East London, South Africa
November 12, 5:05 A.M.
Katinka Kettle overslept.
She did not feel rested as the sun crawled over the sill and caused her to stir. It had not only been an exhausting night but a tiring week. She was not accustomed to such long sea voyages, nor the savagely cold, unwelcoming shores of Prince Edward.
Unrested or not, it was time to get up, time to get back to MEASE and figure out what they should do with her find. She turned on her fully charged phone and washed her face. She regretted that there wasn’t time to do her hair; it would take more than one washing to get the smell and fluff of seawater and the clinging odor of the burning Teri Wheel out of it.
Returning to her nightstand, she ignored her phone inbox, noted that there were eleven calls from Foster, which she would look at as soon as she checked the news. She wanted to see if there was any mention of the explosion of the yacht. If not, she would dig a little deeper on the Web site of the South African Navy Maritime Forces—
“What?”
The headline grabbed her eyes and throat in equal measure. The news—the only news—was about a mysterious attack on Batting Bridge and the possible relationship it might have with the downing of the South African jetliner.
It took a moment for her to find her voice again.
“How could it have randomly showed up there?”
That word did not sit well. It made no sense. Had the pathogen floated in from the Teri Wheel, made its way up the Nahoon, skipped all the homes and businesses on the riverbanks, and then happened to run into Batting Bridge?
It was flatly not possible. Not as possible as—
“Someone releasing it,” she said quietly. She tried to dismiss the thought with a shake of her head. “No. God Almighty and Jesus—tell me he’s not desperate enough.”
But the idea clung.
Breathing hard and wishing she had not given up smoking, Katinka braced herself as she read the full story on the South African news service. There had been an anonymous phone call placed with the East London police, warning of an attack. She jumped to News24 and then to the BBC. They all had the same information, the same call transcript along with a few fuzzy security camera photos of crashed cars, the descending helicopter, and then the destroyed bridge. There were also shots of teams in hazmat suits making their way through the ruins piled jaggedly, haphazardly on the water. A pool reporter had provided the latter images since access was restricted.
Katinka’s mouth was dry and her eyes were damp.
“Yes,” she said. She had been intending to find a way to monetize the bug.
“But by selling it, not by releasing it!”
She sat heavily on the bed, her hands limp on her lap, the phone plopping to the carpet. Katinka knew Foster to be greedy, and after all these years she knew, or thought she knew, his demons. He hated the diamond cartel. He hated the authorities who enabled the monopolies. But, God, he did not hate people. Did he put those two on a scale and have innocent South Africans come up short?
“That has to be it. It has to.”
She wept. She had not foreseen anything like this! She hoped there was another, a less personally horrendous explanation. Another player, someone who found the toxin in the wreckage of the plane.
“Megalomaniacal,” she muttered, sensing the truth. Foster could be that. “God forgive me, what power did I hand to him?”
She considered, for the briefest moment, that someone else at MEASE may have taken the sample and released it. Another employee, perhaps. Eavesdropping. A mistress, of which Foster had several, hiding when Katinka arrived unexpectedly.
“What does that matter?” she asked. This was done and she’d made it possible. She had to figure out what to do next. Because Foster—or whoever—still had another sample.
She wondered if she should go to the authorities with hers, give them a chance to study it?
“No, they’ll have samples aplenty when they pull bodies from the river,” she said. “But if they ever figure out that I’m part of this, and I’m arrested—cooperation may save me.”
Or doom her. How many times had she seen members of Foster’s wide circle of mercenaries and associates arrested on minor charges and given maximum sentences to serve as an object lesson.
And then something terribly urgent occurred to her. He might send someone to keep her from doing just what she was thinking.
“No,” she thought aloud. “It will take time. His most efficient mercenaries died on the Teri Wheel.”
But there were other men and women, arms dealers who also hired those soldiers-for-hire. They would have more, especially Nicus Dumisa in Swaziland. He recruited from the African tribal death squads where there was an endless supply of killers.
She might be able to get away, to think. She would take the sample. There was no choice: if Foster did come by at some point and find the canister, he would know she had her own scheme in mind. That was as good as a death warrant.
Maybe she could disappear, find a way to sell it in a way that did not get back to Foster.
“Go,” she told herself. “Now.”
Katinka dressed quickly, in a sweatshirt and slacks. Then she grabbed a few items and threw them in a bag. Foster would know that she had run, but he would—no, might—presume it was out of fear of being attached to this monstrous act.
As she stood at the foot of the bed amidst a riot of clothes, personal devices, and an empty canvas grip to put them in, the doorbell rang. Katinka shot from the bed and stood there. The woman did not socialize with many people and her neighbors not at all. They never came by.
The bell was followed by a firm knock.
She collected herself, looked around for her phone, saw it beside her old Adidas. She picked it up, unplugged it, and walked numbly, stupidly from the bedroom.
“Coming!” she said.
Katinka paused by a window that overlooked the front walk. She did not draw back the sheer polyester curtain but leaned near to the wall and peeked under it.
She felt sick all over again.
It was the police.