Conspiracies

"Oh, Gus," she sobbed. An utterly miserable sound.

Her head sank until her chin touched her chest. She would have fan-folded to the floor if Jack hadn't been holding her up. He knew this was killing her, but he wanted her to hear it. Maybe it was the alarm she needed to wake her up.

Gus mimicked her. "'Oh, Gus!' Do you have any idea how many rainy nights you got my hopes up when you were late coming home from your card group? How I prayed—actually prayed—that you'd skidded off the road and wrapped your car around a utility pole, or that a big semi had run a light and plowed you under? Do you have any idea? But no. You'd come bouncing in as carefree as you please, and I'd be so disappointed I'd almost cry. That was when I really wanted to wring your scrawny neck!"

"That's just about enough, don't you think?" Jack said.

Gus sighed. "Yeah. I guess it is. But at least all those premiums weren't wasted. Tonight I collect."

Ceil's head lifted.

"What?"

"That's right. An armed robber broke in. During the struggle, I managed to get the gun away from him but he pulled you between us as I fired. You took the first bullet—right in the heart. In a berserk rage, I emptied the rest of the clip into his head. Such a tragedy." He raised the pistol and sighted it on Ceil's chest. "Goodbye, my dear sweet wife."

The metallic click of the hammer was barely audible over Ceil's wail of terror.

Her voice cut off as both she and Gus stared at the pistol.

"That could have been a dud," Jack said. "Man, I hate when that happens." He pointed to the top of the pistol. "Pull that slide back to chamber a fresh round."

Gus stared at him a second, then worked the slide. An unspent round popped out.

"There you go," Jack said. "Now, give it another shot, if you'll pardon the expression."

Looking confused, he aimed at Ceil again, and Jack detected a definite tremor in the barrel now. Gus pulled the trigger but this time Ceil didn't scream. She merely flinched at the sound of the hammer falling on another dud.

"Aw, maaaan? Jack said, drawing out the word into a whine. "You think you're buying good ammo and someone rips you off! Can't trust nobody these days!"

Gus quickly worked the slide and pulled the trigger again. Jack allowed two more misfires, then he stepped around Ceil and approached Gus.

Frantically Gus worked the slide and pulled the trigger again, aiming for Jack's face. Another impotent click. He began backing away when he saw Jack's smile.

"That's my dummy pistol, Gus. Actually, a genuine government-issue Mark IV, but the bullets are dummies—just like the guys I let get hold of it."

Jack brought it along when he wanted to see what somebody was really made of. In the right situation, it tended to draw the worst to the surface.

He bent and picked up the ejected rounds. He held one up for Gus to see.

"The slug is real," Jack said, "but there's no powder in the shell. It's an old rule: Never let an asshole near a loaded gun."

Gus charged, swinging the .45 at Jack's head. Jack caught his wrist and twisted the weapon from his fingers. Then he slammed it hard against the side of Gus's face, opening a gash. Gus tried to turn and run but Jack still had his arm. He hit him again, on the back of the head this time. Gus sagged to his knees and Jack put a lot of upper body behind the pistol as he brought it down once more on the top of his head. Gus stiffened, then toppled face first onto the floor.

Only seconds had passed. Jack spun to check on Ceil's whereabouts. She wasn't going to catch him twice. But no worry. She was right where he'd left her, standing in the corner, eyes closed, tears leaking out between the lids. Poor woman.

Nothing Jack wanted more than to be out of this crazy house. He'd been here too long already, but he had to finish this job now, get it done and over with.

He took Ceil's arm and gently led her from the living room.

"Nothing personal, lady, but I've got to put you in a safe place, okay? Someplace where you can't get near a fire poker. Understand?"

"He didn't love me," she said to no one in particular. "He stayed with me because of his job. He was lying all those times he said he loved me."

"I guess he was."

"Lying ... "

He guided her to a closet in the hall and stood her inside among the winter coats.

"I'm just going to leave you here for a few minutes, okay?"

She was staring straight ahead. "All those years ... lying ... "

Jack closed her in the closet and wedged a ladder-back chair between the door and the wall on the other side of the hall. No way she could get out until he removed the chair.

Back in the living room, Gus was still out cold. Jack turned him over and tied his wrists to the stout wooden legs of the coffee table. He took two four-by-four wooden blocks from his gym bag and placed them under Gus's left lower leg, one just below the knee and the other just above the ankle. Then he removed a short-handled five-pound iron maul from the duffel.

He hesitated as he lifted the hammer.

"Consider this a life saving injury, Gus, old scout," he said in a low voice. "If you're not laid up, your brother-in-law will kill you."

Still Jack hesitated, then recalled Ceil's eyes as Gus methodically battered her kidneys—the pain, the resignation, the despair.

Jack broke Gus's left shin with one sharp blow. Gus groaned and writhed on the floor, but didn't regain consciousness. Jack repeated the process on the right leg. Then he packed up all his gear and returned to the hall.

He pulled the chair from where it was wedged against the closet door, and opened the door a crack.

"I'm leaving now, lady. When I'm gone you can go next door or wherever and call the police. Better call an ambulance too."

A single sob answered him.

Jack left by the back door. It felt good to get the stocking off his head. He'd feel even better to be far away from this house.

23

Jack took the Fifty-ninth Street Bridge back into Manhattan. Since that would drop him right in Gia's neighborhood, he figured he'd pop in on his way back to the hotel. Vicky would be asleep, but he hoped Gia would be up. After the grimness of the Castlemans, he needed a little sweetness and light.

He was about halfway across when he spotted the black sedan. He'd scanned the street when he'd left the Castlemans, but had seen no sign of it then. They must have been waiting somewhere along his return route.

Or ... it simply could be a couple of guys who just happened to be heading into the city behind him, and just happened to be driving a black sedan.

Could be. But Jack wanted to know for sure.

When he reached the Manhattan side he took the downtown ramp, then made a full three-sixty loop around a single block. The black sedan stayed with him all the way, right behind him, not even bothering to hide its presence.

That did it. He'd been sucker punched on a stairwell, damn near killed by some sort of dog monkey, and clocked on the back of his head with a fireplace poker. It had been a bad day and he'd had it.

