by Sam Bourne
'What we did not know, what we could not have known, was that Mr Samak had a weak heart. Such a strong man, but a terribly weak heart. The… steps we had to take to bring him into custody were, I'm afraid, more than he could take.'
For a brief moment, Will thought like a journalist: he had wrung a confession from this man. Not of murder, perhaps, but of manslaughter. In a spasm of professional pride, Will guessed that, despite hours of intense questioning, New York's finest had not yet achieved quite so good a result.
'That is what happened, Mr Monroe and, though it will amaze you to hear it, I have only told you the truth in all our encounters so far. I repeat that I have taken a great risk in speaking so candidly. But something tells me you will take my gesture the right way and you will not spurn me. I have trusted you and now, I hope, you will trust me. Do it for your own reasons, Will. Do it because I have told you that I will do my best to keep your wife alive. But do it also because of what I told you yesterday and repeat again today: that an ancient story is unfolding here, threatening an outcome mankind has feared for thousands of years. Your wife matters to you, Mr Monroe, of course she does. But the world, the creation of the Almighty, matters to me.'
Now the rabbi was leaving the silence, waiting for Will to fill it. He knew what was happening, but he could not help himself.
'What are you asking me to do?'
'To do nothing, Mr Monroe. Nothing at all. Just to stay out of this and to be patient. There are perhaps a couple of days left and then we will all know our fates. So even though you are desperate to see Beth again, I urge you to wait. No meddling, no amateur detective work. Just wait. I hope you will do what's right, Will. Good night. And may God turn his face to shine upon all of us.'
The phone clicked off. Will looked at TO, who seemed to be trembling with him.
'It's so strange to hear his voice,' she was saying, in little more than a whisper. 'After we've talked about him so much, I mean.'
Will had scribbled the odd note while the rabbi was talking so that he and TO could deconstruct his meaning. But it was the tone that was most striking. If Will was briefing Harden on the conversation he had just had, that would be his headline.
The rabbi had sounded conciliatory but something else, too — almost regretful.
The silence was not allowed to last. The cell phone had another text to disgorge. a chain is no stronger than its weakest link And then a moment later:
Safety in numbers. No more.
Will read them out, pausing as TO demanded clarification of the location of the period in that sentence. There were two full stops, Will replied. Was he sure? He was sure. He was having trouble concentrating. He was hearing Beth's voice, over and over: Will? Will, it's Beth.
'OK,' TO was saying. 'Let's assume that he means what he says, that there will be no more. This is the full set.'
In front of her, laid out on the table, were ten neat squares of paper, one message written on each.
He who hesitates is lost
He that knows nothing doubts nothing
Opportunity seldom knocks twice
A friend in need is a friend indeed
To the victor the spoils
Goodness is better than beauty
A man is known by the company he keeps
From little acorns mighty oaks grow A chain is no stronger than its weakest link Safety in numbers. No more.
TO was glaring at them, her sketchbook on her lap, surveying the pattern she had arranged. The messages were in three groups. Encouragement, warnings, enigmas.
TO now laid the pad onto the table, alongside the scraps of paper. It was almost dark with ink: she had filled the page. All over it were words or half-phrases crossed out, written backwards or in diagonals. She had written out the messages in every possible order, each time underlining the first letter of each line: attempting the acrostic. Will could see the results: HHOATGAFAS followed by a list of random variations using the same letters. All of them spelled gibberish.
As if reading his mind, TO turned the page of her sketchbook to show the one underneath, its surface no less covered with calculations and abortive anagrams. She peeled that away to show the one below and the one below that. She had been breaking her head to solve this puzzle for hours.
Will felt a surge of gratitude: he knew how lonely he would have been without her. But there was no getting away from it. Despite all her efforts, despite their combined intellect, they still had not cracked this riddle in ten parts. It had defeated them.
'I can't believe I am that dumb.'
'What?' Will looked up from the table to see TO leaning back in her chair, hands on her head and eyes fixed on the ceiling.
'I cannot believe I am so stupid.' She was smiling, shaking her head in disbelief.
'Please tell me precisely what you're talking about,' Will said, in a voice that even he recognized as excessively polite and English, a voice he often used when trying to stay calm.
'It was so obvious and I made it so complicated. How many hours have I spent on this thing now?'
'You mean, you've worked it out?'
'I've worked it out. What has he sent us? "A friend in need." "From little acorns." He's sent us proverbs. Ten proverbs.'
'Right, so… Sorry, you're going to have to tell me. I can see he's sent us ten proverbs. The trouble is, we don't know what they mean.'
'They don't mean anything. They're not meant to mean anything. He's sent us ten proverbs. Because that's where we're meant to look. Proverbs, 10.'
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Saturday, 8.27pm, Manhattan
He had been there as long as they had and had been muttering just as loudly. He was on his own, middle-aged and no doubt homeless, with a face that seemed swollen through exposure to the elements. In the course of the afternoon Will had seen him eat half an apple pie, handed to him by a guy wearing an iPod (who did not take the earphones out), and perhaps a bag and a half of fries; and at intervals he had read aloud from the black, plastic-bound bible he held in his right hand.
