9
By eleven he’d dealt with the mechanics of arriving in New York, picked up a few things, and still managed to get to the drab basement of Penn Station with over half an hour to spare. As always though, it had left him feeling like one of the walking wounded, and it wasn’t even as if he could crash for the afternoon at his hotel, half the journey still ahead of him.
Instead he spent the afternoon and early evening on the train, winding in and out of the New England states, quite a few tourists among the other passengers, English accents audible here and there. He fit in with them too, dressed in casual clothes, his gun in a small rucksack.
It wasn’t the private dead space of a hotel room but it wasn’t too bad either, the relaxed rhythm of the train, its gentle murmurs. After lunch he catnapped on and off throughout the afternoon, ignorant of the aspiring autumn beyond the windows, hearing it though in the commentaries of other passengers.
He came around sharp just before six and looked out at the rural landscape, familiar, almost European, drenched in early-dusk light and shadow. It was a comfortable environment to be cocooned in, instantly recognizable but alien enough in the detail to feel like another world.
He’d bought a newspaper at the station and picked it up for the first time now, scanning through it like an Edwardian traveler looking for news from home. He scanned every headline, deciphering the runes, looking for some hidden hint in the news stories of what was going on. But there was nothing, no reports of car bombs, gas explosions, no snippets of unexplained murders.
Then he came across the one story he hadn’t expected to find there, a short Associated Press piece with the barest facts on Dylan McGill, a twenty-year-old from Illinois, shot dead in Paris in a suspected street robbery. He’d been touring Europe before continuing his education. And that was all, AP leaving it to others to eulogize about American youth and turn over the ground for Pulitzers.
But there he was, the kid JJ had taken out, the only abstract indication to the outside world that something serious was happening in the shadows. He’d still have made the papers if JJ had left him there too, as the student from Illinois charged with the brutal sex murder of an antiques dealer, and how differently they’d have painted him then.
It couldn’t have been down to chance that he’d been set up like that; he had to have upset somebody. And maybe he hadn’t even been aware of it, just as somehow JJ had managed to cross Berg without knowing it, stumbling out of bad fortune only in that unplanned visit to Viner’s, the same place where Dylan McGill had stumbled into it.
That was the way it was, always too much synchronicity, like someone behind the scenes somewhere was mapping it all out for them, interwoven strands producing a pattern that was always just out of sight. The truth was though that there was no pattern, the connections were randomly generated, meaning nothing, possessed of no more significance than people chose to attach to them.
The connection he was heading into felt ominously significant, like he’d been heading toward it blindly for almost two years, but that too was a trick of his own mind, nothing more. It was only in his own mind that he was more than just a traveler, that they were more than a family that had suffered a loss, that their inn was more than a place for meeting a contact, it mattered only to him, the curse of carrying too much truth, too much knowledge.
But that didn’t make it any easier, the thought that he’d be staying in their guesthouse, within breathing distance of their daily routines and of any hidden sadness. He’d have to meet that woman and speak to her, knowing what he knew, all the while playing the casual tourist. He’d probably see Bostridge’s children too, the baggage of their loss perhaps even more easily visible.
Possibly Holden had chosen the Copley Inn for purely practical reasons, perhaps simply as somewhere Tom would know from his strange little riddle, a place with nowhere to swim. JJ couldn’t help but think though that there must have been some satisfaction, whether Holden was in the business or not, in forcing him to go there, to face the people from whom he’d taken, knowing what they could never know.
If that had been Holden’s intention it had worked well enough; the thought of it played on JJ’s mind as he drove the final leg in darkness, a fine rain falling like a steady mist sprayed onto the windshield, the last half hour on back roads. His thoughts blanked again only when he saw the turning, clearly marked, on the near side of the small town where the inn was situated, the signboard knocking him into automatic.
Numbly, he climbed the couple of hundred yards up to the house, gravel crackling under the tires, trees mossy damp, and then the white clapboard expanse of the building, the porch lit, a few other cars parked around to the side. The rain was still falling, almost invisible but cool in his face as he walked from the car, bracing himself.
