He winced, then his gaze snagged on the name of the applicant: Jorge Heimstadt.
Jorge.
The name caused his heart to leap. Jorge was the villain in
The Name of the Rose.
Jorge had been passing himself off as a blind and helpless holy man, when in fact he'd been murdering people.
As for
The Name of the Rose,
it was the one detective story that Eiran Dempster liked. And that Kay-Lee McDougall also admired.
Surely this couldn't be a coincidence?
Cadel examined Jorge's message more carefully. It was written in plain English. There were no underlined words, no suspicious capitals, no odd spellings. Moreover, he couldn't see anything that remotely resembled the code he had devised with Kay-Lee. But as he reread each phrase, over and over, he sensed that he was missing something. Something obvious.
And then, at last, he spotted it. Two simple words.
Chemical affinity.
Jorge was talking about his need for a perfect match.
You could say I was looking for chemical affinity,
he had written. Suddenly, everything came together in Cadel's head. Chemical affinity. The periodic table of the elements. Atomic numbers.
Fifty-three years old. Fifty-three was the atomic number for iodine, whose symbol was "I." The next number was 178.5, which couldn't be an atomic number (because atomic numbers only go to 103) but
could
be an atomic weight. Cadel scrolled through the table in his head. Barium was 137.34, then came the lanthanides ... then hafnium. Hf.
I. Hf.
Meaningless. Unless it meant "I have"?
He checked the next number. Seventy-three kilograms. That sounded more like an atomic number again—tantalum, to be exact.
I. Hf. Ta.
Birthday on the twelfth of January.
What did that mean? Twelve was the atomic number for magnesium: Mg.
Divorced in '92
was easy, ninety-two being the atomic number for uranium (U). I. Hf. Ta. Mg. U. It didn't really make sense.
And then Cadel realized. The reference to January meant something as well. It wasn't just twelve—it was twelfth of the first, or 12.01. The atomic weight for carbon.
Number, weight, number, weight, number. I. Hf. Ta. C. U.
I have to see you.
It was as clear as day. Kay-Lee wanted to see him. She wanted to see him, but she couldn't tell him so. Not directly. Not even in the code they'd devised.
Why?
He jumped out of his seat and began to pace the floor, hardly knowing whether to dance for joy or wring his hands. What on
earth
was going on? Why this strange message? But perhaps it was incomplete. Perhaps there was more. Throwing himself at the computer again, Cadel studied Jorge's e-mail with ferocious intensity. The only other numbers he could find were in the last paragraph:
I believe that life falls into
four
seasons, and I am, obviously, commencing my autumn years. But I don't believe that would make any difference, for kindred spirits. I believe the Beatles got it right—and even if I was
seventy-four,
or older, it wouldn't matter to the woman who saw past the exterior, to the core of my being. The True Self doesn't fade. Anyway, as Bismarck said, "Do not count the years, only the achievements." I believe I have a fathomless depth of love and experience lo offer the one who digs deep enough.
Four seasons. Four. The atomic number for beryllium. (Be.) Seventy-four was the atomic number for tungsten. (W.) Be W.
Bew?
No, no, no. There had to be something else. Be, W, something. He combed through the last few sentences. He sectioned them, dissected them, ran them through every possible test he could think of before it suddenly sprang out at him. Bismarck, Otto von.
Otto
—the Italian word for eight. Eight was the atomic number for oxygen, or "O."
Be W O.
No. That wasn't right. Be W ... ox? Woxy?
Air? Not exactly scientific, but ...
Be W Air. Beware.
It was a warning:
I have to see you. Beware.
Was Kay-Lee in some sort of danger? Was that why she had cut off all communications with him?
Clearly she was afraid that their main line of communication had been bugged. She was under the impression that someone had been
reading their e-mails.
Well, it might be possible. Cadel's own computer firewalls were almost impossible to breach, but the security on Kay-Lee's machine was hopeless—as he'd proven in the past. Perhaps the hacker had wormed into their exchange from her side? That was possible.
Curled up in his chair, furiously gnawing at his fingernails, Cadel considered his next move. He had to see Kay-Lee. To visit her, in other words—not to phone her, or to e-mail her, or anything else. The question was: How? He could catch a train to Weatherwood House easily enough, but could he just walk in the front door? Kay-Lee had told him to beware. It might be dangerous walking up to the front door. And besides...
