had once made about how deeply she slept. Nevertheless, he was careful to keep the noise down as he climbed out onto the rickety metal structure and settled down for a smoke.
The cigarette had not even touched his lips when he noticed the movement. Someone else was on the fire escape, just one story beneath him. A dark figure — stationary now, perhaps alert to the possibility of being spotted. ‘It could just be someone else out for a smoke,’ Sam thought. ‘Best thing to do is stay calm. We can’t be in danger every single time.’ Tentatively, he took a puff and breathed the smoke out slowly, watching the figure out of the corner of his eye.
It moved. A sudden, fluid, silent movement, up three steps. Sam could think of no reason why a fellow smoker on the floor below would be creeping up the stairs towards him. ‘Here we go again,’ he thought. He stubbed out the cigarette and turned back towards the window.
“Sam!”
Sam paused. The figure was closer now and still advancing, slowly and steadily, hands un-gloved and raised in a gesture of surrender.
“Sam, it’s me.” The pale hands reached up and pulled off the balaclava that covered the figure’s face.
“Purdue!” Sam’s jaw dropped. “What’s happening?”
Purdue said nothing until they were both inside. “We should be a little safer now,” he whispered. “I’ve lined the first step on the final flight with this.” In the dim light filtering in through the window, he held up a small spool, barely larger than a reel of thread, with something that looked like cling film wrapped round it. “I am quite proud of this. It’s essentially a much lighter, even more durable version of my tablet. If the sheet on the step detects the weight of anything heavier than a crow, it will set off a signal on the tablet to let us know that we must leave. It may buy us a life-saving few seconds.”
As usual, Sam felt completely wrong-footed by Purdue. While most people would start by explaining how they came to be sneaking up a fire escape, dressed like a cat burglar, and perhaps even apologizing for any alarm they might have caused, Purdue could not wait to share the genius of his latest toys.
“What’s happening?” Nina had woken up and was squinting into the darkness. “Sam? Are we in danger again?”
“It’s ok, Nina. It’s Purdue.”
“What?” Nina threw back the covers and got up, still fully dressed due to the fact that she had fallen asleep so quickly. “Dave? How did you get here? We were told you would be a couple of days, at least.”
“I made better time than I had expected,” Purdue said. “Anyone who was pursuing us should be under the impression that we set off in the direction of Zurich. They will catch up with us in time, no doubt, but this will give us enough time to stay one step ahead of them.”
“For how long?” Nina asked. “How long will this go on for, Dave? Are we going to be on the run forever?” A sorrowful note crept into her tone. “I want to go home.”
Sam instinctively turned to comfort her, but Purdue got there first. He sat beside her on the bed and slipped an arm around her shoulders. “You will, Nina,” he promised. “You will. I have a plan that should resolve any ill feeling between us and the Order of the Black Sun. I should soon be in a position to bargain for your safety. You must just trust me a little longer — and in the meantime, we have a task. One for which I shall need your help.”
“And what’s that?”
“There is an item I must acquire, something that will give me the means to bring matters to a conclusion with the Black Sun. Something that will require us to act… less than legally.”
Nina collapsed back onto the bed. “Well, there’s a nice change,” she sighed. “Tell me about it in the morning. Do you have a room?”
He shook his head. “Not for tonight. The floor will be quite sufficient.”
“Don’t be an idiot.” She held out the covers, inviting him into the narrow bed. With a protesting ache in his chest Sam saw him climb in beside her, and then there was silence.
‘Well, that clarifies nothing at all,’ Sam thought. He turned over, stared at the wall, and waited for morning.
Chapter Fourteen
By the time dawn broke, Sam had slept very little. His dreams had been full of strange, frightening things, images that kicked him out of sleep and into wakefulness over and over again. Memories of Trish and the days leading up to her death wove themselves together with the events of the past forty-eight hours.
During the small hours he had seen himself step out of his bedroom into the living room in Florence to watch Nina being gunned down just as Trish had been, her pretty face half-destroyed just as Trish’s had been. He had been back in the warehouse, running out from behind the crate as the smoke cleared to cradle Trish’s corpse, except this time the man wielding the gun was still alive and taking aim at Sam. As Sam had leaned back to welcome the bullet he had caught sight of the man’s face and watched it change from Charles Whitsun to his father, Admiral Whitsun, to the grinning, golden face of Jefferson Daniels and finally to Purdue before the sound of the gun shot had jolted him back into consciousness.
With such unwelcome thoughts filling his mind, Sam had found it easier just to stay awake. It was too dark to write so instead he continued to plan his book, composing paragraphs in his head and hoping that he would remember them by the time he was able to see his notebook again. Shaping sentences on the wall kept him focused, prevented him from turning over and seeing the dimly outlined shapes of Nina and Purdue in the opposite bed. He had no idea how things stood between the two of them. He did not know how to ask. Caught up in the business of running for their lives, there had been little time to be concerned with how they defined their relationship.
‘You’re thinking about it again,’ Sam rebuked himself. ‘And you shouldn’t be. It’s none of your business what they do. If Nina wants to talk, she will. If she doesn’t, then it’s safe to assume that she doesn’t want to. Or at least, not to me. The important thing is that she knows that she can talk to me as a friend. At least I hope she does.’
He pushed the thought of Nina out of his mind.
The fresh scent of the crisp morning entwined with stark black caffeine permeated Sam’s senses. His body was still a little stiff from a night of nightmares and he had yet to make peace with Nina and Purdue’s new sleeping arrangements.
“So do we have a plan?” Sam climbed onto the bench and set his heavily laden plate down on the long refectory table.
“You know, you could have gone back for seconds, Sam,” Nina remarked, eyeing the heap of rolls, ham and cheese in front of him. “There’s no-one else here, I doubt anyone would have judged you.”
“God is always watching, Nina. Besides, who says I’m not going back?” Sam tore open a roll, smeared it thickly with butter and stuffed it full. “This is me just getting started. You know the rules, never waste free food.” He took a big bite and munched contentedly. Nina rolled her eyes at him and sipped her hot chocolate.
Never one to answer swiftly when there was a moment of intrigue to be created, Purdue kept them waiting before answering Sam’s question. He looked around, taking in the length of the empty hall, the height of its vaulted ceiling, the tall, narrow windows. “It’s an interesting safe house, isn’t it? I considered buying this place, you know, about five years ago. It seemed to me to have immense potential — sufficient space to build labs and work rooms, and I had a romantic fancy for a monastic cell. A small, irrational part of me was taken with the idea that I might work well in a place that had been built specifically for devotion and contemplation. But it lacked the privacy and seclusion that Wrichtishousis offered, and besides, I was outbid. Not something that happens to me very often, as I’m sure you can imagine, but it mattered a great deal to somebody that this place should remain open to those in need. But then, had I not purchased Wrichtishousis I would have missed out on the opportunity to meet you. Anyway, knowing of this place has done me a disservice now, because if I hadn’t I am almost certain that I would have made a mistake in interpreting the first clue.”