The main door was locked, the glass window in it looking onto an entrance hall with a large staircase. When he rang the bell a woman appeared, mousy hair, slim and attractive, casually dressed but stylish, expensive clothes. She looked in her mid-forties perhaps, old enough to be Susan Bostridge. As she saw him through the glass she smiled, opening the door then and saying, “You must be Mr. Hoffman.” It wasn’t the woman he’d spoken to on the phone; this voice was softer, younger.
“William Hoffman, yes.”
“I’m Susan Bostridge.” She reached out her hand and shook his. JJ was suddenly speechless, his mind tailspun by the mention of her name, the eye contact, the physical presence, this attractive pleasant woman whose husband he’d killed. But she distracted him then by looking at his sweater. “Oh, it’s raining,” she said and lightly brushed the fine droplets of water from his shoulders, an immediate comfortable domesticity that brought him around, putting him at ease. It wasn’t what he’d expected, bringing him back to the moment.
“Idiots’ rain,” he answered her, smiling. “It’s what the Turks call it.”
“Idiots’ rain,” she repeated, the words hanging there for a second. “Have you driven up from Boston?”
“No, I came up from New York on the Vermonter, hired a car at the station.”
“Oh, well that’s a nice journey. But you must be tired! Would you like something to eat?”
He was already forgetting who she was now, the connection almost disappearing. “No, thanks, I am tired. I think I’ll make it an early night.”
“Then I’ll show you to your room,” she said, smiling, as much with her eyes as anything, a smile that looked for an old friend, like the loaded smile Jools had given him the night before.
He almost felt like he knew her too, and not for the obvious reason; her soft patrician voice and easy warmth disarmed him, making it all but impossible to associate her in his thoughts now with the pathetic figure of Bostridge and his child prostitute.
But being in her company even briefly was enough to make him think that memory might be unfair too. This was the man’s wife, his home, a man who had to have had volumes more to him than the few tawdry Technicolor snapshots JJ had stored away. What did he know anyway of a man he’d seen only in a final moment of weakness and exposure? What did he know about any of them?
She talked him through the details of the place as she showed him upstairs in what looked to him like a typical American house, lots of space but willfully harking back to some indistinct past. Within a few minutes she’d left him in the homely clutter of his room, no ceremony, an offer still hanging in the air that he could have his breakfast as late as he liked, and that was it, the imagined significance of their meeting lost in the informal detail.
He sat there then with the world hushed around him, a deep peace that was almost unsettling, like no one else was there in the inn, like the fine mist of idiots’ rain had smothered everything beyond. And it quickly began to work on him too, a calming blanket to set against the meatless sleep of the previous days, a secure comfortable peace in which to recover his senses.
He slept and no dreams came to him, his mind sinking into emptiness, the night devoid of shocks, of the heaving fishhook pulls on his heart, like lines tautening sharply against distant catches. He left himself at ease, becalmed, here of all places.
It was something he thought of when he woke the next morning, the strangeness of finding such peace in this house, a restorative sleep, a feeling that he’d slept for as many days as he’d been awake beforehand. It was completely at odds with the unease he’d had about coming here, this air of benignity around everything, from the first meeting with Susan Bostridge to the room he found himself in, filter-lit by the sun through chintzy curtains, as quiet as it had been the night before.
He checked his watch and saw that despite the offer he was in good time for breakfast, the perfect opportunity to break cover with Holden. Despite the restful atmosphere, he needed to know quickly what Holden could do for him, and what he wanted JJ to do in return; he wasn’t intending to hang around on someone else’s territory if there was nothing in it for him.
There were about a dozen guests at the inn, most of them sitting around a long table when he got to the breakfast room, two young couples, the rest middle-aged. They responded to the sight of him with a communal hello as if they were used to him coming in at that time, and an older woman serving them put down the coffeepot in her hand and said, “Ah, Mr. Hoffman, did you sleep well?”
