"Yeah, sure."

"Do I need to keep standing here in the hallway, Kevin? Can I come in?"

"Sure, babe," said Kevin with a sigh. He stood aside and opened the door just enough for Ali to squeeze inside.

Inside, the laboratory was dimly lit, as always. Most of the light was coming from the bank of computer monitors to the right of the door. Ali saw that all of the computers were active, with each monitor scrolling dizzyingly through endless sets of numbers.

"It's a problem in crypta.n.a.lysis," said Kevin in answer to Ali's puzzled look. "The solution comes much faster when you attack it with a parallel array."

"I see." Ali walked toward the L on the right side of the lab. Ahead of her were an unkempt cot and a row of bookcases filled with jars containing the brains of the animals used in the SIPNI experiments and Kevin's prized collection of skulls. There was an extra chair in that part of the room but Ali did not sit down. She reached out and touched the coils of nylon rope and climbing gear that Kevin had hung on the wall, next to a large framed picture of the south face of K-2.

"You don't look too good, Kevin," she said. "You don't smell too good. I think you need to get out of this cave for a while. Maybe do some climbing."

"Speak for yourself, jasmine flower." After shutting and locking the door, Kevin sat down in his chair and swiveled around to face Ali. "Now what's this about the Winslow kid?"

"He went into a coma for a while, and he may be having some autonomic nervous system dysfunction. Will you run the simulation for us?"

"You have the chart?"

"Not with me. I can go get it."

"Well, by all means do so. Unless you want to just stand around and talk about B.O."

"Okay, sure." Ali pivoted on her feet, as though on the point of leaving, but then stopped to look at a big dry-erase board on the wall. It was covered with diagrams and cryptic inscriptions in runic alphabet. Kevin often wrote notes to himself in runes when he wanted to keep them secret. Ali regretted now that she had never bothered to learn to read them. "I need to ask you about something else, Kevin," she said, trying to hide the tenseness she felt.

Kevin looked at her expectantly, but said nothing.

"It's, uh ... it's about Rahman. Have you been in contact with him?"

"Yeah, he helped me with a few things."

"Oh, what?" She spoke as nonchalantly as she could, shutting her eyes so as not to betray her uneasiness.

"Travel arrangements. I'm going abroad for a while."

Ali touched her hand to her mouth. "The FBI has him in custody, you know," she said after a pause. "They think he's planted a bomb in the hospital."

"Bomb? Oh, you mean that Code White business? Really? Is that still going on?"

"Yes, and Rahman has something to do with it."

"That must be awkward for you."

Kevin's sly tone was meant to goad her, but Ali kept her cool. "I've just come from talking with him," she said, matter-of-factly. "The FBI brought him here, to the hospital. Do you know how they traced him? Through phone calls made from our old apartment. I know I didn't make those calls. Only one other person could have."

"So I've talked with him. He was my brother-in-law. What of it?"

"How could you have anything to do with Rahman? You know what kind of person he is."

Kevin smiled. "I've worked with all kinds of b.a.s.t.a.r.ds in my time. Rahman was nothing special."

Enough of this play-acting! Ali turned and looked directly into his eyes. "He's dangerous, Kevin."

"A comedian. Too predictable to be dangerous."

"Has he threatened you?"

"You mean, like with cutting my throat and so on? Of course. But that's just de rigueur. Among his sort, it pa.s.ses for standard business etiquette."

"Look, whatever he's gotten you into, it's not too late to get out of it. Let me take you to Harry Lewton. Tell him what's happened. He can help."

"Harry Lewton, huh? The Sturmbannfuhrer of our local Gestapo?"

"Stop it, Kevin! He's a decent sort. Not like those hard cases from the FBI. You can talk to him."

"Does Richard know about Harry?"

Ali furrowed her brow. "Richard? What has he got to do with it?"

"Even your marble-s.h.i.tting Greek G.o.ds have been known to show a wee spark of jealousy now and then. Particularly since, well, let's face it-Richard's your gray December, Harry's all l.u.s.ty July."

"Don't be such a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, Kevin. I've only just met Harry Lewton. He's ... he's not my type, anyway. Too crude ... too rugged. And for all I know, he's happily married."

"Not married, jasmine flower. He's the weekend joy of many a bluegra.s.s diva and c.o.c.ktail waitress out of those hick clubs like Horseshoe and Cadillac Ranch."

"Why do you always have to drag things into the gutter? This is exactly the sort of thing that drove me away from you. I don't care if he's married or not. I haven't the slightest interest in him. Do you get that? None. I simply trust him, that's all, and I believe he can help you."