Cadel glanced at the window. For all he knew, the Fiihrer's surveillance team was sitting outside. It might follow him, and then what would happen? Maybe nothing. Maybe, if there was danger, it would be a good thing to have a few Grunts watching his back.
On the other hand, Kay-Lee McDougall was none of the Fiihrer's business. Cadel had seen the Fiihrer's data on other Axis staff members. He had seen the way Adolf collected background tidbits: police records, unpaid child support, outstanding warrants. The Fiihrer seemed to regard this information as important to the security of the institute—in case he ever had to blackmail someone, perhaps. Like Cadel, he made a hobby of data collection. Unlike Cadel, however, he wasn't very good at it.
All the same, Cadel didn't want him finding out about Kay-Lee. As far as Cadel was concerned, Kay-Lee and the Axis Institute had to be kept as far apart as possible. Thaddeus, for example, wouldn't approve. Sending Kay-Lee presents had been bad enough. Going to
visit
her would be regarded as horribly unwise.
You're getting too involved,
Thaddeus had warned him a long time ago.
"That's your opinion," Cadel said aloud. Then he got up, dragged his backpack from under the bed, and stuffed it with items that he'd been hiding: his Indian-cotton skirt, his snap-on earrings, his bra, his hair ribbon. To these he added a plastic shopping bag from Sam's Boutique, a filmy chiffon blouse (filched from the laundry basket), and some of Lanna's makeup, which he was able to take from her bathroom quite easily. She didn't even stir when he slipped through her darkened bedroom; she was just a motionless lump under an embroidered silk duvet.
Having packed his bag, Cadel ordered a taxi, then walked boldly out the front door. He couldn't see anyone—no lurking cars or suspicious strangers lighting cigarettes—but that meant nothing. The Grunts might simply be very good at their job.
He hoped that they wouldn't be too good. If they were, he was in trouble.
The taxi arrived in about ten minutes. Cadel asked the driver to take him to the nearest mall. As they purred along leafy avenues and then swung out onto the highway, Cadel kept his eyes peeled for pursuing vehicles. One white Toyota stayed behind them for a suspiciously long time before turning off down a side street. There was also a motorbike that weaved in and out of the traffic like an Internet search engine spidering through the Web. But Cadel saw nothing that he could positively identify as a surveillance team.
At the mall, he headed straight for a computer store that he often frequented. It wasn't his favorite but it was the closest; it stocked a lot of telephone and entertainment equipment as well. Cadel spent about an hour poking around there, watching everyone who came in after he did. He was trying to lull any hovering surveillance teams into a false sense of security. Finally, he left the shop, ducking down a featureless corridor that led to a pair of restrooms. Two doors were placed side by side, one marked
MALE
, the other
FEMALE.
With a quick glance around, Cadel entered the female bathroom.
It was the riskiest part of the whole plan. One protest could ruin everything. But he moved quickly, and the only person who saw him was a tiny girl, whose mother was peering into a mirror above the basins. The girl caught his eye and stared.
Cadel darted into a stall, slamming the door behind him.
In the unearthly fluorescent light, he struggled with buttons and zippers. Having forgotten to bring spare socks, he was forced to stuff his bra with toilet paper. His sneakers looked odd under the Indian-cotton skirt, but that couldn't be helped. (Alias had warned him about giveaway shoes, but that couldn't be helped, either.) Though he was able to tie his hair back inside the stall, he didn't attempt to put on any makeup. Not until he had a mirror to help him.
The little girl was gone by the time he emerged. Cadel plastered foundation over his bruises until they were barely visible. He then applied his lipstick carefully, with many surreptitious glances at the woman on the other side of the room, who was doing the same thing. He put kohl on his eyes, and a little blush on his cheeks. The mascara, however, defeated him. He decided that mascara wasn't necessary.
When he'd finished, he was pleased with the result. It was convincing.
He
was convincing. He shook out his Sam's Boutique bag and thrust everything into it that he wanted to take with him (discarded boys' clothes, makeup, backpack).
