She thought of Jonathan and tried to fathom what it meant to her that he was working for Roper's ruin. She wrestled, as her father would have done, with the rights and wrongs of her dilemma, but all she could really come up with was that Roper represented a catastrophic wrong turning in her life, and that Jonathan had some brotherly claim upon her that was unlike any other claim she had ever felt; and that she even found it companionable when he saw through her, provided he was also confident of the good parts of her, because those were the pails she wanted to get out and dust and put back into service. For instance, she wanted her father back. And she wanted her Catholicism back, even if it woke the tearaway in her every time she thought about it. She wanted firm ground under her feet, but this time she was prepared to work for it. She would even listen sweetly to her bloody mother.
Finally came Daniel's day of departure, which by then she seemed to have been waiting for all her life. So Jed and Corkoran together took Daniel and his luggage to the airport in the Rolls, and as soon as they arrived Daniel needed to dawdle alone at the newsstand in order to buy sweets and reading material and do whatever small boys do when they're going back to their bloody mothers. So Jed and Corkoran waited for him in the middle of the concourse, both suddenly miserable at the prospect of his departure, the more so since Daniel was on the verge of serious tears. And then to her surprise she heard Corkoran speaking to her in a conspiratorial whisper.
"Got your passport, heart?"
"Corks, darling, it's Daniel who's leaving, not me. Remember?"
"Have you got it or not? Quick!"
"I've always got it."
"Then go with him, heart," he begged, taking out his handkerchief and fussing his nose with it in order not to look as though he was talking. "Jump for it now. Corks never said a word. All your own work. Seats galore. I asked."
But Jed didn't jump for it. It never crossed her mind, which was something she was at once extremely pleased about. In the past she had tended to jump first and ask questions afterwards. But that morning, she discovered that she had answered the questions in her mind already, and she wasn't going to jump anywhere if it meant jumping further away from Jonathan.
* * *
Jonathan was dreaming deliciously when the phone rang, and still dreaming as he lifted it. Nonetheless, the close observer was swift in his reaction, stifling the first ring, then switching on the light, then grabbing a notepad and pencil in anticipation of Rooke's instructions.
"
He pressed his eyes shut. He jammed the phone to his ear, trying to contain the sound of her voice. Every practical instinct in him told him to say, "Jonathan who? Wrong number," and ring off.
"For Christ's sake," he whispered. "Get off the line. Go to sleep."
But the conviction in his voice was fading, and it was too late now to say wrong number. So he lay with the telephone at his ear, listening while she repeated his name, Jonathan, Jonathan, practising it, getting the hang of it in all its shades, so that nobody would send her back to the beginning of the course to start her round again.
* * *
They've come for me.
It was an hour later, and Jonathan could hear footsteps trying to be silent outside his door. He sat up. He heard one step, and it was sticky on the ceramic tiles, and he knew it was a bare foot. He heard a second, and it was on the carpet that ran down the centre of the corridor. He saw the corridor light go on and off in his keyhole as a body slipped past, he thought from left to right. Was Frisky sizing up to burst in on him? Had he gone to fetch Tabby so that they could do the job together? Was Millie returning his laundry? Was a barefoot boot boy collecting shoes to clean? The hotel does not clean shoes. He heard the click of a bedroom lock across the corridor and knew it was a barefoot Meg coming back from Roper's suite.
He felt nothing. No censure, no easing of his conscience or his soul.
* * *
He watched the sky lighten in his window, imagining her head gently turning against his ear. He dialled room 22, let it ring four times and dialled again but didn't speak.
"You're bang on course," Rooke said quietly. "Now hear this."
