“Yes.”
“Why?”
Henri looked up with visible irritation. “The concert had to take place. It was necessary to change the ending and take away my humiliation by correcting the record.”
That answer was more useful than the others. A man who fears humiliation can be made to do extraordinary damage while still telling himself he is acting on principle.
The detective asked three more questions. When he was done, he closed the folder and stood.
“We’ll need a formal statement this afternoon,” he said.
Henri nodded.
The detective looked at Dominic. “Five more minutes.”
The detective stepped back out. The officer remained. Dominic stood.
The motion made Henri lift his head quickly. “I didn’t take your place,” Dominic said.
No one moved.
“I stepped into a moment. That’s all any of us did.” His hands hung quietly at his sides. “You prepared the ground. You made the calls, and you gathered the people. That was you.”
Henri stared at him.
“The city doesn’t know it,” Dominic said. “And I failed to say so for twenty years.”
He continued to look at Henri.
“I am sorry for that,” he said.
Henri’s composure failed again, this time not around the eyes but in the throat. A muscle moved once beneath the skin.
Dominic waited.
Henri lowered his gaze to the table. When he finally spoke, his voice was quieter than before. “I thought the myth was too comfortable for you to surrender.”
“It often wasn’t comfortable,” Dominic said.
Dominic turned and walked toward the door. Luca moved at once, coming around behind my chair. I looked up at him.
“One minute,” he said quietly.
Dominic stepped into the corridor. For a moment, Henri and I were alone in the room, if you did not count Luca behind me and the camera in the corner.
“Who told you?” Henri asked.
My shoulder throbbed in a heavier, more deliberate way. The medication was wearing off. I adjusted slightly in the chair.
“That it was inside the circle?” I asked.
He nodded.
“A person who reads rooms instead of sightlines.”
Recognition settled in for Henri. He gave a very small nod and then looked at Luca. “He saw her first.”
“He saw the changes,” I said. “Before I knew what I was looking at.”
