A Calculated Risk, Katherine Neville [english novels for students txt] 📗

When did Lawrence propose Kiwi for membership in the Vagabond Club? Answer: The week my quality circle project started.

When did Lawrence move my project to report directly to him? Answer: When Pearl and Tavish suggested that it should be moved to the Managing Committee, or to the audit department, instead.

When did Lawrence decide my project should continue, instead of being canceled? Answer: When I threatened to turn it over to audit.

When did Kiwi get blackballed from club membership? Answer: The week my project ended and I left for vacation.

Last question: If Lawrence did all of the above because his goal was to get rid of me so he could do something crooked on the bank computer systems—when would be the perfect time to do it? Answer: Now! Now!! Now!!!

What an idiot I’d been not to see it. It must have been Lawrence all along! Lawrence who’d killed my very first proposal about security—Lawrence who’d arranged to bash any chance of that job with the Fed—Lawrence who’d tried to ship me to Frankfurt for the winter.

So understated was Lawrence’s handling of others, that poor Kiwi might even think all those ideas were his own—even that someone other than Lawrence had dumped him from the club. But the fact that Kiwi had been dumped for outlasting his usefulness—that I was absent from the bank, and that Lawrence was about to arrive here on the island—assured me that the time was now.

I had to get to those phones and call Tavish at once. I leaped to my feet and raced for the house, cursing Pearl for leaving me in the lurch. I didn’t have time to dash to the pool to get her help—but I hadn’t a clue where things were kept here at the castle, or where to find something I might use as a disguise.

I went through three or four rooms, pawing through trunks and barrels and boxes until at last I found an old black burnoose with a hood to cover my hair. I threw it on quickly, then grabbed one of Tor’s big silk hankies and fastened it over my lower face. Casting a quick glance in the rusty wall mirror, I seemed to resemble a Franciscan monk wearing a surgical mask—but it would have to serve. I threw on a pair of leather sandals, hitched up my skirts, and tore up the side of the rocky slope, without bothering to follow the switchback; it took too long.

It was half an hour, running at full clip, before I sighted the tiled roofs of the village. By the time I reached the waterfront, having scrambled the last hundred yards like a goat, my heart was beating like a caged bird, as much from fear as exertion. I was terrified I might be too late.

Coming up to the sail makers’ building, I pulled up the hood closely about my already veiled face, with only one eye peeping out, as an Islamic hausfrau might do. As I reached the entrance a distinguished Middle Eastern chap in Western-style clothes stepped out the doors, and I winced at my luck—an authority who could unmask my unprofessional disguise.

“Allah karim,” he said, brushing past me with some distaste. “God is beneficent”—in other words, ask Him, not me, for a handout. I’d have to speak with Georgian sometime about the state of her wardrobe. On the other hand, maybe it had made me safe—for the moment.

I raced up the stairs inside and, with skirts still hiked, dashed for the room with the phones. I threw the door wide with a bang, barged in—and froze.

Lelia was standing there at the blackboard, chalk poised in midair. Before her, sitting in neat little classroom rows, were Tor and Georgian—and the dozen or more members of the Vagabond Club!

Lelia stared, they all craned in their seats to check out this disruption, and Lawrence—in the last row, only inches from me—started to rise from his seat! Bowing and backing up as fast as I could, I retreated into the corridor and reached out to shut the door. But Tor was too fast for me. As soon as he saw me, in three swift strides he bounded across the room. He grabbed me by the arm, shoved me against the wall, and slammed the door behind us.

“What in hell are you doing here?” he whispered frantically. “Have you completely lost your mind? What if they’d recognized you?”

“… desperate … telephone …” I muttered through the layers of veil and hood.

“What do you have stuffed in your mouth—an apple?” he said irritably, yanking open my hood. He stared at the handkerchief, then smiled as he put his hand beneath my chin, turning my veiled face to left and right for a better view. “How charming,” he said, still smiling. “I rather like this new look of yours. Perhaps if you only wore the napkin and nothing else …”

Just then the door, not fully latched, swung open again, Lelia again frozen with chalk in her hand, Georgian wincing at my choice of attire, and the others continuing to stare. Tor remained, still grasping my arm, his other hand beneath my chin—smiling sheepishly at the group within.

“Forgive me,” he said, recovering himself and clearing his throat. “Gentlemen—may I present Madame Rahadzi, the wife of one of our most important clients from Kuwait. She’s asked to be shown to a private room where she waits until her husband has completed his business here. If you’ll excuse me? …”

“Of course,” Lelia replied for them, bowing to us. “And saha, Madame Rahadzi!” As Tor closed the door again, more firmly this time, I heard her say, “Now let us to continue, gentlemen.”

Tor nearly dragged me along the hallway. At the far end, he shoved me into an empty room with hardwood floors, stepped in behind me, shut the door, and—leaning against it—pulled me to him, pulled down my veil, and kissed me so deeply I felt my knees go weak.

“Madame