And music. Music everywhere, reggae and dancehall and soca spilling from rum shops and cars and the open windows of chattel houses, flashy young men selling CDs out of Suzuki hatchbacks with blackened windows.
It had been almost twenty-five years since Conrad had set foot on the Rock, so why did this insist on feeling like a homecoming?
The director could’ve called this meeting anywhere. Heartless son of a bitch.
Barbados had been Conrad’s home from the age of three to the age of twelve, when he was sent to live at Eton. It was not a typical childhood, whatever that might be. Children of billionaires don’t have typical childhoods. Although Barbados boasted one of the best public education systems in the world, Conrad was chauffeur driven to a private school with the children of other rich white bankers from London and Zurich and Toronto. And although Barbados boasted one of the lowest crime rates in the world, there was a ten-foot wall surrounding their property with an electric gate at the bottom of the drive, and a team of six live-in manservants who practiced martial arts before breakfast on the back lawn beyond the pool. These hard men had come with them from London. To the island’s elite, Conrad’s father was simply a rich, important, and very security-conscious banker. But even as a child Conrad sensed there was something much bigger going on.
The limo was well up the hill now, houses imposing and properties immaculately groomed. They passed the prime minister’s residence, Ilaro Court, on the right. Named after a town in Nigeria where Sir Gilbert Carter had been governor before His Majesty promoted him here.
They were all coming back now, all the dusty memories Conrad never willingly took out of storage. Playing lawn darts on the grounds of Ilaro Court under tamarind and breadfruit trees . . . Playing Marco Polo in the prime minister’s swimming pool with the children of other bankers and captains of industry while the statue of Neptune stood watch, trident held aloft . . . Drinking lime squash served by kindly Bajan ladies on the pool deck while parents drank planter’s punch in the elegant living room, talking of things that do not interest children . . .
The limousine turned left and continued to higher ground, the road steepening, then another left and they pulled to a stop. The driver pressed a button on the dash, and the electric gate swung open.
On either side of the gate, on concrete pedestals, stood two tong shi—bronze Chinese guardian lions. Conrad’s mother had named them Antony and Cleopatra. And it was here, standing next to Antony, that Conrad had seen his mother for the last time. He was ten years old.
She howled like a wounded animal, spit flying from her mouth, tears glistening on her cheeks in the moonlight, red nails on ringed fingers clawing at the widening space between them as Morris pulled her toward an idling Range Rover. Father standing in the headlights’ glare, watching with no expression at all.
Ten years old. And that was Conrad’s last image of his mother.
She awakened him in his room, making a shushing gesture with an index finger pressed to her painted lips.
She smelled of flowery perfume. And gin. She’d been drinking a lot more gin lately.
“Connie,” she said, “sit up.” She was pretending to be happy, but she wasn’t happy. She was scared. “We’re going to have a little adventure, you and I.”
She said they were going to play a joke on Father and sneak away to Miami for a few days to buy him a present as a surprise. But Father was a man who never laughed and made Conrad earn every smile. He did not like surprises, and he was not the sort of man people played jokes on.
She rushed the boy into his clothes, assuring him that everything was fine and this was going to be a grand adventure and Father will be so pleased with his surprise.
She paused at his bedroom door. “Now we mustn’t be seen, or it’ll ruin everything. Connie, dear, take Mum’s hand.” Her hand was cold and her grip too firm. She led him along the dim corridor and down the servants’ staircase into the kitchen, then quietly through the mudroom, picking up a BWIA carry-on bag and slinging it over her shoulder. But Mum never went anywhere for even a few days with less than a full-sized suitcase plus a carry-on plus a purse.
They stepped out through the side door and she closed it silently behind them. Tree frogs and crickets filled the night air with frantic singing—louder, it seemed to the boy, than he’d ever heard them before. He stopped walking at the edge of the gravel drive, trying to make sense of things.
