Entanglement

by Michael Brooks

  The flow was scarred by sculls cleaving the water, the rowers practising their careful, quiet slide through the current. He sat down on a bench, gripping hard at the coffee's warmth. The way the boats moved was extraordinary; so much effort, so many straining muscles, but the result was sleek and smooth, the velocity unchanging.

  He was numb in the fog of a night's unrest. And yet things had to go perfectly today, for Katie's sake. It seemed ridiculous, too pedestrian, to be carrying on like this. But what else was he supposed to do?

  A few geese honked around his feet. He pretended to throw crumbs along the bank; some birds shuffled away on a futile search, the rest stood their ground. It was impossible to know how Genovsky would react to his bluff. Would she go for it?

  By nine o'clock, he couldn't wait any longer. He'd taken a map from the hotel's reception desk, but it only took a glance up and down the street to work out which way he should go: the sidewalk was filled with students heading to the day's first lectures. He fell in with them, listened to their easy chatter, and envied their optimism about the day.

  The physics building wasn't hard to find. Its scale was impressive: the flat, featureless expanses of brown brick were broken only by large squares of shining glass, and it seemed tall and broad and imposing. Inside, though, it would feel like familiar territory.

  They were all essentially the same, these places. Physics had a quiet disinterest in the outside world. It was a kind of nation-state; every departmental library held the same journals, every cramped office would contain a selection of books picked from the same small repertoire. There was a range of perhaps a hundred texts that you'd find inside every physics faculty, at least in Europe and America. And once you were inside, no one paid you the slightest bit of notice: if you wanted to wander the corridors, gaze at the names on doors, read the conference announcement posters pinned at random on the walls – another universal – you could do so for hours unhindered. Physics had no sense of danger, no sense of the suspicious stranger, no eye for a face. Or that was what he told himself. Something had to give you the courage to do ridiculous things.

  Virgo pushed the doors open.

  He stood in the spacious entry hall and let his eyes run over the display case crammed with faculty photographs. Some were in black and white, but most were colour. None were stylish, least of all Laszlo Gierek's. He was posed, shoulders drooping, in a tired beige sweater that sagged over his shoulders. His moustache was bulkier than when Virgo had seen him last. His eyes were brighter too, Virgo noticed, like something in the back of his mind was tempting him to grin.

  Finding Gierek's lab wasn't hard. A peg-letter board next to the photographs announced the location of all the faculty's offices; Gierek's was on the third floor, corridor C, room 29. A site plan on the opposite wall showed where to go. Virgo bounded up the stairs – the lift was shuttered and ancient, probably being used to shuttle liquid helium and nitrogen to and from the cooling plant he had noticed on his way in. He turned left on leaving the stairwell, then left again into corridor C. It was lit by fluorescent strips, and the walls, floors and ceilings were all painted in a faded off-white. Corridor C had all the atmosphere of a down-at-heel hospital.

  Gierek's office was third on the right. With vain hope, Virgo pushed down on the dull steel handle. It resisted movement, and the mechanism issued a defiant metallic clunk. He pulled back from the door and scrutinised the notes pinned to the feltboard on its left. There were tutorial hours, a poster for an upcoming quantum information workshop at College Park, Maryland, and, scrawled in tiny letters on the back of a business card, a list of other places Gierek might be found. Labs 1A43, 1A45, 2B26. Virgo glanced up and down the corridor. There was no one around. He hesitated, and then thought better of trying to force the door. There would be easier, less conspicuous ways in.

  The labs were all locked, as he suspected they would be. But each one had a list of four or five names pinned to the door. Gierek had a number of students, it seemed. Virgo picked the most exotic name from among them – Nickolas Tsankov. Eastern European? He rolled the name around his tongue, practising a pronunciation under his breath. As long as Facilities were of the usual kind – lazy and xenophobic – he would have the keys in minutes.

  CHAPTER 41

  FRANK DELANEY STOOD OUTSIDE the FBI's Boston field office and finished his cigarette. You couldn't smoke in government buildings these days. Or think for yourself. Jesus, what was he thinking, using his initiative like this? No one used their initiative in the Bureau any more – it was practically against regulations.

  But it was worth it if it gave him back some peace. Nathaniel Virgo had bugged him for a couple of days now.

