“Howdy. This is Dr. Upton Downey. I run the residency program at the Maine Medical Center. I’m trying to locate Dr. Christine Palmer.”
“How did you get this number?” Dark asked.
“Her mother gave it to me. Say, is this really Scotland Yard?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Well, Christine’s mom wouldn’t tell me much, except that she’s probably going to miss her next rotation. I can’t imagine Chrissi bein’ in trouble over all this stuff.”
“No, I don’t think there’s anything to worry about.”
“That’s good. I can rework her turn in radiology, but after that things get a little sticky.”
Dark hesitated, then said, “Perhaps you should speak to her directly, Dr. Downey. Hold on for a moment.”
Christine was reading a newspaper when the rap came on her door. She smiled on seeing who it was. She couldn’t help but like Chatham’s calm, amiable counterpart who’d gone out of his way to make her feel less a prisoner and more a guest.
“Hello, Ian.”
“Hello,” Dark said, returning the smile. “Tell me something. Is there a doctor back in the States who acts as your supervisor or mentor, that sort of thing?”
“I have a resident advisor, yes.”
“What’s his name?”
“Upper Downey. Or Upton, if it’s official.”
Dark looked puzzled by the silly name. “Is he a Texan?”
“Even worse. An Aggie.”
That clearly went past the Englishman. “Yes, he’s a Texan,” she said.
Dark wagged his finger for her to follow, “He’s on the phone out here. Why don’t you come talk to him.”
Christine followed Dark down the hall, Big Red in trail as always. The thought of talking to Upper seemed strange. She’d been in his office for an interim evaluation only two months ago. The hospital, her career. It all seemed like a previous life. But Upper would be the one who’d smooth things over when she got back.
Ian Dark quietly admonished her to not say anything about the ongoing investigation, then handed over the phone and disappeared.
“Upper? Are you there?”
“Hello, darlin’.”
Christine froze. The accent was right, but the voice was distinctly not. To her credit, she avoided blurting out “David!”
Slaton held quiet while she recovered.
“How are you?” Christine asked, managing to avoid the instinctive and far more delicate where question.
“I’m fine,” he said quickly. “How are you? Are they keeping you safe?”
Christine hesitated, wondering if she should try to keep some kind of verbal ruse going.
He read her thoughts. “Don’t worry. They’re probably monitoring this conversation, so let’s not bother talking in circles. I want you to pass some information on to Chatham.”
Christine didn’t want to pass information. She wanted to talk to David, she wanted to convince him to turn himself in so they could be together in the fortress that was Scotland Yard.
“David—”
“Darling,” he cut her off, “we have less than a minute. I need your help.”
Christine bit her lip. “You always know just what to say. All right, go ahead.”
“I think I’ve figured this out, or part of it anyway. There is a group in Israel, very high up in the government, who are committing terrorist acts themselves that can be blamed on others. They’ve been doing it for years, and now they’ve stolen these weapons. They’re going to use the second one this weekend, or possibly Monday morning.”
“What?”
“Don’t you see? They don’t want the Greenwich Accord. If a nuke goes off at the right place and the right time, the deal would be dead.”
“Lots of people could end up dead. Where would it happen?”
“That’s the part I don’t know. In the past they’ve attacked inside Israel, but they can’t do that now. Not without destroying — well, you can imagine.”
“Yes,” she said breathlessly.
“But they’ll use it in some way that creates a clear threat to Israel.”
“Who are these people?”
“You’ve already met some of them.”
Christine remembered Harding and Bennett and the black-clad figures at The Excelsior.
“There’s someone named Pytor Roth. I think he may know where that second weapon is. And there’s one person who runs it all.” Slaton told her who.
“Dear God, David! If you’re right—” she stopped, realizing what else it meant. “David, no! You can’t mean he’s the one responsible for—”
“Time’s almost up.”
Christine finally understood what he was going to do. Why he was still out there. She felt ill, but nothing she could say in the next few seconds would change his mind.
“Tell Chatham everything,” he said.
“What about Anton Bloch?”
“Anton?”
“He was here. I met him yesterday.”
This time she’d surprised him, but he answered right away. “Yes. Chatham and Bloch, but nobody else. They’ll know what to do.”
“All right David, I’ll do it if it will help you.”
“It will. I’ve got to go.”
The call ended with a click that seemed deafening.
Christine told Ian Dark she had to see Inspector Chatham right away, with the irregular caveat that Anton Bloch also be present. Dark seemed tentative, so she explained who they had both just spoken to. He was stunned.
Chatham was already in the building, and Dark managed to catch Bloch as he was checking out of his hotel. Twenty minutes later, Christine was rehashing the phone call with two men whose interest was nothing less than absolute. She told them about a hawkish group within the Israeli government that was terrorizing the country’s own citizens.
“This is incredible,” Chatham said. He deferred to Bloch, “Could this possibly be true?”
Bloch’s dire expression was an answer in itself. “If you think about it, there’s a terrible logic. It would connect a lot of things.”
Christine said, “He thinks the second weapon you’re searching for is in the hands of somebody named Pytor Roth.”
Bloch and Chatham looked at one another hopefully, but Christine could see the name meant nothing to either.
“David thinks it’s going to be set off in the next few days.”
“To torpedo the Greenwich Accord,” Bloch correctly deduced.
“Yes,” she said.
“Set off where?” Chatham wondered. “Here in London?”
“David thinks it will be in a way that makes it look like Israel is being attacked or threatened.”
Bloch said, “Of course. And another country, one of our enemies, will take the blame.”
Chatham said to Bloch, “If it goes off in Greenwich and kills your Prime Minister — that’s a threat to Israel’s security, not to mention Great Britain’s.”
“It won’t happen in Greenwich,” Christine warned.
They both looked at her with a plaintive expression that asked, What else can go wrong?
“David believes he knows who’s leading this group,” she said.
Chatham raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “Who?” he asked guardedly.
“Ehud Zak.”
Chatham scowled. “Oh, now that’s rich. I can just see it.” Putting his hands behind his back, Chatham took a few paces and drew a tone of mock seriousness, “I’ve come to 10 Downing today, Mr. Prime Minister, to inform you that the investigation had been badly unstuck, but we’ve finally figured things out. You see, this fellow we’ve been chasing over hill and country isn’t the culprit after all. No, he called this morning and told us that it’s been your counterpart all along, the Prime Minister of Israel. We’ve sent a large party over to the embassy to drag him in.”