Cutting Edge

“Which crap do you mean?” Nimec said. “Just so I’m straight about it.”

“This guy with the fucked-up name, this fucked-up place where he made our appointment to meet him, this fucked-up time for it when I’m just off the plane from Paris,” Scull said, recapitulating his whole bilious list of complaints. He rubbed a hand over his scalp to smooth down a strand of his nearly extinct hair. “That’s what crap, Pete.”

The car started on its way down. Nimec tried without luck to think of a convenient blanket response, decided to tackle things in reverse order.

“You could have flown Air France with the rest of us, gotten here a couple days ago,” Nimec said. “Nobody twisted your arm into waiting around for a private jet charter.”

“Is that goddamn right?”

“Right.”

“Well, I’m not going to get into how much I paid for my membership on that service,” Scull said. “An expense the boss might’ve offered to shoulder, incidentally. At least halfway shoulder.”

Nimec gave him a look. “That’s asinine. If you have a fear of flying…”

“How many million times we been through this? I’m not afraid—”

“Okay, we’ll say you’ve got issues with commercial airlines,” Nimec said, loath to step into that sucking bog of dispute. “It’s your problem, you pay.”

Scull sneered.

“My problem, you want to call it that, is with how they run their security,” he said. “You’re the expert. Tell me you feel safe flying the terrorist-friendly skies.”

Nimec leaned against the handrail on the back wall of the car, glancing up at its floor indicator panel. The number twenty-four flicked by. Eleven down, twenty-three to go.

“I don’t waste energy worrying about what I can’t control,” he said. “DeMarco’s got the right take on it, you want to know what I think. If terrorist incidents in the air were the norm, they wouldn’t make headlines. The only reason they’re on the six o’clock news is because they don’t happen every day.”

“Like floods, earthquakes, and volcanic eruptions, huh? A guy walking aboard with a Semtex bomb in the heel of his shoe’s just another act of God.”

“Do us both a favor and let it go, Vince.”

“Let what go? It was me who was at those negotiations in Paris all last week, while you were still cooling your heels at the home office,” he said. “If somebody hadn’t sewn things up with the Nautel’s cable-maintenance fleet, we wouldn’t be going to see Captain Gunslinger tonight.”

“The boss had other negotiators there taking care of things,” Nimec said. “You enlisted.”

“That’s where you’re dead wrong, Petey,” Scull said. “I’m the company point runner. The forward scout who’s supposed to go conning for buried mines. The risk assessment man. Which means—”

“It’s your job to assess risks,” Nimec said, completing the familiar mantra. He checked his Annie-Meter. Too long to go. Then he glanced at the floor-indicator panel again. Ten, nine. Almost at the lobby. He would have to settle. “Fact is, Vince, you’re earning the salary that pays for your executive jet plan tonight. We’d need to talk with Gunville even if his outfit wasn’t contracted. Right now our teams just mean to use Nautel for support ops. But two divers from the Africana got killed while making repairs on the same fiber line we’re planning to send our men down to survey. I know the company line about what happened to them. I read the press accounts. And I still want to sound him out. Hear the story straight from his mouth. Because it’s my job to keep our people as safe as can be when they might have to put themselves at risk.”

“Did you hear me say I had a problem with that?” Scull thumbed his chest with indignation. “How about we get back to what I asked in the first place, you don’t fucking mind.”

Nimec shrugged mildly.

“The Gabonese are late eaters,” he said. “Nine, ten o’clock at night’s their usual dinner time. It’s also the custom to invite foreign business guests out for a meal. Entertain them. And the place we’re meeting Gunville is supposed to be pretty decent.” He paused. “You ought to enjoy yourself while you can. Be glad it’s not two days from now, when we have to head into the bush to check out the new ground-station facilities.”

“I’ll be gladder if we could stick to the point.” Scull rolled his eyes. “Scintillements, you know what it means? Sparkles. Probably has those laser lights flying around over the walls and ceiling, make you feel like some nut-case with a big crayon covering them with colored squiggles—”

“I’m not sure that’s how it’ll be. I picked up a tourist brochure in my room, and there was an ad—”

“Come on. Since when are you so gullible? Must be the settled life affecting you.”

Nimec looked confused. “Settled life?”

“I just asked you not to stray off the topic. You want my advice on this love thing you got going in Texas, we can do it later,” Scull said. “The club, Petey. Focus on the club. Think about its name a minute, then tell me you expect good eats. They can be pretentious as they want dressing it up in French, I still say it belongs on the marquee of some poky Brooklyn disco like the one that used to be run by the Russian mob punk you took down… what the hell was it called, by the way?”

“The Platinum Club.”

“Yeah, that’s it…”

“Vince,” he said. “French is the official language here.”

“So?”

“So maybe it’s you who should use your head.” He shrugged again. “Nobody’s dressing anything up. Nothing fancy or pretentious about it to their ears.”

“Still worse,” Scull said. “If the owners of the joint know the customers know what the name means, how good can it be? And speaking of bullshit handles, what’s with this Captain Guns-at-the-hips? If you think you’re gonna find that one on his birth certificate, guess again.” Scull made a rumbling sound. “Reminds me of a guy I met at a party once, introduced himself as John Wildlife. No shit. Right away, I peg him as some dilettante rich kid whose moneybags parents stuffed a fortune into his mountaineering knapsack, or maybe into his kayak when he was about to paddle off down the Snake River. Had to be a fortune. Startup capital to help him found one of those tree-hugger nonprofits in D.C… Georgetown, no less. Guy’s got a whole floor of offices on Sixteenth Street for this foundation — you know what rents are like over there. And the reason? Just so he can take a vacation from his recreational activities every now and then, pull himself out of the white-water rapids long enough to dry off his ass. John Wildlife, will somebody please fucking spare me—”

Their elevator stopped at the lobby with a soft ding. As its doors swished open, Nimec saw the concierge flash a hospitable smile from his desk and expelled a sigh of relief. Scull had ceased his tirade.

“Come on, Vince.” He exited the car. “Let’s find ourselves a taxi.”

Scull followed a step behind him, frowned.

“I’ll be happy if we get a driver who doesn’t take us for a couple of greenhorn suckers,” he said.

* * *

The concierge took pains to be helpful as the two Americans came across the lobby from the elevator. Did they need their currency exchanged? he enquired in studied English. Would they like particular directions somewhere? Were there any special room-service orders they might wish to place with the staff in advance of their return?

The first man to pass his desk — Monsieur Nimec, executive suite 9—declined with a polite thank-you. The new arrival — Monsieur Scull, who had insisted on an immediate room change from suite 8 to suite 12 on check-in, stating the former was incommodious and noisy — merely shook his head in the negative and followed the other toward the entrance.

The concierge did not let the second guest’s scowl leach any of the obliging geniality from his expression. He was skilled at his job and knew how to keep his poise.

The concierge’s eyes tracked them as they strode to the hotel entrance and a doorman in a braided, epauletted uniform held open its large glass doors. Then he reached for his telephone, tapped in a number, left a brief message with the person who answered, and hung up.