Reamde

A pause, then, “Yes, I am looking at it.”

“Do you note anything remarkable about the condition of its hammer?” Zula asked him.

Jones, still looking at Csongor, had been surprised by Zula’s entry into the conversation. Now, though, he smiled broadly. Zula, it seemed, was doing his work for him. Reminding Csongor, in case he’d failed to appreciate it the first time, that the 1911 was only a microsecond away from killing both of them.

Then the grin was replaced by astonishment as Csongor’s trigger finger went into motion, executing that long hard pull that Jones had only just warned him of.

THE BELLHOPS WHO would see Sokolov running in had never seen him run out of the hotel. In a smaller place, this might have aroused suspicion. But this place was forty stories high, and he knew that they would think nothing of it as long as he didn’t act in a way that would arouse suspicion. If working as a security consultant had taught him nothing else, it had taught him how to walk in and out of expensive hotels. He jogged up the street, turned into the hotel’s huge curving entry drive, slowed to a trot, and entered the shade of its awning, which was big enough to shelter twenty cars. There he dropped to a brisk walk, checked his wristwatch, and pretended to press one of its little buttons. He pulled his towel out of the CamelBak’s external pocket, unfolded it, wiped his face, and then draped it over his head like an NBA player just sent to the bench. He put the CamelBak’s drinking tube into his mouth and pretended to suck on it while pacing back and forth for half a minute or so along a line of potted shrubs that had been planted along the edge of the drive. These grew in big rectangular boxes of concrete, surfaced with pebbles and filled with dirt. Interspersed with them were waste receptacles, constructed in the same manner, with sand beds on top where waiting taxi drivers could stub out their cigarettes, and open slots below where refuse could be deposited.

At this point he had no particular plan, other than that he would enter the hotel and then try to think of something. But now, glancing into one of the waste receptacles, Sokolov noticed something that looked like a credit card, though emblazoned with the logo of this hotel. It was a key card that some departing guest had thrown away; or perhaps a taxi driver had found it abandoned in his backseat and had tossed it there. On the pretext of throwing away some small bit of debris, Sokolov picked it up and palmed it. Then, using his other hand to wipe his face with the towel—he hoped that this might complicate future analysis of the surveillance video—he approached the hotel’s entrance. He bent down, letting the towel drape around his head, and pretended to pull the key card out of his sock. A bellhop opened the door for him and gave him a cheerful greeting. Sokolov nodded and entered the lobby.

What was their ridiculous word for gymnasticheskii zal? He was scanning the directional signs, trying not to be too obvious about it.

Fitness Center. Of course.

It was on the third floor, a nice one, with windows overlooking the waterfront. Key card access only. He swiped the card he had stolen and got a red light. Rapped the card against the window and got the attention of an attendant, a young woman, who smiled and hurried to the door to let him in.

They had tiny bottles of water and bananas. Thank God. But he had to pace himself or it would look very strange indeed. A grid of pigeonholes, just by the entrance, served as a place for guests to stash their belongings while they worked out. Sokolov slid his CamelBak into one of these. Stuffed with cash, it did not sag and wobble the way a water-filled one should have, and so he pulled it out and put it on the top shelf where it might not be so conspicuous. Half a dozen other pigeonholes were occupied, two with women’s bags, the rest with only a few small items such as key cards and mobile phones. Sokolov went into the men’s bathroom, made sure he was alone, turned on a faucet, bent over, and drank from it for a while. Dust from this morning’s activities was frozen into the hairs on his arms. He rinsed them clean and splashed water on his face. Exiting the bathroom, he plucked two bottles of water and a banana from the display and carried them over to a bank of treadmills. This was served by three large flat-panel television sets, two showing CNN and one showing a Chinese news channel. Sokolov got on a treadmill that was closer to a CNN screen but in view of the Chinese one, and walked on the thing for a while, drinking water, eating the banana, and monitoring local news coverage. Most of this seemed to be about the diplomatic conference. There was a brief story that seemed to be about a fire in Xiamen. But that was only a guess, based on the graphics and a few fleeting video clips of fire trucks and ambulances in a crowded street, people caked with dust, limping and stumbling, supported by astonished bystanders.

