Chapter 7The Fall of the Numbered Fleets

Baxter, Kate

Cope had been allowed to sit up, and had immediately asked for his cards. By the time Baxter brought Tasha and Coster down, he had spread them over a tray the nurse wanted back.

“She's given me ten minutes,” he told them. “You can help.”

“You're playing patience,” Coster said.

“I've had enough of that. Sit down.”

Baxter moved a chair for Tasha and took the one nearest the door. Cope looked better than he had on their last visit, though turning toward them seemed to cost him something, and he let his head rest against the pillow while Coster inspected the cards.

“You're missing a king.”

“Under the bed.”

“How'd it get there?”

“Wasn't helping.”

Coster went down on one knee to find it. Tasha smiled, but when Cope asked how things were going she looked at Baxter.

“We saw Purple Magic,” Coster said from under the bed.

“I heard. So did everyone on this deck.”

“Bird said he'd send the live recording.”

“Then I expect we'll hear that too.”

Coster came up with the king and laid it beside the tray. Cope was watching Tasha.

“What is it?” he asked her.

“The pilot at White Valley. The enemy Hornet.”

Cope waited.

“Ray could have shot him down,” she said. “He did, in the end. But first he—” She stopped and looked at Baxter again. “You saw.”

“I saw,” he said.

“Why did he do that?”

“I don't know.”

“But you spoke to Santos.”

“About what I saw. She hasn't told me what they discussed.”

Santos had asked him back that afternoon. They'd gone over the passes again, his call to finish the engagement, where the other aircraft had been. Later Ray's name had appeared on the flight roster, with another appointment marked against it. That was everything Baxter had been given, and he had read the roster twice to make sure.

Cope moved the king onto the tray, considered it, and moved it back.

“You should ask him,” he said.

“He doesn't answer,” Tasha said.

“He might answer that.”

“You don't know either?”

“No.” Cope looked toward Baxter. “Pike tells me he can fly almost anything we've got. That's rather more than I knew when they put him in my back seat. I thought I'd been given a navigator who'd fallen in the sea.”

“Did he say much?” Coster asked.

“He'd only just come aboard. There wasn't much time.”

Tasha looked at the dressing above Cope's eye.

“He got you out.”

“Yes.”

“And he stayed up for Stalwart.”

Cope nodded.

“Then why do that to the other pilot?”

“I can't answer for him,” Cope said. “I'd like to know myself.”

The nurse came to the door, and Coster began gathering the cards. Cope protested that they were helping, and she told him he could have the tray back after dinner.

Baxter stood while Tasha gave up her chair. She touched Cope's hand before she left. He held hers a moment and asked her to come back when there was less supervision.

In the passageway she waited for Baxter.

“I'm glad he's flying with us,” she said.

“So am I.”

“That doesn't make me like what happened.”

“No,” Baxter said. “It doesn't.”

At Snider's Top, Baxter took a seat where he could see the map without leaning past Coster. They had staged ashore the previous evening, and he was still trying to persuade his shoulders that the narrow bed had been an improvement on his berth aboard Endurance.

Queen sat in the row ahead. Tasha had left her pencil with her flight gear; Kate passed one back over her shoulder without being asked and without turning round. At the far end of Joker's row Ray looked up from the target sheet at the small movement, watched the pencil change hands, and looked down again. It took no time at all. Baxter only noticed because he had begun, lately, to notice where Ray looked first when anyone moved.

Pike's voice came through the speaker on the table.

“Snider's Top is now our northern sector headquarters. Queen, you have the resource depots at Port Edwards. Joker, you have Newfield. Two expeditionary fleets are resupplying there.”

Baxter marked Anderson on the east coast, then Belta to the northwest.

“The Fifth Fleet is at Anderson, under the cruiser Cumulonimbus,” Pike went on. “The Third is at Belta, led by Falconer. Expect air cover from Allenfort. Go in low, hit both fleets, and come home before they can turn surprise into a long fight.”

He had heard enough about Newfield in the last few days to ask before she moved on.

“The aircraft defending the island. Are they all Sotoan?”

There was a pause on the line long enough to be an answer.

“No,” Pike said. “Newfield has declared independence. Its FCU squadron went over with the island. The 262nd.”

“The 262nd?” Nguyen said.

“The Sharks,” Everson said.

Cruz put his pencil down. “Why them?”

Tasha leaned toward Baxter. “You know them?”

“Yes.”

“Who'll be flying?” Kate asked.

