Ve pointed across the expanse of reef-rock, glistening green and silver in the morning sun. “We should return to the city by separate routes. If you head that way, you’ll hit the south-west tram line in twenty minutes.”

“Okay.” I didn’t have the energy to argue. As ve turned to leave, though, I said, “Before you vanish, will you answer one last question?”

Ve shrugged. “No harm in asking.”

“Why are you doing this? I still don’t understand. You say you really don’t care whether Violet Mosala is the Keystone or not. But even if she’s such a great human being that her death would be a global tragedy … what makes that your personal responsibility? She knows exactly what she’s buying into, moving to Stateless. She’s a grown woman, with resources of her own, and more political clout than you or I could ever hope for. She’s not helpless, she’s not stupid – and if she knew what you were doing, she’d probably strangle you with her bare hands. So … why can’t you leave her to take care of herself?”

Kuwale hesitated, and cast vis eyes down. I seemed to have hit a nerve, at last; ve had the air of someone searching for the right words with which to unburden verself.

The silence stretched on, but I waited patiently. Sarah Knight had extracted the whole story, hadn’t she? There was no reason why I couldn’t do the same.

Kuwale looked up and replied casually, “Like I said: no harm in asking.”

Ve turned and walked away.

Chapter 18

I viewed the data Kuwale had given me while I waited for the tram. Eighteen faces, but no names. The images were standardized 3D portraits: backgrounds removed, lighting homogenized, like police mug shots. There were twelve men and six women, of diverse ages and ethnicities. It seemed a curiously large number; Kuwale hadn’t suggested that every one of them was actually on Stateless – but how, exactly, could ve have got hold of portraits of the eighteen corporate assassins most likely to be sent to the island? What kind of source, what kind of leak, what kind of data theft could have yielded precisely this much, and no more?