Gone Tomorrow - Lee Child [59]
* * *
Sansom’s little speech hung in the air for a moment. We all sipped our drinks and sat quiet. Then Elspeth Sansom checked her watch and her husband saw her do it and said, “You’ll have to excuse us now. Today we have some really serious begging to do. Springfield will be happy to see you out.” Which I thought was an odd proposal. It was a public hotel. It was my space as much as Sansom’s. I could find my own way out, and I was entitled to. I wasn’t going to steal the spoons, and even if I did, they weren’t Sansom’s spoons. But then I figured he wanted to set up a little quiet time for Springfield and me, in a lonely corridor somewhere. For further discussion, perhaps, or for a message. So I stood up and headed for the door. Didn’t shake hands or say goodbye. It didn’t seem to be that kind of a parting.
Springfield followed me to the lobby. He didn’t speak. He seemed to be rehearsing something. I stopped and waited and he caught up to me and said, “You really need to leave this whole thing alone.”
I asked, “Why, if he wasn’t even there?”
“Because to prove that he wasn’t there you’ll start asking where he was instead. Better that you never know.”
I nodded. “This is personal to you too, isn’t it? Because you were right there with him. You went wherever he went.”
He nodded back. “Just let it go. You really can’t afford to turn over the wrong rock.”
“Why not?”
“Because you’ll be erased, if you do. You won’t exist anymore. You’ll just disappear, physically and bureaucratically. That can happen now, you know. This is a whole new world. I’d like to say I would help with the process, but I wouldn’t get the chance. Not even close. Because a whole bunch of other people would come for you first. I would be so far back in line that even your birth certificate would be blank before I got anywhere near you.”
“What other people?”
He didn’t answer.
“Government?”
He didn’t answer.
“Those federal guys?”
He didn’t answer. Just turned back and headed for the elevators. I stepped out to the Seventh Avenue sidewalk and Leonid’s phone started ringing in my pocket again.
Chapter 35
I stood on Seventh Avenue with my back to the traffic and answered Leonid’s phone. I heard Lila Hoth’s voice, soft in my ear. Precise diction, quaint phrasing. She said, “Reacher?”
I said, “Yes.”
She said, “I need to see you, quite urgently.”
“About what?”
“I think my mother might be in danger. Myself also, possibly.”
“From what?”
“Three men were downstairs, asking questions at the desk. While we were out. I think our rooms have been searched, too.”
“What three men?”
“I don’t know who they were. Apparently they wouldn’t say.”
“Why talk to me about it?”
“Because they were asking about you too. Please come and see us.”
I asked, “You’re not upset about Leonid?”
She said, “Under the circumstances, no. I think that was just an unfortunate misunderstanding. Please come.”
I didn’t answer.
She said, “I would very much appreciate your help.” She spoke politely, appealingly, a little submissively, even diffidently, like a supplicant. But not with standing all of that something extra in her voice made me fully aware that she was so beautiful that the last time any guy had said no to her was probably a decade in the past. She sounded vaguely commanding, like everything was already a done deal, like to ask was to get. Just let it go, Springfield had said, and of course I should have listened to him. But instead I told Lila Hoth, “I’ll meet you in your hotel lobby, fifteen minutes from now.” I thought that avoiding her