Hostage Books

“In the room, the clocks tick, unseen.

It has been a day of shadows and redirection,
revelation and lies. Diane gets the vague
sense that Kotey — with his confi dence and
his silence — might think himself to be the
smartest person in the room. He is intelligent
yes, but it’s an intelligence that needs to wear
a disguise. And besides, the smartest person
in the room is the one who knows she, or
he, is never the smartest at all: herein lies the
contradiction. She wonders now if he has just
said exactly the things she wanted to hear? She
knows herself to be naïve at times: she admits
this to herself. Yes, it is true, she has often been
far too open to people in the past. She has been
stung. Government offi cials who have deceived
her. Pretenders from the FBI. Misdirection
from the State Department and White House.
Politicians. Negotiators. Informers. Conmen.
And, perhaps now, Kotey. But she also knows
that the naivety is necessary to cultivate
something deeper. She wants to remain open
to the world. Compassion, Lord. And mercy.
And patience.

There will be one more session tomorrow.
Perhaps they will achieve something more
than this intimate stand-off . But then again,
perhaps nothing.

She pulls back her chair and thanks him. It is
dangerous, she knows, to thank him, her son’s
murderer. But she must do it anyway. Perhaps
it’s only politeness. Perhaps it’s something
more.

“In another life,” she says, “you and Jim might
have been friends.”
― Colum McCann