The Last Equation of Isaac Severy(32)

Philip had been stuck in the same room for years now, with no apparent solution within reach. He had often considered abandoning the room altogether, but in the end he knew that this room belonged to him, dark as it may be. He would keep returning to it, an hour at a time, until he knew its contents, until he found the light switch at last. He would die here if necessary.

Rolling down his window, Philip let the Pacific air hit his face. Yes, he would be just fine. She is a passing psychosis. He wasn’t going to give in to some insane impulse simply because his father had died and left his life’s purpose in chaos—chaos with a small c, the messy kind.

An hour and fifteen minutes had gone by when the car halted in front of a stark house, all light and modern angles. It sat near the edge of a bluff, like a pile of blocks waiting to be knocked into the sea. Nellie stood at the threshold, wearing a linen pantsuit in the same off-white hue as the building. There was something about the way she was looking out that struck him as odd, as if she were hiding something, concealing her own anticipation. Could it be that there was really something to his father’s recent mathematics? Might she and P. Booth Lyons know something he didn’t?

As he stepped from the car, Nellie extended an arm, as if guiding a dear friend in from a blizzard. “He hasn’t arrived yet. But let’s enjoy the rest of the afternoon, shall we?” She led Philip through a glass-covered atrium, down a naked hallway, and into a large room bathed in natural light. Everything was spare and white and glass.

“Is he off relating with scholars?” he asked.

She didn’t even pretend to laugh. “You’re the only scholar he’s interested in at the moment.”

“You mean my father is.”

She didn’t answer, only motioned him to some molded modern furniture along one wall. “We’ll wait here.”

Philip took a seat. “Is it your practice to have people followed?”

“Excuse me?”

“The Athenaeum parking lot.”

“Oh, that.” She smiled. “I’m sorry you didn’t take advantage, frankly. It happened that I didn’t need the car that night, and I noticed you’d ducked into the club. It was impulsive of me.”

Before he could respond to this, the doors swung open and an efficient-looking man in white appeared. He set a bottle of spring water and a platter of painstakingly constructed delicacies in front of Philip.

“Thank you, Sasha,” Nellie said. “I just hope it won’t spoil our guest’s lunch.”

Philip popped several caviar-topped morsels into his mouth, taking it on faith that he wasn’t going to wake up later in a posh torture chamber in Mr. Lyons’s basement. He mumbled approvingly. It was the best food he had tasted in months, and it instantly lightened his mood.

“Told you,” she said from across the room.

The server hurried away, and Philip turned in the direction of a large picture window. He couldn’t see the water below, but the vacant sky told him it was there. The clouds were turning pink in the diminishing light. “Nice life you lead here.”

From her place behind a glass desk, she answered without a trace of enthusiasm, “He makes sure my life stays interesting.”

Philip scanned the periodicals filed in a nearby rack as he plucked another morsel from the platter. “So are you a Helen or an Eleanor?”

When there was no response, he turned and saw that she had opened her laptop and was studying the screen intently.

“Sorry?” she said, looking up. “Is there something else you need?”

He decided on a different question. “What does the P in P. Booth stand for?”

“Phone, isn’t it?” she answered dryly. “Actually, I don’t know that I’ve ever asked. Even close friends call him Lyons or Ly.”

Nellie returned to her laptop and began clicking away. Philip studied her.

“So you’re not an inquisitive person.”

Her fingers paused above the keyboard. “You know, Mr. Severy, until you came along, I always thought of myself as inquisitive, but you’re throwing my entire sense of self into doubt.” She resumed her task, her words per minute noticeably increasing.

He watched her impassive expression and wondered if Nellie was really the shrewd professional that she projected and not some smartly dressed dunderhead who had been trained in the art of phony smiles and musty diplomacy.

His phone buzzed. When he saw his daughter’s name on the display, he remembered that it was Halloween. After taking Drew trick-or-treating, Sybil and Jack were coming over for dinner and staying the night. Jane had even reminded him of it that morning. At least Sybil wasn’t angry with him anymore. But Philip let the call go to voice mail and instead texted his wife: Might be a little late.

He stood up, irritated by the delay. He examined a collection of framed photographs on a mantel near Nellie’s desk, images of her standing next to or shaking hands with significant-looking men and women in suits. Philip recognized one of them as a former Pentagon chief.

Her desk phone rang, and she picked up. “Yes . . . yes,” she murmured. “Of course.”

She replaced the receiver. “He’s very sorry. Why don’t we wait in his study?”

Somewhat curious to see more of the building, Philip followed Nellie through a set of double doors and into a room that was smaller and darker than the first, but similarly arranged. He was suddenly struck by the notion that in ten minutes Nellie would receive another call from her boss, instructing her to put him in yet a smaller study. They would keep moving from study to study, each one progressively shrinking, until at last a small door would open and a doll-sized P. Booth Lyons would arrive, sweaty and apologetic.