At the next red light, Jack slammed on the brakes, rammed the gearshift into park and jumped out of the car. Bursting with anger, he strode back to the Lincoln and yanked on the handle of the driver's door—locked. He pounded against the window.

"Open up, dammit!"

The window slid down and Jack found himself staring into the black lenses of a pair of sunglasses. He couldn't tell if this was the guy he'd chased or the one who'd punched him earlier today. They both looked alike and he could pick out no distinguishing marks on what little of their faces was visible.

Traffic was light on the street, but just then a red pickup truck pulled to a stop behind the black sedan. Jack waved him around—he didn't want any witnesses to the altercation he was sure was about to ensue, but the truck stayed put.

That bothered Jack a little. He thought he remembered seeing a red pickup in his rearview a couple of times since leaving the Castleman house, but couldn't be sure—he'd been concentrating on the black sedan. Who was it ... backup for the jokers in the sedan, or just another late night traveler?

If it were a black pickup he'd definitely be worried but since it wasn't, he turned his attention back to the sedan.

"What's the story, guys?" he said, crouching slightly to look into the open window. "Who the hell are you and why're you following me? Is my life that much more interesting than yours?"

The driver merely stared up at him through his shades, saying nothing, his lips a straight line, his pale face expressionless, as if he were deciding whether this man was worthy of reply.

That expression plus the memory of Olive's mutilated body stoked Jack's already topped-off anger.

"Didn't your mothers ever teach you to take off your hats in a car? And what's with the shades at night? Don't you know that's dangerous?"

Jack shot his left hand into the car, aiming to knock off the jerk's hat and grab his sunglasses, but before his fingers were through the opening, the driver's black-gloved hand grabbed Jack's wrist and stopped him.

Jack tried to push farther in, but could not. And when he tried to pull free, he found his wrist imprisoned in a steely grip. Alarmed, he struggled but couldn't break free.

The light had changed to green. A horn sounded, not from the pickup truck, but from some car behind it. The black-gloved grip on his left wrist remained tight as a manacle. The fourth car, a battered old Toyota hatchback, chirped its tires and squeezed through the narrow, barely passable space on the far side of the pickup, the sedan, and Jack's rental, honking angrily all the way. The pickup didn't honk, didn't budge. Maybe the driver didn't think it could fit.

As soon as the Toyota was gone, Jack heard the door open on the other side of the sedan. He looked up and saw the passenger emerge. A carbon copy of the driver. He stared at Jack across the black roof of the car.

"Where is Melanie Rubin Ehler?" the second one said in a hoarse, whispery voice.

"You're asking me?" Jack said. "Don't you know?"

The passenger held up a small cylinder in his black-gloved hand. His thumb pressed some sort of button, Jack heard a snikt! and an ice-pick-like needle suddenly jutted from the upper end. The green glow from the traffic light gleamed evilly along its narrow polished surface.

"Where is Melanie Rubin Ehler?" he repeated, and slammed the door.

As the passenger started to move toward the front of the car, Jack grabbed the little finger on the driver's hand; with no little difficulty he worked it free and pried it up until he got a firm grip on it. Then he bent it sharply back.

He heard the bone snap. But that was all he heard—no cry from the driver, and not the slightest lessening of the lock grip on his wrist. The driver was still looking up at him—no change of expression. Hadn't even flinched.

A quick cold thrust of shock stabbed Jack's gut. He knew he'd broken that bone—he'd felt it give way. Didn't this guy have any nerves?

Jack punched the driver's face as the passenger passed the right headlight. The sunglasses flew off as his hat slid down over his face; Jack punched the fedora, but the iron grip never slackened. A quick glance showed the passenger rounding the left headlight and coming Jack's way, his big needle held high.

Time to bring out the artillery, Jack thought as he flexed his right knee to bring his ankle holster with the Semmerling within reach. But before he touched it, someone began firing.

Jack looked around. The shots had come from the pickup. The driver door was open and a man was standing behind it, aiming a pistol in a two-handed grip through the window opening. Jack couldn't see his face, but that wasn't important right now. What mattered was he wasn't firing at Jack—he was aiming for the passenger.

With an almost snakelike hiss, the passenger ducked into a crouch and jumped back into the car. The next bullet from the pickup went through the sedan's rear window.

"Whoa!" Jack shouted. "Easy back there!"

The driver still hadn't released Jack's arm, but that didn't stop him from throwing the car into gear and spinning the steering wheel.

"Hey!" Jack shouted, pounding on the roof as the car started to roll. "Hey, what the hell are you doing?"

"Where is Melanie Rubin Ehler?" said that same voice from inside the car.

"I don't know!" Jack said as he began to be pulled along by the car.

The sedan picked up speed, moving past the rear bumper of Jack's car, clearing it by a couple of inches—maybe. If Jack didn't free himself right now, his legs would be pinned between the cars. He tried to take another poke at the driver but, because of his position, couldn't reach him with his right fist.

To save his legs, Jack stepped on his own car's bumper, jumped up onto the trunk, and then the driver gunned the sedan, pulling Jack along.

Frantic now, Jack saw he had a choice between being dragged along the street or riding on the sedan's roof. Hell of a choice. He did a belly flop onto the roof as the car picked up speed.

Jack knew he wasn't going to last long up here. He stretched, reached down, pulled the Semmerling. The chamber was empty so he clamped his teeth on the slide, drew it back, then let it spring forward. Turning his head away, he fired a .45 caliber slug through the roof into the general area of the front seat below him. The angle of his wrist made for a wild recoil. The Semmerling was not an autoloader so he had to work the slide with his teeth for every shot. Only rarely did he load full-jacket slugs, and unfortunately this was not one of those times. But the frangibles must have done some damage down below because the sedan suddenly swerved and the grip on his wrist loosened a bit—just enough for Jack to twist free.

The car careened into a turn, its tires screeching as they slipped sideways on the pavement. It lost speed and Jack knew this might be his only chance. He pushed back, avoiding the shattered glass of the rear window as he slid off the roof onto the trunk, then slipped off onto the street. He hit the pavement running just before the car picked up speed again.

