Zero History

Strasbourg-Saint-Denis Métro, and into heavier traffic.
They rode in silence for a few minutes. Then he undid the top button of his shirt and
drew out the Faraday pouch.
“What’s that?”
“Métro station,” he said, for Sleight, then touched his index finger to his lips.
She nodded.
He opened the pouch, inserted the Neo, then closed it. “It blocks radio signals. Like
when you’re in an elevator. If he was listening, he can’t hear us now. And he just lost
track of where we are.”
“Why do you have it?”
“He gave it to me,” he said. “It’s for my passport. He’s worried someone will read the
microchip.”
“Do they do that?”
“People like Sleight do.”
“How does it work?”
“It has metallic fibers. When I tested it, before, he lost me. Thought I was in an
elevator.”
“But if it’s that easy,” she said, “why did he give it to you?”
“He insisted on it,” said Milgrim. “I think he really does worry about the chip-reading
thing. It’s something he’s done himself.”
“But he gave you your means of avoiding surveillance, right there.”
“When I put it in the pouch, before, that was the first time I did something that I knew
he wouldn’t want me to do. I wasn’t well, when I met him. He worked for Bigend and I
did what I was told.”
She looked at him. Then nodded. “I understand.”
“But Sleight,” he said, “really liked it, having someone who’d do exactly what he said.”
“He would, yes.”
“I don’t think he imagined I’d ever get to the point where I’d use the pouch on the Neo.
He would’ve enjoyed being able to count on that.”
“What will you do at Galeries Lafayette?”
“Wait till you’re gone, then take it out of the pouch. Then see who turns up.”
“But what if someone’s following us now, the old-fashioned way?”
“Have the driver take you to a Métro station. Do you know the Métro?”
“More or less.”
“If you’re clever, you can probably lose anyone who might try to follow you.”
“We’re here.”
He saw that they were in Boulevard Haussmann, the driver signaling to pull over.
“Take care of yourself,” she said. “If that was him I saw in the basement, I didn’t like
the look of him.”
“I didn’t get the feeling that he was that good, at the Salon,” he said, checking that the