If they don’t find a camera, they won’t look for pictures.
The whole business had taken five and a half minutes. She washed her hands, just in case anyone was going to sniff them, and went back out. Mark was sitting indecisively in his chair, half-poised to get up. The green-coated man had gone.
‘Michael’s not at the Hotel Marjan,’ Mark said. He sounded angry. ‘The receptionist said he checked in an hour ago, but the room’s empty.’
That didn’t take long. She tried to look apologetic. ‘He probably went for a walk. We’ve been on the road for most of the last fourteen hours.’
‘Why didn’t you bring him here?’
‘Because he knows better than to walk into a walled town that’s crawling with SIS.’
‘Did you tell him we were here?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Does he trust you?’
‘Maybe. Probably not.’ She let exasperation show. ‘Michael convinced the world he was dead, and then covered his tracks so well that neither you nor Dragović could find him. Do you think he’s just going to sit in a bedroom watching TV, while I go and meet with the people who want to arrest him? If I was him, I’d be sitting in the café next door to the hotel, watching to see if any flat-footed thugs came charging in looking for Michael Lascaris.’
Mark’s eyes narrowed. ‘How did you get here?’
‘By car.’
‘Make? Model?’
‘It’s blue.’
Mark started to say something patronising and stereotypical, then realised she was playing with him.
‘It’s a Skoda Fabia – the hatchback. I don’t remember the registration.’
This time, he didn’t bother to pretend with his phone. He pushed back his chair and stood. Outside the window, Abby saw the flash of a red skirt between the columns across the street.
‘Where are you going?’
‘We. You’re staying with me until we get our hands on Michael.’
‘Bollocks to that. If he’s seen your people, he’ll know I’ve turned him in.’ She got up and pulled on her coat. ‘I’ll take care of myself.’
‘Come with me,’ he said. Not an order, more a plea. For a moment she could almost believe he cared about her. ‘I’ve got a car waiting on the promenade. A clean passport, too. In three hours you can be back home and safe. You can have your life back.’
And why not? No more running. No more drifting around these concrete cities at the end of civilisation, waking up every morning not knowing if she’d live or die. Out of the cold, into the warmth.
But what was her life, after all? An empty flat, a failed marriage and a lost faith. She’d come too far down this road.
She put a twenty-kuna note on the table. ‘That’s for the coffee.’
Mark didn’t try to stop her.
‘Aren’t you forgetting something?’ He waggled a finger in the direction of her neck; she gave him an I’m-sorry grimace, unhooked the necklace and laid it back in the box.
‘I bet you do that to all your ex-girlfriends.’
She left the warmth of the café and stepped out into the courtyard. The lady in the red skirt had moved along to the far end and was examining a shop window; the man in the black fleece was enthusiastically photographing the sphinx. The day was so dark the flash kept going off.
She turned right, then immediately right again down a narrow alley barely wider than she was. Footsteps followed – the snare-drum tap of a woman’s boots.
That’s why they let you go. They think you’ll lead them to Michael.
She came out into a small square. Ahead loomed the stark front of a grey Roman temple, squeezed tight between the red-roofed houses. She skirted around its monumental base, past a shuttered café and along an even narrower alley. The tight walls echoed the footsteps back at her like the chatter of crows.
The alley intersected with a wider street, the old Roman Cardo, running through the heart of the palace. East was the mausoleum and the peristyle; west, the double arches of Diocletian’s Iron Gate, leading out to the rest of the city. She looked both ways. To her right, the man in the black fleece was ambling along the street from the peristyle. On her left, a man was reading a tourist plaque mounted next to the gate. He looked like the green-anoraked man from the café, though he’d changed into a long fawn-coloured trenchcoat, a newspaper tucked under his arm.
She went left. The man half-turned, as if studying some detail of the architecture, but didn’t try to block her way. The gate was actually two gateways with a tower connecting them: it would be easy to hide someone inside, invisible until you’d stepped through.
Two sets of feet joined step behind her as Red Skirt and Black Fleece met. Ahead, she could see Trenchcoat looking past her. He moved the folded newspaper from his left arm to his right. Was that some sort of signal?
At the last moment, she veered right up another narrow lane. Stone arches soared overhead, connecting the buildings on both sides; all the houses had squat doors and shuttered windows cut into the dressed stone. Some were homes, but a few were shops. She quickened her pace.
Halfway down, one of the buildings housed a fashion boutique. Abby had been there when they’d visited in June. Michael had bought her a dress with bright orange flowers: she’d fussed about the cost, but worn it all through the summer. She reached the door and turned suddenly in. A bell chimed. There were no other customers. Behind the counter, a well-dressed woman was folding and smoothing a pile of cashmere sweaters. She smiled at Abby.
‘Can I help you?’
Abby smiled and shook her head. She flicked through the rails, one eye on the sizes and one on the door. No one came in; no one came past. Mark’s people had her trapped: they didn’t need to barge in and make a scene.
She picked off a pair of black trousers and a black V-neck sweater.
‘Could I try these on?’
‘Of course.’ The shopkeeper indicated a doorway next to the counter, where a dim stone staircase curved upwards. ‘The dressing room is at the top.’
Abby went upstairs. The walls on each side seemed so massive she had to presume she was climbing through the original fortifications. At the top of the stairs a wooden door led into a small white cubicle with a mirror on the wall, a stool, and an old-fashioned hatstand in the corner. A curtained window overlooked the house behind.
Abby went in and bolted the door. She pulled back the curtain and looked down on a red-tiled rooftop. The shop was built right into the walclass="underline" the roof she could see was on the outside of the old town. It led down to a courtyard between two buildings and there, dressed in motorcycle leathers and looking up expectantly, was Michael. He saw her face in the window and beckoned urgently.
A bell chimed downstairs. Someone had come into the shop. They must be getting impatient. How long would they give her – maybe two minutes? She put her hands against the wooden sash and lifted.
It rose three inches – and stopped. Adrenaline kicked in; she heaved and cursed, but it still wouldn’t move. Looking up, she saw two silver cylinders screwed into the window frame. Window locks.
The window wouldn’t open any further. From outside the door, she heard footsteps mounting the stairs.
‘Come on!’ she heard Michael shout. She tried harder, rattling the window in its casing, thumping it against the locks. They didn’t give.
The person outside stopped at the door and knocked.
‘Is everything OK? You need another size?’
It sounded like the saleswoman, though she couldn’t be sure through the door. ‘I’m fine,’ she called. ‘Just trying to make up my mind.’