His forward momentum was still too fast for his sneakered feet. He went down, landed on his shoulder and rolled halfway back to his feet, then slammed against the side of a car, denting its rear fender. He felt a quick wave of nausea but shook it off.

At least he'd stopped moving. He stood and rubbed his sore shoulder as the black sedan continued down the street. Other cars passed. He saw curious faces looking his way, but no one stopped.

At least not until the red pickup pulled up. Jack recognized the Jiffy-something guy with the gray crewcut behind the wheel: Miles Kenway.

"You all right?" Kenway called through the open passenger window.

What the hell was he doing here? "I've been better."

"Get in. I'll take you back to your car." Jack looked back. He'd barely traveled a block. "I can walk."

"Get in. We need to talk."

Jack hesitated, then figured, what the hell, the guy had probably saved his life—or at least his lips and eyes. Jack got in. The first things he noticed were Kenway's camouflage pants and jacket. Camo? In the city?

"Damn good thing I followed you tonight," Kenway said as he shoved the truck into gear.

"And why were you doing that?"

"Thought you might be working for them."

"Who? The men in black?"

"Don't call them that. That's what the UFO nuts call them. They're NWO operatives."

"NW—?"

"I'll explain later. Obviously you're not with them."

"Obviously."

"But then again, maybe that little scene was all a charade for my benefit, to suck me in, get me thinking of you as an ally."

"Could be," Jack said, nodding, and thinking, Hey, I can be paranoid too. "Or ... your rescuing me from that little scene could have been a charade for my benefit, to suck me in, get me thinking of you as an ally."

Kenway glanced at him and gave him a slow smile. "Yeah, I guess you could look at it like that. But trust me, Shelby—you're riding with the New World Order's worst nightmare."

"Call me Jack."

"Okay, Jack," he said, pulling to a stop behind Jack's car. "Meet me back at the hotel. I need to debrief you. And don't try confronting these guys again without backup. They're tough"

Tell me about it, Jack thought, rubbing his wrist. He jumped out of the pickup.

"Thanks."

Kenway gave him a thumbs-up and roared away.

Well, Jack had been looking for a way to get to Kenway. Maybe he could turn this "debriefing" into a two-way exchange.

As he turned toward his car, something crunched under his foot. Looked like sunglasses. The ones he'd knocked off the driver? He picked them up—no, not quite sunglasses, just the frames. Thick black frames. But where were the lenses?

He searched the pavement. The light wasn't great but he should have been able to spot black pieces among the glittery shards of shattered car window glass. He found nothing.

Odd ...

24

Jack ditched the idea of dropping in on Gia. If he was being tailed, he didn't want the followers knowing anything about Gia and Vicky. Instead, he headed back to the hotel.

He found Kenway waiting for him in the lobby. He wasn't exactly standing at attention, but his spine was so straight, his bearing so erect, he might have been waiting for military inspection. His camo stood out among the more civilian types coming and going around him, but no one paid him much notice.

"All right," Jack said as he reached him. "What—?"

"My room," Kenway said, and marched off toward the elevators.

Amused, Jack followed the shorter man. For the first few paces he resisted the temptation to fall into lockstep directly behind him, then gave in. He even saluted a couple of passersby.

As they entered Kenway's room on the seventh floor, the older man stopped Jack just inside the door.

"Wait here."

All the lights were on. Jack gave the place a quick once-over. No shadows, no place for a big dog-monkey to hide. Good. He watched Kenway cross the room and take a little black box from atop the TV. He pressed a few buttons, then nodded with satisfaction.

"All right. Come in."

"What's that?" Jack said, pointing to the box.

"A little something of my own invention," he said proudly. "A motion detector-recorder. It records the time of any motion in the room. Right now it shows clear readings since the time I left until half a minute ago when we entered. That means no one's been in while I've been out."

"Pretty neat," Jack said, and meant it. He wouldn't mind having a few of those himself. "Anytime you decide to put them on the market, I'll be your first customer."

This seemed to please Kenway, which was one of the reasons Jack had said it. No harm in softening up the guy.

Kenway offered Jack a scotch from the minibar. Jack refused but that didn't deter Kenway from pouring himself a Dewar's, neat.

"Good thing you were traveling armed," Kenway said. "I saw you shoot through the roof. Good move. What are you carrying?"

Jack handed over the empty Semmerling and Kenway laughed.

"I've heard of these but never held one. Cute little baby." He reached under his camo top to the small of his back and came up with a 1911A1 Colt .45. "Here's it's daddy. Best damn handgun ever made."

Jack smiled. "I'll be glad to play 'mine is bigger than yours' some other time, but right now I'd like to know why you were following me."

Kenway pointed his .45 at Jack's chest. "I'll be asking the questions here."

"Ooh, scary," Jack said, broadening his grin. "We both know you're not going to fire that. Lose it now or I'm out of here."

Jack met and held Kenway's gaze. He didn't exactly know that Kenway wasn't going to shoot him, but he was pretty damn sure. A .45 makes one hell of a racket, especially indoors. Kenway had to know that the whole floor would hear it and someone would call the desk to see what was going on.

Finally Kenway sighed and stuffed his pistol back inside his shirt.

"You're a cool one," he said, handing back the Semmerling. "Whoever you are. And don't give me that Jack Shelby shit because I ran a background on you and you're not Jack Shelby."

Background ... the very word sent snakes of dread crawling through his veins. He'd known from the start that a paranoid guy out of Army Intelligence would be trouble, but he hadn't counted on a full background check.

"Strange," Jack said, trying to keep cool, "that's what my First Annual SESOUP Conference badge says."

"Don't play cute."

"Well, if I'm not Shelby, who am I?"

"Damned if I know!" He took a sip of his scotch. "Can't tell you your real name at this point, only that it isn't Jack Shelby. That's probably just something you pulled out of the air. But I'm willing to bet those NWO operatives know who you are."

New, bigger dread-snakes wriggling in Jack's veins.