Will had found these random sermons an irritation during the afternoon, as had the succession of customers who took pains not to sit too near. Now, though, he could not have been more grateful. With a hot cup of coffee in his hand, he approached gingerly.
'Sir, I wonder if perhaps you'd like a cup of coffee. It's freshly made.'
The man,looked up, his eyes watery. The whites were yellow.
'If it had not been the Lord who was on our side — let Israel now say — if it had not been the Lord who was on our side, when our enemies attacked us, then they would have swallowed us up alive, when their anger was kindled against us-'
'Yes, sir, I'm sure that's quite right,' Will tried, in the short moment the man drew breath. But it was no good; he was off again.
'Then the flood would have swept us away, the torrent would have gone over us; then over us would have gone the raging waters.'
'Sir, I'm sorry to trouble you, but I wondered if I could borrow your bible.'
'Blessed be the Lord, who has not given us as prey to their teeth. We have escaped like a bird from the snare of the fowlers; the snare is broken, and we have escaped.'
'That's truly what I pray for, too, sir. But if I could just take a peek at your bible.' Will bent down and tried to take the book from his hand. The man's grip was surprisingly strong. He would not let go.
'Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.'
'Yes, yes, that's what I think too. So if you'd just let me glance at the holy book.' The man's hand gnarled itself even more tightly. Will tugged but the man tugged back, still muttering.
Will looked up; TO had arrived. By now he was almost sitting next to the tramp, pulling horizontally at the book. He knew he looked ridiculous: he was mugging a tramp for his bible.
'Sir,' TO said softly. 'Do you think we could pray together?'
Suddenly the man stopped talking. TO continued, her voice a gentle stream of pure reason. 'Can I
suggest we take as our text, the Book of Proverbs, Chapter 10?'
Without complaint, the man opened up the book, thumbing through its tissue-thin, closely printed pages. Within a few seconds, he began his recitation: 'The proverbs of Solomon.
A wise son maketh a glad father: but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother.'
Will tried to peer over his shoulder, to skim the rest of the ancient text at top speed. To him, it looked like the usual biblical mix of profundity and obscurity. Scripture always had this effect on him: the words might make stirring music, but their precise meaning only ever became clear through great effort. Most of the time, in church or at morning prayers at school, the sounds just washed over him. As they did now, in this odd, spontaneous prayer meeting.
Their leader was onto Verse 2: 'Treasures of wickedness profit nothing: but righteousness delivereth from death.'
Eyes down, Will was racing ahead. Confronted now with verse after verse of the stuff, he found his eye lighting upon anything either immediately intelligible or, better still, familiar.
One word stood out, again and again. It had appeared in Verse 2 and was there again in Verse 3. The Lord will not suffer the soul of the righteous to famish: but he casteth away the substance of the wicked.
And again in Verse 11. The mouth of a righteous man is a well of life: but violence covereth the mouth of the wicked.
And in Verse 16. The labour of the righteous tendeth to life: the fruit of the wicked to sin.
Verse 2I had it too. The lips of the righteous feed many: but fools die for want of wisdom.
Wherever Will looked, the word seemed to jump off the page. In his sleep-deprived state, he could almost hear voices, angry male voices, shouting the word at him. There it was again, in Verse 24. The fear of the wicked, it shall come upon him: but the desire of the righteous shall be granted.
Listening to the rambling murmur of the homeless man, he pictured the Rabbi of Crown Heights swaying as he read Verse 25, his bearded disciples swaying along with him. As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more: but the righteous is an everlasting foundation.
The word refused to let go. Verse 28 had it — The hope of the righteous shall be gladness: but the expectation of the wicked shall perish — and so did Verse 30: The righteous shall never be removed: but the wicked shall not inhabit the earth.
It was even there at the very end, in the final verse. The lips of the righteous know what is acceptable: but the mouth of the wicked speaketh perversity.
The tramp now had his eyes shut, incanting the words from memory. But Will had heard enough. He stood up and moved round, so he could whisper in TO's ear.
'I'm going.'
He knew they could have discussed it for hours, parsing every clause for multiple meanings like a pair of the sharpest Talmudical scholars. But sometimes you just have to go with your first instinct. Journalism was like that. You would be at a press conference, handed some voluminous document, and somehow you would have to whip through it in five minutes, decide what it was all about, ask your question and go. In truth, the document could not be read properly in less than four or five hours, but journalists liked to think such strictures were for lesser mortals.
So Will trusted his judgment. Besides, he was sick of talking, deciphering and interpreting. He wanted to move, to go somewhere.
He had been inside for hours, inhaling air made sweet and sickly by fast food.
He had heard what he needed to hear. He knew exactly where he had to go — and he knew he would have to go there alone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Saturday, 9.50pm, Manhattan
A long line of elevators, maybe ten of them, and barely a soul to elevate. All big offices were probably like this on the weekends: still functioning, still with a guard at the front desk and lights on in the canteen, but skeletal versions of their weekday selves.
