Evensong полностью

“This is their endgame. Between now and the signing, they must move for her. So put your people outside her suite in the positions we discussed. I’ll be in here with her, and I won’t be sleeping. Come for us with your people at 9:00 tomorrow, in the formation we agreed, and escort us to the Conference Centre. If nothing happens there, put them in the agreed positions in the Signing Room and along the mezzanine. And be there yourself. I’ll take it from there.”

They had to move before the signing. He would stay awake all night. Not a problem: he could blank out his sleep requirement for a short period, say a day or two. And right now, he couldn’t see further ahead than a day or two.

He left the doors to her balcony open, and the lights off. Now that the endgame had been reached, it became simpler: just throw people at it. He knew Gaetano would have people on other balconies. On the roof. On adjoining roofs. On the corridors, this one and the ones below.

But not in her apartment. If anything came for her, he wanted to be alone with it.

He stayed awake all night, and nothing happened and nothing came. It was about 8:00 a.m. Two hours to the signing. He made a quick check-in call to Gaetano,confirmed Olivia was still asleep, and put in a call to Arden Bierce. Maybe my last one to her, a voice inside him said. Don’t be morbid, another voice replied. Or self-indulgent, a third one added.

“Still nothing,” he told Arden. “They didn’t move for her throughout the summit. They didn’t move during the night. It must come today. They want it live and public, and everyone will have gone tomorrow.”

“What about your Detail? The one she wouldn’t tell you?”

“I’ve left it. No time, not any more.”

“There’s something I should tell you...” She was going to tell him about Rafiq and herself, but stopped as she realised how wrong it would be at this time.

“Something you should tell me?”

“Not tell you, ask you.” She was floundering, uncharacteristically.

“Ask me what?”

She cast around desperately. “Something,” she blurted, “about what Carne said to you. No,” her voice shook as she realised this was what she’d been looking for, “about the way he said it.”

“You weren’t there.”

“I know, but your account covered everything as if I was. Why do you think we give you all eidetic memories? It was the way he said it! Dammit, Anwar. I’ll call you later.”

When she flicked her wristcom shut, she was shaking. This was pivotal. There really was something, and she’d only thought of it when she’d been trying to avoid telling him about Rafiq and he’d been pressing her and now she had to chase it down and would there be time? He only had about two hours until the signing, and if they were still going to move for her then this—whatever it was—might be something he needed to know. She had to chase it down.

Anwar went into Olivia’s bedroom. She was still sleeping. The act of watching her sleeping, and the act of waking her, which he’d do in a moment, could in different contexts both be acts of intimacy. But not in this context. Her face was small and sharp-featured against the bulk of her pillow. Far from ugly, but not beautiful like Arden’s, either. It didn’t matter now. Her face carried too many associations for him to bother about its aesthetics.

You’ve shown me more double meanings, he thought, more things under the surface, in the last three weeks than I’ve seen in the rest of my life. I don’t know if love exists, but I’ve listed all the pros and cons about you and I think it must Nothing else seems to fit.

She moved slightly, but didn’t wake.

And now it’s academic. We both mistimed. Whatever happens today, whether I protect you or not, the mission will finish and we won’t see each other again.

He reached down and shook her shoulder to wake her. “Time,” he said. 

Anwar and Olivia left the New Grand at 8:55 a.m. on October 20. Gaetano was with them. They walked through piazzas and gardens to the Conference Centre. Anwar wore his light grey linen blend suit and dark grey woven-silk shirt from his first day at Brighton. Olivia, coincidentally, wore the dark red velvet dress she’d worn when she first greeted him. It had to be coincidental, because they no longer dressed or undressed in each other’s presence.

Anwar also wore his Yusuf Khan badge, though it was probably too near the end to worry about details of identity.