“Yes thanks,” he replied, recognizing her voice as that of the woman he’d spoken to on the phone.
“Good. Now why don’t you sit right here and I’ll introduce you to everyone?” He took the seat she offered him at the head of the table and went along with the strangely chummy ritual of being introduced, each couple responding like he was someone marrying into the family. They were all American but at the end the woman said, “You’ve missed our Scottish guests, the McCowans, already out walking, and of course Mr. Lassiter had to leave yesterday. But I think that’s everyone.”
One of the younger men up the table said, “Except you, Kathryn.” His partner smiled approvingly at him, a couple not long together.
She responded as though to a bout of forgetfulness. “Of course, what am I thinking of? I’m Kathryn and this is William Hoffman. You like to be called William?”
“Actually, friends call me JJ.”
Nods of acknowledgment were given around the table, people discreetly carrying on their conversations then as Kathryn said, “Now what can I get you for breakfast, JJ?”
“I don’t really eat breakfast,” he said apologetically, adding, “Just some tea please, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh but you have to eat something,” she countered like it was an undeniable truth. “How about some blueberry pancakes? Once you’ve tried them there’s no turning back.” He gave in, accepting the offer rather than being cajoled into it like someone spoiling the party, and she went off into the kitchen looking pleased with herself. Another convert.
The couple to either side looked at him and smiled. The man, introduced as Steve, looked like an off-duty mobster: balding, a solid neck that looked as wide as his head, a body that seemed to keep him away from the table.
He flicked his eyebrows in the direction of the disappearing Kathryn and said, “I never eat breakfast, only when I’m here. Any other time I’m in the office at eight-thirty, nothing but coffee.”
His wife smiled benevolently and said, “As you can see, he makes up for it in lunches.” Steve shrugged in response, a New Yorker’s shrug, like there was nothing he could do about it so no point worrying. JJ smiled, unused to this kind of thing but going along with it, not wanting to stand out from the happy crowd.
They kept talking to him then, Steve the mobster turning out to be a lawyer, talking about the Copley Inn, about their grown-up kids, about the state of America, the last subject bringing agreement from people farther up the table. JJ listened for the most part, giving away only that he worked in venture capital, that he lived in Switzerland, that a friend had recommended the Copley.
He ate the breakfast, not finding it as addictive as they’d suggested but washing it down with the tea and feeling satisfied for having eaten it. Conversation continued to drift around the table, always genial, a general surge of goodwill each time a couple finished and left the room.
JJ let it all wash over him, but at the same time he was already turning over why Holden wasn’t there, and why no one had mentioned him in passing. The absent McCowans received another mention, as did the apparently somber Lassiter who’d made room for JJ. Susan Bostridge got a couple of mentions, one woman dropping in that the children were beautiful, an all-encompassing, meaningless use of the word that nevertheless earned general approval around the table.
But there was no mention of Holden. It crossed his mind briefly that Tom Furst had gotten the location wrong, then that someone had already gotten to Holden, then perhaps that he’d given up on JJ coming and moved on. Whatever the explanation, he didn’t seem to be there, and if Holden wasn’t around there was no reason for JJ to be there either, no reason for him even to have made the trip.
On the other hand though, there weren’t many further options that sprang to mind, apart from going to ground which in a sense he’d already done. And of course it was possible that Holden was there but keeping a low profile, staying in the family’s own quarters, too much of a shadow to feature in the breakfast table conversation but there all the same and already aware of JJ’s arrival.
At the end of breakfast there was one couple left at the table with him, Lenny and Dee Kaplan, well-preserved and perma-tanned, from some town in Southern California, a quiet sporty affluence about them.
When JJ asked whether they’d been there before Lenny said, “First time here in the Copley Inn.”
“Not the last,” added his wife.
“Definitely not the last. But we come to the East Coast every year around this time. It’s our way of making our children love us.” JJ smiled affably, seeing a joke coming; Dee was already holding back a giggle. “See, the grandparents move in to keep an eye on them; one week of that and they thank God they’ve got us for the other fifty-one.”
