The Delphi Agenda Read Online Free PDF Page A

just being paranoid. It was the shock. A familiar state rose up inside her, a desperate separation from the physical world. It had been building since Hugo had apprehended her on the platform at Corvisart.
    She took a step forward and then staggered back. Hugo caught her elbow again. “His throat,” she said in a thick voice.
    “Come, sit.” He guided her to a small sofa.
    She sat and leaned on her elbows, pressing her thumbs to her temples, fighting the rising feeling of unreality, the waves of darkness flowing up from the carpet under her feet. She regarded the pattern, the weave of reds, blues, and greens without really seeing. She coaxed a voice from deep in her mind:
Come on, you can handle this
.
    Hugo was at her side. “I’m sorry…,” he began.
    She held up a hand. “No, I’ll be all right. It’s the shock. So much blood…”
    She looked up and her gaze landed on the third man in the room, a tall, thin figure with white hair combed up into a wave, standing by the bookcases near the desk. He wore a dark suit of some shiny material, perhaps polyester, perhaps silk, so he was either very poor or very important. One hand was in the side pocket of his suit jacket, the other elbow resting on a shelf. Lisa examined him, carefully avoiding looking at the body behind the desk.
    “This is the banker I told you about,” Hugo said.
    She forced all her attention on this new person. She could take in Raimond’s death later. So, the banker? Definitely not polyester, then. “What bank, monsieur?” She heard how strangled her voice sounded, and sat up with an effort. Her tight expression softened as she warmed to him. A banker was something ordinary, safe.
    His long face twitched. It might have been the premonition of a smile coming to the pouches under his eyes, the prominent cheekbones, and the sunken hollows under them, but the expression faded away as if it had never existed. “A private bank, Mademoiselle.”
    Already the darkness was receding and she could see the silk shimmer of his jacket; she could sense Viètes behind her, feel Hugo’s presence at her side. Reality was returned, isolated from the desolation that waited nearby. She would mourn later. “Private?” she said.
    “Very.” He produced a card from the side pocket, as if he had been holding it just for her. “Allow me to present myself.”
    She read A. Rossignol. A phone number, the only other information, suggested a location just across the river in the First Arrondissement.
    She stared at the card. It was thick and beige, the name and number deeply embossed in a simple serif font. It spoke strongly of understatement and the self-effacing manner of an extremely powerful man who had no need of publicity. This was the important personage Hugo had said was above suspicion, yet here he was at the murder scene. He was the first to know, and was certainly tall enough to aim a gun down at the dead man. He lived or worked nearby.
    The name seemed familiar: it meant nightingale in French, an old family name, no doubt. Perhaps the name of someone she had met along the way, a butcher or mailman. A name learned, filed and forgotten.
    “Monsieur Rossignol.” She dipped her head and tucked the card into her bag.
    The banker cleared his throat. “We have some things to discuss, Mademoiselle Emmer.” He pronounced her name in the American manner.
    “What could we possibly…”
    He interrupted. “Now is not the time, of course. Dr. Foix made arrangements. They are of some importance.”
    “Important for me?”
    Again the faint intimation of a smile touched his long face. “They do not concern the police, who are now in need of your aide. Please call me this morning at your earliest convenience. I must do some things before we talk.” He bowed to her and shook hands with Hugo. Then he stepped very carefully over the debris by the door and was gone.
    Hugo had been waiting patiently. He took her elbow again in a way that was becoming irritatingly