"Maybe they came up empty too," Kenway said. "And maybe they were following you for the same reason as I was—to find out who the hell you are. What I found is you're some kind of creep—a lousy Peeping Tom."

"A Peeping Tom?"

"Don't play innocent with me. I saw you watching that woman out in Queens. Christ, fella, get a life!"

Jack ran a hand over his mouth to hide an incipient grin. This guy follows me around and watches me watch the Castlemans—and he thinks I need a life. He wondered if Kenway had seen the fight.

"You watched me all night?"

"Only for a few minutes," Kenway said, "Then I waited in my truck." He narrowed his eyes. "And I bet that story of your experience out in the Jersey pines is as bogus as your name."

"How do you know I didn't change my name because I don't want to be connected with that story? Maybe I have a job and a family and I just don't want everybody thinking I'm nuts. That ever occur to you?"

"Of course it did. Nobody knows better than me how people fear the truth. But some of us have the guts to stand up and be counted. If what you said is true, you probably stumbled on a New World Order outpost. They tend to set up in remote areas, especially in national parks. Did you see any black helicopters?"

"You asked me that the other night. I told you, it was dark—night, remember?"

"Oh, right. I do remember. But did you hear a helicopter?"

"Not that I recall." Jack wasn't interested in black helicopters. He wanted to turn the discussion toward Melanie Ehler. "Maybe you should ask Melanie. She seemed to know all about what happened to me."

"I wish I could. If there's an NWO outpost in the pinelands, I want to know about it."

"What about her Grand Unification Theory? You think—?"

"Frankly I don't give a damn about her theory. If it doesn't center on the New World Order, then it's flat-out-wrong."

A little heat there, Jack thought. If he could get Kenway rolling, maybe he'd make a slip.

"What's this New World Order you keep mentioning? Wasn't George Bush talking about that after the Gulf War?"

Kenway nodded vigorously. "Damn right he was." He leaned forward, and Jack got the impression he'd been waiting for Jack to ask about the NWO. "Remember how he was the hero of the country then, of the whole damn so-called free world? His reelection looked to be a sure thing, didn't it. But he slipped up, got carried away and spilled the beans about the New World Order. That was a no-no. Not bad enough to be punishable by death, but they had to take him out of the limelight. And that's why 'the guy who couldn't lose' was not reelected. When people talk about the 1992 Presidential race, they always mention Bush's lame, lackluster campaign. That's because he'd been told he was going to lose."

"So who's behind this New World Order?" Jack said. "Aliens?"

"Aliens?" Kenway said with the expression of someone who'd just stepped into a Portapotty at the National Chili Eating Contest. "I see Zaleski has been bending your ear. Look, Jim and his kind mean well enough, but the UFO types who aren't outright kooks are dupes. These flying saucers they're seeing aren't from outer space—they're from right here on Earth, experimental craft built by the One Worlders."

"What about Roswell and—?"

"Staged—all staged. That alien saucer crash baloney is all disinformation to distract people form the real truth. And I've got to hand it to them, they've done a masterful job—that intentionally clumsy fake cover-up at Roswell was a work of genius. But if you want the real skinny, you've got to go back to the nineteenth century." He finished his scotch. "You sure you don't want one?"

"Well, if we're going back to the eighteen hundreds ... maybe a beer."

"Good," Kenway said, pulling a Heineken from the bar. "It all starts with a guy named Cecil Rhodes. You remember Rhodesia? He's the Rhodes in Rhodesia. A British financier and statesman. A true believer in the Empire. He formed a secret society called the Round Table whose members were dedicated to seeing the entire globe under one world government. And to their minds at the time, the ideal One World government was the British Empire. Rhodes's special interest was Africa. Wanted to add the whole continent to the Empire, became a small-scale tyrant in the process, but ultimately failed. His One World legacy lives on, however."

Kenway popped the top on Jack's beer and handed it to him.

"After World War One, the British Empire fell apart, so Rhodes's heirs had to try a different tactic. They formed two front organizations: the Council on Foreign Relations, then the Trilateral Commission. You've heard of those, I take it?"

"Heard of them," Jack said, sipping his beer. "But damned if I know what they do."

"Hardly anyone knows what they really do. But in a 1975 report the Trilateral Commission said that there could be, in certain situations—and I quote—'an excess of democracy.' Can you believe that?"

"Can you believe how little I'm surprised?" Jack said. "Or care?"

"You damn well should care. Between NATO and the EC, they've got Europe pretty much in their pocket. And the UN—which they run—has the Third World sewn up. The only piece missing is the old US of A and they're making great headway here. Just consider: nearly every president and secretary of state is or was a member of the CFR and/or the Trilateral Commission. Bill Clinton's an even better example: he's with the Trilateral Commission, the CFR, and he's a Rhodes Scholar! He went to Oxford on Cecil Rhodes money! That's why he was tapped to replace George Bush."

"This is a little scary," Jack said, and meant it. Kenway's scenario wasn't quite as easy to dismiss as aliens and antichrists.

"A little scary? You don't know the half of it. Europe has pretty much surrendered, but the American people aren't playing ball. That means it's dirty tricks time, and the all-time masters of dirty tricks work for the CIA—which the NWO has controlled since its inception. It's public-knowledge now that the CIA has been running mind-control experiments since the fifties. MK-ULTRA is the best-known. That one was exposed in Congress and the government has had to pay off the victims of those early LSD experiments."

"I read something about that a while ago," Jack said.

"Big embarrassment. They slipped up on that one. But there are so many other projects that've remained secret—remote viewing, HAARP, mind-control implants, brainwashing. The agents you dealt with tonight are the results of their mind-control and programming experiments."

"Yeah?" Jack said, rubbing his sore wrist. Something more going on with those two than mind control.

"Trust me: they were. The NWO has been dabbling in programmed suicide too—the Jonestown and Heaven's Gate mass suicides are their most successful tests—but they've generally failed in their quest to program the whole country. So lately they've been concentrating on the US military."

"You're ex-military, I'm told."

