“There are plenty of arguments you could use,” Cameron said breezily. “Kidnap and murder have proved highly effective tools for other terror groups, especially if the aim is to engage the enemy, to escalate conflict. Plus it’s a shock to the enemy’s system. People are used to seeing medieval barbarism in the Middle East and Africa, but not in Europe. The irony is, it’s precisely because hacking has gotten so sophisticated and so virtually unstoppable that we’re seeing a return to old school methods. U.S. nuclear codes are stored on paper files these days. Once you know the Pentagon can be hacked to the core, it’s only a short step to the major powers moving back to cannons and bows and arrows.”

Tracy laughed.

“OK, maybe not bows and arrows. But technological weaponry like drones might easily fall out of favor. And once armies start heading back to the dark ages, why not companies, or banks? It would certainly suit Group 99’s ends to see a return to bartering, for example. The abolition of financial markets, maybe even of paper money itself. I know it sounds crazy to us, sitting here, about to pay for a five star meal with our platinum visa cards.”

“Your platinum visa card,” Tracy corrected him.

Cameron laughed. “You really are old school, aren’t you?”

“I try.” Tracy raised her glass.

“But it could happen. Financial anarchy. Or utopia, depending on how you look at it. Group 99 embracing more traditional terror tactics could certainly be presented as a step in that direction. That would make it consistent with their views.”

Tracy changed the subject. “Tell me about Hunter Drexel.” She found Cameron fascinating and could listen to him theorize all night. But she was here to find Althea, and to do that she needed facts, not theories. She felt sure that there must be a connection between Althea and the abducted American journalist. Something none of them had thought of yet.

“I’m sure you know far more about Mr. Drexel than I do,” Cameron answered cautiously.

“I know he was on his way to meet you in Moscow when Group 99 abducted him.”

“That’s right.”

“Why had you agreed to meet him that day?”

Cameron looked surprised by the question.

“Drexel was working on a piece about the fracking industry. As I assume you already know. Specifically about corruption in the business.”

“I hear there’s a lot of it about.”

“I hear that too.” Cameron smiled briefly. “I imagine that’s what he wanted to talk to me about but I’m not certain. He was rather cryptic on the telephone. And of course, we never actually met, in the end.”

“You don’t usually give interviews,” Tracy said. “In fact you never give them. According to the CIA files you’re notorious for avoiding the media.”

“Notorious? Am I really?” Cameron gave Tracy a wry look, taking a sip of his jasmine tea. “What else do Greg Walton’s files say about me?”

Tracy blushed, thinking about Marcus, Cameron’s only son, lost to leukemia, and his divorce. It was embarrassing to know these private things about a person. She’d already said too much.

“It’s all right,” Cameron said. “It’s true I’m a very private man. After my son died I withdrew pretty much completely from public life. It’s also true I don’t like journalists. They all bang on about how we need to break our dependence on Saudi oil, yet they have no qualms in slagging off the fracking business, or in tarring all oil and gas companies with the same brush.”

“So why meet Drexel?”

“I was curious. Hunter Drexel was just different from all the others.”

“In what way?”

Cameron considered for a moment. “Better, I suppose. A better man and a much better writer. Did you read his article in Time about the Nazi hunters?”

Tracy admitted that she hadn’t.

“You must,” said Cameron. “It’s a beautiful piece of writing, moving without being schmaltzy, meticulously researched. Hunter Drexel is really, really good at his job. He’s also fearless. But of course, there’s a downside to that, as he learned in Moscow. I imagine the man has a lot of enemies.”

“Such as?”

“Ex-lovers. Disgruntled poker players. Drexel’s reneged on a lot of debts in his time. He’s a serious gambling addict. The subjects of his op-eds. Pretty much any editor he’s ever worked with.” Cameron calmly listed the potential Drexel-haters out there. “He’s a great writer but he’s also a maverick. Erratic. Famously impulsive. He’s one of those guys who puts a lot of store by his instinct, without necessarily always having the facts to back it up. When someone sues for libel, it’s the editor who ends up picking up the pieces.”

“But you said his Time piece was well researched?” Tracy reminded him.

“It was. But they haven’t all been. He’s written some outrageous takedowns of public figures—like Senator Braverman, remember him?”

Tags: Sidney Sheldon Thriller
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