“My name’s Hal,” the big man said. He handed Stone two cell phones. “One for each of you. Use them for outgoing calls. You can use your own phone for incoming ones. I’ll be in or around the courtyard downstairs tonight. A guy named Ernie will relieve me in the morning, and he’ll check in with you. My phone number is speed dial one, his is two, three will get you Mr. Freeman, in New York.” He took Stone aside and handed him a compact 9mm handgun and a spare magazine. “It’s loaded, and there’s one in the chamber,” he said.

“Thank you for your help.”

“It’s what we do. Good night.”

He left and Stone went into the bedroom, where Hedy was unpacking his things and putting them into a huge wardrobe on one side of the room. He put the gun in the bedside table drawer.

“Now,” she said, finishing her work and handing him a terrycloth robe. “You’re my guest.”

12

Stone woke to an unfamiliar sound: there was a light knocking far away, and it began to increase in volume. He got into his robe, took the gun from the bedside table drawer, and walked through the living room and the kitchen to the front door. “Who is it?” he shouted, before opening the door.

“Ernie.”

Stone unlatched the door and found a smaller version of Hal there.

“Mike Freeman sent me. I just wanted you to know I’m on the job,” he said.

Hedy appeared from behind Stone, pulling on a sweater over jeans. “I’ve got to go out for breakfast stuff,” she said.

“Walk her to the store and back, will you?” Stone asked Ernie.

“Sure thing. You gonna be okay?”

Stone nodded.

“Hey,” Ernie said, pointing to the edge of the front door. “Give me your door key.”

Hedy handed it to him. He inserted and turned it. Six bolts emerged from the door. “Look at that,” he said. “It’s like a safe: heavy steel and six bolts that go into a steel jamb. Nobody’s coming in here without a bazooka.”

“Good to know,” Stone said. He had never seen a door like that, either.

Hedy let herself out.

“Lock it from outside,” Stone said, and she did.

Stone got a shower and a shave, and by the time he was out of the bathroom, Hedy had come back and had scrambled eggs and Italian sausage ready.

“Really good,” Stone said. “You know, there’s something very familiar about your name, and I can’t place it.”

“Hedy Eva Maria Kiesler? It’s the real name of the actress from the forties, Hedy Lamarr. She’s Viennese, as was my father, and he claimed some sort of kinship, a distant cousin or something. The name is a family joke.”

“‘I am Tondelayo,’” Stone quoted. “That was her famous line from White Cargo. She was very beautiful.”