Delaney had been absorbed into teaching literature to ninth-graders, coaxing them into forming stumbling poetry, making honest attempts to introduce them to Shakespeare's subtleties, to Whitman's rhythms, to Harper Lee's cool prose. Something in the job sucked the life out of him and, six years down the line, out of nowhere, he applied to join the Bureau. A couple of decades later, he was starting to wonder if the Bureau hadn't sucked the life out of him too, now.
The reed heads came up well framed in a burnt umber. As the water evaporated away, leaving the powder embedded in the fibres of the heavy paper, Delaney felt the deep satisfaction of a match cleverly made. He used to get that same feeling from stringing facts together in an investigation, but satisfaction eluded him in his work now. He had felt a glimmer of it when he called Fed-Ex and got them to divert the package Virgo sent to Radcliffe. It was a blank disk, but that particular model wasn't available in the US. It wasn't the one Radcliffe had given him, Delaney was sure of that. But then he was called off the case, told it had been handed back to the Baltimore Police Department, instructed to drop it and head home. The message came from way too high up to ignore, a clear and unambiguous order: the Bureau had more urgent matters to look into than the murder of one science geek. It was probably some drug-crazed Baltimore junkie, the letter from Homeland Security said.
Homeland Security could kiss his ass; he had no time for government stupidity. Things were bad enough already, and then the whole fucking thing got turned upside down after 9/11. How could something as uniquely crafted as the Bureau be squeezed into some rabbit's ass of a government department? The proof of the fuck-up was there in that call from on high. Radcliffe's murder was nothing to do with drugs. Or at least with any junkie. Maybe the cartels would inflict those kinds of injury if someone had snitched, but it was certainly no junkie looking for cash.
But Delaney complied, and dropped it. He had lost the will to disobey direct orders; he lost it just about the same time he found the Creek, and its birdlife, and understood why Nancy had spent all her spare time out here. She'd taken the bullet running on a hunch, flouting an order, and the investigation had exonerated the Bureau. Maybe the order had been right. Delaney had even said so at the inquiry and earned himself a sense of betrayal: when it came down to it, he'd betrayed Nancy's memory. Despite the fuck-up of the situation she was trying to deal with, despite the mess she had been thrown into, they had all sold her out because she acted on instinct. Well, that taught him something. In the FBI, instinct was yesterday's game.
Still, at least he had got entanglement from the whole charade. At the airport, on the way out to interview Virgo, he had bought an idiot's guide to quantum theory, just to get a handle on Paul Radcliffe's brain. Old-fashioned sleuthing, just like Philip Marlowe. And he felt like it had changed his world. Just one chapter, twenty-six pages, had made sense of everything he felt about Nancy. They were still connected. He didn't have to explain why or how; if the physics geeks didn't know how or why, there was no sense him agonising over it. He just took comfort in it. All those people who thought it was a sordid little workplace affair, all the self-righteous fucks who told him he shouldn't have been sleeping with another man's wife; none of them knew what he and Nancy had found in each other.
Not that they'd had it for long. Almost before it had really begun – maybe it was some fucked-up karma thing he'd brought on her – she was dead. But death hadn't parted them. Here he was now in the Creek; he had become her eyes, taken on the quest to watch her world. He captured the sway of the beech and the yellow poplar, set them down on the stretched paper. When he glimpsed the wood thrushes she had monitored, saw how her conservation project had worked, he felt like he saw them for her. Through him, she was assured of their survival.
Delaney put down his brushes and looked out across the Creek. The dawn was blossoming into full day now and he had to go teach a class of wannabe agents at the Academy in a couple of hours. It had happened again; despite everything, the world had turned once more.
CHAPTER 18
VIRGO DROVE FOR AN hour and a half before the serenity of Oxford's stone towers and spires came into view, rising above the jumble of the city's grey slate roofs. Dreaming spires? Fuck Oxford! That's what Born said: one quote that Virgo would never forget. For someone who was supposed to be an otherworldly genius, Daniel Born had an unbelievably earthy mouth.