She tugged at his hand. “Please, sweetie, be cooperative. You don’t want to spoil the surprise, do you?”
Conrad held his ground. “We’re running away,” he said, “aren’t we?”
“Don’t be silly. Of course not.” She was lying again.
“I don’t want to go without Lucy,” said Conrad.
“Oh, for God’s sake. You’ll survive three days without your nanny.” Another false smile. “We’ll be back before you know it.”
He jerked his hand free from hers. “Why aren’t you telling me the truth?”
“Lower your voice,” she whispered louder than he had spoken, reaching forward and snatching his wrist, nails digging in. “Stop asking questions and do as you’re told, right this instant.” She drew a flashlight from her bag and aimed the beam down the curving hibiscus-lined drive. Started walking, pulling him along by the wrist. “I promise I’ll explain everything later. All you need to know right now is I’m a mother protecting her son.”
A chill ran down Conrad’s arms and his scalp tingled. “Protect me from what?” He was careful to keep his voice quiet. The iron gate at the bottom of the drive was now within range of the flashlight’s beam.
“From the life your father is planning for you.” She slowed and looked back at the boy. Her eyes were wet. “I’m sorry, Connie, but this is real grown-up stuff and it’s going to be a while before you can understand it completely. Please trust me, I’m doing this for you.”
To Conrad’s ten-year-old mind it was like the point in a jigsaw puzzle where you add one more piece and now you can see what the finished puzzle will look like. So many secret meetings and private phone calls . . . so many never-to-be-discussed subjects . . . so many men with guns.
His father was some kind of Bad Guy.
“You can let go, Mum,” he said. “I’m coming with you.”
She let go of his wrist and approached the gate, pulling a key on a silver chain from under her shirt. She turned the key in the electric box and the gate began to hum open. They slipped through as soon as the opening was large enough. Conrad heard something nearby in the darkness to their right.
A car.
The Range Rover’s headlights came on, flooding the boy’s eyes with blinding light.
18: IRON SHARPENING IRON
Nice of you to join us, Conrad.”
Conrad stepped past Carruthers into the airy entrance hall. “Don’t start, Charles. Where is he?”
The deputy director pointed to the louvered French doors. “Back patio. You know the way.” His mouth tightened. “He wishes to see you alone.”
The director sat out beyond the wet bar and covered patio in the full sun, his back to the house, facing the swimming pool. Beside him on the pool deck a second wicker chair waited for Conrad. Sometime in the last four months, the director had accepted impending baldness and shaved the dome completely. Conrad marched up behind him, thinking: Ignore the venue, focus on the meeting. He’s an asshole. Stay professional.
Or not.
“Hi, Dad,” he said.
The old man sat very still, didn’t turn around. “Son.”
Conrad sat in the empty chair and faced his father.
Mother of God . . .
The old man hadn’t shaved his head at all—his hair had fallen out. He’d lost about twenty pounds, the mirrored sunglasses like bug eyes on his gaunt face. And he was wearing a cardigan in the tropical sun.
“Inoperable,” the ol
d man said. He gestured to the small table between the chairs. “Pour yourself a drink. I’m on strict rations, don’t get my next dram until after supper.”
Conrad uncorked the bottle of Mount Gay Extra Old, poured the amber spirit into a tulip snifter. “How long have you got?”
“Six months to a year, they say.” The director cleared his throat for a full half minute. “You and I are never going to be friends, Conrad. I didn’t raise a friend. I raised a successor. Nothing in your life has happened by accident. Cancer forces me to bring the schedule forward five years, but you were always meant to inherit my role in the game. Make no mistake about that.”
The boy stopped in the darkened entrance hall and spun to challenge his father. “Where’s Mum? Where did Morris take her?”
“Do not address me in that tone of voice,” barked his father. “Get ahold of yourself.”
Conrad couldn’t match the challenge, his gaze dropping—against his will—to the floor between them. “Yes, sir.”
