approaching, then felt the wind whipped up from its rotors as it landed nearby.
“Keep the hood on, please,” said the driver. “And duck your head.”
Dean hunched over, trying to feel his way into the helicopter as the door was opened for him. The driver of the Mercedes came around the other side once Dean was in and helped him fasten his seat belt.
“Where are we going?” said Dean, shouting over the rush of the motor as the aircraft took over.
He asked twice more before realizing that he was alone in the back of the aircraft.
Lia had picked him up at the airport, hoping to find a way to bump into him and attach a fly so the Art Room could monitor what was going on. But they’d moved through too quickly, and she’d had to follow in her car. She drove past them after they pulled off; before she could backtrack she heard a helicopter in the distance.
“This is moving too fast,” she told Rockman. “We have to pull him out.”
“Relax.”
“He doesn’t have any backup,” said Lia. “If they start asking him questions, they’ll know he’s a phony.”
“Charlie can handle himself. Relax.”
“You’re out of your mind if you think they’re not dangerous.” Lia gunned the car back toward the spot where they had pulled off.
“These are just scientific types,” said Telach, coming on the line. “Dean’s resourceful. That’s why he’s there.”
“Damn easy for you to say,” said Lia.
The Mercedes pulled back onto the highway as she approached. There was another car — and the helicopter, its rotors spinning in the field to the left.
“Where is he?” demanded Lia, slowing down.
“Just take it easy, Lia,” said Rockman. “We’re going to trail him.”
“The car or the helicopter?”
The helicopter whipped upward. Lia slapped her hand on the wheel.
“You need to turn around,” said Rockman.
“Damn it.”
“Relax, Lia.”
“Tell me that one more time and I’m going to shove my fist down your throat.”
Dean remained motionless in the seat after they landed, not quite sure what he was supposed to do next. Finally the door on the right side opened and he was helped from the aircraft. He smelled perfume and realized that he was being guided by a woman, though she remained silent. There was at least one other person with her, another woman, he thought, though she didn’t come near enough for him to tell.
Inside another car — this was a much smaller vehicle than the others — Dean asked where he was.
“You are in Austria,” said a woman. “We’ll be at the castle soon.”
“Castle?”
But the woman said nothing else. Dean began counting to himself, more because he had nothing better to do than as part of any tangible plan to figure out where he was. After about ten minutes, the car began driving up a steep hill, leveled off, and then began climbing again, this time in a circle. He heard the sound of gravel popping between the tires, and then the car stopped.
“We are here, Professor,” said the woman as the door opened.
“Actually, I’m not a professor,” said Dean. “I really don’t like to teach.”
“No?”
“Some people just don’t like it.”
The woman helped him from the car, then removed the hood. The woman smelled nice, but her face could have stopped a tank.
“This way,” she said, gesturing toward a stone arch before them.
A concrete walkway began at the arch and led around a wall made of yellow-brown bricks. As he approached the wall, Dean looked up and saw a castle looming at his left, perched at the top of a considerable slope that seemed to be made of sheer rock. There were steps on the other side of the wall made of thick slabs of limestone, the centers worn down by millions of soles sliding along their surface.
Dean stayed a step behind the woman, who seemed nonchalant in her attitude toward him; she wore jeans and a knit top over a blouse. It was possible she was armed, but Dean thought that he would have had no trouble overcoming her if he had to. He didn’t spot any obvious cameras or other devices, though he knew from his short stint with Deep Black that this was no guarantee of anything.
“Are you tired already?” the woman asked. He had fallen several steps behind.
“A little,” Dean lied. “Long flight of steps.”
She smiled at him and, if anything, started walking faster.
“How old is the castle?” he asked.
“Oh, not as old as it looks,” she answered.
“My name’s Charlie.”
“Yes, I know who you are.”
“And who are you?”
“Just a friend.”
At the third landing, there was a large metal door off to the side. The woman went to it and opened it, swinging it back easily, though to Dean it looked ponderous.
“Good-bye, Dr. Dean,” she said, gesturing for him to enter.
“You’re not coming?”
“No. Good-bye now.”
Dean stepped into the narrow, dark passageway. The rock walls seemed sheer and solid; they were lit by a string of dim red lights about knee-high bolted to the stone and connected by a run of wire. Dean ran his hand along the stone as he walked. It seemed too smooth to have been cut by hand, and he remembered the woman’s comment that the castle itself was not as old as it looked. He came to a comer and turned; a large freight elevator gaped at him. He walked to it and got in. Before he could touch the control panel, the doors closed and it began to move upward.
“Going up,” said Dean.
By rights, it should be Keys being transported. Would he have been nervous?
No, because he’d undoubtedly have a better idea what was going on. Maybe he had a deal with these people.
A deal to do what?
Supply the bastards with a germ that could kill millions?
That wasn’t Keys, thought Dean. He wasn’t a traitor.
Then again, Dean didn’t think he was a killer, either.
Dean let his arms drop to his sides, relaxing his body. He’d bluffed his way past the E. coli question, but it was unlikely he’d get off that easy again.
Kegan had done some work with E. coli, but the answer Dean had supplied had come not from the briefing but a high school biology class about a billion years before. Dean smiled at the memory of his old teacher, Wayne Guernsey — Guernsey, like the cow. Rumor had it that you could judge the difficulty of the lab by how far his thick oily hair stood out from the sides of his head.
The door opened onto a dimly lit corridor. Dean took a breath of the dank air as he stepped out of the elevator onto a stone floor. Two men with Steyr Para 9 mm submachine guns stood across from him, their faces covered by hoods. Dean stepped forward and someone stopped him from behind, tugging gently for him to stand in place. He was searched for a weapon once again, quickly and efficiently. The hands then took hold of his shoulders — he guessed he was being held by a woman, though he had only the lightness of the touch to go by — and nudged him two steps forward, then held firm. A light flashed in his face as the entire space was lit by powerful floodlights. Blinded, Dean put up his hands, then remembered the sunglasses. He gestured with his thumb that he was going to take them out; when no one reacted, he did so. The lights were so powerful that he had to keep his hands near his eyes, continuing to shield them.
