A Calculated Risk by Katherine Neville (best time to read books .txt) 📗

usual,” he told me. “But I just got this cryptic communiqué from Pearl—no way to reply yes or no—just a one-way plane ticket to Greece. For you.”

“I beg your pardon?” I said.

“Pearl has wired a whole packet of info to Charles here,” Tavish was saying. “Times, schedules, money, tickets, instructions—I’ll overnight-express them to you. You’re to leave next Friday. Don’t pretend you haven’t enough vacation accrued—I’ve accessed your personnel files! Nor do Charles and the Bobbseys and I need you to carry on our end of things. Though Charles Babbage gets nothing out of all this, I’ve already won more than I could ever have hoped! You see, Dr. Tor’s wired me the offer of a job with his own firm! He claims that my brilliant programs saved his life that night at the data center—though I hardly believe that. You understand, Mademoiselle Banks, that this is the fantasy of my life come true—and I know I owe it all to you.”

“Oh, Bobby—many thanks. I’m thrilled for you, of course. But Tor would never have offered to hire you if he didn’t mean everything he said. The credit’s yours—not mine—and congratulations! But why have they suddenly sent for me?” I asked. “They’ve waited months to phone—you’d think they’d wait another few weeks until Tor could say he’d won the wager.” Though, much as I’d wanted to beat Tor, the wager seemed a moot point now, compared with what we were up against.

“Who knows why they called?” said Tavish cheerfully. “Perhaps they’ve already won!”

I hadn’t thought of that. And as Tavish said, I was totally useless here. I’d racked my brains and rifled every system to try to get the goods on Lawrence, but apart from that one memo, I had nothing. Though parking might be illegal, I couldn’t prove he was pushing the bank to do it, based on that one scrap—nor could I ask Tor what he knew about it, if anything, since I didn’t know how to reach him! So I thanked Tavish for sending the stuff ahead, hung up, and stared at the walls awhile. Then I turned out all the lights and sat in darkness.

I knew what was troubling me, of course. Less than four months after my night at the opera, I found myself alone—looking not at blank walls, but at a demolished life. I’d robbed two banks, abetted setting up a possibly illegal country—not to mention knocking over the entire securities industry—destroyed my career, and slept with my best friend, mentor, and competitor, who—for the three months immediately thereafter—had been listed among the missing. I felt I’d been socked in the gut by life. If this was the excitement Georgian was always touting, I confess I longed to return to the white womb of my former existence—the one Tor had called a mausoleum—the one that I’d thought was safe.

But it was too late to turn back now, I knew, though I hadn’t a clue how to deal with Tor when I finally got to Greece. I’d lost the wager, it seemed—despite all his help—and I’d never been asked for the aid I’d expected to donate in return. Tavish said those bonds had been called—but no one had called me. Clearly, Tor didn’t need to stoop to conquer.

But the worst part of all was the feeling of having lost everything because of this bet. My life had been sucked away—there was nothing left but Tor and a ticket to Greece. I sat there in darkness a very long time. Then I opened the small crystal box on the table, pulled out a match, and lit it. As I watched it slowly burn down in the dark, I imagined the bridge. And I smiled.

The boat chugged with effort through the crystalline waters that looped like scattered ribbons through the dotted chain of isles. Silhouetted against the sea was the black cone of Omphalos, its rugged lava crust glittering like black diamonds where the waves struck, drenching the cliffs with spray.

The shore was lined with a stately procession of cypresses, etched in charcoal against the chalk-white houses that clustered near the port. A small stone jetty curved into the sea. Within lay a few little fishing boats in red and blue. Waves silently lapped the quay.

As my boat pulled into berth I saw Lelia seated on a stone wall beside the quay, waving to me, her parasol fluttering in the breeze. Her flowered muslin dress with billowing sleeves, the tawny hair tumbling in ringlets at her brow, the basket of flowers beside her on the wall—it was all so lovely, it made me want to weep.

“Darlink,” she cried, rushing to me breathlessly when the gate was down and I could step on land, “I was so worrying you would not come!”

“Of course I’ve come,” I told her.

I inhaled the dark aroma of her flowers. I wanted to see Tor.

“Where is everyone?” I asked.

“All working—tout le monde. Zhorzhione, she takes pictures of the island here, she find it so beautiful she cannot resist. Pearl is making the moneys for us, as always. And the lovely Zoltan—he is in France.”

“In France?” I said, amazed that Tor would bring me all this way, and then be absent himself. “Well—let’s drop my bags at the hotel and see what the girls are doing.”

“No hotel,” said Lelia, beaming in a very possessive fashion as she took my arm. The heels of my shoes kept getting stuck between the picturesque cobbles on the quay. “We have a château—a castle,” she was saying, “and I decorate it all myself. It is unique.”

It was unique. But reaching it was an even more fascinating experience.

We left the little village of whitewashed houses, red-tiled roofs, and fragrant lemon trees hugging the bay, and climbed the circuitous dirt path that crossed the mountain. Our rickety horse—something of a national treasure, according to Lelia—seemed to know the way himself, as he dragged our pony cart at his own leisurely pace, through silvery olive groves dotted with small,