Conspiracy

39

Even a man half Tommy Karr’s size could not have found a place to hide in Thao Duong’s office. So Karr found one outside the office — he opened one of the windows directly behind the desk.

The ledge was all of four inches thick, but Karr didn’t have much choice. He pushed the window down behind him, then began making his way to the next window, gripping the gaps in the bricks as firmly as he could.

The light in the office came on just as Karr reached to the window of the next room. He pulled himself across, then felt his right toe start to slip on the greasy stone ledge.

This way, this way, he told himself, trying to balance his momentum forward. He did a little slide step and pinched his fingers tighter, pushing himself close to the window. His left foot sailed out over the pavement and his hand lost its grip. Just in time he grabbed the upper part of the window, rattling the jamb but keeping himself on the ledge.

“Tommy, are you all right?” asked Rockman. “Where are you?”

“Getting some air. What do you see with that video bug I left in the office?”

“Just sitting at his desk. We’ll tell you when he’s gone.”

“What’s he doing?” Karr asked.

“Working. He went to the pile and took a report out.”

“Come on. You’re telling me he’s a dedicated bureaucrat?”

“I’m just the messenger. Wait a second — he’s reaching for that envelope you found.”

“You ID the key?”

“Looks like the type used in a firebox or trunk. Do you think you can follow him when he leaves the building?”

“If I can grow wings in the next five minutes, I’ll be happy to,” said Karr. “Where’s Dean?”

“He’s on his way. But he’s never going to get there in time. Looks like Thao’s getting ready to go — he put the envelope back.”

Karr tried opening the window, but it was locked from the inside. Breaking it would make too much noise while Thao Duon was next door, but if Karr waited until he left, it would probably be too late.

Karr glanced toward the ground and then back at the building, trying to see if it might be possible to climb down.

There was decorative brickwork at the corner that he could use as a ladder, but that meant going past three more double sets of windows. He was bound to slip sooner or later.

How about going up? There was only one floor between him and the flat roof. A row of bricks ran just above the windows, a decorative bump-out thick enough to grab on to. He wrapped his fingers around the bricks and pulled himself up as if doing a reverse chin-up. He put his right boot against the window casing for more leverage. He started to pull himself up, then realized it wasn’t going to work; the window ledge above the row of bricks was too far away to reach. But it was too late; he couldn’t get his feet down without risking a fall.

A short line of taxis waited at the curb of the hotel. Dean got in the first one, and with the aid of the Art Room translator gave the driver an address a half block from the office building where Karr was. It was less than four miles away, and there was very little traffic on the streets at night, but Dean found himself bouncing his foot up and down on the floor in the backseat, anxious to get there.

“Wait for me here,” he told the driver when they were about a block from the destination. Dean threw a twenty-dollar American bill on the front seat and bolted from the cab.

“Tommy’s around the back of the building,” Rockman told him. “Thao Duong is still in his office. We want you to trail him if you can.”

“Tommy, can you hear me?”

“He’s on the window ledge,” said Rockman.

“Connect us.”

The op-to-op mode on the communications gear could be activated either by the operatives themselves or by the Art Room. Dean heard Karr’s heavy breathing and asked if he was OK.

“Uh, yeah,” grunted Karr. “Just busy.”

“I’ll be there in a second,” said Dean, starting to run.

if he was going to fall anyway, Karr decided it would be better existentially to fall while going up rather than down. He gritted his teeth and jerked his right leg upward, swinging it up and over the ledge above him — and into the window glass, which shattered above him. He pushed up with his hands, curled what he could of his foot inside the building, and then for a moment hung suspended in mid-air.

“Hang on!” yelled Dean in Karr’s ear.

“Oh yeah.”

Upside down, Karr struggled to get a grip on the side of the window. He was now draped halfway in and halfway out, part of him inside the room and the larger part out. Blood rushed to his head. His face swam in sweat.

Karr had just enough of his calf inside the window to leverage himself upward. The rest of the glass broke and fell into his lap as he pulled himself up. Hands bleeding, he managed to maneuver himself around into a seated position.

Shouldn’t have done that, he told himself. It was OK to be negative once he’d succeeded.

Something smacked the side of his face. He looked up but couldn’t figure out what it was. All he could see in his night glasses was a black blur.

“Grab the rope,” said Charlie Dean. “It’s by your head.”

“Where are you?”

“Grab the damn rope before you fall,” said Dean. “I’m on the roof. I don’t know if this rig is going to hold long enough to pull you up.”

“Nah, I’m OK,” said Karr. “Is there a door up there?”

“Yeah, but—”

“I’ll meet you on the sixth floor,” he said, slipping inside.