“The unit remains under Webb,” Pike said. “Four Eagles.”

Baxter wrote Webb beside the squadron number, though he hadn't needed to. He wanted to ask who had voted for it and who hadn't, whether anyone had been allowed to leave, whether Webb had stood up in front of them and made it sound reasonable. None of those were questions Pike could answer from Endurance.

She explained the submarine project next. The Federation and Enso had been developing it at Anderson in the hope of getting through the Tonitrus Satellite's defences, and losing the port had lost them any chance of recovering it.

Baxter kept his eyes on the map until she finished. When he looked up, Ray had stopped reading and was watching him. Baxter couldn't tell what he'd made of the briefing, only that he had been listening to Baxter's part of it more closely than to the rest.

Pike's last instruction was simpler.

“You win, we get cake, so come back alive.”

Coster looked up. “Did she say cake?”

“She did,” Tasha said.

“What kind?”

“Does it matter?”

“It matters to me.”

“You'd eat it if it were made of cardboard.”

“I'd eat it,” Coster agreed. “I'd have opinions.”

They stood while Kate collected her papers. D.D. caught her beside the table and asked for a moment. She pointed at the clock, but stayed when he lowered his voice, and Baxter saw him unfold a sheet of paper and show her something on it.

“What does he want with Queen?” Coster asked.

“Probably a photograph of the cake.”

“Better get it before we do.”

Ray was the last of Joker out of the room. He waited by the door, apparently for nothing, until D.D. had finished with Kate and she had gone past him into the corridor. Then he followed the rest of them.

Baxter folded the map. Webb's name still showed through the thin paper.

“Getting sleepy, Tasha?”

“Wide awake, Bax. You don't have to handle me with kid gloves.”

They were descending toward the sea, the island still below the horizon. A pale band had opened up along the water ahead of them, the colour of weak tea.

“I always got up for this,” Tasha said. “When I was little. My mother thought something was wrong with me.”

“I'd rather watch it after breakfast,” Baxter said.

“So would I,” said Coster.

“You're both old.”

“I'm not old.”

“You own a record player.”

“So does half the ship.”

“That's what I said.”

Coster made a noise that might have been an objection. Baxter brought the flight lower. Ray was leading, far enough ahead that Baxter had to look past the reflection on his own canopy to find the Hornet against the sea, a small grey shape keeping its height above the water with a steadiness that made it look painted there.

The band of light thickened and went gold at its lower edge. For a minute nobody said anything at all.

“All right,” Coster said eventually, to no one in particular. “It's quite a good one.”

“Thank you,” said Tasha, as if she had arranged it. “Ray? Isn't it? Don't you love this part? Before anything happens, when it's just flying?”

Two clicks.

“That's not an answer.”

There wasn't another. Ahead of them the grey Hornet held its height above the gold water, perfectly level, perfectly steady, and did not so much as rock its wings. Baxter, who had seen him do that for Tasha before, noticed that he didn't do it now, and couldn't have said why it stayed with him.

Dealer reported aircraft approaching from the north of the island. Then Webb came on the open channel.

“This is Newfield airspace. Your flight is unauthorised.”

Baxter knew the voice before the sentence was finished. Tasha answered first, sharply enough that he almost warned her about the channel.

“Hello, traitors. Did the wicked get their rest?”

“Good morning to you too,” said Webb. “Lovely weather for it. But alas, if you keep on that course, we'll have to shoot you down.”

It was precisely the tone he'd have used on someone complaining about the hour he'd chosen to go fishing. Baxter found that he was smiling, and that he disliked himself for it.

“Bravo,” he said. “You make a very convincing villain.”

There was a pause.

“Wait. Is that—that's you, isn't it. Professor. Lieutenant Commander Baxter.”

“How've you been, Webb?”

“Didn't expect you lot.”

“Neither did I.”

He could see the Eagles now, four contacts resolving into aircraft as they closed. He found Webb's position in the formation without needing Dealer to tell him. Webb always flew a little high on the left, as though he wanted a better view of whatever his squadron was about to do.

“So that's it, then,” Webb said. “Different sides.”

“It appears so.”

“Could've ended up somewhere worse. Fishing's good. Still using that rig you showed me.”

“Glad it works.”

“You ought to try the mackerel.”

“Another morning.”

Baxter eased his grip on the stick. Webb was talking to him. That was something. If they could keep talking, there might be space enough for the Eagles to turn away, and time for him to ask them to stand down without making it sound like a threat.