“I’m going out back for a cigarette. You stay here, take a moment to collect yourself. When you’re ready to discuss this calmly, come out and see me.”
It felt like a test. Conrad didn’t wait behind but followed right on his father’s heels, out through the French doors.
Thinking: You can do this.
His father stepped over to the patio bar, pulled a small bottle of Coca-Cola from the fridge, and pried off the cap. “Bring a chair,” he said, turning his back and walking into the moonlight.
Conrad dragged a wicker chair behind his father out to the pool deck, the bleep-bleeping of tree frogs now a wall of sound hollering from everywhere at once, as if coming from inside his own head.
His father pointed at the chair and Conrad sat. He stood over the boy, handed him the bottle. “Have a Coca-Cola.”
Keep it together . . . “Thank you, sir. But I don’t want Coca-Cola. I want to know where Mum is.”
His father seemed to search the canopy of stars above for the right words, then he simply shrugged. “Here is the bottom line: Your mother could have chosen to stay here with you. She was also free to leave by herself. But nobody takes what’s—nobody takes my son away. I’m sorry to tell you this, but in the end she chose to go and leave you behind. She didn’t love you enough to stay. She loved leaving more than she loved you.”
Do not cry . . . do . . . not . . . The boy could feel his eyes stinging, his bottom lip trembling.
“Stop that right now,” said his father. “Be a man.”
“I’m TEN!” Conrad shouted. The tears came, he couldn’t stop them, but he found he could still control his voice, and all at once he knew that he would not sob. He could feel anger push despair out the window. That gave him strength. He grew steadier as his father took the time to light a cigarette and blow a long, blue stream of smoke.
Conrad’s father looked at him now with something like grudging tolerance. “I acknowledge this is a very difficult time for you, and there will be an adjustment period. And you may cry in your room. There’s no shame in crying alone, but a man does not cry in front of others.”
“I’m not a man yet,” Conrad insisted, somehow managing to say it with no quaver or whine in his voice.
“I’m afraid you’re going to have to be. And the blame for that falls squarely at the feet of your absent bitch of a mother. But we will manage this difficulty as best we can. In fact, it will strengthen you, so you’ll grow up to be more than just a man. You’ll do world-changing things. You’ll be among the authors of history. What I mean to say is, everything will work out fine, son.” Father cleared his throat. “Now drink your soda.”
The old man drank some water. “Five more years would’ve been optimal. I probably should’ve promoted you out of the Vatican a few years ago . . . but that’s barn doors and horses now.”
He looked out at the pool. “On the day I become too ill to run this organization, the board of advisers will appoint either you or Charles to the director’s chair. The other will serve as deputy. Charles is of course beside himself that they might leapfrog you over him—he feels he’s earned it. And he has.”
“So why not give it to him?” Two other Conrads stared back at Conrad from his father’s mirrored lenses, but just the angle of the old man’s head made clear his displeasure at the question.
“Because he isn’t half the man I raised you to be. I’ve always been hard on you. Iron sharpening iron, to make you ready. Now it’s up to you. If you want the director’s chair, you have to take it. You have to claim it and own it.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You’ll take the reins—if you can take them—at a major turning point in history. The next director will change the course of human affairs in ways I both dreaded and dreamed of. The very earth will wobble as we transition out of the dying empire and into the empire to come, but it is necessary and it cannot be stopped. And time grows short. There will be sacrifices, but we must preserve our essential culture, our essential structures. If we don’t manage this shift, the so-called people will, and they’ll make beasts of us all. When the ranchers do battle, fences fall and the livestock begin to wander about, begin to consider independence. But livestock can’t run the ranch. Well, the livestock are becoming restless, they can feel the tides shifting. We’ll have to risk a little heating-up of the game.”
“I’ll do what’s necessary,” said Conrad. “You know that.”
“Yes. The question is whether or not you’ll do what’s necessary well enough.”
