“Hallo, Gabi.”
“Letzter Tag, huh?” she said, and it took him a moment to remember that this was, in fact, the last day of school-Alan Drummond was already interfering with his life. Gabi squinted at his face, then began to laugh. “Hast du es vergessen?”
“Of course I remembered,” he muttered in German.
She said, “The only problem is that now I have to be with the brats all day long. I don’t know how I’m going to survive.”
“Day camp,” he told her, now remembering more about Stephanie’s life. “It’s not far from here, and it’s nearly the same hours. Tell their parents that all the brats’ friends will be there.”
She brightened visibly at the suggestion as Milo’s phone began to ring.
“Entschuldigung,” he said, and she watched him check the number and take the call.
“Did you call me from jail, Milo?” said Janet Simmons.
“From the unemployment line.”
Self-consciously, Gabi turned back to look at the school, but she didn’t walk away.
“Thank God for little mercies,” said Simmons. “Is it true that someone put a bullet in you?”
“Is that the rumor?”
“It was on the wire a couple months ago.”
“I’m nearly back to normal.”
“And normal for Milo Weaver would be what, exactly?”
“Why don’t you tell me about your life?” he asked. “I’ll lay odds it’s more interesting.”
It wasn’t. In part because of her failed pursuit of Milo a year ago, Simmons had been reassigned to border duty in Seattle. Though the demotion had been rough at first, she’d grown fond of the city.
“You sound happy,” he said.
“Being engaged will do that to you.”
“Well. Congratulations.”
“We’ll pretend that’s why you called me out of the blue,” she said, then added, “Why don’t you tell me why you called me out of the blue?”
“I’ve got an ICE agent asking me questions. Can you check his name and verify he is what he says he is?”
“What does he say he is?”
“A special agent, just like you.”
“Nobody’s just like me, Milo. You should know that. What’s the name?”
She promised to get back to him by the next day, then asked about Tina and Stephanie. As he was trying to answer, children spilled out onto the sidewalk, weighed down by fat backpacks. Gabi waved long fingers at him and gave a wink as she went to meet the two boys she called her brats. In his ear, Simmons told him not to break Tina’s heart, or else she’d be on the next plane to New York with her SIG SAUER. He promised to try his best. Stephanie waved for his attention.
At home, he and Stephanie ordered pizza, briefly assessed the academic year (okay was her opinion), and while she talked online with Unity Khama, a friend from Botswana she had met through a class project (even though it was after 10:00 P. M. in Gaborone), Milo used his own computer to search for Sebastian Hall. The first hit was dated yesterday, Monday, June 16.
An anonymous employee of the Rathbone Hotel had told a Guardian journalist that an American had vanished from his room on Saturday. Nothing particularly strange there, but Scotland Yard had been called in, which was odd. Further questions to hotel management had confirmed the disappearance, but, according to the police, the name was being withheld until the American’s family had been contacted. By Monday, though, a Scotland Yard leak had let the name slip: Sebastian Hall.
Armed with that name, the Guardian journalist had found gold: an Interpol arrest warrant for one Sebastian Hall, dated 25 February, charged with involvement in the notorious E. G. Buhrle art gallery heist in Zurich.
As was well known to Guardian readers, the mystery of the heist had been solved at the beginning of April when, in Munich, Theodor Wartmuller, a ranking member of the German Federal Intelligence Service, the BND, had been caught with the missing paintings in his apartment.
So what, the journalist asked, was Sebastian Hall-assumedly a coconspirator with Wartmuller-doing in London? What had happened to him? Also why, the journalist continued, was New Scotland Yard remaining so quiet on the issue?
Beside the article was a police sketch, from the Interpol Web site, of Sebastian Hall. A face that, when set beside Milo’s, was a nearly perfect match. Without his face to go by, it could have been anyone.
Milo said, “That fucker,” and closed his eyes.
“What fucker?” asked Stephanie. She was standing in the kitchen doorway, clutching a can of Sprite with a straw in it.
“Oh, no one, hon, and don’t ever say that word again.”
Stephanie sipped on the straw, staring at him.
“Something wrong?”
She shrugged, eyes big.
He closed his laptop and came over, squatting to her height. He stroked some hair off her face. “What is it?”
“Nothing, I…”
“Are you worried about me again? Because I’m fine.”
“What’s going on with Pen?”
He thought a moment. “Nothing important, she’s all right, too.”
“But she’s getting a divorce, right?”
“Who said anything about divorce?”
“I heard her talking last night.”
“I thought you were asleep.”
She pursed her lips on the straw so that they turned white. “I couldn’t help it,” she said finally. “She’s loud.”
“Come here,” he said and pulled her closer. “They’re having problems, yes, but that doesn’t mean they’re getting a divorce. People just fight sometimes. Like you and Sarah Lawton. Look at you now! Best friends.”
She grinned up at him, then lowered her voice to a whisper. “I don’t know, Daddy. Sarah’s starting to get on my nerves again. Maybe I’ll divorce her.”
4
A little after eight, he found Dennis Chaudhury at a window table of the Twelfth Street Bar amp; Grill, a placement that struck him as sloppy. “Where’s your friend?” Milo asked as he sat down.
On Chaudhury’s plate lay the remnants of a burger and fries, and he tapped the corners of his mouth with a napkin as he spoke. “Prior engagements. You want something to drink?”
Milo gazed out the window at the busy evening street; there was no way to know if some other shadow had been brought in, and there was no point asking. He felt a strong desire for a vodka martini, wondering just how much damage it would really do to his insides. “Tonic water.”
“Straight?”
Milo shrugged.
They didn’t start their conversation until the waiter had collected Chaudhury’s plate and delivered tonic water and a Beck’s. Until then, Chaudhury asked about the neighborhood; he had never been to Park Slope before and was surprised by how genteel the place was. “Expensive, though, right?”
“Like you wouldn’t believe.”
“Life in the brownstone jungle.”
Milo smiled.