The lobby of The New York Times building looked especially bereft. On Monday at 10am, this space would be jammed, as circulation managers jostled with graphic designers to cram into elevators, half of them clutching steaming cups of overpriced coffee. Now the same space was empty and silent, with only the rarest 'ping' to announce that an elevator had moved up a few floors and come back home again.
Will nodded a hello to the guard on duty who gave him the merest glance. He was watching a ball game on a TV monitor that Will was sure was supposed to be tuned to closed circuit pictures of the fire escape or rear entrance or something.
Will swiped his card and headed to the newsroom.
He was glad to be here. He had not worked at the Times for long, but this office felt familiar. And he could not face going home. Just the thought of closing the front door and hearing the silence made him shudder. The pictures on the wall; Beth's clothes in the cupboard; her smell in the bathroom.
Even imagining it scared him.
Besides, was this not what Yosef Yitzhok had told him to do in person, before he began communicating by texted riddle? Look to your work. Now, via Proverbs 10, he had been more specific.
Will's pace quickened as he walked into the newsroom, deliberately avoiding eye contact with anyone who might spot him. At this time of night it was mainly production staff, not friends of his, but still Will kept his peripheral vision switched off, focused only on reaching his desk.
As he got nearer, glimpsing something over the flimsy partition wall, his heart thumped. There was a box, placed on his seat. Could this be what YY had been talking about? Had he been perfectly literal? Go to your office, it's all there waiting for you. A box containing all the answers?
Will knew it was pure fantasy, but he could not help himself.
He sprinted the last yard or two, grabbed the box, feeling its weight and tearing it open all at the same time. It was much lighter than its size had suggested and hard to open too. Finally the two top leaves came apart, Will stuck his arm inside and felt something soft and fleshy, like a fruit. What the hell was this? He dug in deeper; it felt moist. He hooked his fingers through some kind of opening and, using it as a handle, pulled up the entire object.
A Hallowe'en pumpkin. Will had poked his fingers through an eye socket.
Attached was a card.
The Better Relations Company invite you to a special evening…
Some bullshit PR freebie. Invitations for promotional events in New York had become increasingly absurd and excessive:
FedEx packages arriving at great expense, containing a silver key which turned out to be the ticket for the launch of the new Ericsson cell phone. The English Puritan in Will balked at such conspicuous waste. He picked up the pumpkin and hurled it across the pod towards a dustbin; it landed and split open by Schwarz's desk. He'll hardly notice.
He glanced at the rest of the post: circulars and press releases.
A few seemed to be new deposits — an invite for a party at the British Consulate in New York; a flyer for a convention hosted by some evangelical outfit, the Church of the Reborn Jesus; a notice about the Times healthcare scheme — otherwise, the pile of paper was just as he had left it on Monday, the last day he had been in the office.
That was nearly a week ago; it felt like a lifetime. It seemed like an earlier, golden era — life before the kidnap. How lucky he had been, flying out of New York, then bombing down the backroads of Montana with nothing more grave on his mind than the fickle tastes of the National desk. Of course he had not appreciated it: he had even been idiotic enough to feel glum about his cock-up on the floods story. As if any of that mattered. One of Beth's favourite songs floated into his head, or rather just one line of it. You don't know what you've got till it's gone… After a second or two, he was not hearing Joni Mitchell's voice but Beth's. She loved singing and he loved to listen to her. Gathering dust in the corner of their living room was an old acoustic guitar, a memento of student days when she would strum old songs of love and loss to herself. She sang only rarely these days; Will would have to bribe her to do it. But when she did, his heart
would soar.
Will could feel his eyes stinging. He wanted very badly to cry, to give into this memory of his wife that had caught him unawares. He wanted to fall into a chair, make a pillow of his arms and prolong the memory, to hold on to it the way a child wants to catch a bubble, never letting it burst.
Instead he began searching for the notebook he had left here five days ago, the one he had filled up in Brownsville, writing on both sides of the pages.
It was not under the press release pile, nor in the stack of magazines and papers Will had already begun to accumulate, waiting to be clipped. (A job he liked in theory but never got around to doing.) He checked the drawers, which he had loaded on his first day with Post-its, a handful of contacts' business cards, batteries and an old cassette machine in case his mini-disc recorder broke down. Not there. He looked back at the desk-chair and on the floor and then rummaged through the papers all over again.
He looked around the pod, his eye stopping on the photo of Amy Woodstein's toddler son apparently wrestling with his mother, pushing her over from the side. They were both smiling, Amy wearing an expression of relaxed joy that neither she, nor anyone else, ever displayed in this newsroom.
Suddenly he heard Woodstein's voice in his head. My advice is to lock up your notebooks when Terry's around. And talk quietly when you 're on the phone.
Will turned himself around slowly. Neat as ever, Walton's desk seemed to carry no excess paper. Just the single yellow legal pad.
Will inched closer, his eyes instinctively darting left and right to check no one was around. He ran his hands along the desk, as if to confirm through touch that it really was as clear and empty as it looked. Nothing there. He checked below the yellow pad, to see if there was another stashed underneath. No.
Now his hand was moving towards the desk drawer. Still scoping the room, he began to pull. It was locked.