"I have a room at the Umberto. If I get you out of here, will you go to
my room and wait for me there?"
Her eyes narrowed sharply for a second. She parted her lips to say
something, but only nodded.
"Your word, Rena? I don't want to turn you in."
She looked helplessly at the purple spilled pool on the floor, and
wistfully at the sack that held her father. Then she said, "My word on
it. But you're a fool, Tom!"
"I know it!" I admitted.
I hurried her back up the ramp, back toward the violence upstairs. If
it was over, I would have to talk her out of the clinic, somehow cover
up the fact that she had been in the vaults. If it was still going on,
though--
It was.
We blended ourselves with the shouting, rioting knots. I dragged her
into the main waiting room, saw her thrust through the doors. Things
were quieting even then. And I saw two women hastening toward her
through the fight, and I do not think it was a coincidence that the
steam went out of the rioters almost at once.
I stayed at the clinic until everything was peaceful again, though it
was hours.
I wasn't fooling myself. I didn't have a shred of real reason for not
having her arrested. If she had information to give, I was not the type
to trick it out of her--even if she really was waiting at the Umberto,
which was, in itself, not likely. If I had turned her in, Defoe would
have had the information out of her in moments; but not I.
She was an enemy of the Company.
And I was unable to betray her.