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All the same, it wasn’t as if his opinion of her was going to drop any further. If I’m damned, she thought, I might as well get paid for it.
That said, she was in no hurry to certify her ultimate destination, which returned her to the problem of Plowman and his plan. You would have expected the press of the .22 against the small of her back to have been reassuring, but instead, it only emphasized her sense of powerlessness, as if Plowman were so confident, so secure, he could allow her whatever firearm she wanted.
The cab turned onto the Champs Йlysйes. Ahead, the Arc de Triomphe squatted in the distance. Another monument to cross off the list.
—
IV
The restaurant whose card Plowman had handed her was located on one of the side streets about halfway to the arch; Vasquez and Buchanan departed their cab at the street’s corner and walked the hundred yards to a door flanked by man-sized plaster Chinese dragons. Buchanan brushed past the black-suited host and his welcome; smiling and murmuring, “Pardo
His back to the far wall, Plowman was seated at a table directly in front of her. Already, Buchanan was lowering himself into a chair opposite him. Stupid, Vasquez thought at the expanse of his unguarded back. Her boots clacked on the glass. She moved around the table to sit beside Plowman, who had exchanged the dark suit in which he’d greeted them at de Gaulle for a tan jacket over a cream shirt and slacks. His outfit caught the light filtering from below them and held it in as a dull sheen. A metal bowl filled with dumplings was centered on the table mat before him; to its right, a slice of lemon floated at the top of a glass of clear liquid. Plowman’s eyebrow raised as she settled beside him, but he did not comment on her choice; instead, he said, “You’re here.”
Vasquez’s yes was overridden by Buchanan’s “We are, and there are some things we need cleared up.”
Vasquez stared at him. Plowman said, “Oh?”
“That’s right,” Buchanan said. “We’ve been thinking, and this plan of yours doesn’t add up.”
“Really.” The tone of Plowman’s voice did not change.
“Really,” Buchanan nodded.
“Would you care to explain to me exactly how it doesn’t add up?”
“You expect Vasquez and me to believe you spent all this money so the two of us can have a five-minute conversation with Mr. White?”
Vasquez flinched.
“There’s a little bit more to it than that.”
“We’re supposed to persuade him to walk twenty feet with us to an elevator.”
“Actually, it’s seventy-four feet, three inches.”
“Whatever.” Buchanan glanced at Vasquez. She looked away. To the wall to her right, water chuckled down a series of small rock terraces and through an opening in the floor into the fish tank.
“No, not whatever, Buchanan. Seventy-four feet, three inches,” Plowman said. “This is why the biggest responsibility you confront each day is lifting the fry basket out of the hot oil when the buzzer tells you to. You don’t pay attention to the little things.”
The host was standing at Buchanan’s elbow, his hands clasped over a pair of long menus. Plowman nodded at him, and he passed the menus to Vasquez and Buchanan. Inclining toward them, the host said, “May I bring you drinks while you decide your order?”
His eyes on the menu, Buchanan said, “Water.”
“Moi aussi,” Vasquez said. “Merзi.”
“Nice accent,” Plowman said when the host had left.
“Thanks.”
“I don’t think I realized you speak French.”
Vasquez shrugged. “Wasn’t any call for it, was there?”
“Anything else?” Plowman said. “Spanish?”
“I understand more than I can speak.”
“Your folks were from—where, again?”
“Chile,” Vasquez said. “My dad. My mom’s American, but her parents were from Argentina.”
“That’s useful to know.”
“For when Stillwater hires her,” Buchanan said.
“Yes,” Plowman answered. “The company has projects underway in a number of places where fluency in French and Spanish would be an asset.”
“Such as?”
“One thing at a time,” Plowman said. “Let’s get through tonight, first, and then you can worry about your next assignment.”
“And what’s that going to be,” Buchanan said, “another twenty K to walk someone to an elevator?”
“I doubt it’ll be anything so mundane,” Plowman said. “I also doubt it’ll pay as little as twenty thousand.”
“Look,” Vasquez started to say, but the host had returned with their water. Once he deposited their glasses on the table, he withdrew a pad and pen from his jacket pocket and took Buchanan’s order of crispy duck and Vasquez’s of steamed dumplings. After he had retrieved the menus and gone, Plowman turned to Vasquez and said, “You were saying?”
“It’s just—what Buchanan’s trying to say is, it’s a lot, you know? If you’d offered us, I don’t know, say five hundred bucks apiece to come here and play escort, that still would’ve been a lot, but it wouldn’t—I mean, twenty thousand dollars, plus the airfare, the hotel, the expense account. It seems too much for what you’re asking us to do. Can you understand that?”
Plowman shook his head yes. “I can. I can understand how strange it might appear to offer this kind of money for this length of service, but . . .” He raised his drink to his lips. When he lowered his arm, the glass was half-drained. “Mr. White is . . . to say he’s high value doesn’t begin to cover it. The guy’s been around—he’s been around. Talk about a font of information: the stuff this guy’s forgotten would be enough for a dozen careers. What he remembers will give whoever can get him to share it with them permanent tactical advantage.”
“No such thing,” Buchanan said. “No matter how much the guy says he knows—”
“Yes, yes,” Plowman held up his hand like a traffic cop. “Trust me. He’s high value.”
“But won’t the spooks—what’s Just-Call-Me-Bill have to say about this?” Vasquez said.
“Bill’s dead.”
Simultaneously, Buchanan said, “Huh,” and Vasquez, “What? How?”
“I don’t know. When my bosses green-lighted me for this, Bill was the first person I thought of. I wasn’t sure if he was still with the agency, so I did some checking around. I couldn’t find out much—goddamn spooks keep their mouths shut—but I was able to determine that Bill was dead. It sounded like it might’ve been that chopper crash in Helmand, but that’s a guess. To answer your question, Vasquez, Bill didn’t have a whole lot to say.”
“Shit,” Buchanan said.
“Okay,” Vasquez exhaled. “Okay. Was he the only one who knew about Mr. White?”
“I find it hard to believe he was,” Plowman said, “but thus far, no one’s nibbled at any of the bait I’ve left out. I’m surprised; I’ll admit it. But it makes our job that much simpler, so I’m not complaining.”
“All right,” Vasquez said, “but the money—”
His eyes alight, Plowman leaned forward. “To get my hands on Mr. White, I would have paid each of you ten times as much. That’s how important this operation is. Whatever we have to shell out now is nothing compared to what we’re going to gain from this guy.”
“Now you tell us,” Buchanan said.