She looked at Smith and saw that he was shovelling pad kee mao into his mouth as if it were his first meal in days. She felt bad about snapping at him when he’d asked whether she was married. She was being honest when she had said that she wasn’t expecting the question, and it was still a difficult subject for her to talk about. Everyone who asked the question wanted to ask a natural follow-up: how had Miyasato died? The truth—that he had been murdered by his brother at the behest of his father—was not something that she could share.

“How’s the chicken?” Smith asked.

“Very good,” Sakura said. “The sauce is delicious. And the rice?”

Smith held up his empty bowl. “It was okay,” he said with a self-deprecating smile. “Maybe I was hungrier than I thought. Eat when you can, sleep when you can. That was drummed into me a long time ago.”

“Drummed into you where?”

“What?”

“The phrase? What is it? Military?”

He paused before replying. “That’s right,” he said. “Eat when you can, sleep when you can. Because you never know when you’ll be able to do either again.”

“Is that what you do, then? You’re in the military?”

“Not anymore. Once. A long time ago.”

“You’re full of surprises,” she said, pushing the table away from her chair. Sakura picked up her clutch purse in one hand and stood up. “Would you excuse me for a moment? I just need to pop to the bathroom.”

* * *

Sakura felt progressively worse. It had started with mild nausea, a feeling in the pit of her stomach that she was going to be sick, and the feeling became more acute until she had hurried to the bathroom to be sick, only to find that all that came up was acrid bile.

Her next trip to the bathroom an hour later was more productive, with the salty white cheeses, tahini and molasses that the Gülenists had given her for breakfast splashing down into the bowl of the toilet. She returned to her seat. The cabin lights had been dimmed, and most of the other passengers were sleeping, their seats reconfigured as beds. Amber had taken care of her seat, folding back the duvet so that the seat belt was visible. Sakura braced her arm on the armrest and lowered herself onto the thin mattress. She felt weak and was beginning to feel dizzy. She glanced across the divider, hoping for a word with Smith, but saw that he was asleep; he had been watching one of the films on the in-flight entertainment and had nodded off as the credits rolled up the screen. She felt a twinge of disappointment. He had an assuredness about him that had been consoling, and she would have appreciated some of that comfort now.