“Why are you with them?” Tasha asked.

“I put it to the squadron,” Webb said. “Majority wanted to stay. So I stayed with them.”

There was a short silence on the channel.

“I understand staying with your friends,” Tasha said.

“You do understand,” said Webb. “Nice to talk to someone who does.”

“That doesn't mean she agrees with you,” Baxter said.

“I gathered.”

“Webb. You can let us pass.”

“I've already reported you to headquarters, Professor.”

Baxter looked past the Eagles toward the island. Dealer's display had begun showing other aircraft coming out to meet them.

“Then tell them you've lost us.”

“Bit late for that.”

Coster called the new contacts. Baxter counted six MiGs behind the Sharks, coming fast in close formation. He found Ray ahead of him.

“Joker One. The Eagles are people I know.”

Two clicks.

“Webb leads them. He's the one talking.”

Two more.

Baxter waited for something else, a question or an assurance. The Hornet was already turning toward the incoming fighters.

“Three and Four, stay clear of the MiGs,” he said. “Watch the Eagles.”

Four missiles spread ahead of Joker One.

Baxter selected the nearest MiG, saw the formation begin to open, and had time to think that they'd left it late before the missiles arrived. Four aircraft burst apart almost together. A fifth disappeared into the spreading flash; the last tried to roll clear, took debris through its wing and fell out of the group trailing fire.

“Six down,” Dealer said.

Baxter looked for anything hidden behind the wreckage, found nothing, and turned back toward the Eagles. He had barely had time to warn Ray about Webb, and Ray's Hornet was already heading for them.

“One, spare the pilots. Keep your fire away from the cockpits.”

The first Eagle began turning toward him.

“Give them room to get out,” Baxter added.

Two clicks.

He watched Ray's nose come round. Webb rolled beneath it, still trying for a shot, and Baxter had begun to call his position before he remembered whose position he was calling.

A short burst took the left engine and nothing else. Baxter would have sworn to that afterward in front of anyone who asked: not the wing root, not the spine, not the canopy a few feet forward of the damage, only the engine. The Eagle kept turning with smoke dragging behind it. Ray went beneath it and left Webb all the sky he needed to climb.

“Webb, get out,” Baxter said.

No answer. The Eagle's nose came up, dipped, came up again. He could see Webb fighting to keep it.

“Get out of it.”

The canopy went. Baxter followed the seat until it separated, and held his turn while the parachute opened.

“One chute,” Tasha said.

“I see him.”

He ought to have been watching the next aircraft. He dragged his eyes off Webb and found Darre's Eagle crossing behind Ray, firing. The Hornet reversed above it as though it had known where the rounds would go before Darre did. Darre was good. He reversed with it, and for a turn and a half the two aircraft went round each other like partners who had practised, and Baxter saw Ray's Hornet begin to loosen, the line softening, the next roll coming a fraction wider than it needed to be. He had seen that at White Valley. Then it stopped. The Hornet snapped flat and straight, as abruptly as a hand jerked back from a stove, and the next burst cut into the Eagle's rear fuselage and a piece of the tail came away, while the cockpit carried on ahead of the damage, untouched.

“Shark Two's hit,” Coster said.

The pilot ejected before the aircraft lost its turn. Tasha called the chute.

Two pilots out, two aircraft left. One was trying to reach the island. The other had stayed in the fight and was coming round toward Joker.

“Three, don't turn into him.”

“I'm clear.”

Ray passed behind the returning Eagle. Its right engine flared, and the pilot climbed out of the turn and ejected. Baxter saw the canopy lift and asked Coster about the one heading inland.

“Still got him,” Coster said. “One's behind him.”

A wingtip came off the fourth Eagle, then smoke from an engine. The pilot rolled level and held it just long enough for Baxter to hope he'd make the runway. Then the seat came out.

“Four,” Coster said. “Four chutes.”

“Confirm all four,” Baxter told Dealer.

“Confirmed. Marking positions for rescue.”

He looked back toward Webb's parachute. It was still coming down, far enough from the burning aircraft that he could keep both in view. There was a shore crew on Newfield who could reach him, provided someone was still listening.

“Webb, if your radio's working, call the island. Dealer has your position.”

No answer, but he hadn't expected one so soon. He gave Dealer the fishing pier as a landmark.