“Isn’t he terrible?” asked Dee. “Our two boys are great kids. I mean, really beautiful kids.”
“It’s true, I admit it,” Lenny agreed, like it was never in doubt. Dee was the person who’d described the Bostridge kids as beautiful too, and as it turned out hers were around the same age. Lenny and Dee were eager to bring them the next time so the four could meet, no doubt in their minds that the Bostridge children would like their own.
A little while later Kathryn came through and said to the couple like it was their regular routine, “If you’re ready to go in, I’ll bring you some fresh coffee.”
“Thanks, Kathryn, you’re an angel,” said Lenny, and then to JJ, “Join us? We always sit in the lounge and read the papers. “ JJ agreed, accepting Kathryn’s offer of more tea.
The lounge was more like a sunroom, half conservatory, the Kaplans basking like lizards in the enhanced morning sunlight and warmth, as if needing a fix of their own climate. They didn’t seem to read much but used the various stories instead as springboards for views on different subjects, stories about themselves.
At one point as Dee turned a page JJ caught a glimpse of a couple of columns and a picture of the kid from Viner’s apartment, the kind of odd grinning portraits that he guessed came from high school yearbooks and always looked as though they’d been taken in the fifties. Dee focused on the story too, reading in silence for a few minutes before saying, “How terrible.”
“What is it?” asked Lenny without looking up from his paper.
“This boy was traveling in Europe and they shot him. In Paris of all places.” She looked at JJ and said, “Have you seen it?” He took the paper from her and looked at it briefly. The picture didn’t do the kid justice, and didn’t sum up either what had happened to him; JJ was thinking how a picture of his sleek corpse would have told more truth.
“I saw something about it yesterday,” he said finally. “Paris can be a dangerous place.”
“Isn’t it terrible though? His poor family.” Her words were heartfelt, feverish with empathy, a mother with children approaching the same age where they’d go out into the world, fend for themselves.
JJ passed the paper to Lenny who’d looked up now. He looked at the article, or maybe just at the picture, shaking his head. “It doesn’t make sense,” he said, exasperated. “Kid goes on vacation and gets shot. In Europe, for God’s sake.” He looked at JJ then and said, “Maybe it wasn’t a robbery. You know, maybe there’s something we don’t know about. I mean, why would they kill him? This isn’t L.A. we’re talking about, it’s Paris. France, for God’s sake! So why would they kill him, shoot him dead, just for a street robbery?”
It was funny the way he’d come close to the truth in his need for reassurance that Paris and Europe and life in general were safer than that; funny too how shocked he’d have been at the real, increasingly pointless reason for the kid’s death.
JJ thought of him briefly, Dylan McGill, whose name he hadn’t known, of the way he’d looked in the first few moments after seeing JJ, like he was involved in some practical joke. And he thought of his family and friends asking the same exasperated questions Lenny and Dee were asking, and of the new Dylan McGill they were building between themselves.
It was like they all wanted the fundamental truth of why it had happened, of why life was like that, but there were no explanations, at least not the explanations people wanted to hear. How much would it comfort them to know that their son, brother, friend had been killed as a precautionary measure by a hitman who only moments before had sought to help him? What use was that to anyone?
And as if to back him up in his reasoning Susan Bostridge suddenly appeared, carrying a cup of coffee, and walked over to them, relaxed, graceful, like a model or ballet dancer who’d kept it into middle age. Whatever wondering she’d done about her husband’s death it looked long stored away now; she looked at peace with life, content.
“Mind if I join you?” They all responded quickly and she sat down, turning to JJ then. “How did you sleep?”
“Very well, thank you.”
“You look much better,” she said like she’d been concerned by his appearance the night before, like he’d been ill but was on the mend. Turning to Dee, she asked, “Any news?”
“We were just talking about that poor boy who was killed in Paris,” Dee said as though it was someone they’d all known.
