William Gibson - Spook Country

“No,” said Tito.

Garreth brought out an unopened toothbrush and passed it to him, along with the bottle of water. While Tito brushed his teeth, he watched the old man walk a distance down the road, then stand, his back to them, urinating. Finishing with the toothbrush, Tito poured what was left of the water over its bristles, shook it dry, and tucked it into the inner pocket of his jacket. He wanted to ask where they were, but the protocol of dealing with clients prevented him.

“Western Illinois,” Garreth said, as if reading his mind. “Belongs to a friend.”

“Of yours?”

“The pilot’s. The friend flies, keeps avgas here.” The man with the cowboy hat yanked a cord on the back of the truck, starting up the engine of a pump. They moved away from a sudden billowing reek of fuel.

“How far can it fly?” Tito asked, looking at the plane.

“A little under twelve hundred miles on a full tank. Depending on weather and number of passengers.”

“That seems not so far.”

“Piston-engine prop. We have to keep hopping, this way, but it keeps us under all kinds of radar. We won’t see any airport. All private runways.”

Tito didn’t think he meant actual radar.

“Gentlemen,” said the old man, joining them, “good morning. You seemed to sleep quite well, finally,” he said to Tito.

“Yes,” Tito agreed.

“Why did you lift that Immigrations and Customs Enforcement badge, Tito?” the old man asked.

ICE. Tito remembered Garreth saying “ice,” when he’d handed him the thing. Now he had no idea why he’d done that. And Eleggua, not he, had taken the badge-case from the man’s belt. He couldn’t tell them that. “I felt it on his belt as he tried to hold me,” he said. “I thought it might be a weapon.”

“Then you thought to use the Bulgarian salt?”

“Yes,” Tito said.

“I’m curious to learn what happened to him. I imagine, though, that he was taken briefly into custody, causing a jurisdictional pissing match. Until some entity, sufficiently high up in the DHS, ordered his release. You probably did your man a favor, Tito, taking that badge. It’s unlikely it was really his. You saved him having to refuse to explain it, until his fix came through.”

Tito nodded, hoping the subject was now closed.

They stood, then, watching the fueling of the plane.

M iller,” said Brown, from his enormous white leather recliner, across ten feet of off-white shag carpet. “Your name is David Miller. Same birthday, same age, same place of birth.”

They were in a Gulfstream jet on a runway at Ronald Reagan. Milgrim had his own white leather recliner. He hadn’t been to this airport since it had been National. Across a bridge from Georgetown. He knew this was a Gulfstream because there was an elaborately engraved brass plate that said “Gulfstream II” on the high-gloss wooden surround of the window beside his chair. Bird’s-eye maple, he thought, but too shiny, like the trim in a limo that was really trying. There was a lot of that in this cabin. And a lot of white leather, polished brass, and off-white shag. “David Miller,” he repeated.

“You live in New York. You’re a translator. Russian.”

“I’m Russian?”

“Your passport,” said Brown, holding one up, navy blue with pale gold trim, “is American. David Miller. David Miller is not a junkie. David Miller, upon entering Canada, will neither be in possession of nor under the influence of drugs.” He checked his watch. He was wearing the gray suit and a white shirt again. “How many of those pills are you holding?”

“One,” said Milgrim. It was too serious a matter to lie about.

“Take it,” said Brown. “I want you straight for customs.”

“Canada?”

“Vancouver.”

“Aren’t there going to be more passengers?” Milgrim asked. The Gulfstream looked like it could sit twenty or so. Or serve as the set for a porn feature, as most of the seating consisted of very long white leather divans, plus a bedroom in the back that looked like a natural for your more formal money shots.

“No,” said Brown, “there aren’t.” He slipped the passport back into his suit coat, then patted the place on his right hip where he kept his gun. Milgrim had seen him do this five times since they’d left N Street, and the micro-expression that always accompanied it convinced him that Brown had left his gun behind. Also his black nylon bag. Brown was suffering from phantom gun syndrome, Milgrim thought, like an amputee itching to scratch toes that were no longer there.

The Gulfstream’s engines fired up, or started, or whatever you called it. Milgrim looked around the back of his white leather chair, to the front of the cabin, where a corrugated white leather curtain sealed off the cockpit. There was evidently a pilot up there, though Milgrim had yet to see him.

“When we land,” said Brown, raising his voice against the engines, “customs officers drive out to the plane. They come aboard, say hello, I hand them the passports, they open them, hand them back, say goodbye. An aircraft like this, that’s what happens. Our passport numbers, and the pilot’s, went through when he filed our flight plan. Don’t behave as though you’re expecting them to ask you any questions.” The plane began to taxi.

When it rushed forward, the roar of its engines deepening, and seemed to leap almost straight up into the air, Milgrim was completely unprepared. Nobody had even told them to fasten their seat belts, let alone about oxygen masks or life jackets. That seemed not only wrong, but deeply, almost physically, anomalous. As did the steepness of this climb, forcing Milgrim, who was facing backward, to cling desperately to the white, padded arms.

He looked out the window. And saw Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport recede, more quickly than he would have thought possible, and as smoothly as if someone had zoomed a lens in reverse.

When they leveled out, Brown removed his shoes, stood, and padded toward the back of the plane. Where, Milgrim assumed, there would be a toilet.

From behind, he saw Brown’s hand touch the place where his gun wasn’t.

A pale boy with a very thin beard was holding a rectangle of white cardboard inscribed with HENRY & RICHARD in green marker, as they left the customs hall. He wore a dusty-looking, no doubt expensively Dickensian chimney-sweep suit. “That’s us,” said Hollis, stopping their luggage cart beside him and offering him her hand. “Hollis Henry. This is Odile Richard.”

“Oliver Sleight,” he said, tucking his sign under his arm. “Like sleight of hand,” offering his to shake, first with Hollis, then Odile. “Ollie. Blue Ant Vancouver.”

“Pamela told me there was no office, up here,” Hollis said, pushing the cart toward the exit. It was a few minutes after eleven.

“No office,” he said, walking beside them, “but that doesn’t mean there’s no work. This is a game design center, and we have clients through other offices, so there’s still a need for hands-on. Let me push that for you.”

“No need, thanks.” They went out through an automatic door, and past a crowd of post-flight smokers working back up to functional blood-nicotine levels. Odile was evidently one of a new generation of nonsmoking French, and had been delighted that Hollis no longer smoked, but Sleight, Ollie, as they followed him across a striped section of covered roadway, produced a yellow pack of cigarettes, lighting up.

Hollis started to remember something, but then the difference in the air struck her, after Los Angeles. It was like a sauna, but cool, almost chilly.

They went up a ramp, into a covered parking lot, where he used a credit card to pay for parking, then led them to his car, an oversized Volkswagen like the one Pamela had driven. It was pearlescent white, with a small stylized Blue Ant glyph to the left of the rear license plate. He helped them stow their bags and her cardboard carton in the trunk. He dropped his half-smoked cigarette and crushed it with an elongated, elaborately distressed shoe that she supposed went with his look.