Four Eagles, flown by men who had trained alongside the best of the Federation and had been trying their hardest to kill him. Ray had taken each of them apart like a careful mechanic, one engine, one tail, one wingtip, and left the man in the middle of it alive. Baxter had heard people say surgical about air strikes in briefings for years and had always privately thought it a stupid word. He was going to have to find another one for this. He didn't think there was one.

Tasha had come back beside him.

“All of them,” she said.

“Yes.”

Ray's Hornet was ahead, climbing gently as it returned to course. Baxter pressed the transmit switch.

“Thank you, One.”

Two clicks came back.

The Fifth Fleet had begun trying to leave Anderson by the time they reached it. Boats were moving between ships still at the docks, a tug was pulling away from a cruiser, and smoke rose from a vessel whose engines had started while it was still moored.

Dealer confirmed Cumulonimbus and gave them the other ships' positions. Baxter took an outer escort and left Ray the cruiser. Coster took the vessel nearest the harbour entrance.

“Tasha, watch Allenfort. Call anything lifting off.”

“Watching.”

He turned into his run. The ship's radar found him before he had the launch position he wanted; the warning tone climbed, and a missile came up from the harbour.

Baxter fired, broke away and released countermeasures. He watched his own missile cross the water, saw tracer meet it short of the ship, and was left looking for a hit he hadn't got.

“Two, off. Their defences are awake.”

“Four, off,” Coster said. “They got mine too.”

A second warning sent Baxter farther out to sea. He caught the missile's trail, waited, then pulled hard enough to put the ship under his canopy frame. When he looked forward again he was clear, and a good deal farther from the harbour than he'd meant to be.

“Hard way to earn cake,” Coster said.

“Keep your speed up. Don't give them the same run twice.”

The intercepted channel carried a ship's officer shouting for a gangway to be cleared. Another voice said they couldn't move it. Baxter looked at the docks and saw men on the quay beside the cruiser, too many of them trying to use the same narrow space.

“Joker One, cruiser has active defences,” he called. “Recommend we take the outer escorts first.”

Ray's Hornet crossed the harbour low enough that Baxter lost it among the ships. Gunfire walked along the cruiser's upperworks. A launcher flashed, fell silent, and the next missile went into the hull beneath it.

Baxter rolled back toward the port. An escort was swinging its bow outward to bring more weapons to bear. He began setting up another run, but the ship's forward gun stopped moving and smoke rose behind its bridge.

“Four, can you take the southern ship?”

“Coming round.”

Coster had barely begun the turn when a missile struck it. The vessel settled toward the quay, mooring lines stretching between its stern and the bollards until one parted and whipped back across the water.

“Not any more,” Coster said.

Baxter picked the next intact ship. He would come in from the east this time, under the first radar, and cross its bow before it could bring its close defences round.

“Aircraft at Allenfort,” Tasha said. “Four. Su-33s.”

“Dealer, confirm launches.”

“Four Flankers airborne.”

He abandoned his run and turned toward them. Ray's aircraft came up out of the harbour beneath him, already pointing inland. Baxter began calling the lead pair, and stopped as two missile trails reached them. The others separated. One went down in the climb, and the last broke back toward the airfield before a short burst caught it.

“Air cover destroyed,” Dealer said.

Baxter turned back to Anderson. Cumulonimbus was burning at her berth. The remaining ships were sinking or so badly damaged that they had stopped trying to leave. On the fleet channel someone was asking whether the boats had room for the men still on the quay.

“Fifth Fleet neutralised,” Dealer reported.

“Joker, go northwest,” Baxter said. “Three, keep watching behind us.”

“Watching.”

He looked at the water beyond the harbour mouth once more before following Ray toward Belta.

They had a little time crossing the island. Baxter used it to check fuel and weapons, then asked Tasha which she'd have taken first, the aircraft or the ships.

“The aircraft,” she said.

“Why?”

“They can follow us when we leave.”

“And the ships?”

“Can't go uphill.”

Coster laughed out loud on the channel, a real laugh, surprised out of him. “That's the best tactical analysis I've heard all war.”

“You haven't heard much, then.”

“I've heard Bax.”

“I'm on this frequency,” Baxter said.

“We know,” said Tasha, perfectly pleasant, and Coster laughed again.

Baxter looked down at the ridge beneath them and decided not to pursue it.

“Watch the gaps between the hills,” he said. “Their radars can't see through them either.”

A contact appeared behind him as they came out over the northern coast. Tasha called it almost at once.

“Two, fighter behind you. Gripen.”