  The lie about the disk, the closed investigation. And then he came to Boston and gave a false address. A lot of questions there.

  'Hey, Frank.' Lorraine passed him and entered the building. Like he'd seen her just yesterday. It had been, what? Five years?

  'Hey, Lorraine.' He took a final drag, then squashed the butt into the sand. Time to go in.

  Getting out had been better.

  'Delaney. How you doing?'

  Hal Morgan was giving him the concerned head-tilt from behind the huge, cluttered desk. Towers of paper rose up from coloured plastic trays sitting on each corner.

  'Bullshit, Morgan. Like you ever cared.' Delaney allowed his face to break into a smile, then moved into the Bureau chief's office and shook Morgan's hand. 'How's that paperless office coming along – any sign of it yet?'

  Morgan motioned to the papers. 'It's coming any day now. Soon as I fill in the application forms here, Bureau'll have it delivered. Sit down, Delaney. How's things at Quantico?'

  'Pretty quiet.'

  'Quiet good or quiet like hell?'

  Delaney shrugged. 'It's all hell, ain't it?'

  'Can I get you some coffee?'

  Delaney held up a hand. 'I'm good, thanks.' He hesitated, trying to find the right way to break out of the niceties.

  'What we talked about on the phone . . .' he began. 'Nathaniel Virgo.'

  Morgan eased back in his chair. 'I had a look at the file. Like you asked. Not much to go on. Wanted for questioning, that's it.'

  'But the British are looking for him.'

  'As I recall, we're independent now, Delaney.' Morgan's mouth twitched in a suppressed smile. 'Did no one tell you? There was some declaration. Back in 1776, I believe. We're very proud of it in Boston – it all kicked off round here. You should look it up in a history book. Pretty stirring stuff.'

  Delaney ignored the sarcasm.

  'So I'm asking a favour.'

  'And I owe you a favour.' Morgan raised his eyebrows. 'Or I did. A friend of mine at the Globe just paid it back.

  Didn't you see the paper today? Your boy is front-page news.'

  Morgan leaned forward again, then pointed to his secretary's office.

  'See that phone there? That's the Frank Delaney hotline. Get some coffee, kick off your shoes, and take a seat in Rosemary's guest chair. Somebody, somewhere is bound to see your fella soon.'

  CHAPTER 42

  THE FACILITIES COUNTER WAS near the main entrance of the physics building, just beyond the wall of photographs. As Virgo approached, a fat, red-faced man with slicked-back silver hair looked up from the sports pages of the Globe. Virgo held his gaze and smiled.

  'Hello, I am Nickolas Tsankov, one of Professor Gierek's students.'

  The man looked up. He was wheezing heavily with every breath.

  Virgo hammed up the accent. 'He is at . . . a conference in Japan, and has . . . asked me to fax him some papers from his office, for a . . . presentation he is giving this afternoon. I don't have his office . . . er . . . keys – he said you would lend them to me?'

  The man grunted and heaved himself up from his chair. 'I can't give you the keys,' he said. He stood tall and inflated. 'It's against regulations. The professor'll have to call me or one of my colleagues himself if he wants something.' He succeeded in his effort to soun
d pompous and inconvenienced, and topped it off with a superior downward gaze.

  Virgo took a breath and tried another tack. 'Are you Jerry? Professor Gierek said to ask for you. It is the middle of the . . . er . . . night in Japan. He said you would understand, and help him.'

  Jerry glowed at the praise. He was wearing a name badge; it was almost too easy.

  'Look, I can't give you the keys,' he said, deflating before Virgo's eyes. 'But I can sure as hell open up his office for you. That OK?'

  Virgo nodded gratefully and headed quickly towards the lift. Jerry heaved along twenty paces behind him. As Virgo turned the corner and stood in front of the lift door, he noticed the alarm button. He glanced over his shoulder. Jerry was still out of sight. Virgo slapped the button and saw a red light appear above the shutters. He headed back round the corner and slammed into Jerry's stomach.

  'The elevator's not . . . not . . . er . . . working, Mr Jerry,' he said. Was he overdoing it? 'Shall we take the stairs?'

  Jerry hesitated and leaned to look round the corner. He saw the red light and grunted.

  'It's the third floor, isn't it?' he said.

