Robert Harris - The Fear Index

It was, therefore, an unusual experience, and frankly an ordeal for him to attend his wife’s first exhibition. From the moment he stepped out of the car and crossed the crowded pavement and entered the noisy gallery, he wished he could turn around and leave. People he suspected he had met before, friends of Gabrielle’s, loomed up and spoke to him, but although he had a mind that could perform mental arithmetic to five decimal places, he had no memory for faces. It was as if his personality had grown lopsided to compensate for his gifts. He heard what others were saying, the usual trite and pointless remarks, but somehow he didn’t take them in. He was conscious of mumbling things in reply that were inappropriate or even downright odd. Offered a glass of champagne, he took water instead, and that was when he noticed Bob Walton staring at him from the other side of the room.

Walton, of all people!

Before he could take evasive action, his former colleague was making his way through the crowd towards him, determined to have a word, his hand extended. ‘Alex,’ he said, ‘it’s been a while.’

‘Bob.’ He shook his hand coldly. ‘I don’t believe I’ve seen you since I offered you a job and you told me I was the devil come to steal your soul.’

‘I don’t think I put it quite like that.’

‘No? I seem to recall you made it pretty damn clear what you thought of scientists going to the dark side and becoming quants.’

‘Did I really? I’m sorry about that.’ Walton gestured round the room with his drink. ‘Anyway, I’m glad it all turned out so happily for you. And that’s sincerely meant, Alex.’

He said it with such warmth that Hoffmann regretted his hostility. When he had first come to Geneva from Princeton, knowing no one and with nothing except two suitcases and an Anglo-French dictionary, Walton had been his section head at CERN. He and his wife had taken him under their wing – Sunday lunches, apartment-hunting, lifts to work, even attempts to fix him up with a girlfriend.

Hoffmann said, with an effort at friendliness, ‘So how goes the search for the God particle?’

‘Oh, we’re getting there. And you? How’s the elusive holy grail of autonomous machine reasoning?’

‘The same. Getting there.’

‘Really?’ Walton raised his eyebrows in surprise. ‘So you’re still going on with it?’

‘Of course.’

‘Gosh. That’s brave. What happened to your head?’

‘Nothing. A silly accident.’ He glanced over towards Gabrielle. ‘I think maybe I ought to go and say hello to my wife…’

‘Of course. Forgive me.’ Walton offered his hand again. ‘Well, it’s been good talking to you, Alex. We should hook up properly some time. You’ve got my email address.’

Hoffmann called after him, ‘Actually, I haven’t.’

Walton turned. ‘Yes you have. You sent me an invitation.’

‘An invitation to what?’

‘To this.’

‘I haven’t sent any invitations.’

‘I think you’ll find you have. Just a second…’

It was typical of Walton’s academic pedantry, thought Hoffmann, to insist on such a minor point, even when he was wrong. But then to his surprise, Walton handed him his BlackBerry, showing the invitation plainly sent from Hoffmann’s email address.

Hoffmann said reluctantly, for he too hated to admit an error, ‘Oh, okay. Sorry. I must have forgotten. I’ll see you around.’

He quickly turned his back on Walton to hide his dismay and went in search of Gabrielle. When he finally managed to get across to her, she said – rather sulkily, he thought – ‘I was starting to think you weren’t coming.’

‘I got away as soon as I could.’ He kissed her on the mouth and tasted the sourness of the champagne on her breath.

A man called out, ‘Over here, Dr Hoffmann,’ and a photographer’s flash went off less than a metre away.

Hoffmann jerked his head back instinctively, as if someone had flung a cup of acid in his face. Through his false smile he said, ‘What the hell is Bob Walton doing here?’

‘How should I know? You’re the one who invited him.’

‘Yeah, he just showed me. But you know something? I’m sure I never did that. Why would I? He’s the guy who closed down my research at CERN. I haven’t seen him for years…’

Suddenly the owner of the gallery was beside him. ‘You must be very proud of her, Dr Hoffmann,’ said Bertrand.

‘What?’ Hoffmann was still looking across the party at his former colleague. ‘Oh yes. Yes, I am – very proud.’ He made a concentrated effort to put Walton out of his mind and to think of something appropriate to say to Gabrielle. ‘Have you sold anything yet?’

Gabrielle said, ‘Thanks, Alex – it isn’t all about money, you know.’

‘Yes, okay, I know it isn’t. I was just asking.’

‘We have plenty of time yet,’ said Bertrand. His mobile emitted an alert, playing two bars of Mozart. He blinked at the message in surprise, muttered, ‘Excuse me,’ and hurried away.

Hoffmann was still half-blinded by the camera flash. When he tried to look at the portraits, the centres were voids. Nevertheless, he struggled to make appreciative comments. ‘It’s fantastic to see them all together, isn’t it? You really get a sense of another way of looking at the world. What’s hidden beneath the surface.’

Gabrielle said, ‘How’s your head?’

‘Good. I hadn’t even thought about it till you just mentioned it. I like that one very much.’ He pointed to a nearby cube.

‘That’s of you, isn’t it?’

It had taken her a day simply to sit for it, he remembered, squatting in the scanner like a victim of Pompeii with her knees drawn up to her chest, her head clasped in her hands, her mouth opened wide as if frozen in mid-scream. When she had first shown it to him at home, he had been almost as shocked by it as he had been by the foetus, of which it was a conscious echo.

She said, ‘Leclerc was here earlier. You just missed him.’

‘Don’t tell me they’ve found the guy?’

‘Oh no, that wasn’t it.’

Her tone put Hoffmann on his guard. ‘So what did he want?’

‘He wanted to ask me about the nervous breakdown you apparently had when you worked at CERN.’

Hoffmann wasn’t sure he had heard properly. The noise of all the people talking, bouncing off the whitewashed walls, reminded him of the racket in the computer room. ‘He’s talked to CERN?’

‘About the nervous breakdown,’ she repeated more loudly. ‘The one you’ve never mentioned before.’

He felt winded, as if someone had punched him. ‘I wouldn’t exactly call it a nervous breakdown. I don’t know why he has to drag CERN into this.’

‘What would you call it, then?’

‘Do we really have to do this now?’ Her expression told him they did. He wondered how many glasses of champagne she had drunk. ‘Okay, I guess we do. I got depressed. I took time off. I saw a shrink. I got better.’

‘You saw a psychiatrist? You were treated for depression? And you’ve never mentioned it in eight years?’

A couple standing nearby turned to stare.

‘You’re making something out of nothing,’ he said irritably. ‘You’re being ridiculous. It was before I even met you, for God’s sake.’ And then, more softly: ‘Come on, Gabby, we shouldn’t spoil this.’

For a moment he thought she was going to argue. Her chin was raised and pointing at him, always a storm signal. Her eyes were glassy, bloodshot – she had not got much sleep either, he realised. But then came a sound of metal rapping on glass.

‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ called Bertrand. He was holding up a champagne flute and hitting it with a fork. ‘Ladies and gentlemen!’ It was surprisingly effective. A silence quickly fell on the crowded room. He put down the glass. ‘Don’t be alarmed, friends. I’m not going to make a speech. Besides, for artists, symbols are more eloquent than words.’