“I saw it. Very sad.”
“I still maintain,” cut in Lenny, “that people don’t get shot places like that for no good reason. There had to be something.” Before he could expand on it again his wife threw him a glance and he crashed to a stop, looking sheepishly at Susan Bostridge then. “Me and my big mouth. Susan ...”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Lenny,” she said, smiling, unperturbed. “And I know what you mean because it’s a puzzle, it really is. But the sad truth of life today, anywhere in the world, is that people are killed for the most absurd reasons. None of us are immune.”
JJ looked on nonplussed, an expression that concealed the uneasy sensation of being the killer of both the people they were talking about.
Having put Lenny at ease again, Susan turned to him and said, “I should explain, JJ. David, my husband, was killed two years ago in Moscow.”
“Oh, I’m sorry.”
“Just another Western businessman killed by the Russian Mafia. It got less press coverage than this poor boy and maybe that’s as it should be.” She wasn’t dismissing her husband’s death, her tone touched lightly with sadness. Inexplicably though, at the same time he got the feeling she hadn’t loved him when he’d died, something in her face that was centered somewhere beyond having come to terms with it, like his death had merely tied up the loose threads of a separation that had already been completed in the heart.
And for the first time it made him wonder about the condom too. Bostridge had been wearing a condom and it made him wonder whether she’d been told about it, what she’d made of it if she had. It had never occurred to him before then how strange it was, that a dead man should be found wearing a condom that hadn’t served its purpose.
It was such a minor detail, but if she’d been told it would have opened up all kinds of speculation in her mind: that he’d been unfaithful to her, that a girl had been there at the time of the murder, had perhaps even been involved. Equally though, with a Western businessman in Moscow, it was a detail even the police could have overlooked, so possibly she never had been told.
When he tuned back into the conversation Lenny and Dee were outlining their itinerary for the day, Susan showing interest in a list of tourist spots she’d probably heard repeated and described thousands of times before. She turned to him then and said, “And what about you, JJ?”
“I’m not sure,” he said, suddenly on the spot. “I’m here to relax so I don’t really have any plans. I suppose I’ll have a look around, go for a walk.” She looked enchanted by his lack of ideas, as if she was used to people treating their few days there like a military exercise.
“The village should keep you busy for an hour or so. And the woods of course; there are plenty of marked trails. And if you don’t mind driving—”
“No,” he cut in, “I don’t want to drive anywhere today.” He wanted to stay around the place, eager to spot Holden if he was there or to let Holden find him before the frustration began to set in. “I might try the woodland walks.”
She nodded thoughtfully and said, “I’ll join you if you’d like the company? Give you some pointers.” She smiled before adding, “No extra charge.”
“I’d like that, as long as I’m not keeping you from anything.” She smiled again warmly. Lenny and Dee looked on slightly astounded, as though they couldn’t quite work out how the new guest had so easily developed an unspoken rapport with their host, something they’d probably been working at assiduously for the full week of their stay, trying to belong.
There was a rapport too, like a tacit recognition that they were the same kind of people. Yet whatever similarities lay beneath the surface, whatever commonality there was in their backgrounds, he doubted somehow that they shared the same values, the same beliefs, that they felt the same way about life. Either way, it already seemed hard to believe this was a woman he’d dreaded meeting.
She was easy enough company too as they walked through the camouflage warmth of the woods, Susan pointing out the landmarks, explaining how the leaves would peak in a few weeks. Occasionally tourists passed them and strained to hear what she was saying, apparently recognizing a voice with some authority.
At one point they reached the top of a short climb and, turning, she pointed back down to where one end of the inn was visible between the trees; a couple of other buildings and a white church steeple were apparent farther on—the hotel was closer to the village than he’d thought at first.
“Beautiful, don’t you think?” she said as they stood there. “Sometimes I think we’re the luckiest people in the world to be living here.”
Sometimes, he noted, only sometimes, when the world didn’t intrude perhaps, and asked her then, “How long have you been here?”
