A Calculated Risk by Katherine Neville (most difficult books to read txt) 📕

“Why don’t we get down to business?” I suggested. “I haven’t come all this way to chat about my table manners.”

“You’ve been gone a long time,” he told me. “You’ve forgotten, we don’t do things that way here. First, the aperitif—the fish, the fowl, the salad, the sweets, perhaps the cheese—but business is discussed over the demitasse. Not before.”

“I’ll be happy to watch you stuff your face, if that’s the custom. But I can’t pack away food like that.”

“Fine—then leave it all to me,” he said, and at a slight flick of his hand, the waiter materialized beside the table, with a bucket of wine already on ice.

“I’ve meant to ask—how do you do that?” I said, gesturing toward the disappearing waiter.

“Restaurant ESP—mind control,” he said blithely. “It works every time. With two powerful transmission devices, a copper wire is unnecessary to complete a successful link. How do you think I found your friend Charles Babbage—or got in touch with you?”

I stared at him across the table as he filled my glass.

“So you tapped into our wavelengths. Terrific—I’m having lunch with Nostradamus. You can’t control my mind, and you never could. I can’t believe I’m sitting in a restaurant at the heart of Manhattan, seriously discussing mental telepathy.”

“Fine. If you’d prefer, we’ll discuss robbing banks—since that seems more sensible to you.”

I glanced around quickly to be sure no one had overheard. It had taken Tor no time at all to get my dander up. How could he put me on the defensive like that? It was rather as though he could read my mind, and knew what would get to me quickest.

“Let’s discuss the menu instead,” I suggested coolly.

“I’ve already ordered,” he informed me, twirling the bottle in the ice. “As I’ve always said, children should never be—”

“I’m thirty-two, and a bank vice-president,” I informed him, trying not to sound huffy, “and I’ve chosen a few meals on my own. I’m a full-grown woman now—not your little protégée—so you can stop the sage philosophe routine.”

I couldn’t understand what it was about Tor that raised such irritation in me. I’d known again—the moment I saw him rising to greet me—that he was the reason I’d left New York ten years ago, not some tempting offer from the Bank of the World. Like my grandfather, Tor was the quintessential artisan in search of a lump of clay; he’d said as much, hadn’t he? Was it my fault that I wanted to be the sculptor of my own fate?

But after that little diatribe of mine, he was watching me with a strange expression; I couldn’t read it.

“So I see,” he said cryptically. “Quite right, you are a grown woman. So that’s what’s changed—it had never occurred to me.” He paused for a moment. “I see I shall have to revise my plans.”

What plans? I wanted to ask—but I bit my tongue as the lemon sole arrived. I made idle chitchat through the rest of the meal, trying to come to terms with my mixed and indefinable feelings. The fish course was followed by veal chops with tiny vegetables, a salad of soft buttery lettuce, and finally, fresh strawberries—a luxury at this time of year—with thick Devonshire cream.

Tor had been strangely silent throughout the meal. I felt like a blimp, since despite my demurral I’d held up my end of the table—and I turned away when Tor tried to poke a strawberry, dripping with cream, into my mouth.

“I don’t need to be force-fed,” I protested. “I’m not a plant—nor a child, either.…”

“We’ve established that,” he said curtly, pouring some coffee from a small silver pot. “Since we’re here on business, now’s the time. Why don’t you show me your scheme?”

I pulled the thick folder from my bag, and handed it to him. One by one, he unfurled the pastiched charts Charles had produced for me. He ran his fingers over the crude lines that depicted risk against stolen dollars.

“Good Lord, what did you run these on—a dinosaur?” he asked, glancing up at me.

He pulled from his pocket a tiny machine, smaller than a calculator—a pocket microcomputer of the type they’d mentioned in the press; they weren’t yet on the market. Tapping in a few numbers, he studied the results closely.

As he was so embroiled, scratching numbers on a scrap of paper and glancing back and forth between the machine and my charts, I flagged a passing waiter and ordered a crème caramel with extra burnt sugar.

Tor glanced up at me briefly in disgust.

“I thought you couldn’t eat another bite,” he said.

“It is woman’s prerogative to change her mind,” I pointed out.

But when the dessert arrived, without looking up from the charts, he stuck out a spoon and helped himself to some of the gooey custard. He glanced up with a naughty expression.

“I’ve always been secretly amused by your desire to have everything your own way,” he admitted.

He tapped his pencil on the charts before him.

“According to these figures, you must pull off this theft of yours within a limited window of two months—no more. And the maximum you could hope to steal would be around ten million.” He picked up his cup and sipped the coffee.

“I suppose you think you can do better?” I said sarcastically.

“My dear young woman,” Tor said with a smile. “Did Strauss know how to waltz? It seems you’ve forgotten all you once learned under the baton of the master.”

He leaned forward until his face was close to mine, and looked me straight in the eye.

“I can steal a billion dollars in two weeks,” he said.

The waiter was hovering around, refreshing our coffee and swishing crumbs from the tablecloth with a flourish. Tor asked for the check, and paid it on the spot, as I fumed in silence.

“You told me you wanted to help me—not try to up the ante!” I hissed as soon as the waiter had left. “You said if I showed you my plan, you might