Part 13 (2/2)

A low concrete barrier was now blocking the entrance to the footbridge that crossed the ca.n.a.l, and a small wooden kiosk, no larger than a portable latrine, had been placed just beside it. As I approached, two men suddenly emerged from the booth. They were wearing dark suits and coats and (oddly, given the glowering weather) even darker sungla.s.ses.

'Please state your business,' said the first man in a flat, official voice.

'I beg your pardon?' I said, alarmed.

Security, Eremon had said. But this surprise barricade popping up like a mushroom on the deserted bridge seemed beyond the bizarre. I was becoming more nervous by the minute.

'And we need your name, birthdate, and a photo ID,' the second man requested in a duplicate monotone, holding out his hand palm-up toward me.

'I'm on my way to work; I'm a chef at Sutalde,' I explained, motioning to the stone buildings across the bridge.

I tried to look obliging as I rummaged in my crammed shoulder bag for my driver's license. But I suddenly realized how remote and inaccessible this brushy section of the towpath really was. Women had been murdered along here, one even during a morning jog. And had anyone ever reported having heard them scream?

'How do I know who you are?' I asked them. I raised my voice a bit, more to quell my fears than to solicit a.s.sistance when none seemed to exist.

Number one had reached into his breast pocket and, like lightning, he flashed his ID beneath my nose. Oh lord, the Secret Service! This did tend to suggest that Eremon's hunch about tonight might be right. Whoever was 'commanding' this boum had to be pretty high up themselves, or they could hardly commandeer the highest echelons of government security, to provide a private blockade, just to screen folks for a dinner party.

But by now, I was fuming; I was surprised they couldn't detect the smoke of indignation pouring from my ears. I was going to kill Rodo, whenever he deigned to show up, for never alerting me about this showdown at 'Checkpoint Charlie' after what I'd already been through these past forty-eight hours just to get here.

I finally dug out my buried driver's license and I flashed the two thugs back. Show me yours and I'll show you mine. Number one returned to the kiosk to check my name against his instructions. He nodded out the door to number two, who handed me over the concrete hurdle, vaulted after me, escorted me across the ca.n.a.l, and deposited me on my own at the far side of the bridge.

When I entered Sutalde, I was in for yet another jolt. More security guys prowled the upstairs dining room maybe half a dozen, all whispering on mouthpieces into their individual walkie-talkies. A few searched beneath the linen-draped tables, while their boss searched behind the long wall rack displaying Rodo's colorful collection of homemade Sagardoa.

The Kiosk Twins must have buzzed ahead to announce my arrival, since n.o.body in the vast dining room seemed to give me a second glance. Finally one of the plainclothesmen came over to speak to me.

'My team will be clearing out of here shortly, once we've finished sweeping the place,' he informed me curtly. 'Now that you've been processed for admission, you're not to leave these premises until you've been clearance-processed for exit at the end of the night. And we need to search your bag.'

Terrific. They went through my stuff, removed my cell phone, and told me they'd give it back later.

I knew it was senseless to argue with these guys. After all, given what I'd just learned these past four days about my own family and circle of friends, who knew when a little unexpected offer of security might come in handy? Besides, even if I wanted out now, upon whom could I call for help against the Secret Service of the United States government?

Once the boys in black had departed, I ducked behind the cider rack, made a quick trip down the spiral stone steps into the dungeon where I found myself, refres.h.i.+ngly, completely alone. Except, that is, for the enormous cadaver of a lamb that was silently revolving on the spit in the central hearth. I raked the hot embers into place beneath the slowly revolving Meschoui, to keep the heat steady. Then I checked the flames in all the hearths and ovens, and I brought extra wood and kindling to touch up what needed improvement. But as I placed the new logs, I realized I had a bigger problem.

The rich herbal aroma of the roasting meat wafted over me, almost reducing me to tears. How long had it been since I'd ingested anything substantial? I knew this carca.s.s couldn't be done yet and it would be ruined if I started picking at it too soon. Yet for all I knew, Rodo might not show up here for hours with the rest of the dinner fixings or anything I could nibble on. And no other potential sustenance-provider that I knew of had security clearance to get across that bridge. I cursed myself for not making Eremon stop off even at a fast-food place somewhere en route so I could get a snack.

I considered foraging in the food lockers at the back of the dungeon where we kept all our supplies, but I knew it would be pointless. Sutalde was famous for fresh homegrown produce, daily-procured seafood, and healthily raised, recently butchered viands. We mostly kept things on-site that were hard to come by in a pinch like preserved lemons, vanilla beans, and saffron stamens nothing resembling actual food that could be popped quickly from a freezer and nuked. Indeed, Rodo had banned freezers and microwaves from the premises.

By now, I could hear those tart gooseberries I'd been foolish enough to eat, already fighting for supremacy with the acids in my stomach. I knew I wouldn't last until dinnertime. I had to be fed. I had in my mind the stark, ugly image of the prisoner of Zenda, starving to death here in her very own dungeon the last vision before her eyes of delicious, savory meat rotating slowly on a spit.