Dying of cancer, still an asshole.
The old man dug into the pocket of his cardigan, pulled out a set of keys, and smiled for the first time since Conrad’s arrival. “Keys to the kingdom. Need to know is no longer a restriction for you. For there to be a level playing field, you need access to the same operating intelligence your rival has.” He reached forward a once-strong hand, now bony and covered in liver spots, passing the keys to Conrad. The gold fob said Fountaine Pajot. “She’s a sixty-foot motor cat, sitting at anchor just off Speightstown. I assume you still have a fondness for the sea?”
“I do.”
“Then consider the boat a graduation present in advance. I hope you earn it. The computer on board contains the files I’ve deemed crucial. Read all you can.”
Conrad pocketed the keys. “I’d better get at it.”
The old man held up a hand. “One more thing. You’ve just promoted Michael Dillman to your second-in-command for the next phase of the AIT project.”
“I have?”
The director nodded. “Let him think it came from you. Dillman’s been a Council ally since you were a boy in short pants, and he’s loyal to me. He’ll be loyal to my son.” He looked out at the pool again, a field of diamonds dancing above cold blue tiles. “And my son cannot afford to fail with this project.”
19: GAMMA RAY
London, England
Oh,” said Kara. She opened the door wide and gestured Daniel inside. Her eyes were a little glassy. “You came back.”
“I came back.” Daniel followed her into the living room. A half-full bottle of red wine stood on the coffee table, wineglass beside it empty but still wet. It was eleven thirty in the morning.
“I’ll get you a glass.” She was back in less than a minute. They sat and she poured. “You report back to Julia?” The effort to smile looked exhausting. “Don’t spare my feelings. Did I pass or fail?”
Go easy . . .
“I haven’t spoken to Julia yet, but I’m almost certain I’ll recommend she include you in the book.”
“Almost?”
“Yes. But Julia’s chasing down another bongo-playing theoretical physicist with another mathematically sound but currently untestable hypothesis about the Trinity Phenomenon. She’ll be tied up a couple weeks maybe.” He drank some wine. “Meanwhile, I have a proposition for you.”
&n
bsp; He laid out the line, selling himself as a nephew on a personal quest. Then he baited the line with a pitch he’d thought up in the bathtub. A pitch framed as logic, designed to appeal to her hyper-rationality.
“First of all,” he said, “I suspect you’re right. The voices are coming from somewhere other than your own mind.”
An inch of tension dropped from Kara’s shoulders and her smile was genuine. “You have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear those words.” She let out a breath. “I can hear it whenever I want from fellow sufferers on the forums, but . . .”
“But a lot of them are crazy,” said Daniel.
“Not all,” she said, “but yes, a lot of them—most of them—are . . . crazy. Anyway, thank you.”
“Just calling it as I see it. Which brings me to this: While it’s possible that your working hypothesis—the Pentagon weapon—is the source of the voices, I suspect the truth is something different.”
“Please don’t tell me you think I’m another Tim Trinity.”
“Just hear me out for a minute. You’re a scientist, consider it as you would any competing hypothesis.”
“Okay . . .”
“It happened before in Mandal, where the revealed was once concealed, and the concealed shall be revealed. I read that in your journal last night.”
“I haven’t got them memorized. I’m not that crazy.”
“It’s there. I can show you. And four days ago in West Virginia, a man said those exact same words to me.”
“I don’t understand.”
“See, my uncle thought God was speaking to him, and I figured if what happened to Tim was happening to other people, I should look for people with similar notions. And I found this man who thinks he’s possessed by Satan.”
“And people say I’m crazy.”
“Think of it this way: Information is coming into your head from the outside, manifesting as disembodied voices, auditory hallucinations. If you’re my uncle, you interpret it as the voice of God. If you’re this other man, you think it’s the devil’s voice. And if you’re you . . .”
The Devil's Game (The Game Trilogy Book 2) Page 10
