“I’m a good husband,” I said. “You don’t assume your wife is a traitor or a criminal. I saw her taken by Edward. She saved my life. Twice.”

“I think you were both working with this group, gang, whatever. I think she turned, and then she turned you. I tend to go for the simplest explanation.”

“That’s because you’re simple,” I said. “Life isn’t. This isn’t. I don’t understand why Lucy’s done what she’s done.”

“Where’s your baby?”

I looked at my knees. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t want him to know she’d offered me my child for silence. A silence I’d already broken. So I looked up and said, “Lucy lost the baby.”

He studied my face for a long time. “Where is Lucy? Where will she go?”

“I don’t know. But I’m going to find her and I’m going to find out the truth,” I said.

“Uh, no, you’re not,” Howell said. I swear bureaucrats have a smug voice they save for moments like this, ones they can savor.

“Yes, I am. Look, Howell, if I was guilty and I was caught, I’d be cutting a deal. I don’t want your deal. I’m not going to confess to anything I haven’t done. Put away your knives and your waterboards because I will never confess to what I haven’t done. Ever. All I care about is finding Lucy.”

“Convince me, Sam. Tell me the whole story of what’s happened since New York and maybe I can help you find her. Who got you off the boat? Who’s been funding you and supplying you?”

“I can’t.”

“You helped a man escape who fired on me and my men.”

“I didn’t shoot at you. I killed men firing on your agents. They used to give medals for that.”

He grabbed my shirt and slammed my head against the van’s wall. It hurt. My body felt wracked with pain. “I want the whole truth, Sam. Everything.”

“Why don’t you believe me? Why? Why?” I screamed into his face. “Why don’t you even try to believe me?” Spittle from my mouth sprayed his face. He leaned back.

I fought for calm. Pain wracked my body. I’d been beaten, shot, and the implacable doubt on Howell’s face made me blind with rage. He just stared at me.

“Why aren’t we at a Company safe house?” I asked. “Why aren’t you recording what I’m saying, in front of witnesses? Where are the Dutch intelligence agents? None of this is protocol.”

“Pot, meet kettle,” he said. “Sam, you have no place to lecture me on right and wrong. The whole Company is going to know soon enough that you are a traitor.”

The word was like a lash against my skin. “I’m not a traitor.”

“You want me to believe you? Then tell me everything.”

I blew out a long hiss of air. I had to give him more to get to a position of strength. “This Edward used the Centraal Station bombing to kill the Money Czar we were investigating in London. A supposed financier for criminal networks, the biggest ones that connect back into government. I don’t understand why Edward killed this man, but he did,” I said. “He’s smuggling contraband, bad stuff, into the States and he needed that shipment I stole as camouflage for whatever he’s shipping. It could be a bomb, it could be plague, it could be people. I don’t know. I could have found out if you hadn’t interfered.”

“Let’s say you’re telling me the truth and that you are innocent. How did you find these people, Sam? How did you learn about them? How do you know any of these details? Who helped you find this Edward who got you into Holland?”

It was the wrong question. Realization bolted into my bones. “Don’t you care about what his operation is?”

“I don’t believe a word you say until you tell me who has been helping you.”

“Where is your curiosity about Edward’s shipment?”

“First things first.” He pushed a photo at me. Me and Mila, at the train station in Rotterdam. Then another one, at the train station in Amsterdam. “Who is this woman?”

I pretended to frown at the photo. “Someone who rode on the train with me. I don’t know her.”

“You do. We questioned a conductor on the train. You traveled together. You sat together and talked.”

“Oh, her. Yes. Lovely face but horrible breath. I offered her an Altoid. That was the extent of our interaction.”

“Bull. Where have you been staying in Amsterdam?”

“In hostels. Cheap, paying cash. I’m young enough to look like a wandering grad student.”

“Which hostels?”

“Let me get this straight,” I said. “I have just told you that the guy who bombed the London office is smuggling seriously dangerous goods into America, and you want to know what hostel I stayed at?”

“If he can smuggle this stuff in, it’s because you provided him with the camouflage,” Howell said. “What I’ve caught you doing is helping this guy.”

I heard a noise outside, like a man falling against the side of the van and sliding to the pavement. A yell.

Howell whipped out a pistol, aimed it at my head.

“I’m tied up,” I said. “I’m not the threat.”

He moved the gun away from me and I hammered my foot hard into his jaw. I hope I broke it because I was really tired of hearing him talk. Shutting up for a long while would do Howell a world of good. He slammed against the side of the van and I launched myself toward him, my hands useless and bound behind me but I didn’t care. I wasn’t rational. I just wanted him to shut up and listen to me. I wanted his silent belief.

I hit him hard with my head, pounded my skull upward to catch him under the jaw. He gurgled and a freshet of blood oozed from his mouth. I rocked my head into his and he went down. I lost my balance and collapsed on top of him.

The van door opened and I expected to see one of his puppies there.

Mila.

“Finally,” I said.

She sliced my plastic restraints off and I helped her put the two Company guys into the van; both were unconscious but not seriously injured. She slammed the van doors shut, locked them, tossed the keys into the field behind the brewery. We got into her car and she gunned it toward Amsterdam. The day was going to be a cloudy, gray one; it matched my mood.

“Thank you,” I said.

“You are welcome.” She sounded weary.

“How did you find me?”

“Your friend Piet.”

“Piet is not my friend.”

“Piet came to the Rode Prins. He was panicked. He thought he could trade information for sanctuary, for whoever you worked for.”

“And Piet talked.”

“Piet talked.” Now her voice was cool iron.

“Is Piet still talking?”

“Piet is done talking.”

“What did you do to him?”

“Such concern for the rapist and the slaver.”

“My concern is not for him. My concern is for you.”

I put my hand on hers. She shrugged it off. “Don’t worry your bloodied and beaten head about me, Sam. I’m fine. Never felt better.”

“You killed him.”

“He needed killing.” She raised an eyebrow. “Did you find this Edward? Did you find Yasmin?”

“I found my wife.”

77

MILA’S RESOURCES INCLUDED A DOCTOR; I woke up in the bed in the apartment above the Rode Prins with an old man poking at me. He was bald and frowning and his breath smelled like hard-boiled eggs.

“You’re a wreck, young man,” he said to me.

“Yes.” In more ways than one, I thought, but I’d sooner die than admit that.

“I stitched and bandaged your head. And cleaned out your shoulder. The muscle will be sore, you should rest it. The back injury required several stitches, like a furrow it was. So drink fluids. Rest. I leave you some pain pills. Do not abuse them.” He turned to Mila and said, “I know you are no Nightingale, woman. Make sure he rests.” He extended a finger but did not wag it.

Mila nodded. The doctor packed a bag and scooted an array of medical equipment back into the storage room. I watched him. Rather I stared off into space and thought about what I was going to do now.