Baxter broke. The first burst went past outside his canopy, close enough that he saw the individual flashes before Dealer identified the aircraft. AUSTER. It had come through the gap at the tunnel exit while he was watching the ridge ahead.

“Two, defensive,” he said. “Four, keep Three clear.”

He tightened the turn. The Gripen stayed with him, and there was too little height to trade for speed. He checked the water, the coastline and the threat display, looking for a break that would leave him something afterward, and did not find one.

“Two missiles away,” Dealer called.

For a moment Baxter thought they were for him. He looked back and found both trails converging on the Gripen. The fighter began to roll; the first missile struck near the wing root and the second went into the breakup before there was anything left to follow.

He held the turn a moment longer, then eased off the stick. Nothing came after him.

“Two, status,” Coster said.

“Clear.” He looked at his instruments before adding, “No damage.”

Ray's Hornet passed above him and turned toward Belta. Baxter hadn't seen it arrive. He had been flying for his life inside a space perhaps half a mile across, and at no point had he seen Joker One enter it.

“One, I'm clear,” he said.

Two clicks. Baxter got his breathing under control and followed.

At Belta, the Third Fleet had had time to man its stations. Falconer was moving off the dock, her escorts trying to form round her in water too confined for the arrangement they wanted.

Baxter and Coster split for their approaches. The first missile warning came before Baxter had reached his line.

“They're covering each other,” Coster said. “Can't get an angle on the cruiser without the escort getting a shot.”

“Stay outside it. I'll draw the nearer one.”

Baxter began the turn and watched the launch come for him. He had to abandon the shot to clear it. When he looked back, Ray's Hornet was beneath the missile trail, heading into the space he'd just left.

“Cruiser, port side,” he called. “One, the escort's tracking you.”

Gunfire cut across the escort's weapons station. A missile went past it into Falconer, and an explosion hid the cruiser's stern. The escort kept turning, still trying to face the attack, until another hit stopped it in the water.

Baxter came round. Coster was off the western side of the harbour, setting up a second run on a ship whose defences had chased him off the first. Before he reached the launch point, the target began to list.

“Four, target's hit,” Dealer said.

“I can see that.”

Baxter let his nose come up and looked farther out for anything that had got away from the docks. There was one, but it was burning too. A boat had come alongside, and men were climbing down a ladder over its stern.

He watched the boat until Dealer called the Third Fleet neutralised.

“Both fleets destroyed as fighting units,” the controller said. “Joker, return to Snider's Top.”

“Joker, check in,” Baxter said.

Ray clicked.

“Three, ready to go home.”

“Four,” said Coster. “Has anybody with authority over the kitchen actually confirmed the cake?”

“I'm not asking Dealer that,” Baxter said.

“I can hear you,” Dealer told him.

“Then don't answer him.”

At 0838, Baxter was parked beside the taxiway while a ground crewman waited for him to open the canopy. Joker One had been directed farther along, and Coster was still coming in behind Tasha.

The tower called Ray again.

“Joker One, can you relaunch?”

Baxter stopped with his hand on the canopy control.

“What's happened?”

“Queen inbound. Six aircraft. Two unidentified contacts following them.”

He looked toward the runway. A crewman near the shelters had started running, and another was pointing at the air-defence positions. Farther along the apron, Ray's Hornet was already moving. Baxter hadn't heard Ray acknowledge. He hadn't heard the tower clear him. The aircraft had simply swung out of its parking slot with the canopy coming down as it turned, and was rolling back toward the runway threshold at a speed that made the marshaller beside it step smartly out of the way.

“Joker One, hold position,” the tower said. “Hold position. You are not cleared.”

The Hornet didn't stop.

Kate came on the channel before Baxter could ask for the bearing.

“Queen One. The extra two are with us. They're tankers. Keep your guns down.”

Ray's Hornet stopped.

It stopped so abruptly that the nose dipped on its strut. It sat at the edge of the taxiway, short of the runway, engines still turning, canopy still shut.

The tower demanded confirmation. Kate gave it, then explained that Majestic was beached at Port Edwards, with two unmanned tankers waiting at the airbase for transfer to the carrier. Queen had recovered them instead.

Baxter let go of the throttle.

“That's what D.D. wanted before the briefing?”

“He had the access code,” Kate said.

“Of course he did.”

The ground crewman tapped the canopy. Baxter opened it and apologised for keeping him waiting, and then didn't climb out. Across the apron, Ray's engines were still running.