I was looking at the logs I'd just placed under the Meschoui, when I caught a glimpse of something silvery and metallic back there in the ashes. I bent over and peered beneath the rotating spit. For sure, there was a tinfoil lump back behind the coals that you could barely see, half covered with ash. I got the rake and pulled it out: a large oval object I instantly recognized. I fell on my knees and started to grab it with my hands, until I realized what I was doing. I yanked on the asbestos gloves, pulled the object out, and peeled the heavy tinfoil away. I'd never been so happy to see anything or so grateful to anyone in my life.

It was a gift from Leda. I recognized not only her style but her taste.

Comfort food: a twice-baked potato stuffed with meat, spinach, and cheese.

It's hard to imagine how perfectly exquisite a stuffed potato can taste, until you're starving. I ate every bit except the tinfoil.

I thought of phoning Leda, until I recalled that she'd worked the graveyard s.h.i.+ft for me and was probably sleeping it off right now. But I resolved to buy her a magnum of Perrier-Jout, just as soon as I broke out of prison.

Now that I had an infusion of fodder that I could burn off, it ignited a few thoughts that had not occurred before.

For starters, Leda and Eremon each knew more than they were letting on about this dinner party, as evidence revealed. After all, one was my driver and the other my potato-provider, which meant they knew when I'd be arriving here and that I wouldn't have had time to eat. But there was more.

Last night when I was building the fires, I was too exhausted to follow up on Leda's comments about Rodo: How he'd thrown a fit when he learned I'd left town without notice. How he'd been driving the staff like a slave-master 'ever since I'd left.' How he was throwing a secret party for 'goverment muckety-mucks' and only I was to help out at the dinner. How he'd insisted that Leda was to stay on-site until I returned that night, to 'help me with the fires.'

Then this morning, practically the instant I'd arrived up there at the Kenwood estate with the food, Eremon had raced me back here to the restaurant.

What had Rodo said just after his tantrum this morning just before he slammed the door behind him? He'd said there was no mystery to worry about. That I was late for work. And that Eremon will explain anything you need to know en route.

But what had Eremon actually told me on the way? That Rodo wasn't in charge of this dinner at all lack of control being something my boss had always hated. That it might involve guests from the Middle East. That security was involved. That from square one, this boum had been arranged by the highest echelons of D.C. clout.

Oh, yes and that he himself, Eremon, was in love with Leda the swan.

Such things seemed like diversionary tactics, drawing my vision away from a sneaking lateral attack. This was not the time to miss the big picture, not the moment to succ.u.mb to chess blindness not here, locked in a dungeon, waiting for the ax to fall.

And then it struck me.

When exactly was it this morning that Rodo went into that tantrum? Exactly when did he toss his beret on the floor, lapse into Basque, eject me from his presence? Wasn't this connected with everything Leda and Eremon had hinted at, but hadn't come right out and told me?

It was not my questions about this party that had lit Rodo's fire. It was when I'd demanded to know how he'd found out about that other party. After I told him I'd driven through a blizzard to get here. After I'd demanded to know how he could possibly have known where I was.

Though I'd had the first glimmer, back in Colorado, of what might be headed my way I'd missed the main point until it reached out and bit me: Whatever might happen tonight here in this cellar, it was going to be the next move in the Game.

Tactics and Strategy.

Whereas strategy is abstract and based on long-term goals, tactics are concrete and based on finding the right move now.

Garry Kasparov, How Life Imitates Chess.

Tactics is knowing what to do when there is something to do.

Strategy is knowing what to do when there is nothing to do.

Savielly Tartakower, Polish Grandmaster.

Practice makes perfect, as Key would say.

I'd spent half a lifetime practicing cooking in my uncle's big wood-burning ovens and his open hearth out at Montauk Point on Long Island. And now I'd had another nearly four years of apprentices.h.i.+p here at Sutalde, under the rigorous, if often overbearing, surveillance of the Basque Bonaparte Monsieur Boujaron.

So one would think that by now, at least when it came to cooking, I'd be able to distinguish a flame from a flimflam.

Yet until this moment it hadn't really hit me that there was something wrong with this scenario. Of course, I'd been a bit preoccupied by things like food and sleep deprivation, by tempestuous tantrums and Secret Service spies. But my first clue that something was wrong should have been the Meschoui itself.

It was obvious to the trained eye. After all, the clockwork spit was running just like clockwork; the fire I'd created was producing an even, steady heat; and the lamb itself, rotating at perfect elevation above the hearth, was trussed correctly, so as it turned all sides would be evenly exposed to heat from the firebox. But the dripping pan was missing. The liquid fat, instead of dropping into a water-filled catch-all beneath, to be recycled for basting the meat, had been splas.h.i.+ng onto the flagstones below and baking into a black mess for hours. It would be h.e.l.l to scrub all that off.

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