“Since we married, nearly twenty years. The house was always too big for us but I fell in love with it at first sight. I like that it’s an inn now.” He glanced at her quickly, gauging the way she was thinking. She looked smitten with the place, even after all that time.
“Did you turn it into an inn when your husband died?”
“No, no, six years ago,” she said. “The kids were getting bigger, David was often away on business, and I wanted to do something with myself, you know? Then one day I just saw it, saw how beautiful it would be as an inn and how I could share it with people. It became my dream.” She turned to him. “And I’ve never looked back. I like being an innkeeper.”
“I can see that,” he said, smiling, and she laughed a little like he’d seen through her, that she was playacting, living a childhood fantasy like those children who dreamt of owning toy shops or candy stores.
They didn’t mention her husband again; JJ was eager not to seem too inquisitive. Instead he asked questions about the running of the inn, keeping her on a subject she enjoyed, hoping that in the process she might mention Holden, the close family friend he still hoped was simply failing to show on the radar screens but was there nonetheless.
Once again he got nothing, and he was already beginning to think how he might proceed if Holden didn’t show at all.
It wasn’t as if he had many choices but one obvious possibility was to go down to Yale, to look for signs of him there or signs of where he might be; another was simply to give it up and get out of there.
But there was still time yet, and if Susan knew about Holden’s background and knew he was in a fix, that would even explain why she hadn’t mentioned him, particularly to a man on his own with no defined reason for being there beyond relaxing between business trips.
He didn’t get the impression she was suspicious of him, particularly since she was out walking with him but, still stung from the way Esther had deceived him, he decided to test the water, saying when he had the opportunity, “The other people at breakfast seemed lukewarm about the chap who was here before me.”
“Mr. Lassiter? Really?” It was a token effort not to be seen criticizing a guest but she gave up almost instantly, adding, “He was a little odd. Only about your age, said he was here on business but didn’t say where or what he was doing. As a matter of fact he gave me the creeps; I think the other guests picked up on it too. Why, of course they did. They seem to have taken to you though.”
“Good, I’m glad.”
“So am I. I pride myself on having a happy atmosphere among the guests.” She walked a few paces in silence and then said like an afterthought, “He’d come up from Washington. Wore a suit too.”
He wondered if she’d turned the tables and was testing him now so he deflected it by saying, “A spy perhaps, on important business.”
“Exactly,” she said, laughing. “An ice cream spy! Not a very good one though. We’re a long way from Ben and Jerry’s.” He had no idea what she was talking about but laughed anyway, guessing it was some tourist attraction, wanting to keep the light mood too, giving no indication that there was any more to him than met the eye.
When they got back to the inn he thanked her for the tour and went to his room, spending an hour or so doing nothing, a professional skill he’d developed, of shutting down and letting time pass, waiting. It was the final test; if Holden was there he’d definitely know JJ had arrived by now and would come for him.
Around lunchtime though he gave up, the frustration already beginning to wear on him, the fact that nothing was happening when it was meant to be. He walked down to the Village, more like a small town as it turned out, well manicured, plenty of clapboard and picket fences and white-painted porches. It looked disturbingly familiar, a twilight zone quality dispelled only by a handful of awestruck tourists wandering around, some of them clutching jars of preserves or other wrapped gifts.
There were a few homely looking shops, a couple of restaurants, something calling itself the Old Maple Tavern which also proved to be a restaurant. Steve and his wife emerged satisfied as JJ neared it.
“Our secret’s out,” he shouted at JJ as he saw him.
“Good meal?”
“Red meat, guilty as charged.”
His wife shrugged and said, “I’m telling you, the day he dies cows everywhere will celebrate.”
“Yeah, yeah. JJ, what are your plans for tonight? I mean, if you’re eating at the inn, well so are we. Karen and me, we’d be very happy if you joined us. If you want to, I mean, if you have no other plans?”
“That’s very kind, thanks.”
