“Nothing,” Willem admitted. “They’d find ways to stop it.”
“My point exactly.”
“And now you’ve gone and done it . . . and they are stopping it by other means.”
“Is that what you think is happening? To me it looks like they are demanding a seat at the table. Now that I gone and done something. They’re happy someone did it.”
“They’ve a funny way of showing it.”
T.R. scoffed and waved him off. “It’s just full-contact football,” he explained, in a helpful tone. “Like when the linebacker comes through and lays a good lick on the quarterback. A sign of respect. Game on!”
Willem was only beginning to organize, in his mind, some of his objections to this metaphor, when there was a light knock at the door. Then it opened a bit and Sister Catherine stuck her head in. She had a shy-schoolgirl look about her very different from the bus driver avatar in which she had manifested yesterday. Both men threw their napkins down and stood up. Willem was closer to the door; he got to it first and held it open for her as she bustled into the room. Looking over the top of her habit—not difficult, for she was of not very great stature—he saw the anteroom, and the corridor leading to it, now populated by at least a dozen Papuan men slinging weapons ranging from AK-47s down to the machetelike choppers known as parangs. Engulfed in them was Amelia, looking at him wryly. Willem gave what he hoped was a polite nod to the one who looked oldest and best equipped, then gently closed the door. T.R. was greeting Sister Catherine, even trying out a few words in one of the local languages.
She took a seat at the table and partook of the meal. The conversation that followed was polite, awkward, and peculiarly dull
in the way that important conversations sometimes had to be. Everyone here must know that something was up. But they couldn’t yet talk about it directly. Ultimately it was about copper and gold mines—not really of interest to Willem. As Sister Catherine had made crystal clear yesterday, these people would worry about climate change later.
“It is my recommendation,” Sister Catherine said, when they’d got through the polite stuff, “that you get out of here.”
“What do we know about conditions at the airport?” Willem asked. He directed the question at T.R., supposing that T.R. might actually know something. But—a bit disconcertingly—T.R. just looked across the table at Sister Catherine. She made a gesture indicative of her mouth being full, so T.R. looked back at Willem. “Need a lift?”
“Now that you mention it, if you could find room for me and Amelia . . .”
“Certainly. As long as you don’t mind going to Texas.”
“We’ll find a way to make the most of it.”
> Going to Texas apparently Willem texted Princess Frederika.
Sister Catherine washed down her food with a swallow of beer and said, “Now would be a bad time. Indications are that the airport will be up and running by mid-morning. You might need special clearance to take off, but . . . arrangements can be made.”
T.R. nodded. “For the benefit of my people who are trying to wrangle the logistics of it all, who do we need to talk to about that?”
“You need to talk to me.”
Willem’s phone vibrated and he glanced down to see a cowboy hat emoji.
> C U there.
The meal didn’t reach a firm conclusion but sort of devolved into what showed every sign of becoming a slumber party. Sister Catherine basically lived here, albeit in another part of the complex. The compound where T.R. had been staying was across the river, not convenient to the airport, and so if they really were looking at a departure in less than twelve hours there was no point in his risking the drive back just so he could then risk a separate trip
to the runway a few hours later. For the night had become lively with sporadic exchanges of gunfire and occasional deep booms audible through the conference room’s windows. More than once, Willem looked at those askance, wondering if they might at any point turn into a horizontal storm of glinting cubes propelled into the building on a shock wave. But Sister Catherine seemed to think it was in God’s hands. So it turned into a game of chicken, which Willem was not about to lose to a five-foot-tall nun.
For their parts, Willem and Amelia had shunted into that mode of carrying all their luggage with them at all times. With equal ease they could hole up here, go to the airport, or try to get back to Uncle Ed’s in one piece.
Someone finally just propped the conference room doors open. Various aides to T.R. and Sister Catherine began to dart in and out without ceremony. Senior ones claimed table space and unfolded laptops. Amelia found a comfy chair in a corner and dozed.