'Like I said,' Lopez nodded, 'this is the start of his game and it's all about him. He's the star, we're the audience, and he'll continue to crave more and more attention right up to the moment he's captured or gets himself killed.'

Ethan looked at Sears.

'Except for the fact that he did accurately predict the future, right?'

'He did,' Sears conceded. 'That part, I got no explanation for.'

'Anything else?' Ethan asked.

'The opposite wall,' Sears said, and gestured behind them. 'We haven't got a clue what the hell it means.'

Ethan turned and strode across to the window, pulling aside threadbare net curtains to reveal another message written on the wall just above the window pane in small, precise strokes.

'Looks like some kind of equation written backwards,' Lopez said as she moved alongside Ethan and peered at the strange symbols. 'Same person wrote both messages?'

'Purcell was a physicist,' Ethan suggested. 'He'd have spent much of his life using math. It fits his history, if nothing else.'

'You actually know what it means?' Sears asked.

'Not in the slightest,' Ethan admitted. 'And how did he know I would come here at all?'

Sears smiled but it was tinged with anxiety.

'I got a letter this morning, sent by UPS, from Charles Purcell. It had a picture of you, taken off a website from your old high school in Illinois. It helped us track you down, and that's how your man at the Defense Intelligence Agency got involved. We called the FBI when we realized that we were getting out of our depth. They wrote us off, but the DIA picked up the case.'

Sears slipped a print from his pocket and showed it to Ethan. The image showed a young man in his late teens, his light-brown hair still scruffy despite having been combed for the shot, his gray eyes clear and sharp. Ethan's jaw looked slightly leaner than it did now, and the creases etched into his skin by years of physical and mental hardship were missing, but there was no mistaking the defiant set of his shoulders and the crooked grin on his face.

'You were actually almost cute once,' Lopez said, with a smirk. 'The hell happened?'

'Life,' Ethan replied. 'This code must mean something. Why did he write a huge message for me on that wall, but then conceal a tiny one over here?'

'Either the guy's crazy or he's just trying to buy himself time to get away,' Lopez replied. 'By the time we're finished decoding this, even if that's possible, Purcell could be clean out of the state.'

Ethan shook his head.

'He could have been clean out of the state without doing any of this. He's leaving us messages, leaving us a trail.'

'Why leave anything?' Lopez asked. 'And why us? Why you? You've never met this guy. Surely if he'd wanted private detectives on his case he'd have contacted someone in Florida instead, somebody nearby?'

Ethan nodded in agreement but could find nothing to say that could explain Charles Purcell's bizarre actions.

'My guess,' Sears said, 'is that he's suffered some kind of mental breakdown and all of this is the result of his illness. Until I'm convinced otherwise, I'm putting out an APB for this guy as a wanted murderer. We need him off the streets and in custody because we can't risk the chance that he won't hit some other family just like he's iced his own. Believe me, once these freaks really lose the plot, anyone and anything is fair game.'

Sears headed out of the lounge to leave the apartment. As Ethan turned to follow, his gaze settled on the mirror hanging on the wall opposite the window. He focused on the reflection of the room around them and then a smile curled from the corner of his mouth.

'Maybe Charles Purcell knows exactly what he's doing.'

11.

LOIZA, PUERTO RICO.

June 28, 09:24 'Do we know what happened to our aircraft.'

Joaquin Abell kept his voice down, not wanting his children to hear the news that Sandra had related to him.

'We chartered a Grumman Mallard from Bimini Wings to bring home our staff from their work on the coral-conservation project in the Florida Straits. It went down late yesterday afternoon. No mayday call from the pilots, radar contact was lost by Miami at seven twenty. Search and Rescue haven't found a thing.'

'Why didn't you tell me sooner?' Joaquin stared at her.

'I was waiting for confirmation from the coastguard before I broke the news,' Sandra said. 'I didn't want to bring this to you until I was sure.'

Joaquin massaged his temples, his eyes closed. 'How many people were aboard?'

'Nineteen, including the two pilots.'

'Jesus,' Joaquin whispered, 'the poor families. Get in touch with all of them, I'll want to speak to them in person and reassure them that we'll stand by them. IRIS is a family, Sandra, and I want them to know that they're members too.' Sandra nodded and jotted down notes as Joaquin spoke. 'Then contact the families' litigation teams and let them know that appropriate compensation will be provided, regardless of whether IRIS is considered legally responsible for the loss of life, understood?'