"With the emphasis on ex," Ken way said. "I got a look at some NATO papers that scared the shit out of me. That's why I retired. You see, the New World Order bosses have resigned themselves to the fact that force will be necessary to tame America. But first they have to soften us up. The plan is to weaken the American economy by shipping jobs out of the country with treaties like NAFTA, and hamstringing industry with whacked-out environmental restraints. Then they'll try to push us toward Kosovo-style anarchy with church bombings, and more Ruby Ridge and Waco-type incidents. When all hell finally breaks loose, United Nations 'peacekeepers' will be called in to 'quiet' things down. But the forces won't have to be shipped in because they're already here; As I mentioned before, foreign UN troops are secretly camped out in our national parks and in wildernesses like the pine barrens, and when they charge out, our own soldiers will put on blue UN helmets and join them. Why? Because they've all been brainwashed by the CIA mind-control projects I told you about."

Kenway paused for breath and unlocked the briefcase on the desk. He pulled a map of the United States and handed it to Jack. Little hand-drawn stars were scattered across the country.

"These are confirmed UN troop locations and planned concentration camp sites. Black helicopters will darken the skies and people like me will be rounded up and placed in concentration camps where we'll be 're-educated.' But not without a fight, brother. I and others like me will fight to the death to keep America from becomifig enslaved."

Jack handed back the map and said nothing. It would be so easy to get sucked into Kenway's world—the reasoning and pseudologic were so convincing on the surface—but he wasn't buying.

"Well?" Kenway said. "Want to join me? I saw the way you handled yourself tonight. We can always use someone like you."

"I'll think about it," Jack said, hoping to avoid a sales pitch. "But I can't help wondering why these New World Order types should bother with an armed takeover. I mean, considering how nowadays people are slugging away at two and three jobs to make ends meet, how Mr. and Mrs. Average American are working until mid-May every year just to pay their federal income tax, and then on top of that they pay state and city income taxes, and then after those they've got to fork over sales taxes, property taxes, excise taxes, and surcharges, not to mention all the hidden expenses passed on in day-to-day prices jacked up by license fees and endless streams of regulations from OSHA and all the other two-bit government regulatory agencies. By the time Mr. and Mrs. Citizen are through they've surrendered seventy-five percent of their earnings to the bureaucracy. Seems to me like the NWO boys have already got you right where they want you."

"No, no, no!" Kenway said, his face reddening as he vigorously shook his head. "An armed takeover! That's how it will happen! That's how they'll take away our freedoms and make us slaves, make us property!"

A little touchy, aren't we? Jack thought as he finished his beer. Let's try one extra nudge.

"As I see it, that's pretty much what you already are. If and when this takeover comes, the only difference will be you'll no longer be able to kid yourself that you're not property."

Kenway stared at him, mouth slightly parted. Then his eyes narrowed. "You keep saying 'you' as if you're not involved."

Uh-oh. This was veering into areas Jack did not want to go. His own lifestyle was off limits.

"Just a way of putting it," he said, rising. "Time to go. Thanks for the help tonight, and the beer."

"No, wait," Kenway said. "There's so much more to discuss."

"Thanks, but I need my beauty sleep." He turned toward the door, then turned back. "By the way ... you said you checked me out. Ever check out Roma?"

"Damn straight—six ways from Sunday, and Professor Salvatore Roma of Northern Kentucky University passed with flying colors. I don't particularly like the fellow, but he's the real deal."

"Yeah?" He kept thinking about Roma being spotted in Monroe with Melanie before she disappeared, and then lying about having never met her.

"Ever see a picture of him?"

Kenway laughed. "Why should I want to? I know what he looks like. I've been looking at his pretty puss for two days now."

"You know what the guy calling himself Professor Salvatore Roma who started SESOUP looks like. But does he look the same as the professor you checked out at Northern Kentucky U?"

Kenway's smile vanished like a coin in a magician's hand. "What are you saying?"

"Just wondering. Does SESOUP mail go to Roma's faculty office, his home, or a post office box?"

"A P.O. box."

Jack smiled and shook his head. "I think you'd better get that faculty photo."

Miles's eyes widened. "You mean they're different people?"

Jack held up his hands. "Didn't say that. It's just you never know till you check. Usurping someone's identity is surprisingly easy."

"Oh, really?" Kenway's eyes narrowed. "How do you know so much about it?"

"Gotta go," Jack said, heading for the door.

"All right, some other time then," Kenway said. "But just to be sure, I'm going to get a picture of the university Roma."

"You can do that?"

"I'll have it within twenty-four hours, tops."

"Love to see it when you get it."

Kenway started following Jack to the door, but stopped at the desk to scribble on a hotel pad. He tore off the sheet and handed it to Jack.

"Think about what I said. Here's my pager number. Any time you want to talk about joining us, call me. I like the way you think."

He unlatched the door and used the peephole before opening it. Then he stuck his head out and peered up and down the hall.

"And be careful," he said. "They're watching you."

Jack stepped out into the hall. He could feel Kenway's eyes on his back as he walked away.

And so are you, he thought. Lately it seems like everybody's watching me.

IN THE WEE HOURS

Roma ...

"Feel it?" Roma said as he and Mauricio waited in the basement. "It is beginning again."

"To what end?" Mauricio said sourly. "To send the rest of the device to the stranger?

Roma sensed that Mauricio was troubled ... much more so than usual.

"What is wrong?"

Mauricio looked away. "I must tell you something. Earlier tonight I tried to eliminate the stranger."

"What?" Roma cried, suddenly furious. He'd half-suspected the creature would do something foolish, but had hoped his better judgment would prevail. "Without checking with me?"

Mauricio still did not make eye contact. "I felt it the safest course."

"You said 'tried.' I assume that means you failed?"

"Yes. And that is what is most disturbing. I had him down. I was about to deliver the death blow, when suddenly I was pushed away from him."

"Pushed? By whom?"

"By myself—or rather by some strange sudden impulse within that would not allow me to kill him."

Roma's anger evaporated. He did not like the sound of this at all. "Did you sense the enemy protecting him?"

"No. That is the strangest part. It seemed to be the work of the Otherness. I am very confused."

So am I, Roma thought. Why would the Otherness protect the stranger? It made no sense. Perhaps Mauricio was mistaken.

