Then, less than a minute later, “The fissile material is there. It’s real. It seems to be in working order, unfortunately.”
The bomb was real. It wasn’t a fake threat. The Wolf was still keeping his promises, wasn’t he? The sadistic bastard was everything he said he was.
Then I saw one of the technicians pump his arm in the air. A cheer went up around the console in the van. I didn’t understand exactly what had happened at first, but it seemed like good news. No one explained anything to me.
“What just happened?” I finally asked in French.
One of the techs turned to me. “There’s no trigger! It couldn’t blow up. They didn’t want it to explode, thank God. They only wanted to scare the shit out of us.”
“It worked,” I told him. “I shit you not.”
Chapter 82
OVER THE NEXT couple of hours it was revealed that the suitcase bomb had everything necessary for a nuclear explosion except a single part, a pulsed neutron emitter, a trigger. All the difficult elements were there. I couldn’t eat that night, couldn’t keep anything down, couldn’t concentrate at all. I’d been tested, but I couldn’t get the idea of radiation poisoning to leave my brain.
I also couldn’t get Maud Boulard out of my mind: her face, the tenor of her voice, our absurd lunch together, the detective’s stubbornness and naïveté, her red hair splayed out on the sidewalk. The casual brutality of the Wolf and his people.
I kept flashing back to the Russian who had struck me in the farmhouse. Had it been the Wolf? Why would he let me see him? And then, why not?
I went back to the Relais and suddenly wished that I hadn’t asked for a room facing the street. My body felt numb all over, exhausted, but my mind wouldn’t stop racing at warp speed. The noise rising from the street was a disturbance that I couldn’t handle right now. They have nuclear weapons. This isn’t a bluff. It’s going to happen. A holocaust.
I decided to call the kids at about six o’clock, their time. I talked to them about all the things in Paris that I didn’t see that day—everything except what had really happened to me. So far, the media had none of it, but that wouldn’t last.
Then I called Nana. I told her the truth about how it had felt sitting on the pavement with a bomb attached to my wrist. She was the one I always told about my worst days, and this was probably the worst of them all.
Chapter 83
WHEN I ARRIVED at my small office at the Préfecture I got another surprise. Martin Lodge wa
s waiting there for me. It was 7:15: ten hours and forty-five minutes to doomsday.
I shook Martin’s hand, and told him how glad I was that he was there. “Not much time left. Why are you here?”
“Last words, I suppose. I have to give the final update on the situation in London. As well as Tel Aviv. From our vantage point, anyway.”
“And?”
Martin shook his head. “You don’t want to hear the same rotten story twice.”
“Yeah. I do.”
“Not this story, you don’t. Oh hell, it’s all cocked up, Alex. I think he might have to blow up a city to get them to act. That’s how bad it is. The worst is Tel Aviv. I think it’s basically hopeless there. They don’t make deals with terrorists. You asked.”
The morning briefing started at eight sharp and included a quick summary on the briefcase bomb from the technicians who had taken it apart. They reported that the bomb was authentic in design, but there was no neutron emitter, no trigger, and possibly not enough radioactive material inside.
An army general spoke about the current situation in Paris: the people were frightened and staying off the streets, but only a small percentage had actually fled the city. The army was prepared to move in and declare martial law about the time of the deadline, which was six P.M.
Then it was time for Martin. He strode to the front of the room and spoke in French. “Good morning. Isn’t it incredible what can happen once we adapt ourselves to a new reality? The people of London have been splendid, for the most part. Some rioting. Not too much in terms of what could have happened. I suspect that those who might have given us the most trouble got out of London early. As for Tel Aviv, they’re so accustomed to crisis and living under threatening scenarios—let’s just say that they’re handling this very well.
“Anyway, that’s the good news. The bad is that we’ve raised most of the money, but not all of it. That’s in London. And Tel Aviv? As best we can tell, they’re not going to make a deal. The Israelis hold their cards very close to the vest, so we’re not sure what’s transpired there.
“We’re putting on pressure, of course. And so is Washington. I know that private individuals have been approached to put up the entire ransom. That could still happen. But it isn’t clear if the government will take the money. They simply don’t want to meet terrorist demands.
“Less than ten hours,” Martin Lodge said. “To be blunt, we don’t have time for a lot of bullshit. Somebody has to drop the hammer on anyone who’s resisting paying the ransom.”
A policeman had come up to me and was whispering against my ear. “Sorry. You’re needed, Dr. Cross.”
“What is it?” I whispered back. I wanted to hear everything that was being said in this meeting.