The Memorist

Chapter 88

Thursday, May 1^st-7:18 p.m.

David Yalom’s fingers rested on the detonating device, playing with it as if it were the ring on his wife’s finger that he used to twist around and around when they sat in a dark theater watching a movie or listening to a concert. There were people he knew by name up above him in the hall who would not survive the blast. Tom Paxton and Bill Vine, plus dozens of other executives and heads of government agencies from every country in the world-so many of whom he’d interviewed and written about over the years. They were in their seats now, listening to the performance, having no idea what the grand finale of Beethoven’s Third would be like tonight.

At 9:50 p.m., David’s computer would e-mail a series of articles he’d composed to three major newspapers simultaneously. The manifesto he’d been working on was a confession no one would ignore. The basics that he learned in journalism school so long ago-the who what where when and why of the bombing of the Vienna ISTA Conference-would be delivered in the crisp prose he’d always been known for.

Only those left behind would be able to judge if David’s sacrifice was worth it.

The first movement ended and there were a few beats of silence and then the glorious symphony filled the underground cavern again, drowning out David’s beating heart and the rats’ scratchings.

David imagined that in the audience each of his children and every member of his family was sitting on the plush seats, programs discarded on the floor or scrunched in their hands, faces rapt, eyes half shut, listening. In less than an hour the explosion would both destroy him and resurrect them. He would become memory as they were memory now and they would all be together again in the past. He felt very close to them now. To his end and their end. His nerves were untangled and smoothed out for the first time in months; the music had calmed him, the music and the knowledge that even if they were to find him now he’d have enough time to press the detonator.

He only needed a few seconds.

And that might be all he had because the men chasing him were nearby. One layer of stones and one shaft of light nearby. David had guessed they were Paxton’s men because they spoke English with American accents but he couldn’t be certain. The men could have been hired by Abdul to track him to these underground caverns. They were close though. That he was sure of. He could hear them in the shaft, getting closer and closer to his hiding place.

He was actually rooting for them to be Tom Paxton’s men and half hoping they would find him and outsmart him. Prove that this time their mousetraps were as good as they said they were. Prove they’d improved since their failure a year and a half ago. At one time, David had been impressed by the brash American so convinced of his own ability and he wished, just once, the good guys could win.