Eddie started, remembering his days as a cocaine mule and the sallow thing from whom he had bought his last load of dope. “Been there, done that,” he said. “Didn’t see anyone from the Sombra Corporation, though.”

But did he know that was true? Suppose the sallow thing with the British accent worked for Sombra? Was it so hard to believe that they were involved in the dope trade, along with whatever else they were into? Eddie supposed not. If nothing else, it suggested a tie to Enrico Balazar.

“Anyway, they were there in all the right reference books and yearlies,” Callahan said. “Obscure, but there. And rich. I don’t know exactly what Sombra is, and I’m at least half-convinced that most of the people we saw in their offices on the thirty-third floor were nothing but extras…stage-dressing…but there probably is an actual Sombra Corporation.

“We took the elevator up there. Beautiful reception area—French Impressionist paintings on the walls, what else?—and a beautiful receptionist to go with it. The kind of woman—say pardon, Susannah—if you’re a man, you can almost believe that if you were allowed to touch her breast, you’d live forever.”

Eddie burst out laughing, looked sideways at Susannah, and stopped in a hurry.

“It was 4:17. We were invited to sit down. Which we did, feeling nervous as hell. People came and went. Every now and then a door to our left would open and we’d see a floor filled with desks and cubicles. Phones ringing, secretaries flitting hither and yon with files, the sound of a big copier. If it was a setup—and I think it was—it was as elaborate as a Hollywood movie. I was nervous about our appointment with Mr. Sayre, but no more than that. Extraordinary, really. I’d been on the run more or less constantly since leaving ’Salem’s Lot eight years previous, and I’d developed a pretty good early-warning system, but it never so much as chirruped that day. I suppose if you could reach him via the Ouija board, John Dillinger would say much the same about his night at the movies with Anna Sage.

“At 4:19, a young man in a striped shirt and tie that looked just oh so Hugo Boss came out and got us. We were whisked down a corridor past some very upscale offices—with an upscale executive beavering away in every one, so far as I could see—and to double doors at the end of the hall. This was marked CONFERENCE ROOM . Our escort opened the doors. He said, ‘God luck, gentlemen.’ I remember that very clearly. Not good luck, but god luck. That was when my perimeter alarms started to go off, and by then it was far too late. It happened fast, you see. They didn’t…”

Sixteen