"You shouldn't have acted without my approval in the first place," he said. "I will tolerate no more of that, understood?"

Mauricio said nothing.

"I had a long talk with the stranger earlier. He is blissfully ignorant of the Otherness and anything connected with it. We have nothing to fear from him. When the second half of the shipment arrives, we will relieve him of both packages."

"In light of my experience with him, that may not be so easy."

Roma pondered that. He would not allow these anomalous events to rattle him. He would remain in control.

"That is why we must learn who he is and, as I said before, who he loves. With the proper leverage, we can move him in any direction we wish." Roma closed his eyes and breathed deeply. "Ah. Feel it?"

Right now he could almost smell the charge in the air. Once again he congratulated himself on his cleverness at being able to concentrate all these sensitives in one spot. They were lightning rods, so to speak, attractors for the influence of the Otherness, and as they slept they would draw it in and funnel its power through the building, weakening the barrier between this plane and the Otherness just long enough to allow something to slip through from the other side.

The second delivery was on its way now ... he could feel the barrier thinning, the tiny rent beginning ...

And once again, just like last night, that seepage from the other side would gift these sensitives with the worst nightmares of their lives.

James ...

... awakens squinting in the white glare that pours through his room window, creating a brilliant rectangle on the carpet.

The light blazes intolerably, searing his retinas, so bright it seems solid.

Jim could swear he pulled the curtains before knocking off, but now they're wide open, as if pushed aside or burned away by this beam from above.

Where's it coming from? Sure as hell ain't the moon, and it's too white for sunlight.

He doesn't want to move, doesn't want to leave the security of his bed, but he's got to know the source. Like a reluctant moth wise beyond its genus, knowing its wings will be fried but slave to a hardwired compulsion, Jim is drawn inexorably toward the shaft of brilliance. Without allowing the light to touch him, he peers through the window at an angle but cannot find the source. Finally he takes the plunge and steps into the shaft—

—and screams as the light pierces him. It is a physical thing, lancing through skin, fat, bone and organ, spearing every cell of every tissue. He feels the birdshot sting of each photon as it shoots through him.

And once he is firmly and irretrievably spitted, the light lifts him like a speared fish and hauls him toward the window. He cringes in fear as he sees the glass rushing toward him. He raises his arms across his face and howls as he hits the glass ... but his wail fades as he passes through it, leaving both window and flesh unscathed.

He's afraid—shit, he's one absofuckinglutely terrified little boy who wants to go home to Mama—but he's filled with awe and wonder as well. He's not trapped in the light, he's part of it, one with it. And as he looks up he sees its intolerably bright source, a circular doorway into the blazing heart of the Cosmic Egg at zero-point-one nanoseconds before the Big Bang.

He's not drifting toward it, he's careening upward at near light speed, far beyond escape velocity. He leaves behind the moldy apple of Earth, flashes past the moon, and hurtles through interplanetary space, past Mars, straight through the tumbling asteroid obstacle course, and on toward the red-eyed beach ball of Jupiter.

But Jim doesn't reach Jupiter. He's drawn into a huge saucer-shaped mothership hovering off Io. He flashes through the searingly bright portal. His universe dissolves into blinding liquid brilliance ...

When he can see again, he finds himself naked, strapped facedown upon a gleaming block of polished steel in an oblong room with mirror walls. The surface of the block is cold and hard against his bare flesh.

He is not alone in the room.

The grays are here, perhaps a dozen of them, but it's hard to tell with all the reflections off the walls. They're not quite like the drawings he's seen, but close enough. They're big-headed, small-bodied, and three to four feet tall; their hairless gray skin is wrinkled, as if they've been left in the water too long. They float through the air, whether by levitation or zero gravity, Jim can't say. Probably levitation, because those puny legs don't look strong enough to support an infant. And nothing between those legs to give any hint whether they're male or female. Long skinny fingers at the end of long skinny arms, big, lidless slanty black eyes over a rudimentary nose and a slit mouth.

The wonder is gone, leaving only the terror. Jim feels something warm and wet pooling around his pelvis as his bladder cuts loose.

His voice echoes off the shiny walls as he cries out—inanely—in dread. "Who are you? What do you want?"

He knows damn well who they are. And he's afraid he'll have the answer to the second question long before he wants it.

None of the aliens pauses or even looks his way. They float on, going about their business as if he were a fixture.

Suddenly something cold is thrust between his buttocks, and a whirling searing pain shoots into his rectum. As Jim screams, a gray floats into view and hovers near his head. Nothing in those black eyes as they stare down at him. The gray lifts something in its hand: a slender instrument with a thin, needle-like probe attached to its tip. The alien extends it toward Jim's face, taking dead aim at one of his nostrils.

Jim screams again, writhing and twisting frantically within his restraints.

No! Please! Not a mind-control probe! Anything but that!

But he's utterly helpless, a test animal in a vivisection clinic. He can't even turn his head. All he can do is watch in crosseyed horror as the probe enters his left nostril. But instead of a stab of pain in his nose, Jim feels a sharp blow to the side of his head—

"What the fuck?"

He was on the floor of his hotel room, mummied in his sheets, his left temple throbbing with pain.

Damn, that hurts.

He wriggled an arm free and rubbed the spot, then reached out and felt the corner of the night table, inches away.

Must have fallen out of bed.

He unwound himself from the sheets and crawled back up on the mattress.

Kee-rist, another wild-ass dream.

He glanced at the clock: 4:32. Same time as last night. What was going on here?

He lay back, sweaty and trembling. Awfully fucking real, that dream. How could he be sure it was a dream? He felt his nose—no tenderness there.

And yet ...

James Zaleski lay in the dark, trembling, staring at the shadows on the ceiling, afraid to go back to sleep.

Miles ...

... awakens with a start to the sound of gunfire.

A dream, or real? And where did it come from?

Another burst of automatic fire—from the hall.

Miles leaps out of bed, pulls open the night table drawer, and reaches inside for his .45.

Gone! Panic nibbles at his entrails as he runs frantic fingers over the entire interior of the drawer—except for the Gideon Bible, it's empty.

