Reamde

Prohibition Crick. She wondered if that would show up on Google Maps.

“And later by marijuana smugglers.”

“That’s the rumor, certainly.”

Jones was impatient with that. “Rumor or not, he made a lot of trips along this route.” He leaned forward and traced it with his finger. “He passed by the ruin of the baron’s house many times, and that was how he conceived the idea to buy the property and fix it up into a legitimate business.”

“That much of the Wikipedia entry is correct as far as I know,” she allowed.

“YOU MEAN, YOU were there in China?” Richard asked the woman.

“I mean, I was there when the apartment building blew up.”

Richard just stared at her.

“The one with your niece in the cellar.”

“Yeah,” he said. “I didn’t imagine you were talking about some other blown-up apartment in China.”

“Sorry.”

He looked at her for a while. “You’re not going to tell me who you are, are you?”

“No, I’m afraid not. But you can call me … oh, Laura, if it helps to have a name.”

“What is your interest in all this, Laura? What do you have to gain from talking me out of going to Xiamen?”

“Laura” got a wry look on her face. Trying to work out what she could say and what she couldn’t.

“Is this to do with the Russians?” he asked. “Are you somehow connected with that investigation?”

“Not in the way you mean,” she said. “But just a few days ago I was with one of them. The leader.”

“Ivanov, or Sokolov?” Richard asked. And was immediately gratified to see frank shock spread across Laura’s face.

“Very good,” she said. “I had the feeling that unexpected things might happen if I talked to you.”

Richard knew the two Russian names because Zula had mentioned them in her note. But he could see that the woman Laura didn’t know about that note. “So which of them were you with?” he asked.

“Sokolov,” Laura said. And she must have seen some look of hope on Richard’s face, because caution then fell down over her own visage like a shutter. “But I’m very sorry to tell you that this doesn’t actually help, where finding Zula is concerned. Not directly, anyway.”

“How can it not help? My understanding is that Ivanov abducted her and that Sokolov is his henchman.”

“Ivanov’s dead. Sokolov, if anything, was prepared to help Zula once Ivanov was out of the way. But because of the way it all went down … nothing happened right. Zula is no longer with the Russians.”

“Who’s she with?”

Laura clearly knew the answer but was uncomfortable blurting it out. “Is there another place we can chat?” she asked.

“Not until you talk me out of getting on that plane and flying to China.”

“Zula hasn’t been in China for something like ten days,” Laura said.

“Where is she then?”

“It is my considered opinion,” Laura said, “that she’s quite nearby.”

Day 17

Even after land finally hove into view on her port side, Szélanya glided along parallel to a dark coast for the better part of a day before the winds finally shifted round and enabled them to steer her in to shore. The coastline was fractally scalloped, consisting of shallow bays, miles wide, themselves indented with smaller indentations. The big bays were frequently demarcated by headlands or little isles that were connected to the mainland at low tide. Having cleared one of these, the crew of Szélanya—unused to navigating in the presence of land, or, for that matter, any solid object—trimmed her sails and adjusted her rudder to make her cut into the next bay. This one eventually hooked around, perhaps ten kilometers ahead of them, into a little island that was linked to the mainland by mudflats, and once they got themselves pointed into it, there was no doubt that they would make landfall somewhere, and soon. They could not now escape from the bay even if they tried. For Szélanya had not been designed as a sailing vessel. It had become one almost two weeks ago, but only in the sense that any floating object, devoid of other propulsion, was wind driven. Actually making it into something that would sail had involved a lot of trial and error; mostly the latter.