'No. He never joins anyone.' She looked for the boy.

The lights came on again, flickering and then steadying, and I said, 'Is Pol Pot expected to make a final try for power?' It had been in the news for a while.

Gabrielle's eyes had widened at the sound of the name. 'Everyone thinks so, here. Everyone is afraid.' 'But you're more informed than most.'

'I think the same as everyone does. It is not just fear, although we all feel that. From my… sources of information, yes, I believe he will make a final attempt to seize power, now the UN has left. And if he does that, we'll have the Killing Fields all over again.' Our serving boy came for the dishes, and it occurred to me that Gabrielle preferred not to use French in public places because it was the second language, though English was catching on fast among the students. 'Would you care for some li-chee?' she asked me.

'Just coffee.'

She told the boy, and when he'd gone I said, 'You believe Pol will launch an armed attack on the city?'

'Perhaps, but no one knows. The UN took their intelligence services with them.'

'Has the Khmer Rouge got a base here in Phnom Penh?'

'Yes, but we do not know where it is any more. Pol has moved it, and taken it underground. But we know it is still here. We see his agents.'

She'd turned her head as she said that, looking towards the tables near the grandiose archway of chipped plaster and gilt that led to the hotel lobby.

'One of them is over there?' I asked her.

'Yes.' She turned her head back. 'The man at the corner table, sitting alone.'

I'd noticed him earlier, simply because I knew his type, recognized the attitude, his body language, his stillnesses, the way he moved his head, always slowly, his eyes moving with it, passing across the target without stopping, passing back. I had also identified the target, the man he was keeping under surveillance.