Sandra finished scribbling and looked up at him, a flourish of admiration on her features.

'Absolutely, sir. I'll get on it right away. At least it seems there may be a survivor from the conservation project, that's something that we can take away from this tragedy.'

Joaquin's eyes fixed on hers. 'Who?'

'Charles Purcell, one of our lead scientists. His name was absent from the aircraft's departure roster at South Bimini. He can't have been aboard.'

'Excellent news, Sandra. See if you can find Charles and let me know the moment that you do.'

Joaquin watched as Sandra dashed away, and then walked across to his wife. Katherine was now accompanied by a short, pale-looking man with baleful eyes that peered out from behind thin glasses. Dennis Aubrey was a lifelong friend of Katherine, a physicist who had attended the University of Florida as she had. Just as she had grown to become a powerful lawyer, so Aubrey had grown alongside her from a shy, plump little boy into a physics genius, sought after by some of the most prestigious laboratories and universities in the continental United States. Joaquin had recently hired Aubrey, always preferring to appoint family friends to his organization rather than cast his net and take on potentially unreliable employees. People tended to work better for their friends than for anonymous corporations, and despite its size he had worked hard to make IRIS a family and not just an employer.

'Mr. Abell,' Aubrey said in greeting. 'Katherine tells me that the news broadcast went well.'

Joaquin nodded with a brief but weary smile. 'Let's hope it garners support in Congress and the funding we'll need out here.'

Katherine reacted to the shadows of restrained grief that drifted behind his eyes, and immediately moved to his side. 'What is it?'

Joaquin whispered so that Jacob and Merriel would not hear.

'There's been an accident and I need to deal with it personally,' he said. 'Why not take the children back to the airport? I'll meet you in Miami after we've surveyed the island.'

'You sure?' she asked, concerned but not alarmed.

'It'll be fine,' Joaquin assured her, and gestured to Dennis Aubrey, who was chatting amiably to the children. 'You sure he's able to lip-read?'

Katherine chuckled. 'Of course, his brother is deaf so he learned sign-language and lip-reading as a child. I still don't understand why you need a scientist working for you who can lip-read?'

'Communications,' Joaquin replied. 'Sometimes we have issues with equipment on the conservation projects and we only have visual and not audio.' He waved for Aubrey to join them. 'Dennis, something's come up. You okay to accompany me before we head back to Miami?'

'Not a problem,' Aubrey agreed, clearly eager to please.

Katherine kissed his cheek. 'Talk to me,' she said quickly. 'Whatever this is about, don't keep trying to save the world on your own, okay?'

She turned and led their children away from the shattered remains of the school and down to the white jeep waiting for them. Joaquin watched as they were driven away down a hill littered with debris that wound its way to a distant, broad bay.

'This way, Dennis,' he said to Aubrey.

Joaquin turned and walked further up the hill with the physicist to where the helicopter waited. Standing alongside it with his arms folded was a tall, powerfully built man in an expensive suit that did little to conceal the ranks of muscles bulging through the fabric. Olaf Jorgenson, Joaquin's personal bodyguard, watched them approach and then turned and rapped on the cockpit window. The pilot inside immediately started the helicopter's engines.

'What's happened?' Aubrey asked Joaquin as they walked. 'Something urgent?'

'Yes, I'm afraid so,' Joaquin replied. 'You've just been promoted to head scientist at the IRIS Deep Blue facility on the Miami Terrace reef.'

Dennis Aubrey's round face broke into a bright smile as his pasty skin glowed with a brief flourish of color.

'That's fantastic news.' His expression sagged slightly. 'You don't seem very happy about it.'

'I'm afraid that your promotion is due to a tragedy, Dennis. There was an airplane crash yesterday afternoon. I lost my entire Deep Blue staff.'

Aubrey's skin dulled again to its familiar wan tones.

'My God, I'm sorry. Do we know what happened?'

Joaquin shook his head.

'I'm sorry that this promotion hasn't occurred under better circumstances, Dennis,' he said. 'But I need your help. It will take some time to find replacement staff, and between now and then I need somebody reliable to man the Deep Blue facility. It might entail you being on the site for a few days, until I can get everything sorted.'

Aubrey grabbed the helicopter's door handle and opened it for Joaquin.

'Consider it done,' he promised. 'When do we leave for the facility?'