Virgo had been astonished when Born agreed to the profile; he'd done a few science stories before then, but nothing big, nothing to make Born take any notice of his request. Born didn't go to conferences – he didn't need to. He lived off the proceeds of two popular science books about the quantum world, and only communicated with the outside world through email. His motives for accepting the interview had only started to become apparent about halfway through their meeting, when Born started ranting about the university's exploitation of his work.
Born had demonstrated the quantum computer's true potential. He worked out what each component of the machine would need to do, and how the atoms could work together to achieve the impossible. No one else had managed this in the two decades since Richard Feynman first made the suggestion about computing with the quantum world. Born had done it in one night.
Or that's what he said. Virgo was a junior back then, doing a bit of everything – science, arts, health – for any section of the paper that wanted his time. He was too thrilled to have got the interview to be properly sceptical about anything Born told him. Until the venom started to flow. The second half of the interview was almost entirely unprintable: a string of conspiracy theorising. Born had quit his professorship in a storm when the university insisted that it would act on his insight even if he wouldn't. He came across as paranoid. Maybe he was. Maybe he had reason to be.
A light rain was falling. Virgo turned off the ring road and scanned the roundabout for the signs that would lead him to the city centre. If he was going to find Born's house, he needed to go from the middle, the way he went before. The house was out to the north, in a tiny village. The taxi from the railway station had cost a bloody fortune, he remembered.
He tried not to think about Rachel and Katie. He failed. At least they would soon be thousands of miles away, beyond reach. This was just a blip. Born would tell him what was going on. He was a genius – he'd know what to do with the disk. He'd know whether the story was worth it.
He was almost in the city centre now. A bridge took him over the Cherwell. Two figures were huddled together in a punt tied to the bank, smiling up at the sky. Virgo craned his neck to see what they saw, but his view was blocked by the majestic rise of Magdalen Tower, its rooftop turrets like fairy castles. As he drove up St Aldate's, he watched laughing students, wrapped in hooded sweatshirts, throwing frisbees around on Christ Church Meadow. Ahead of them the poised angles of the cathedral tower rose tall into the sky, speaking loftily with the surrounding spires.
He was at the station. Where now? He scanned the road signs. That was it: Banbury A4165.
Twenty minutes later, Virgo was heading down a narrow lane flanked by two low hawthorn hedges. The rain had stopped now. The air coming in through the car's vents was loaded with the scent of damp vegetation.
'There,' he said to himself.
He drew the car to a halt outside a whitewashed cottage. The window frames were painted black, and the grey slates of the roof were speckled with a green-brown moss. Roses and ivy competed for space on its walls. Rachel would love this place – however much she gloried in modern architecture, she was always seduced by the secluded, the romantic. Virgo got out of the car, opened the wooden gate into the garden, and walked slowly up the path. All the curtains were drawn. He pulled back the black iron knocker, and drove it against the oak of the front door.
No response. After three minutes of waiting, he knocked again. Another two minutes of silence followed before he took a few steps back down the path and looked up at the windows. No sign of life.
'He doesn't go out,' he muttered.
> When did he start talking to himself?
Virgo wandered back out into the lane, and leaned against the car. Was he wasting his time? He looked at his watch. Rachel and Katie wouldn't be landing for a good few hours yet. He could leave a message for them at the hotel. He had programmed the number into his phone when they made the booking. It couldn't hurt to let Rachel know he might not be out for a day or two.
He pulled his phone out of the back pocket of his jeans, and turned it on.
It beeped: there were two voicemail messages. The Missed Calls screen told him they were from Charles and Imogen. Charles would be wondering why the hell he'd disappeared from the office. He'd listen to that later, once he had some answers. Imogen would no doubt have heard something was up; she would be checking up on him, making sure he was OK. They could both wait, for now. He scrolled through the directory. He punched the 'dial' button when the hotel's name appeared, and put the phone to his ear.