The lawyer and his wife both grinned, as though the two of them had discussed the idea over lunch, and the three of them spoke on for a little while, tourist talk, their temporary location the only thing that linked them.
JJ left them and went into the tavern, ordering a chicken salad, what looked like the lightest meal on the menu. Other diners glanced over half sympathetically as he ate alone, the young waitress paying him more attention too, checking that everything was okay, asking where he was staying.
Far from being lonely though, the small talk with Steve and Karen and the dinner invitation had persuaded him to go down to Yale the next morning. For whatever reason Holden wasn’t at the Copley, that seemed obvious now, and JJ didn’t think he could stand the tourist camaraderie for more than a day, getting sucked gradually into being part of someone else’s holiday. It wasn’t something he was used to.
Susan Bostridge was more interesting, but that morning had been a one-time thing, he was certain of it, a welcoming gesture to someone who was on his own. And even then, most of what interested him about her was the link with her husband, a subject that was off the table, a subject it probably wasn’t healthy for him to be curious about either, not when he was there.
It wasn’t about fitting in or feeling comfortable anyway; he’d come there to get out from under a contract, to get Berg as Holden had implicitly promised. It didn’t seem as urgent now that he was tucked away in Vermont, no longer a matter of pure survival like finding people in his apartment, but sooner or later it would catch up with him and become that urgent again. So whether he felt comfortable there or not he had to do something, either find Holden or rule him out and consider his moves.
The afternoon was pressing on by the time he got back to the inn. He could hear her voice as he walked into the lobby and went through to the dining room, where the large table was broken up into smaller units now. Susan was sitting on the edge of one of them talking to a stocky kid in his early teens, a bag slung over his shoulder.
They both looked in his direction as he stood there, the kid fair and good-looking but with a facial resemblance to his father that was unnerving, like a flashback.
“Sorry,” said JJ quickly, “I’ll catch you later.”
“Not at all, JJ. I’d like you to meet my son.”
He halted his bid for the door and walked over to them. “I just thought you might be busy.”
“No,” she said casually, “just chewing the fat after a day at school. This is Jackson.”
“Jack,” the kid cut in, good-humored but raising his eyes skyward.
“Hello, Jack. I’m JJ.” He shook hands; Jack’s grip was soft like it was a form of greeting he wasn’t used to, though he probably got introduced to guests all the time judging by the breakfast-table conversation that morning. JJ turned to Susan then and said, “I just wanted to let you know, I’m going to New Haven tomorrow so I’ll be leaving before breakfast, probably late back.”
“New Haven? Yale?”
“Yeah.” He left a slight breathing space, again giving her the chance to mention Holden, then added, “The daughter of a family friend’s down there. I just found out she’s going away the day after tomorrow so ...” She nodded, almost as if she’d been expecting him to mention Holden too.
“We can arrange an early breakfast if you’d like.”
“No, really Thanks all the same.” He smiled again, said, “See you around,” to her son, and left, Susan asking Jack something else about school as they tailed out of JJ’s earshot.
He went to his room then and studied the map, looking at the route down to New Haven. Holden almost certainly wasn’t there either, not alive, but at least he’d be doing something, trying in some way to recapture the sense of momentum he’d had, the force that had carried him through Geneva and London, taking the bullet to them, letting Berg know that he was coming for them.
Of course, when it had come to the body count in London he hadn’t achieved anything with that momentum, only a recognition of how little he could do on his own. Maybe he’d spooked them too, but that was only worthwhile if he could keep getting closer to them, and at the moment he couldn’t even get to Holden.
But he had to do something, anything to move things on, realizing somewhere in that day’s fabric that he had the wrong constitution for disappearing. Because that was what disappearing would mean, the life of a permanent tourist, soulless, drowning in small talk.
He couldn’t die by degrees in a life like that, didn’t think he could do it even for a few days, a revulsion that probably sprang from the same part of his character as the violence he’d come to live by. And maybe it wasn’t much of a life but at least it was lived with eyes open, fixed on the common destination they all shared no matter what they did.