“You’re not interested in the gas. It’s just a convenient excuse, isn’t it? Just a way of convincing people like me and those poor fools in the unit to help you. Do you know how many people have already risked their lives for you? Do you realize that my parents will be killed if I get caught? Haven’t you thought for one—”

“Leni! For God’s sake, shut up! Will you let me explain?”

Leni stopped herself and held out her palms to him.

“All right,” she said. “It had better be good.”

“It’s a coincidence,” he said, “just a bloody coincidence. I was first told where Anna was when I was in Crete. I had never heard of Mittelbau, had no idea where it was, or what went on there. And then, when I was in Berlin, when I heard Nicolas knocking through the wall, he tapped the word ‘Mitt’ when I asked him where the sarin was. But he was dragged off to his death before he could finish. Of course, when I first heard ‘Mitt,’ I immediately thought of Mittelbau, but I dismissed it, thinking that such a coincidence was far too unlikely. It was only last week, when that telegram arrived, that I knew for certain.”

Leni raised her hands, as if she was about to say something, but let them fall back down to her sides.

“What do you want to say?” Lockhart asked.

“So…so do you think she’s alive?”

Lockhart looked down at the blueprint, looked down at hall 4.

“I don’t know,” he said, “I really don’t know. But something tells me that she is.”

“And so that’s why we’re going.”

“No!” Lockhart snapped.

Leni started.

“No!” he repeated. “That’s not the reason. The reason we’re going is the same as it always was—to destroy the sarin. Whether my wife is there or not is secondary, and even then, secondary only for me—I would expect it to be of no relevance to anyone else. I would never ask anyone to risk their life just so I could save my own wife.”

“So you’re going to forget that she’s there?”

“Yes.”

“But how can you not look for her when you think she could be alive?” she asked.

“Because,” Lockhart replied, “her life is worth no more than any other.”

“But she’s your wife.”

“Just because she’s worth more to me doesn’t mean that she’s worth more than anyone else in the world. I’d rather my wife died than two innocent people, let alone the countless others who might die.”

“You can’t really think that. Most people would rather let others die before sacrificing their own wife or husband.”