Death of an Adept

"If I may say so, sir, I hope that when you reach San Francisco, you'll not bother too much with keeping your feet on the ground. I - would regard it as a great favor if you were to convey my particular greetings to Dr. Lockhart."

"I shall certainly do that," Adam said quietly, well aware of Humphrey's hopes that Ximena might become the next Lady Sinclair. "But it's a difficult situation, as you know."

"I do, sir," Humphrey murmured. "And she and her father are in my prayers."

"Then they have a powerful advocate. Thank you." Adam sighed heavily, then glanced at his luggage in the back of the car and reached for the door handle. "Well, if you'll see to the luggage and get me checked in, I'll meet you at the Air UK desk. If the news agents are open yet, I believe I have time to pick up a copy of The Scotsman before boarding."

"You do, indeed, sir. I'll take care of the bags."

Alighting from the car, Adam shrugged out of his overcoat and slung it across his arm, then headed into the terminal, making for the nearest news kiosk. Five minutes later, as he approached the Air UK check-in, he found Humphrey just turning away from the counter, replacing a handful of travel documents in their paper folder.

"Here we are, sir," Humphrey murmured, as they moved a few paces away from the desk and Adam set down his briefcase between his feet. "Here are your tickets, your passport, and your boarding card. The bags are checked through to Houston, and you have a bulkhead seat for this flight, with plenty of leg room. Your seat on the Houston flight is pre-assigned."

"Humphrey, you are indispensable," Adam replied with a smile, tucking the tickets into an inside pocket. "I'll check back with you from time to time to see how things are going. I've left a full itinerary back at the house, if anyone should need to reach me."

"Very good, sir. Have a safe trip."

He handed Adam his briefcase and raised a hand in farewell as his employer headed off toward the gate, watching until he had disappeared through the security checkpoint before turning away to return to the car.

Across the departures hall, a nondescript-looking man in a dark suit gazed after Humphrey from behind a newspaper, then furled it under his arm and strolled casually in the direction of the security checkpoint, glancing at his watch and then at the monitor that announced imminent departures. When the London flight had disappeared from the display and his quarry did not emerge, he turned and headed purposefully toward the Air UK desk, discarding his paper in a convenient refuse barrel and then elbowing past a queue of passengers waiting to check in.

"I'm Dr. Travis," he announced to the pretty ticket agent tagging a bag on the scale beneath her counter. "I do beg your pardon, madam," he said, turning briefly to address the passenger he had shoved aside. "Did a Dr. Sinclair get on your London flight that just left?''

A male agent one position down looked over with interest.

"Sir Adam Sinclair? I believe he did, sir. Is there some problem?''

Feigning dismay, "Dr. Travis" glanced at his watch, then back at both agents in more urgent appeal.

"Oh, dear, I'd hoped to catch up with him before he got away. It's rather an emergency. Do you know if London was his final destination? If so, I might be able to track him down there. His nurse only said he was on his way to the airport. Fortunately, there aren't too many flights this early."

As the two ticket agents exchanged bewildered glances, their inquisitor lifted both palms in entreaty.

"Please, I need to know where to reach him," he insisted. "It may be a matter of life and death."

"What did you say your name was?"

"Travis. Dr. Edward Travis. I'm a colleague of Dr. Sinclair."

Won over by his urgency and apparent authority, the male agent quickly called up Adam Sinclair's flight details on his computer terminal. Ten minutes later, "Dr. Travis" was ringing his employer from a pay phone in another part of the airport terminal.

A little over a hundred miles away, in a secluded Victorian house in Paisley, Francis Raeburn's Spanish-born valet took the call, then strode to the dining room.

"Senor Richter, you are wanted on the telephone," he announced, as Klaus Richter was just sitting down to an early breakfast. "It is Mr. Toynbee."

Richter took the call in the seclusion of the adjoining study. Through a burst of background noise, he could hear a voice relaying information over a public address system.

"Richter here. What is it?"

"I'm at the airport in Edinburgh," came the voice from the other end of the line. "There's been an interesting development."

"Yes?"