Leaving the lights off he feels his way to his suitcase where he always carries a spare. But that's gone too. Miles jumps at the sound of an accented voice behind him.

"Don't waste your time, Kenway."

The lights go on and he sees a man in full military battle gear, all in black except for his pale blue helmet. He looks Japanese or Chinese, or maybe even Vietnamese.

"Who the hell are you?"

Miles knows full well who he is—not his name, but who sent him. He recognizes the uniform, and cold dread seeps through his soul. It's finally happened—the New World Order has begun its takeover.

"Your new master," the trooper says. He's pointing an AK-47 at Miles's gut. "Out into the hall."

Miles looks down at his undershirt and boxer shorts. "At least let me get—"

Without warning, the automatic rifle bursts to life. Miles cringes as it stitches a row of holes across the wall of the room.

"Move!"

Miles moves. Barefooted, he raises his hands above his head and pads toward the door. His heart thuds against his chest wall like a mailed fist. Where are they taking him? To a mass execution area? Or to a detention camp? Better a quick death here than a slow death in a camp.

With that thought powering him, he lowers his hands and grabs the doorknob. He pretends it won't turn.

"Something's wrong," he says. "It's locked."

The NWO trooper shoves the stock of his rife against Miles's back and barks: "Open it!"

"It won't turn, I tell you."

The trooper shoves him again and reaches past him ... and that leaves only one hand on the rifle.

Do I have the guts to do this? Miles wonders. His bladder feels ready to explode and he's got so much adrenaline flowing through him now he feels like he's floating. Do I?

Guts or not, this may be his only chance, so that leaves him no choice.

Miles twists and drives his right elbow into the trooper's throat as he grabs the AK-47. The trooper lets out a strangled cough and staggers back, clutching at his throat. Miles knees him in the balls as he gets a two-handed grip on the rifle and rips it free. Without hesitation he aims and fires a short burst. The rifle kicks and bucks and blows the bastard through the window onto the street below.

Miles stares at the ragged hole in the glass. Jesus, he did it! All that training paid off! He blew the son of a bitch away!

Suddenly the remaining glass is shattered by a barrage from below. Miles turns, ducks, and dives for the door. They'll be after him now. No time to get dressed. He runs out into the hall and automatically turns toward the elevators. He stops. No. Too easy to trap him there. He whirls and runs for the stairs.

As he reaches the door he hears a commotion behind him. He looks back and sees a squad of NWO troopers rush out of the elevator foyer.

"Damn!" he whispers and pushes through into the stairwell.

He starts down but hears the sound of running feet echoing from below. He's got only one option now, and since there's only one floor above him, that doesn't leave him far to go.

He bounds up four flights to a red door. The sign says:

FOR EMERGENCY ONLY ALARM WILL SOUND

He pushes through and, just as promised, the alarm starts ringing. And now he's on the roof and he knows it's Alamo time. He won't get out of this alive, but he'll take as many of the bastards as he can with him before he dies.

The oblivious city is lit up around him. In how many other buildings is this same scene being played out?

He finds an air conditioning vent and crouches behind it, points the AK-47 at the door, and waits.

Suddenly a nylon rope whips around his upper body and tightens like a noose, pinning his arms at his sides. He drops the rifle as he is yanked off his feet and into the air.

He looks above and sees a giant black helicopter reeling him in like a cheap toy in an arcade game. Why can't he hear it? Why doesn't he feel the wash from its rotating blades?

Rough hands haul him into the black maw in the side of the craft. As the rope is loosened and pulled over his head, an accented voice, much like that of the trooper he killed, whispers in his ear.

"We've been looking for you. You're too valuable to kill, so we've got a special spot reserved in one of the re-education camps. You'll make a fine addition to one of our units."

No! He won't be brainwashed!

Miles kicks out and leaps from the helicopter. Death first!

But a hand grabs the back of his shirt, and a different voice, a very American voice, starts shouting ...

"Easy, now. Easy. You don't want to hurt yourself." Miles looked down and saw the street eight stories below. With a cry of alarm, he turned and lurched away——into the arms of a large black man in some sort of uniform.

"Hey, now, that's better!"

It took Miles a second to recognize him as a hotel security guard.

"Where am I? He said, shakily pulling free of the guard's grasp.

"Up on the roof."

"How—how'd I get here?"

"Sleepwalking, I think. You sure didn't look completely awake when you passed me in the hall a few minutes ago. And since it's my job to be on the lookout for things like people wandering around dressed in their skivvies at four-thirty in the morning, I decided to follow you. Good thing I did or you'd be splattered on the sidewalk by now."

Miles shuddered. "But I never sleepwalk."

"Well, you did tonight. Come on," he said, gesturing toward the door to the stairs. "Let's get you back to your room."

Shakily, Miles led the way.

"We don't have to tell anyone about this do we?"

"I'll have to put it in my report," the guard said, "but it won't go beyond that."

"Good," Miles said, relieved. "Thank you. I have a reputation to uphold in this organization."

"I hear you. It's just a good thing I was upholding your ass a few moments ago or you wouldn't be worrying about your reputation or anything else."

The guard laughed good-naturedly. Miles saw nothing funny about it.

Jack ...

... feels his bed move and opens his eyes.

His eyes search for the clock's red numerals and can't find them. The room is dark ... too dark. Light from the street lamps below usually leaks around the edges of the drapes, but not now. A sound leaks through instead ... a deep basso rumble shuddering through the floor and walls.

His bed trembles as the rumble grows, mixing with frightened cries and wails from outside.

Jack rises and pads across the vibrating floor to the window where he pulls back the drapes. The moon is high and full in a pristine sky, bathing the world outside with glacial light. The street is clogged with crawling cars and frantic people screaming, running, clawing over each other in a scene out of every giant monster film ever made. It's The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms times ten, but this is no movie; this is real. Even up here on the fifth floor he can smell the raw-edged panic as the mob struggles downhill, west, toward the river. He scans his limited view to the east to see what's driving them. All he can tell is that the rest of the city is dark.

