The Jennifer Morgue - Charles Stross [70]
★★Oh, you’d be surprised.★★ She sounds as if she does this sort of thing every other week. Then, a second later, I sense rather than feel her feet hit bottom: ★★Oh. Well that’s a surprise,★★ she adds conversationally.
And suddenly I realize I can’t breathe underwater.
8.
WHITE HAT/BLACK HAT
AN ADVENTURE DEMANDS A HERO, AROUND WHOM the whole world circles; but what use is a hero who can’t even breathe underwater?
To spare you Bob’s embarrassment, and to provide a shark’s-eye view of the turbid waters through which he swims, it is necessary to pause for a moment and, as if in a dream—or an oneiromantic stream ripped from the screen of Bob’s smartphone—to cast your gaze across the ocean towards events transpiring at exactly the same time, in an office in London.
Do not fear for Bob. He’ll be back, albeit somewhat moist around the gills.
“THE SECRETARY WILL SEE YOU NOW, MISS O’Brien,” says the receptionist.
O’Brien nods amiably at the receptionist, slides a bookmark into the hardback she’s reading, then stands up. This takes some time because the visitor’s chair she’s been waiting in is ancient and sags like a hungry Venus flytrap, and O’Brien is trying to keep her grip on a scuffed black violin case. The receptionist watches her, bored, as she shrugs her khaki linen jacket into place, pats down a straying lock of reddish-brown hair, and walks over towards the closed briefing-room door with the AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY sign above it. She pauses with one hand on the doorknob. “By the way, it’s Professor O’Brien,” she says, smiling to take the sting out of the words. “‘Miss’ sounds like something you’d call a naughty schoolgirl, don’t you think?”
The receptionist is still nodding wordlessly and trying to think of a comeback when O’Brien closes the door and the red light comes on over the lintel.
The briefing room contains a boardroom table, six chairs, a jug of tap water, some paper cups, and an ancient Agfa slide projector. All the fittings look to be at least a third of a century old: some of them might even have seen service during the Second World War. There used to be windows in two of the walls, but they were bricked up and covered over with institutional magnolia paint some years ago. The lighting tubes above the table shed a ghastly glare that gives everybody in the room the skin tint of a corpse—except for Angleton, who looks mummified at the best of times.
“Professor O’Brien.” Angleton actually smiles, revealing teeth like tombstones. “Do have a seat.”
“Of course.” O’Brien pulls one of the battered wooden chairs out from the table and sits down carefully. She nods at Angleton, polite control personified. The violin case she places on the tabletop.
“As a matter of curiosity, how are your studies proceeding?”
“Everything’s going smoothly.” She carefully aligns the case’s neck in accordance with the direction of the wards on Angleton’s door. “You needn’t worry on that account.” Then she exhausts her patiently husbanded patience. “Where’s Andy Newstrom?”
Angleton makes a steeple of his fingers. “Andrew was unable to attend the meeting you called at short notice. I believe he has been unexpectedly detained in Germany.”
O’Brien opens her mouth to say something, but Angleton raises a bony finger in warning: “I have arranged an appropriate substitute to deputize for him.”
O’Brien swallows. “I see.” Fingers drum on the body of the violin case. Angleton tracks them with his eyes. “You know this isn’t about my research,” she begins, elliptically.
“Of course not.” Angleton falls silent for a few seconds. “Feel free to tell me exactly what you think of me, Dominique.”
Dominique—Mo—sends him a withering stare. “No thank you. If I get started you’ll be late