“Of course.”
Gray rang the bell on the front door, then used another key. No one waited for them, and the first room they entered was stripped down to its bare walls and hardwood floor. Gray stopped, shocked, then ran to the other rooms, finally shouting, “Motherfucker! They took my computer!”
Involuntarily, Milo started to laugh. Xin Zhu had only been interested in sending a message, and Milo was there to receive it: We know who you are and what you did. We can touch you whenever we like.
He took the pieces of his phone out of his pocket and put it back together, walking slowly through the empty rooms. He found Gray coming out of a bathroom, wiping vomit from his lips. He started to say something to Milo but changed his mind.
Milo’s phone rang. He took it to the kitchen.
“Riverrun, past Eve.”
“And Adam’s,” said Milo.
“You’re in some serious shit,” said Drummond. “Irwin’s on the warpath for you.”
“I bet he is.”
“Get yourself back home.”
“I’ll need my credit cards.”
“They’ll be working in an hour, okay?”
“One more thing,” said Milo. “You can unfreeze the department. There’s no mole.”
“What?”
Milo gave him the short version, and though he was doubtful, Drummond said, “What kind of bastard dreams up such a thing?”
“Don’t talk that way about the man I love,” Milo said, then hung up.
26
By the time he landed at JFK, it was Tuesday morning. He drove a rental into midtown and, knowing the lot beside 101 West Thirty-first would be full of employees’ cars, parked in a public lot on West Twenty-ninth and walked over to the Avenue of the Americas, then up the busy sidewalk to Thirty-first. Cameras positioned along the streets surrounding the Department of Tourism’s headquarters tracked his progress, and when he reached the entrance to the inconspicuous brick tower two doormen were already waiting.
In the old days, he would have known these huge men who acted as Tourism’s first barrier against intrusion, and called them by name, but these two had come along after his dismissal, and they were as mute and humorless as their predecessors. There was one familiar face, though-Gloria Martinez, who worked the front desk. She was pretty but stern; this had never stopped Milo from flirting with her in an unending game of proposal and rejection.
The last time she’d seen him, Milo was being beaten to the ground by three doormen in this cold lobby. Now, the look on her face suggested she had assumed him dead, and she showed the maximum emotion her position would allow: “Good to see you again, sir.”
“Ms. Martinez, you are, as ever, a sight for sore eyes.”
When he stopped to be photographed by the computer and stated his name for the microphone, Gloria Martinez didn’t even blink when he said, “Sebastian Hall.” She had only ever known him as Milo.
In the elevator the doormen patted him down, then used a key to access the twenty-second floor. The ride was silent, and Milo watched their stony faces in the mirrored walls.
When the doors opened, he involuntarily caught his breath. This, for six years, had been his daily destination, his nine-to-five. A quietly productive floor of cubicles and computers and busy Travel Agents combing through the intelligence sent in by a whole world of Tourists. Now, though, the most striking thing about the Department of Tourism was its emptiness. The maze of cubicles was still here, but they were empty. In a few, kneeling in mock prayer, technicians fooled with computer cables, tagging and logging hard drives, but they were like sweepers cleaning up after a parade, not even raising their heads to acknowledge the visitors heading to the offices along the far wall.
On the left and right, windows watched over the midpoints of skyscrapers under slate clouds, and ahead of them, through open blinds, was the office Grainger had used when running the department. It had been taken over by Owen Mendel, then the surprisingly young Alan Drummond, and now, behind the large desk, sat a prematurely white-haired man with reading glasses-fifty-five, Milo remembered. It was a familiar face from CNN talk shows and the occasional C-SPAN sleeper. He was a man not used to having to work through such volumes of paperwork, not used to having to lead a mole hunt. Senator Nathan Irwin.
Milo hoped that, for their first meeting, he wouldn’t snap and murder the senator.
Then again, he wasn’t sure what he hoped.
Irwin wasn’t alone in the office. Drummond was leaning back in a chair used for visitors, and two young men in suits stood around, slouched. One muttered into a cell phone and watched the visitors approach, then turned and said something to Irwin, who took off his glasses. All the men watched them enter.
“Thanks, guys,” Drummond said as he got to his feet, and the two doormen withdrew.
Irwin remained seated, so Drummond made introductions. “Nathan, this is Sebastian Hall.”
Irwin blinked at him, then shook his head. “You mean-”
“Yes,” Drummond cut in, “but for security we stick to work names.”
“Of course,” said Irwin. He finally pushed himself up and stretched a large hand across his desk-actually, Grainger’s desk. The department had decided to keep the oak monstrosity after his death.
Milo stepped forward and shook the senator’s cool hand.
“This,” Drummond continued, “is Max Grzybowski, the senator’s chief of staff.”
The blond young man stuck out a hand, smiling goofily. “Pleased to meet you.”
The one with the phone kept whispering into it but raised a hand and offered a salutary smile.
“He’s Dave Pearson, legislative director,” said Drummond, and Milo waved casually back. “They’re Senator Irwin’s personal assistants, and they’ve been given the same clearance as the senator.”
The senator nodded agreeably, then pointed at Milo. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you, er, Hall. Have time for a drink?”
“That’s up to Mr. Drummond, sir. I’m due for some debriefing, I think.”
“It’s up to me now,” Irwin said before Drummond could answer, “and I want us to chat before your debriefing. Max, can you take care of it?”
After months on the road, there was something freakishly civilized about what followed. Max took out a BlackBerry. “Four o’clock all right?”
Milo shrugged.
Max said to Irwin, “That way you can still make dinner at six with the Joshipuras. Stout-it’s a bar up on Thirty- third.”
Dave Pearson finally ended his call. “Would you like me on hand?”
Everyone looked at Irwin, who shook his head. “Let’s keep this off the record, shall we, Hall?”
“I’m a big fan of off the record, sir.”
“Four at Stout should work,” Max told them both. “Minimal clientele.”
“You sound like a regular,” said Milo.
“Max is a regular of all the world’s better drinking establishments,” Irwin informed him, then settled back down. “Now, though, I’d like to hear a little more about your theory.”
“My theory?”
“Your theory that there is no mole in Tourism.”
There were no spare chairs, so Milo remained standing. “Sure. But first you have to get your mind around one thing that’s almost nonexistent in our line of work.”
“What’s that?” asked Irwin, and Drummond leaned forward expectantly.
“A sense of humor, sir.”
He took them through it all-Grainger’s letter, the failed attempt on Gray’s life, Gray’s approach to the Chinese,
