And that's before you start asking how many regulatory committees she had to buy off to bury the details of her research."
"Why not go after her directly"
"Because — " Ramona shrugs. "Eileen's not the main target. She's not even the appetizer. What she does amounts to at most a few dozen deaths per year. If Ellis gets what my boss thinks he wants the whole human species gets to deal with the fallout. So he figured I should get close to Eileen — to introduce you to Ellis, as much as anything else — and meanwhile get enough of a grip on the rest of her project to mop them up afterward."
"You were going to get information out of Marc after your Other got through chowing down on his soul?"
"You'd be surprised." She sniffs primly. "Anyway, you should know, mister computational demonologist: How hard would it be to summon up a puppeteer and schedule a latebinding, voice-directed linkage to keep the body dancing"
I think back to the dead seagulls. To the bad guys and what they did to Marc after his fatal heart attack. "Not very."
"Okay, just so you know the score." She reaches out and grasps my wrist. Her fingers are warm and much too human.
"Billington's plans," I prompt. "The business with the Explorer."
"I'm not allowed to tell you everything I know," she says patiently. "If you know too much, his geas will spit you out like a melon seed and we won't have any time to prep a replacement."
"But you need me to get aboard his ship because I'm playing a role in some sort of script. While you stay entangled with me so you get to come along, too." I swallow.
"Punching a hole in his firewall."
"That's the idea:"
"Any idea how to do it"
"Well — " a hint of a smile " — Billington usually visits the casino every evening when he's in range. So I'd say we ought to get back to the hotel and get ready for a high-rolling evening, and try to finesse an invitation. How does that sound"
I stand up. "That sounds like a plan," I say doubtfully. "I expected something a bit more concrete, though." I glance around. "Where did I put my boxers"
We head back up the beach and when we get to the car Ramona hands me my clothes. By the time I get out of the toilet she's changed into a white sundress, head scarf, and shades that conceal her eyes. She's unrecognizable as the naked blonde from the beach. "Let's go," she suggests, turning the ignition key. I belt in beside her and she guns the engine, backing out of the parking lot in a spray of sand.
Ramona drives carefully along the coast road, back towards the west end of the island and the hotels and casinos.
I slump down in the passenger seat and check my email as soon as we get adequate cellphone coverage. All that's waiting for me are two administrative circulars from the office, an almost plaintive request for a Sitrep from Angleton, and an interesting business proposition from the widow of the former president of Nigeria[10 I briefly consider replying to the latter in the person of a highly placed agent of a secret British government agency, but the last time I did that Tony from Internal Security called me into his office and waxed sarcastic for almost half an hour before ordering me to give them back their bank.]. Ramona doesn't seem to be in a talkative mood right now, and I'm not sure I want to risk upsetting her by asking why.
Eventually, as we're entering Philipsburg, she nods to herself and begins talking. "You'll want to report in to your support team." She downshifts a gear and the engine growls.
"Keep your station chief off your back, pick up the toys your tech guys have been unpacking, and call home."
"Yes. So?" I study the roadside. Pedestrians in bright summer holiday gear, locals in casuals, rickshaws, parked cars. Heat and dust.
"Just saying." We're crawling along. "Then I figure we need to meet up, late afternoon. To go sort out your invitation to the floating party aboard the Mabuse."
Late afternoon. A stab of guilt gets to me: it's about six o'clock back home, and I really ought to call Mo. I've got to reassure her that everything's under control and make sure she doesn't do something stupid like drop everything and come out here. (Assuming everything is under control, a quiet comer of my conscience reminds me. If you were Mo, and you knew what was going on, what would you do?) "You sound very certain that I'll get an invite," I speculate.
"Oh, I don't think it'll be too difficult." Ramona focuses on the road ahead. "You already got Billington's attention yesterday. After today, he'll want another look at you." She looks pensive. "Just in case, I've got some ideas. We can go over them later."
I steel myself. "I get the feeling you're trying very hard not to tell me something that's not related to the mission," I begin. "And you know I know but I don't know what I'm not supposed to know, and so — " I wind down, trying to keep track of all the double-indirect pointers and Boolean operators before I succumb to a stack crash.
"Not your problem, monkey-boy," she says with a false smile and a toss of her beautiful blonde hair, now coiling up into tight ringlets as the seawater dries in the breeze over the windscreen. "Don't worry yourself about me."
"What — " My skin crawls.
She looks at me, her eyes abruptly distant and hard. "You just have to get aboard the yacht, figure out what's going on, and expedite a solution," she tells me. "I've got to sit it out back here."
"But." I shut my mouth before I can stick any of my feet in it by accident. Then I point my head forwards, watching her out of the corner of my eye. Thin-lipped and grim-faced, knuckles gripping the steering wheel. The mermaid who clutched me to her watery bosom is frightened. Ramona, who plays with her food and never slept with a man who didn't die within twenty-four hours, is concerned. Driving me back to the hotel and the safe house and a setup where she'll have to hand me over to people she seems to despise — Ramona, the spy who loves me? No, that dog won't hunt. It must be something else, but whatever it is, she isn't talking.
So we drive the rest of the way to the hotel in lonely silence, grappling with our respective demons.
10: DEAD LUCKY
WHEN I BET BACK TO MY HOTEL ROOM I FIND BORIS pacing the carpet like a trapped tiger. "What time you are naming this?" he asks, tapping his heavy stainless steel wristwatch. "Am being on edge of calling in Code Red on you!"
Pinky has plugged a PlayStation into the TV set and is making zooming sounds, bouncing up and down on the bed; and from the sounds leaking under the bathroom door Brains is testing a radio-controlled hovercraft in the shower.
"I've been running some errands," I say tiredly. "And then I went swimming."
"Swimming?" Boris shakes his head. "Am not enquiring.
Are giving Angleton the Sitrep yet"
"Oops. My bad." I pull out the desk chair and slump into it. My forearms and thighs are aching in unaccustomed places: I'm going to feel like shit tomorrow. "How did you get in here"
Pinky saves his game and looks round. "Picked the lock,"
he says, waving what looks suspiciously like a hotel card key at me.
"You picked." I stare at it. "The lock."
"Yup." He flips it at me and I catch it. "It's a smartcard, got an induction loop instead of the usual dumb mag stripe on the back. Guaranteed to run through the complete list of makers' override keys in under twenty seconds."
"Right." I put it down carefully.
"Hey, I'll want it back in a minute — where'd you think I saved my game"
Boris snorts, then stares at me. "Report, Bob, now."