"Do I need help?"

"I'm not stupid, Kevin. I've seen that ransom message. I know Rahman didn't write it."

Kevin raised his eyebrows in a look of exaggerated innocence. "Which means ... I did?"

"I don't know anyone else who can be so ignorant and arrogant at the same time."

"Have you discussed this theory with the FBI?"

"No. I wanted to hear your side of it first."

"My side ... is a little bit messy."

Kevin's coy frat-boy smile was as good as a confession. Ali's eyes opened wide as she covered her mouth in horror. "Oh, G.o.d, Kevin! What have you done?"

Kevin raised an eyebrow. "Be careful where you go with this, jasmine flower. You may wind up hearing things you would rather not know."

Kevin, you b.a.s.t.a.r.d! thought Ali. This is not a game. You're in over your head this time. She strove not to overreact. "You've cooked something up with Rahman, I know. He's duped you somehow. Promised you money. Played on your fantasies of getting back at me and Richard."

"Duped me? Do I really seem that weak to you?"

Ali knelt in front of Kevin's chair, leaning on the armrests. "Kevin, you can still get out of it. Please, let me help you."

Kevin looked at her coldly. "Has it not occurred to you that Rahman may not have been the master of this affair?"

"That you-"

"Yes, me."

"No, I don't believe it. You don't have that kind of wickedness in you. You can be mean and selfish sometimes, but not evil. You're ... you're a scientist. This is not you. This bomb has Rahman's signature all over it."

"Rahman was a bull, and like a bull he could be led by the wave of a cape. I gave him a chance to carry out one of those feats of martyrdom he's always talking about. He would have done something anyway. He was itching to do it."

"You gave him..." She could barely get the words out. "It was your idea?"

"Yes. I'd been thinking about it in the abstract for quite a while." Kevin suddenly pitched his voice upward, as though he were playing a part in a stage farce. "A game-playing scenario between Odin and myself. Probably would have gone nowhere. But then one morning, I woke up all alone, just staring at the ceiling, and I thought, 'Enough of these daydreams!' I could move from theory into real applications if I could just get my hands on a little bit of that silly putty stuff-C4, they call it. So I called the only real expert I knew on the subject-your late half-brother -and asked him if there was a trading house or bazaar for dealing in curiosities like this. And it turned out that sometimes East and West do meet. Rahman had a dream, and I had a dream, and both dreams intersected precisely in this same batch of C4. The Martyrs, of course, were very predictable in what they sought: glory, the liberation of their comrades, a small stake of money to finance their next experiment in mayhem. All this I promised them, reserving a small but interesting part of the project to myself."

"A part? I know you, Kevin. You would never settle for a part of anything."

"Let's call it the gleaning. You know how, in olden times, there was a law that after the reapers had come through during the harvest, they were forbidden to go back and cut down the stalks they had missed? Those sc.r.a.ps belonged to the poor and the outcasts, who lived off of what they could scavenge. Well, behold an outcast! I content myself with the leavings of the great martyrs and mujahideen of this world."

"Now you're talking as crazy as they do."

Kevin raised an eyebrow. "Crazy? I'll show you my craziness. You've read the ransom message?"

"Yes. It asked for the release of two prisoners."

"Meteb and Mossalam. Mere decoys. Of course, our brother Rahman insisted very punctiliously upon them, but there was never a chance that they would be released. G.o.d be with them. Do you recall the rest?"

"There was money, to be paid by a number of different payers. I forget which."

"What do they all have in common, jasmine flower?"

"Nothing."

"On the contrary, they are all very wealthy. They have enormous liquid accounts to cover the turnover of their operating funds. They spend vast amounts of money in a single day."

"If that's true, it's odd that you asked for so little."

"Actually, it was the Al-Quds Martyrs who asked for little. I didn't ask for anything. Mine, you see, is the gleaning, and not the reaping."

"I have no idea what you're talking about."

"I kept the money demand very reasonable, to seem more like an afterthought. I knew that attention would be focused on Meteb and Mossalam. If the cash payments were modest, they would be paid promptly, if for no other reason than to stall on the release demand. You see, it was crucial that the money be paid promptly, at the exact time stipulated."

"Why?"

"My confederate insisted on it."

"Rahman?"

"Rahman was no confederate. He was a hired delivery boy. I am speaking of a collaborator of much higher caliber."

Ali's breath stopped, although her mouth was poised half-open. "Odin," she said, barely moving her lips.