Of course they would claim it was a gas explosion. Everything was always a gas explosion. But Sokolov knew that the PSB investigators now working on the case were under no illusions.

He spent forty-five minutes on the treadmill and half an hour lifting weights. Guests came and went. As they did, Sokolov tallied them: gender, nationality, size, shape, age. Which pigeonhole they put their stuff in.

An Asian man came in; Sokolov guessed Japanese or Korean. He was trim, well put together. He shoved his wallet and a phone into one of the pigeonholes. Sokolov, moving from one machine to another, walked past him and judged him to be of the same height. Shoe size was more difficult to judge at a glance. After wandering around the Fitness Center and taking an inventory of its machines and facilities, this man boarded an elliptical trainer and set it up for a half-hour program, then turned his attention to a magazine.

Sokolov went to the entryway and set a half-empty water bottle down on the counter, then got his CamelBak down, shoved one arm through a shoulder strap, and let it swing free while he poked the other arm through the other strap. It knocked the water bottle off the counter. He cursed and ran to pick it up, but it had already leaked most of its contents into a puddle on the floor. The attendant, delighted to have something to do, ran over, assessed the situation, and then went to grab some towels, assuring Sokolov that it was all okay and she would take care of it.

While she had her back turned, Sokolov turned to face the pigeonholes. He pulled out the Asian man’s wallet and flipped it open. His key card was right there in the easiest-to-reach pocket. Sokolov pulled it out and replaced it with the one he had stolen from the wastebasket outside, then put the wallet back.

He then went into the sauna, which was unoccupied, and slipped the stolen key card into his sock. He sat in the sauna for twenty minutes.

When the Japanese or Korean man finished his exercise routine, he retrieved his belongings from the pigeonhole and exited the Fitness Center with Sokolov a few paces ahead of him. They ended up in the elevator lobby together. Sokolov, pretending to be distracted by a phone call, was slow to get on the elevator; the other courteously held the door for him. Sokolov scanned the button panel, reached to hit the button for 21, then hesitated, startled to find that his floor had already been selected. He hit the button again anyway. During the elevator ride, he pretended to lose his connection and, after uttering a couple of mild curses, began fiddling with the buttons, trying to make a new call. He was still doing so when the doors opened and the other man exited. Trailing well behind him, Sokolov ambled down the corridor. The man stopped before the door to Room 2139 and swiped his key card, only to get a red light. Sokolov kept on walking and disappeared around the next corner.

A few moments later he peeked back around the corner to see the man’s retreating back. He was headed for the elevators, going down to the lobby to get a new key card made.

Sokolov went to Room 2139, opened the door, and made a quick inventory of its closet and dresser. The guest’s name was Jeremy Jeong and he was an American citizen (he had left his passport in a desk drawer). Sokolov established that the best place to hide was under the bed. In most hotels this would not have been the case because the bed was just a box, with no “under,” but this was a luxury place with real beds, and the bedspread hung down far enough to hide him. Once he was well situated there, he opened the CamelBak, pawed out the wads of money, and retrieved the pieces of the Makarov, which he quickly assembled into a functioning and loaded weapon. He hoped to God he would not need it, but to leave it in pieces would have been foolish.

He was stuffing the money back into the CamelBak when he heard the door opening and Jeremy Jeong coming in.

ABDALLAH JONES PULLED the trigger of his own weapon, causing its hammer to fly forward and pinch down painfully on the little finger of Zula’s right hand, which she had inserted into the gap between it and the weapon’s frame. This prevented it from striking the firing pin. Nothing happened.

Jones did not have time to take in and understand his own weapon’s failure to fire. The sight of Csongor’s trigger finger in motion had thrown him into an involuntary movement. He snapped his head around to the left, pushing the Makarov’s muzzle away. Zula saw and heard it discharge and saw Jones’s head jerk away from it.

A minute earlier Jones had grabbed her right arm and coiled her body up against his to make her a human shield. Now they uncoiled. Jones pivoted away from her, pulling the pistol loose from her finger, leaving an icy