Douglas Preston - Gideon’s Sword

“He showed signs of regaining lucidity, but it never actually rose to the level of consciousness. He said nothing. And then the sepsis set in.” He looked at Gideon. “I’m terribly sorry. For what it’s worth, he didn’t suffer at all.”

“Thank you, Doctor.”

The doctor nodded and left.

Gideon threw himself into a chair. Orchid sat down next to him, her face creased with concern. He reached into his pocket, removed a sheaf of bills, and handed them to her. “This is for you. When we leave the hospital, we’ll get in a cab together, but after a while I’ll get out of the cab while you continue on to wherever you want to go.”

She didn’t take the money.

“Thanks for your help,” he said. “I really appreciated it.”

“Creighton, or Crew, or whatever your name is, I can guess this isn’t really about some Method acting gig. You’re a nice guy, and it’s been a long time since I met any nice guys. Whatever you’re doing, I want to help.” She pressed his hand.

Gideon cleared his throat. “Thanks, but I’ve got to do this alone.” He knew how lame that sounded even as he said it.

“But…will I see you again? I don’t care about the money.”

Gideon glanced at her and was shocked at the look he saw on her face.

He thought about lying, but decided the truth was ultimately less painful. “No. I’m not going to call you. Look, the money’s yours. You earned it.” He gave the bills an impatient shake.

“I don’t want it,” she said. “I want you to call me.”

“Look,” said Gideon as coldly as he could. “This was a business arrangement, and you did your job well. Just take the money and go.”

She reached out, snatched the money. “You’re an asshole.” She turned to leave and he tried not to notice she was crying.

“Good-bye,” he said, cringing inwardly.

“Good-bye, jerk-off.”

Gideon Crew strolled up Fifth Avenue and entered Central Park at the 102nd Street gate. He felt absolutely awful. It was early evening, and the joggers were out in force. He couldn’t get Orchid’s lovesick look out of his head. And now that Wu was dead — and his assignment had crashed and burned — he found himself replaying Glinn again and again in his mind, pulling out the medical file with a sorrowful look on his face. Arteriovenous malformation. The more he thought about it, the less probable it seemed: this mysterious illness that would just happen to strike him dead in a year with no warning, no treatment, no symptoms, nothing. It smelled phony, smacking of psychological manipulation. Glinn seemed the type to tell any kind of fantastic story if it got him what he wanted. Gideon walked aimlessly, not knowing where he was going, cutting across the baseball diamonds, heading west.

This is crazy, he thought, just forget about Orchid and the file and move on. Focus on the problem. But he couldn’t forget. He pulled out a new cell phone he’d bought—​a cheapie with preloaded minutes—​and called Tom O’Brien as he walked.

“Yo” came the abrasive voice after an inordinate number of rings.

“Gideon here. What news?”

“Jeez, you told me I’d have twenty-four hours.”

“Well?”

“Well, the credit card and passport are just that. No hidden data. The cell phone’s the same. It’s a brand-new SIM card phone, probably just purchased.”

“Damn.”

“All that’s left on it are the contacts you already got, a few recent calls — and that’s it. No other hidden data, no secret microchips, nothing.”

“What about the string of numbers I gave you?”

“Those are a lot more interesting. I’m still working on them.”

Gideon turned south. It was now dusk, and the park was emptying.

“Interesting why?”

“Like I told you before, lot of patterns in here.”

“Such as?”

“Repeated numbers, rows of decreasing numbers, stuff like that. Right now it’s hard to say what they mean. I just started in on them. It’s definitely not code.”

Central Park Reservoir loomed ahead, and he stepped onto the jogging path. The water lay dark and still. Far to the south, over the tops of the trees, Gideon could see the skyline of Midtown, the lights in the buildings glowing against the fading sky.

“How do you know?”

“Any decent code yields a string of numbers that look random. They aren’t, of course, but all the mathematical tests for randomness will show that they are. In this case, even the simplest test shows they’re not random.”

“Test? Such as?”

“Tallying up the digits. A truly random string has roughly ten percent zeros, ten percent ones, et cetera. This one is way heavy on the zeros and ones.”

There was a silence. Gideon took a deep breath and tried to speak casually. “And the CT scans I gave you?”

“Oh yeah. I passed them along to a doctor like you asked.”

“And?”

“I was supposed to call him this afternoon. I forgot.”

“Right,” said Gideon.

“I’ll call him first thing in the morning.”

“You do that,” said Gideon. “Thanks.” He wiped his brow. He felt like shit.

And then all of a sudden — for the second time that day — he had the distinct impression he was being followed. He looked around. It was almost dark, and he was in the middle of the park.

“Hello? Anyone home?” asked O’Brien.

Gideon realized he hadn’t hung up. “Yeah. Listen, I’ve got to go. See you tomorrow.”

“Not before noon.”

He closed the phone and stuck it in his pocket. Maintaining a brisk stride, he headed west past the tennis courts, still keeping to the jogging path. What made him feel he was being followed this time? He hadn’t heard or seen anything…or had he? Long ago, he’d learned to trust his instincts — and they’d saved his ass again just that morning.

He realized that, by following the jogging path, he was making it easy for his follower — if there was one. Better turn back to the north, get off the paths, and cut through the wooded area around the courts. The pursuer would have to stay closer. And then Gideon could figure out a way to double around and come up behind.

He cut off the path and entered the woods below the courts. There were dead leaves underfoot that rustled as he walked. He continued for a moment, then stopped abruptly, pretending to have dropped something — and heard the crunch of leaves behind him cease abruptly as well.

Now he knew he was being followed, and his stupidity began to dawn on him. He didn’t have a weapon, he was in the middle of the empty park — how had he allowed this to happen? He’d been upset about Orchid, who’d turned out to have feelings as tender as a damn teenager’s. He’d been worrying about Glinn and his medical folder. And as a result he’d let down his guard.

He started up again, walking fast. He couldn’t let them know that he knew. But he had to get out of the park as soon as possible, get among people. He swung around the tennis courts and took a sharp left, walked along the court fence and then, in a bushy area, briefly reversed direction and made a quick ninety-degree dogleg, angling back toward the reservoir.

That would, he hoped, confuse the bastard.

“Move and you’re dead,” spoke a voice from the darkness, and a figure with a gun stepped out in front of him.

Gideon halted, tensed to spring, but held his ground. It had been a woman’s voice.

“Don’t be stupid. Raise your hands. Slowly.”

Gideon raised his hands, and the figure took another step forward. She had a Glock trained on him with both hands, and he could see from her stance that she was thoroughly trained in its use. Slender, athletic, her mahogany hair was pulled back in a heavy, loose ponytail, and she wore a dark leather jacket over a crisp white blouse and blue slacks.