The Evolution of Fear (Claymore Straker #2) - Paul E. Hardisty Page 0,54

understand.

‘Good, Claymore. That’s what this is about: good.’

He wanted to ask her exactly what this obscure notion of good actually was. A decade ago, he was told that dead SWAPO terrorists made the world a better place, and he was rewarded for killing them. For a while, he’d even believed it. Then, in his work, he’d helped the clearing of forests to feed the multitudes, justified the dredging of reefs for new marinas, helped permit factories that made near-new junk, which was chucked into landfills within weeks of being produced, which meant more factories producing even better replacements, keeping thousands of people busy. It was all ‘good’. But he did not say any of it. The streets outside ran a current of steel. The air was thick with a haze of ozone and diesel that seemed to dematerialise buildings only car-lengths away. The sun’s disc, faint and forlorn in what should have been a blue sky, fought to pierce the blanket that strangled the city. All of this, but he said nothing.

‘It was you who did this, Clay. You.’ She jammed her free hand into his chest, tried again to push him away. ‘And you were right. I know now what my life is for, why I have been put on this earth. You helped me see it, even if you seem to have forgotten.’

‘For God’s sake, Rania. The Greeks and Turks have been killing each other for centuries. Do you really think you’re going to change anything?’

She was crying now, tears falling from her eyes like broken glass, hard and angular. ‘Do you remember what you said to me, when we were piecing the Yemen story together?’ She moved her face closer to his, inches only between their lips. ‘You said, “this matters”. I can see it as clearly as if it was now, sitting together on that rock overlooking the glacier.’

Clay stared into the depths of her eyes, the swirling nebula.

‘Well this matters, Claymore. And because this matters, so do I. Do you understand? Good is rewarded ten-fold. It is in the Al- Anaam, Claymore. I have repeated it since I was a little girl, but I had never really understood what it meant. You showed me. And I will always love you for it. Even if you don’t.’ She pulled her hand away, turned back to her desk.

Clay walked out to the balcony, breathed in a lungful of Istanbul smog, watched the sun starting to slant long across the Bosphorus, Asia Minor falling into darkness. The call to prayer drifted across the Golden Horn, a hundred voices raised to God. Clay wondered if He was listening.

After a while he heard her pick up the phone, dial. She asked for Hamour. A moment of quiet, car horns complaining from the street below.

Perhaps they could send Hamour to have a look at the documents. He was the senior AFP person in the country, after all. Then they could hire a car, drive overland into Greece, take a ferry to Cyprus or get someone to deliver Flame to Athens, then sail to Egypt and through the canal. And then? Suddenly the world seemed a very small place. He could hear her describing the outline of the story now, that newspaper language she spoke so well. She was excited, knew she was on to something, a crusader. Then, mid-sentence, she stopped. He heard her gasp, the distorted voice on the other end of the line speaking rapidly. He turned. She was sitting at the desk, the receiver clamped to her ear, her mouth agape, shock in her eyes, confusion. Her lower lip started to tremble. She raised her hand to her mouth and shut her eyes. Then she mumbled something into the phone and placed it gently in its cradle, sat staring at it.

Clay stepped forward. ‘What is it, Rania? What’s wrong?’

She looked up at him as if she wasn’t sure who he was.

‘LeClerc,’ she mumbled.

Clay said nothing, waited for her to continue.

‘He is dead, Claymore. Murdered. They found in him in a flat in Paris this morning, castrated, disfigured. Oh, mon dieu.’ She buried her face in her hands, sobbing.

Clay stood a moment watching her cry. Then he walked to the armoire, pulled out Rania’s case, opened the bureau and started packing her things.

Rania looked up. ‘What are you doing?’ she managed through her tears.

‘We’re leaving. Now.’

‘Where?’

‘I don’t know. Anywhere. Africa.’

‘No. Cyprus.’

‘We’ll find a place. Get married.’

‘I cannot.’

‘Yes you can.’

No answer.

He stopped packing and turned to look at her. ‘Understand,