"Bingo!" Kevin pointed his index finger in the air. He was now in full rant. Ali had seen him like this before, whenever he felt that his intellect had been slighted. He poured out a torrent of words, as though unable to stop himself-heedless of all that he was giving away. "The Al-Quds ransom was paid in two disburs.e.m.e.nts, s.p.a.ced five minutes apart. When the connection was opened for the first payment, Odin made an unscheduled deposit to the server of the sending bank. Inside the header data for the confirmation of payment he implanted a small but very effective virus, a Trojan horse if you will. Five minutes later, when the connection was reopened for the second payment, this busy little routine gobbled up pa.s.swords, internal IP addresses, routing numbers-everything needed to commandeer the entire paying account. From then on, Odin could open the connection at will, posing as a trusted internal network computer, and completely draining the available funds. From published information about the payers, I expected that as much as eighty, ninety, even a hundred million dollars could be accessed in this way. But I underestimated Odin. It turns out that these payers also receive enormous sums several times each day from a whole host of secondary payers. Odin was able to infect these secondary accounts, too-an entire financial system, extending from Chicago to New York and beyond. The scheme has been so successful as to be, well, embarra.s.sing."

Kevin leaned back in his chair and ran his fingers through his temples.

Ali shook her head. "This is unworthy of you, Kevin. You're a scientist. You've never cared a fig about money. How can this little sh.e.l.l game interest you?"

"Sh.e.l.l game?" Kevin abruptly swung the chair toward the wall, leaving Ali to catch her balance as the armrests tore away from her grip. With a stentorian voice, like a sorcerer summoning a dread spirit out of h.e.l.l, he called out to the air, "Odin, display the current proceeds from Project Vesuvius."

On the monitor above him, a two-line inscription instantly appeared: PROJECT VESUVIUS TOTAL REVENUE AS OF 15:27:00:.

$1,403,266,408.52.

Ali stood up, her mouth agape. "My G.o.d, Kevin! That's over a billion dollars."

"A billion and a half, almost. And counting."

"This can't be true."

"All true, jasmine flower. Of course, collecting the money is one thing. Hiding it is another. A billion and a half dollars tends to get noticed. So, at the moment, Odin has the money distributed in over eleven thousand different accounts. Most of these are ordinary accounts of unwitting law-abiding citizens, which he has piggybacked very briefly, for periods ranging from a few minutes to an hour or so, while he shifts the money around. Ultimately, the money will be collected into about a hundred and fifty permanent accounts, in a dozen different countries."

"This is insane. What would you ever do with that much money?"

Kevin grew suddenly quiet. He stared at her intently. "Share it with you," he said at last, his voice a near-whisper.

"I want nothing to do with it."

"Get over your conventional ideas of right and wrong. Look at it as a scientific achievement in its own right. Think of the possibilities. We can have a phenomenal partnership, jasmine flower. Free to pursue our dreams, virtually without material limitations. You want to heal the sick? You want to unlock the riddle of the human brain? I give you scores of operating rooms, hundreds of a.s.sistants, laboratories custom-built for all the ideas you have in mind. No one in the world has, or has ever had, such resources at her fingertips. I give them to you. I, the husband you so coldly discarded. Come away with me, and these past three months will be forgotten. We'll build a new life together-a life that will become the stuff of legends."

"Don't you think they'll hunt you down for it, for a billion and a half dollars?"

"They'll have to move awfully fast. My partner is the greatest hacker the world has ever seen. He can access the database of any country, create a new ident.i.ty for me as often as I need one. If the law moves in three dimensions, he will move in four. And, of course, my road will be carpeted with money. I'll get by. We'll get by, - if you'll come with me. You won't need to worry."

"No, Kevin. You don't understand how the world works. Your whole universe is this laboratory. Every problem here has a neat little mathematical answer. You live and breathe and eat and sleep in this realm. That's what makes you a prodigy in your field. But in the real world, Kevin, you're maladapted. You'd be like a trained circus dog turned loose into the wilderness. Tracking you would be child's play to men like Raymond Lee."

Kevin gave her a poisonous look. "You underestimate me, babe."

Ali once again knelt before him, this time wedging herself between the chair and the wall. She took his hands in hers. "Please, Kevin. I beg of you to stop this. This isn't a game. This ... this bomb, it's Rahman's stock in trade, but you don't belong in this sort of scheme. Rahman worships death. He could set off the bomb on a whim-"

"I wish you would quit trying to save me from Rahman. Rahman is dead."

"No, he's alive, Kevin. I saw him ten minutes ago."

Kevin chuckled. "Uh-uh, babe. Very much dead."

"But I saw-"