'We're headed for Miami right now,' Joaquin said. 'You'll join me at the facility as soon as I've tied up some loose ends in the city.'

Olaf Jorgenson joined them inside the helicopter, as did Sandra, her red hair flying in the downwash from the spinning blades, until Olaf's giant arm slammed the fuselage door shut. The four of them donned headphones, and Aubrey's voice cut through the static.

'What about Katherine and the children? Will they be joining us?'

'Katherine is due to lead the defense for IRIS at the opening of a court case in Miami this morning,' Joaquin explained, 'and won't be able to join us until later. We'll have to make do until then. The children will be in school for the week.'

The helicopter lifted off, the downwash from the blades shuddering through the palm trees below as it flew low over the battered shanty towns. Joaquin looked out across the crippled island as it swept past beneath the helicopter, a barren and mud-strewn wasteland of misery and despair. Tiny figures stared up at him, their bare legs ankle-deep in cold mud, their clothes smeared with filth and their eyes wide with shock and disbelief, haunted by the loss of their families and homes.

Joaquin felt a burden of responsibility weigh down on him, strong enough that it seemed it could send the helicopter in which he sat plunging back down to earth. One man, one company, one chance to make a difference. Most people lived under a comfortable illusion that the whole world was now connected, that all people had some idea of what technology was, had access to medicine, had a chance in life. The truth was that only one fifth of the world's population lived in the developed world. Half of all the people on earth had never made or received a telephone call. The vast majority of mankind had little or no access to clean water. Several hundred million children died every decade from easily preventable diseases or starvation. And all the while politicians in designer suits, chauffeured in cars that cost more than many people would earn in several lifetimes, attended huge conferences and told the world how much better it all would soon be. How much they were doing to help. How much brighter the future was.

Joaquin looked down at the devastation and considered once again how nothing changed. Not ever. Governments would never be able to save their own people, not unless there was a chance of generating a profit at the same time, anyway. Too much corporate interference now. As one government gave millions to dig wells in one impoverished country, another would sell arms to its rival. The whole charade continued, decade after decade, century after century, propping up the wealthy and keeping the poor incarcerated in poverty for all time. A line from Homer's Iliad drifted through his mind: We men are wretched things.

Sandra's voice cut through his glum reverie.

'There's no word from the Miami-Dade police about Charles Purcell,' she said, looking at an e-mail on her tablet. 'He's not been reported as missing and there's nothing from South Bimini about him either. He must have missed the flight, but I can't locate him.'

Joaquin nodded and glanced at Jorgenson. The huge man's angular, expressionless face and pale-blue eyes returned his gaze as though he were hewn from solid granite, but his square head gave a barely perceptible nod.

'What will I be doing at the reef?' Dennis Aubrey asked Joaquin, his features vibrant with enthusiasm.

'Manning our sub-aquatic research station,' Joaquin replied, turning away from Olaf's gaze. 'It's on the edge of an underwater terrace shelf about twenty miles offshore of Miami beach. You'll be responsible for some of the technological assets we have built there.'

Aubrey frowned in confusion.

'I thought that it was some kind of wildlife preserve? What have we got down there that would need a physicist?'

Joaquin grinned conspiratorially and patted Aubrey on the shoulder.

'The future, Dennis, or at least that's what I hope something that will benefit mankind for all time to come. You'll see soon enough. Right now, we have to get back to the city. I have some very important guests to meet for breakfast, and I need you to be there with me to get to know them. I'm sure that you'd like to meet the Florida governor?'

'The governor?' Aubrey almost choked. 'Is he involved in the conservation effort?'

Joaquin chuckled.

'Not yet, Dennis, but it's time to make government work for the people and bring some balance back into their lives. By the time I'm done with him, he'll be up to his neck in it.'

Olaf's broad jaw fractured like a glacier into a broad grin.

12.

HALLANDALE, MIAMI.

June 28, 9:34 Ethan stared at the mirror on the wall of the motel room, captivated by the reflection.

'What are you talking about?' Lopez asked. 'You see something?'

Ethan nodded, tilting his head to one side and looking at the strange symbols written on the wall above the window, and then looking again at the reflection in the mirror.

'It's not an equation,' he said finally. 'I need a piece of paper.'

Sears reached into his pocket and provided Ethan with a small notepad and a pen. Ethan leaned on a table and copied down what he saw in the mirror before showing it to Lopez.

N2764C.

She scanned the figures and frowned.