Then he walked through the exit door.
No one stared. No one stopped him. He might have been invisible, for all the notice he attracted.
With a dry mouth and a hammering heart, he wandered down to the street, pausing every so often to peer into the kind of shop windows that he usually ignored—windows full of lingerie, jewelry, scented soaps, floral cushions. He wasn't sure if anyone was following him. He thought not.
Once on the street, he turned left and headed for the station. The air was full of grit. He felt strangely exposed after the bright, enclosed world of the mall, but the eyes of the people he passed simply slid over him. His skirt swished around his ankles: a very peculiar sensation. He could taste lipstick.
When he reached the station, he bought a ticket from a machine. Every platform was crowded with people, but the train that he caught wasn't very full. Though he moved from carriage to carriage, no one seemed to be dogging his footsteps. After about forty minutes, when he finally reached his stop, he sat by the door until the last possible moment.
Only as it was sliding shut did he suddenly fling himself out onto the platform, nearly knocking down an elderly lady.
He would have apologized, if he'd trusted his voice. But he couldn't. So he brushed past her rudely and bounded up the stairs to the street, two at a time. He saw Chinese families, slouching skateboard riders, a woman with a baby in a stroller—nothing suspicious. Weatherwood House was a half-hour walk away, down a very long road. He had checked his street directory before coming; he knew exactly what to do.
It was overcast, though dry. The walk seemed endless. On and on he went, tripping sometimes on the badly maintained pavement, barely noticing the apartment blocks and brick-veneer houses that lined the road on each side. At one stage he thought he'd reached Weatherwood House, only to discover that he was looking at a nursing home. And Weatherwood House, when he finally got there, wasn't at all what he had expected. Somehow he hadn't pictured so many entrances and exits—so many signs:
VISITOR PARKING, AMBULANCE ONLY
, and
KYLE MANLY WING
. There were trees and a big white house, but the photograph on the website hadn't encompassed all the glass breezeways, parking lots, ramps, patios, and ugly additions.
He didn't dare hesitate, however. He had to look purposeful. Briskly, he crossed the front lawn and headed for the nearest entrance, which was the door to an enclosed verandah. The verandah contained all kinds of odd chairs, a wicker side table stacked with boxes of jigsaw puzzles, and an electric urn—but no people. From one end of this airy but slightly depressing space, a pair of double doors opened into a wide hallway. Here everything looked far less run-down. There was carpet on the floor and a plant in a pot. Bright pictures hung on the wall, interspersed with several bulletin boards. A faint smell of cooking lingered in the air.
"Can I help you?" a female voice inquired.
Cadel whirled around. He saw a compact, grayhaired woman in slacks and a short-sleeved blouse, carrying a pile of folded sheets. She was emerging from what appeared to be a storeroom or linen cupboard.
Her manner was anything but friendly.
"Uh..." Cadel was so nervous that his voice was a startled squeak. "Kay-Lee McDougall?"
"You want Kay-Lee?"
Cadel nodded, relieved that the woman didn't seem to find the pitch and tone of his request at all suspicious.
"Kay-Lee hasn't finished her shift," she said. "Are you sure you want to wait?"
Cadel nodded again.
"Well ... perhaps you'd better come through here."
The woman led Cadel down the hallway, past lots of wide-open doors. Cadel saw an office, a bathroom, a floor strewn with toys. He had to dodge a wheelchair, which was being pushed by a young man in a pink T-shirt; the child in the wheelchair rolled his eyes at Cadel, his head juddering.
"In there," said the woman, and stopped. The hallway had widened into a large area that was in fact the vestibule of the old house. A polished staircase swept up to the second floor; it had some kind of stair lift attached to it. There was also an elevator, Cadel saw, and a row of upholstered seats near the massive front door.
"Just sit down and I'll tell her you've arrived," his companion instructed. "Who are you, anyway?"
She couldn't have been more blunt. Cadel was reluctant to advertise his presence, just in case the danger that Kay-Lee had warned him against lurked inside Weatherwood House. So he picked a fake name.
"Fe," he shrilled.
"Fee?"
Cadel nodded. Fe, of course, was the symbol for iron—Eiran. He hoped that Kay-Lee would understand.