Queen came in over the far end of the field. Cruz landed first, then Nguyen, then Everson. The Hornet at the edge of the taxiway did not move. Its canopy didn't open. The crewman beside Baxter's ladder followed his gaze and said something about fuel, and Baxter didn't answer.

Kate's aircraft touched down fourth. Baxter watched it roll out, slow, and turn off toward the shelters.

Ray's engines spooled down. A moment later the canopy rose.

The tankers came in behind the fighters, enormous and pilotless and slightly absurd. Baxter watched them until both were down, then climbed out and followed Tasha toward the building where Pike had promised them cake. He looked back once. Ray was still sitting in the cockpit with his helmet off, his head turned toward the shelters where Queen were parking.

D.D. was already inside, talking to the base liaison about fuel. With the tankers, Dauntless could put nine Harriers into the next operation; with Queen and Joker, that made seventeen aircraft.

Coster asked whether the Harrier pilots would be getting cake too.

“They aren't here,” D.D. said.

“Just checking.”

Kate found Baxter at the mess entrance, waiting while the kitchen staff moved a trolley through.

“Your four friends?” she asked.

“Four chutes. Dealer passed the positions for rescue.”

“All four?”

“Yes.”

She glanced across the apron, where Ray's aircraft was surrounded by ground crew.

“He did that?”

“I asked him to leave the cockpits alone. He did.”

“And Webb?”

“Out first. I haven't heard anything since.”

“We will.” She was still looking at the Hornet. “The tower said he was rolling before we called in.”

“Yes.”

“Rolling where?”

“Back to the runway.”

“With two unknown contacts behind six friendly aircraft, and the base guns already looking for something to shoot.” She said it evenly. Baxter had known her long enough to hear the edge underneath. “To do what, exactly? Rescue Queen from our own tankers?”

“I don't think he knew they were tankers.”

“No. He just assumed we'd need him.” She folded her arms. “White Valley. The Mirage he took off Victor. And now this. Your lead seems to have formed the view that Queen can't be trusted to get itself home, Professor, and I'd be grateful if somebody told him we've been doing it for five months without his help.”

“I'll mention it,” said Baxter, who had no intention of doing anything of the kind.

“Do.”

She was still looking at the Hornet across the apron, he noticed. She went on looking at it for some time after she'd finished being annoyed with it. Inside, Coster was asking which cake Pike had meant, and someone told him to take a plate and find out. Everson was already eating, with Cruz making room beside him for Nguyen and Tasha.

“Come on,” Kate said. “Before he decides you're not coming.”

Coster had claimed enough chairs for both flights. Baxter took the one beside Tasha and reached for the coffee while she pushed a plate toward him.

“That's yours.”

“Did you choose it?”

“Yes.”

“Any particular reason?”

“It's cake, Bax.”

He accepted it. Nguyen wanted to know how close they'd had to get to the cruisers, and Coster began explaining that he'd been close enough for his own purposes and rather closer than he'd have liked for theirs. Cruz asked what Ray had done about the ships' defences.

Baxter let Coster tell it. He told it well; he'd had a better view of some of it than Baxter had, and he had a habit of acting out the aircraft with his hands that made Nguyen grin.

“And then the four Flankers,” Coster said. “He took the first one in the climb—”

“The second,” said Tasha.

“The first.”

“The first two were the missiles. The climb was the third one. Then the gun on the last.”

Coster stopped, hands still in the air, and thought about it.

“Right,” he said. “Third. Then the gun.” He went on.

Baxter drank his coffee. He had heard Everson correct Coster's account of an engagement, once, in this same tone of perfect certainty, and had heard Coster spend twenty minutes proving Everson wrong with a pencil and the back of a menu. He had heard Coster dispute the order of events with Cope, with Dealer, with a tape recording. He had never heard him simply say right and carry on.

Tasha, beside him, had gone back to her cake as though nothing had happened. As far as she knew, nothing had.

There was an empty chair at the end of the table. After a while Kate asked, in a tone of the most complete indifference, whether Joker's lead intended to eat at all, or whether he ran on jet fuel like everything else he seemed to think he was responsible for.

“I told him where we'd be,” Baxter said.

“Still with Jenkins?”

“He wasn't at the aircraft when I left.”

Coster looked at the door, then went back to telling Cruz about Belta. Tasha set a clean plate in front of the empty place.

Baxter cut into his cake. When the kitchen staff began clearing the trolley, he asked them for another slice and put it on the plate she'd left.