Cloud Atlas

June. We vetted each other’s work.”

“The Defense Department? You don’t mean Energy?”

“Defense. A by-product of the HYDRA-Zero reactor is weapons-grade uranium. Highest quality, lots of it.” Megan lets Luisa Rey digest the new implications. “What do you need?”

“The report, only the report, will bring Seaboard crashing down in public and legal arenas. And, incidentally, save my own skin.”

Trust this stranger or get up and walk away?

A crocodile of schoolchildren clusters around the portrait of the old woman. Megan murmurs, under the curator’s short speech, “Rufus kept academic papers, data, notes, early drafts, et cetera on Starfish—his yacht—for future reference. His funeral isn’t until next week, probate won’t begin until then, so this cache should still be untouched. I would bet a lot he had a copy of his report aboard. Seaboard’s people may have already combed the boat, but he had a thing about not mentioning Starfish at work?.?.?.”

“Where’s Starfish moored now?”

67

CAPE YERBAS MARINA ROYALE

PROUD HOME OF THE PROPHETESS

BEST-PRESERVED SCHOONER IN THE WORLD!

Napier parks the rented Ford by the clubhouse, a weatherboarded former boathouse. Its bright windows boast an inviting bar, and nautical flags ruffle stiff in the evening wind. Sounds of laughter and dogs are carried from the dunes as Luisa and Napier cross the clubhouse garden and descend the steps to the sizable marina. A three- masted wooden ship is silhouetted against the dying east, towering over the sleek fiberglass yachts around it. Some people move on the jetties and yachts, but not many. “Starfish is moored on the furthest jetty away from the clubhouse”—Luisa consults Megan Sixsmith’s map—“past the Prophetess.”

The nineteenth-century ship is indeed restored beautifully. Despite their mission, Luisa is distracted by a strange gravity that makes her pause for a moment and look at its rigging, listen to its wooden bones creaking.

“What’s wrong?” whispers Napier.

What is wrong? Luisa’s birthmark throbs. She grasps for the ends of this elastic moment, but they disappear into the past and the future. “Nothing.”

“It’s okay to be spooked. I’m spooked myself.”

“Yeah.”

“We’re almost there.”

Starfish is where Megan’s map says. They clamber aboard. Napier inserts a clip into the cabin door and slides a Popsicle stick into the gap. Luisa watches for watchers. “Bet you didn’t learn that in the army.”

“You lose your bet. Cat burglars make resourceful soldiers, and the draft board wasn’t choosy?.?.?.” A click. “Got it.” The tidy cabin is devoid of books. An inset digital clock blinks from 21:55 to 21:56. Napier’s flashlight’s pencil beam rests on a navigation table fitted atop a mini-filing cabinet. “How about in there?”

Luisa opens a drawer. “This is it. Shine here.” A mass of folders and binders. One, vanilla in color, catches her eye. The HYDRA-Zero Reactor—An Operational Assessment Model—Project Head Dr. Rufus Sixsmith. “Got it. This is it. Joe? You okay?”

“Yeah. It’s just .?.?. about time something went well, so simply.”

So Joe Napier can smile.

A motion in the cabin doorway; a man blocks out the stars. Napier reads Luisa’s alarm and whirls around. In the flashlight Luisa sees a tendon in the gunman’s wrist twitch, twice, but no gunfire sounds. Jammed safety catch?

Joe Napier makes a hiccuping sound, slumps to his knees, and cracks his head on the steel foot of the navigation table.

He lies inert.

Luisa loses all but the dimmest sense of being herself. Napier’s flashlight rolls in the gentle swell, and its beam rotates to show his shredded torso. His lifeblood spreads obscenely quickly, obscenely scarlet, obscenely shiny. Rigging whistles and twangs in the wind.

The killer closes the cabin door behind him. “Put the report on the table, Luisa.” His voice is kindly. “I don’t want blood on it.” She obeys. His face is hidden. “Well, you get to make peace with your maker.”

Luisa grips the table. “You’re Bill Smoke. You killed Sixsmith.”

The darkness answers, “Bigger forces than me. I just dispatched the bullet.”

Focus. “You followed us, from the bank, in the subway, to the art museum?.?.?.”

“Does death always make you so verbose?”

Luisa’s voice trembles. “What do you mean ‘always’?”

68

Joe Napier drifts in a torrential silence.

The ghost of Bill Smoke hovers over his dark vision.

More than half of himself has gone already.

Words come bruising the silence again. He’s going to kill her.

That .38 in your pocket.

I’ve done my duty, I’m dying, for Chrissakes.

Hey. Go tell Lester Rey about duty and dying.

Napier’s right hand inches to his buckle. He wonders if he is a baby in his cot or a man dying in his bed. Nights pass, no, lifetimes. Often Napier wants to ebb away, but his hand refuses to forget. The butt of a gun arrives in his palm. His finger enters a loop of steel, and a flare of clarity illuminates his purpose. The trigger, this, yes. Pull her out. Slowly now?.?.?.

Angle the gun. Bill Smoke is just yards away.

The trigger resists his index finger—then a blaze of incredible noise spins Bill Smoke backwards, his arms flailing like a marionette’s.

In the fourth to last moment of his life, Napier fires another bullet into the marionette silhouetted by stars. The word Silvaplana comes to him, unasked for.

In the third to last moment, Bill Smoke’s body slides down the cabin door.

Second to last, an inset digital clock blinks from 21:57 to 21:58.

Napier’s eyes sink, newborn sunshine slants through ancient oaks and dances on a lost river. Look, Joe, herons.

69

In Margo Roker’s ward in Swannekke County Hospital, Hester Van Zandt glances at her watch. 21:57.