  Jerry looked behind him, then at the stairs. He grunted again, and pulled a huge, rattling bunch of keys from his pocket. He flicked three of them round, and held the fourth between a massive forefinger and thumb. He handed the bunch to Virgo. 'This is the one you want,' he muttered. 'Be quick or I'll get my ass kicked.'

  Virgo grabbed the keys and bounded up the stairs.

  Closing the door behind him, Virgo took in the scene. There were piles of paper everywhere, most of them printouts from the web archive where researchers posted their papers before publication. Stacks of journals covered the desk. Running along the wall to his left, floor to ceiling, six rows of shelving heaved with texts on every conceivable area of physics. Many of them were in Polish.

  Keys?

  Where would Gierek keep his lab keys? Virgo knew time was running against him. As soon as Jerry realised that his laziness could cost him his job, he would come looking. He only had a few minutes.

  What he wanted to see wouldn't be in the office. It was in a lab somewhere, wrapped up in a blanket in a cupboard. He could still hear Gierek's voice.

  But where were the keys?

  He stepped into the room and pulled at the desk drawers. They were locked. He looked at the bunch of keys in his hand. None of them would fit these tiny locks. Beginning to panic, he tugged hard at a drawer handle. The force dragged the desk away from the wall, and a pile of journals slipped down onto a stack of papers on the floor, knocking them askew. Virgo looked around. There must be something here that he could use to lever the drawers open. There was a stainless-steel letter opener in a stationery holder on the windowsill. He grabbed it and set to work.

  He was sweating in the institutional heat of the building and, after a few twists, the opener slipped from his hand. It gouged a track down the front of the desk drawer and clattered onto the floor. As he stooped down to pick it up, there was a sharp rap on the door. The handle turned.

  'Are you still in there?'

  Shit.

  The door opened.

  Jerry's eyes scanned the room, his gaze narrowing as he finally located Virgo, crouched under the desk, knife in hand.

  'Jeeezus. What're you doin'?'

  He took a step into the room, his bulky frame knocking the door aside. Virgo looked up as the door rebounded from its rubber stop. A bunch of keys, strung on a red and white striped cord, flew upwards, then clattered against the back of the office door.

  On the door, looped over the coat hook. Blindingly bloody obvious.

  'I dropped the papers behind the desk. I was just trying to reach them.' Virgo gagged: he had also dropped the accent.

  He put the letter opener gently down onto the carpet. 'Got them . . . now, though,' he said, his vaguely Balkan roots miraculously restored. 'Shall we go?'

  Jerry looked puzzled and said nothing. Virgo got up, one of the papers in hand, and threw Jerry his keys. 'Here you are. Thank you for your help. Professor Gierek was certainly right about you.'

  He took the few steps to the door and patted Jerry on the shoulder, pushing him gently backwards. 'Can you show me where the fax machine is?'

  Virgo opened the door and followed the huge frame out into the corridor. As Jerry fumbled to find the door key, Virgo slapped himself on the forehead.

  This was getting like pantomime.

  'Sorry, I dropped my phone in there,' he said. 'Just a minute.'

  Jerry looked up as Virgo disappeared back inside Gierek's office and pushed the door half-closed. Deftly, he lifted the keys from the coat hook, and stuffed them into his trouser pocket. He emerged again, smiled at Jerry, and waved the paper in the air.

  'Now,' he said, patting Jerry's shoulder again. 'Where's that fax machine?'

  Jerry left him alone at the fax machine. After two minutes, Virgo sloped off and headed for the nearest of Gierek's labs. With a quick glance up and down the empty corridor, he slipped a key into the lock. It turned first time. Easy.

  The lab was spartan and contained nothing interesting. There was a connecting door into a second lab, but this appeared to be a clean room for making circuit boards – or maybe optical disks.

  The third lab, on the second floor, had to be the place. Virgo stepped out into the corridor, locked the door behind him and headed for the stairs. Two minutes later, his heart began to race. At last, the numbness was dissipating, and he was feeling something. It was the urgency of consequences.

  He had to find it. He couldn't think about Rachel, but he wasn't going to let Katie die. And he certainly wasn't going to leave her an orphan. He had to make this work.

  The wooden benches and the shelves on all four walls were crammed with equipment. But what he was looking for wasn't on show.

