Hard Fall by Ridley Pearson Page B

left behind. He doesn’t want to know. He has purpose. That is enough. It will suffice.
    â€œI’m Monique,” she says.
    He finds himself staring at her.
    â€œSomething wrong?”
    â€œNo, nothing.”
    â€œYou’re French,” he observes.
    She ignores this. “I do not know why I should feel so nervous, but I do. It is not so very hard what we are going to do, is it?”
    â€œThe bag will match?”
    â€œOf course it will, but I warn you that hotel is impossible. I have never seen so many people.”
    â€œAnd the schedule?”
    â€œYes. I double-checked.”
    â€œThen it’s done. There’s nothing to be nervous about.”
    â€œMy insides say differently.” The car stalls at a light. The engine grinds and slows behind the efforts of a drained battery. He knows exactly how that battery feels.
    â€œWait,” he tells her. He switches off the radio, which she had turned down but not off. He turns off the fan. Like closing off compartments. “Okay. Try again.” Someone honks at them.
    â€œFuck off,” she says, glaring into the rearview mirror.
    â€œPay no attention to that.”
    At last the engine flutters to life. “This fucking car!” she says. “This fucking cold. I hate Frankfurt. I hate this place.”
    â€œPull in behind that bus,” he instructs.
    â€œOh, my God, we are here! And look, the bus is early. Oh, my God.” She glances at him with an expression of horror, as if this were her fault.
    â€œNo it’s not,” he tells her, finding his watch beneath his glove. “It’s right on time. Pull over here.”
    As she drives around the block, he carries the suitcase into the lobby, jammed with a hundred pieces of luggage. You can barely move for the luggage. An older couple, clearly late, sets their bags among the others and goes to join the tour for the final free breakfast. One thing you can count on with the Americans, he thinks, is that they will never turn down a free breakfast.
    He carries the suitcase across the lobby. Monique has done her job well. There, in the sea of hundreds of bags, are ten, maybe fifteen, identical black Samsonites. Just like the one he’s carrying. He cuts his way into the throng and sets his bag next to one of its twins. With his back to the registration desk, which is frantic with check-outs, he slips the personal identification tag off the one bag and on to his. It takes him less than ten seconds. There, it is done. All of these bags will be loaded by the bus driver, his substitute among them. At the airport, at check-in, the bags will be matched with passengers. By switching tags, he has insured this bag of his will be claimed. There will be one extra Samsonite that will not be claimed. Because of rules, it will not be loaded onto the plane. On large tours, such mistakes occur regularly. Nothing will be made of it. The bag will be returned to the hotel or destroyed by airport Security. His replacement will be boarded onto the plane in its place, Bernard’s bomb inside.
    He pulls the scarf up around his face and flexes his gloved hands, a person preparing for the bitter cold. Only his eyes show above the scarf, like an outlaw in a western.
    The Mercedes is waiting. She is bent over the hood, stretched out, scraping the windscreen clear of ice. He feels a twinge of lust stir his loin. So foreign an experience is this that he only faintly recognizes it for what it is. He gets in the car. She climbs behind the wheel.
    They drive for three hours to a Bavarian-style chalet hotel where they are to stay for three days. She talks for the entire trip. But he likes it, welcomes it as a blind man welcomes back his sight. It’s the most time he has spent with any one person in over a year. As she is parking the car she says, “There has been a slight change of plans. We are to stay together.”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œMichael