His Spanish was terrible, and quickly forced the reception staff into halting English. He left a message and his number. Rachel wouldn't remember it: it was programmed into her phone, the one she'd left behind. No one remembered phone numbers any more.
Glancing back up at the cottage, he almost didn't see it. The shiver in the curtain was so subtle it took a half-second to register in his mind. Born was there.
Virgo ran up the path to pound the knocker again. Thirty seconds later, a voice called out from behind the door.
'Who are you?'
He pressed himself against the door.
'Professor Born, my name is Nathaniel Virgo. We met a long time ago: I interviewed you for the Herald. For the magazine. Could I please talk to you about something? It's very urgent.'
There was a long pause.
'I'm not doing any more interviews.'
'This has nothing to do with the paper. It's a personal matter. Please, I'm in a lot of trouble.'
A slow minute passed. Then another.
'Professor Born, please. I really need to talk to you.'
The seconds ticked past too slowly. What more could he do? He was wasting his time.
Then, with a medieval clunk, the lock turned and the oak door swung open a few inches. The eyes that looked out from the semi-darkness shone a fierce emerald green. A few long, greying strands of lank hair fell across his face.
'Professor Born, can I come in?'
Born remained behind the door.
Virgo ransacked his mind for an approach that might break the deadlock. Surely Born would at least know Gierek's name? Surely he'd have to react to that?
'Laszlo Gierek was killed this morning. In my house. Something's going on with the quantum computer.'
Bingo.
The door swung slowly back. Daniel Born was wrapped in a threadbare towelling dressing gown. It was a dirty white, with a Hilton hotel logo on the breast pocket. His belly pushed at the gown's belt. His eyes, set in a pale and slightly bloated unshaven face, retained their suspicion as he moved aside.
Virgo hurriedly stepped inside. 'Thank you,' he said.
Born rubbed at his stubble. 'Let me get some clothes on.' He disappeared upstairs.
Despite the light from the windows, the living room seemed unnaturally dark. Its air smelled of warm dust – same as it did when he came here last. The walls were covered with a dark hessian, and almost every surface, and most of the mottled carpet – an orange-red shag pile – was stacked with piles of papers, books, and bits of machinery. As Virgo moved into the room, he saw they were mostly pieces of hard disk drives and other computer parts. Through an open door on the other side of the room, he could see into the kitchen, where a row of chocolate-brown melamine units was lined up against the far wall. Decades had been swallowed up inside these walls.
He turned back into the lounge. It wasn't entirely chaotic: an oak table by the window was clear of clutter. On it sat a laptop and a paperback-sized wireless internet router. Despite his surroundings, Born wasn't living completely in the past. Weird people, scientists. They could live without sanitation, but deny them fast internet access and they crumbled to dust.
Born reappeared in just two minutes, still buttoning up a red and black checked shirt. His baggy beige chinos were too long for his short legs, and rucked up at the ankles. He didn't offer Virgo a seat, but eyed him from the middle of the room, afloat on the detritus.
Virgo pulled the disk from his pocket. 'Gierek's death had something to do with this.' He swallowed. 'I think.'
'You think?'
'He was coming to get it from me.'
Born still hadn't moved. 'Laszlo . . .' he said.
It sounded like a reprimand, a sigh of frustration. He stepped across the room and took the disk from Virgo's hand.
'What's on it?' He inspected it front and back, but didn't remove it from the case.
'Nothing – at least, nothing readable. There's something strange about the data on it. It's . . .' What had Andy said? 'It's quantum-sized.'
Born looked up sharply, then handed the disk back and turned away. 'So? What's it got to do with me?'
'I think the disk has something to do with a quantum computer. Gierek called it an activator.'
That was meant to sound impressive, striding. It came out lame.
'Gierek had a disk too,' Virgo added. 'But whoever killed him took it.'
There was a long, uncomfortable silence before Born sighed and spoke again.
'Let me have another look at this disk,' he said, holding out his hand.