  A few cupboards ranged across the wall furthest from the door. Virgo glanced at his watch: it was 10.45. He didn't have much time to spare now. He turned and locked the door from the inside. Whatever it was, it had to be in there.

  CHAPTER 43

  KATIE VIRGO NURSED A vague memory of a cock crowing. Her shoulders ached and her neck was stiff. She had slept with her prosthetic on, and the stump of her left leg ached too, now. But she wasn't going to give the surprise away yet. She had a plan for that moment.

  She opened her eyes. Ramón and Vicente were staring at her from low stools on the other side of the room. She experienced a rushing giddiness as her mind reloaded.

  'What time is it?'

  'About eleven,' Vicente said. 'You sleep like el diablo.'

  She sat up. The room didn't look any better than it had in the half-light of the electric bulb. It was still dim, a faint light struggling through the dirty net curtains at the window. On the shelf, the clock still said 11.15.

  A smell in the air wrenched at her stomach.

  'Do you have any food?' She realised that her hands were now free.

  'It's coming.' Vicente glanced at the door, then yelled, 'Miguel!' A few moments later, the door opened, and the little boy came through carrying three plates. He held one out to her, and she took it.

  'Gracias.'

  Miguel studied her face for a moment, like he was trying to dredge up a memory. His eyes clouded, and he turned and gave the other plates to the two men, then sat down on the floor in front of Vicente.

  Katie hardly chewed as she gulped down the food. It was a mound of rice and black beans with a little sausage sprinkled through it, but it tasted like gourmet cuisine. As she finished, she looked up and saw Vicente staring at her. He was stroking Miguel's hair, running his fingers through it fondly. The boy had cuddled up close to him.

  Vicente pointed at her empty plate. 'We call it moros y cristianos. Moors and Christians. Because of the black and white. You want more? He pointed at his own plate, lying untouched on the dusty floor beside him. 'We might be here a while. You should eat while you can.'

  He motioned for Miguel to give her
his portion. She accepted it gratefully and bolted most of it down. She was ravenous, and it was good. It felt ridiculous to be accepting Vicente's hospitality like this; surely she should be throwing it back in his face? She was taking food from the hand that had killed her mother just a few hours ago.

  Maybe it was human to put survival ahead of expressing her despair, her outraged anger. Her mum was dead. But she couldn't think about it all now. She wanted to be able to cry when she did, and she couldn't afford that yet. Despair could wait.

  Miguel was back at Vicente's feet, leaning against his leg, having his head gently stroked. Vicente looked like a tender father with his son.

  'What happened to Miguel's father?' she asked.

  Vicente gave a half-smile. 'He's a lazy womaniser.' He turned to Ramón. 'Aren't you?'

  Ramón didn't react.

  Miguel's eyes bored into her. There was no way he understood their conversation; there was something else going on in his head. He started to sing softly again – the same soft melody he had sung the night before.

  She lifted her eyes to Vicente. 'What is he singing?'

  Vicente's eyes clouded, and his hand stopped still on the boy's hair. 'It's a lullaby,' he said. 'It says, "Go to sleep and wake up when the light comes again." His mother used to sing it to him. I think he is still waiting for the light to come for her.'

  Miguel looked up at Katie again. After a couple of seconds, she forced herself to look away. What she had planned was going to be hard enough already.

  CHAPTER 44

  VIRGO STARED INTO THE cupboard.

  This was it. This was what Radcliffe, Gierek – and maybe Rachel – had died for. His own life might depend on it. Katie's too. And it was just a grey box, about the size of a VCR, tucked under a dust sheet at the back of the bottom shelf of the corner unit.

  Virgo's hands shook as he bent down and pulled it carefully out. It was strangely light. He placed it on the nearest bench, stepped back and looked at Gierek's machine. Maybe its phantom weight was due to the plastic casing. The machine was neatly built, but unmistakably self-made; the folds of the casing were less neat than those a factory would produce, and it was scratched around the screws. The rear of the box looked like a standard interface set-up: there was a power input, monitor output, some kind of modem or ethernet socket, and mouse and keyboard ports. Virgo crouched down to look in the cupboard again. As he knew they would be, the peripherals were all there: a flat-screen monitor, mouse and keyboard. Gierek was obviously a believer in minimal engineering; no futuristic interfaces for his creation.