Virgo offered it again; Born took the disk and walked over to the laptop. He put the disk into the optical drive and pushed it shut.
'The quantum computer is a millstone around my neck,' Born muttered as the disk drive whirred into action. 'It took about two minutes to become an end in itself.'
He looked up and locked eyes with Virgo. 'A machine that can probe the strangest features of the universe. And someone turned it into a spy's tool. Do you have any idea how much money people have offered me to make the quantum computer work?'
Virgo shook his head.
'Have you ever paid for sex, Nathaniel?'
It took Virgo a moment to recover from the question. He shook his head again.
'Don't. That's my advice. Some things are too important to be about money.' Born grabbed a pencil from his desk and pressed its point into the tip of his index finger. 'Not once did I get an offer from someone interested in physics. Someone who wanted to find out what it means to exist.'
The laptop screen changed colour, and lit his face in the gloom. The rancour was gone.
'I only wish Laszlo . . .' Born paused. 'Sometimes people have their choices made for them. It can happen to any of us.' He looked up. 'Laszlo was brilliant, you know.'
'You knew him?'
'We worked on a couple of things together. It was years ago.'
Suddenly, Born snapped out of his reverie.
'Your disk is unreadable. I have no idea why Laszlo wanted it.'
That was it? Virgo slumped in disappointment. 'Could it be something to do with a quantum computer?'
Born didn't answer. He was looking down at the blank screen. He jabbed at a couple of keys, and then, without looking up, ejected the disk and handed it to Virgo.
Virgo took it, but stood still. How could this be? All the way here he'd convinced himelf: Born would figure the whole situation out. Without an answer, there was no story.
A minute later, Born looked up again; he seemed surprised to see Virgo still standing there.
'You should go: I can't help you. The other disk might be important, of course. But you don't have that, do you?' He stood up. 'Really. You should go. Now. I'm sorry, but this is your problem, not mine.'
He ushered Virgo out. Virgo offered no resistance.
'Don't come back,' Born said.
Suddenly, he was on the doorstep.
'Just one more thing,' Virgo said, holding a hand against the closing door. 'Does the name Alex Genovsky mean anything to you?'
>
The pressure on Virgo's hand eased, and Born looked him in the eye. He hesitated before he spoke. Virgo heard a hint of regret, maybe even pity, in his voice.
'It means you're in some very deep shit,' he said quietly.
The door slammed shut.
CHAPTER 19
VASIL MARINOV PUT THE receiver carefully down on its cradle. His mouth was set tight, his clear eyes burning into the wood-panelled wall opposite. He walked over to the window and stared out at the rain-strewn boats moored to the wharf. He had yet to get used to the grey of a Boston winter. Houston had suited him much better; working for NASA had its own difficulties, but at least, after a hard day at the keyboard, you could always have a drink in the sun.
Somewhere across that grey ocean, Laszlo Gierek was dead. Marinov felt nothing at the news: they'd had all they needed from Gierek now. Setting him up at Boston University had been easy; no one asked difficult questions back then. And the cachet Gierek had built up in the past couple of decades had swung numerous deals, brought in some serious money. It was a shame how things had ended, but Marinov had no regrets: Gierek had been a good investment, and now he had been cashed in.
Alex had reported in exactly on schedule, and would be heading back later today. There was still this one loose end to tie up, but that would be quick. It was only a matter of time. They had found Virgo, now that he'd switched his phone on. His cellphone number was just sitting there, on a business card lying on the dining table, Alex said. Tapping into these networks, locating the responding base stations and triangulating a position wasn't a challenge to Marinov's hacking skills. He had hacked into bigger, more secure systems than this.
The location put Virgo in Oxford. Why Oxford?
Daniel Born.
That was not good. Alex had mentioned Born yesterday, as a means of tracking down Gierek. Years before, Gierek and Born had worked together on a couple of projects; Gierek might well have tried getting in touch again. Or told Virgo to contact him.
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