Power failure, he thinks, and then blinks. An icy phantom breeze ripples his nape hairs as he cups his hands around his eyes and squints through the glass ... it's too dark. Even with the power gone and the lights out, the moonlight should pick up something.

Jack slides the window back and pokes his head through the opening for a better look. If nothing else, the metallic top of the Empire State Building should be visible. But the sky is empty there, stars twinkle where buildings stood.

And that rumble, growing ever louder, deafening now, jittering the entire building on its foundation.

And then, still staring east, Jack sees an office building tilt, then fall away, disappearing behind the structure before it. And now that building is collapsing, and then the one in front of it follows, a wave of destruction coming his way.

Jack is about to pull his head inside and run downstairs to join the crowd below when he sees it, moving inexorably along the street at the speed of a brisk walk, devouring everything in its path. Not a ravaging behemoth from another age, something much simpler and much, much worse.

A hole ... so wide the moonlight can't find its far edge, so deep Jack can't hear the buildings hit bottom when they tumble into its ever-expanding maw. If the world were flat, a dirt pancake floating in space, and its edge began to crumble and fall away, this is what it would be like on that edge.

Part of Jack is saying this is a dream, it has to be, but another part is saying you wish it was a dream: this is too real to be a dream. Either way, he knows he can't escape, knows the hole will swallow the hotel well before he reaches the lobby. So he watches in fascinated dread as Hell's Kitchen crumbles and disappears into the approaching edge of infinity. Panic reigns supreme below as the marching rim undermines the pavement, sending cars and screaming bodies tumbling into the void, but Jack feels an unnatural calm. Gia and Vicky are already gone, swallowed with the rest of the East Side; soon he will be following them and there is nothing he can do about it, nothing he cares to do about it.

The rim is almost to the hotel now. Jack grabs a chair and uses it to smash the window. Then he climbs out onto the ledge and strains to see into the depths, but the bottom is lost in midnight shadow. He feels the building shudder and tilt to a crazy angle. As the hotel leans, poised on the rim, Jack leaps from the ledge. If he's going to fall, he'll fall his way.

He swan-dives into the abyss ...

And hears a loud crash! It's not the hotel ... it's something else ... something smaller ... closer ...

Jack blinked in the darkness. Not complete darkness. The glowing red numerals on the clock read 4:33; light from the street filtered around the drapes. No cosmic rumble or sound of mass panic in the street outside.

He let out a deep breath. Another nightmare. But what was that noise? Sounded like it had come from—

"Aw, no."

Grabbing his pistol from under the pillow, he jumped out of bed and crept toward the bathroom. The only light at this end of the room was a narrow strip from the hallway leaking past the bottom edge of the door. The bathroom was dark ... and the cold air flowing from it chilled his feet.

"Not again."

He reached in and turned on the light. Squinting in the glare, he saw the first crate under the sink where he'd left it. But now a new box of the same dark green material, smoking like dry ice, sat in the middle of the floor.

Jack checked the room door. This time he'd leaned the desk chair under the doorknob before hitting the sack. The chair was still in the wedged position.

Back to the bathroom: the second box had obviously arrived by the same route as the first. Which was ... how?

He stepped back to the desk and retrieved a hotel pen from beside the phone, then used that to flip off this crate's lid.

No mini girders this time. The new crate was filled with curved metal plates and copper spheres, all collecting a rime of frost as moisture from the air condensed and froze on their surfaces. He checked out the underside of the lid and saw more construction plans—an exploded diagram of whatever it was, plus an illustration of the completed structure: Looked like an oil rig with a warty dome on top. As before, the directions appeared to have been seared into the material of the lid. He even thought he saw something that looked like lettering in one corner, but couldn't decipher it through the thickening layer of frost. He could check that out later. Right now ...

Jack shivered—with cold as well as uneasiness. It was damn near freezing in here. He turned off the light and closed the bathroom door behind him.

He checked the clock again: 4:35 A.M. This second crate had arrived about the same time as the first. What was all this? Some weird equivalent of the "interociter" from This Island Earth? Was that it? Was he supposed to assemble the damn thing?

"Don't hold your breath, whoever you are," he muttered as he sat on the bed.

Jack had a bad feeling about that gizmo in there, a sense that putting it together might not be such a good idea. But even if he were gung-ho to do the Erector Set thing with it, he didn't have any tools with him.

He wondered if Lew had come back to the hotel. Wouldn't hurt to get his input. Maybe he'd seen something like this before.

An ungodly hour to get a call, but so what? Lew had got him into this. He rang Lew's room but no answer.

Still out in Shoreham, he guessed. It could wait till morning.

Jack got back under the covers but knew he wouldn't sleep. He tried not to think of those crates or the dream ... a giant hole again, sucking him down. Why did it feel more like a premonition than a dream?

His thoughts drifted to Ceil Castleman and the lost, utterly crushed look in her eyes as he'd led her to the closet. And that called up another vision—Lewis Ehler, who seemed rudderless without his missing Melanie.

He lay still, thinking about lost souls as daylight grew beyond the pulled curtains.

Roma ...

"Once again we come up empty-handed," Mauricio said from his place on the basement shelf.

Roma saw no need to acknowledge the obvious. He had a sinking feeling as to where the second delivery had come to rest.

"What I do not understand is why. Why is the Otherness directing the components elsewhere?"

"Maybe the stranger has found a way to influence the Otherness?"

Roma snorted in derision. "That man, controlling the Otherness? I hardly think so."

"But what other explanation is there?" Mauricio said, rising and pacing along the shelf. "You are The One. The device is for your use. Why would the Otherness direct it to anyone else? Unless ... "

"Unless?"

"Never mind. It was a fleeting, ridiculous thought."

"Say it."

"Very well: Unless you are not The One."

The words staggered Roma. His terror-clenched jaw blocked speech. He locked his knees to keep from sagging. Not The One? Unthinkable! He had been preparing for ages! It could be no one else. There was no one else!

"You can see why I might think that," Mauricio said quickly. "After being prevented from killing the stranger, I had to wonder: Could he be The One? But of course that is impossible. I would not have been sent to you if you were not The One. The stranger has been marked by the Otherness, but he is not The One."

Mauricio was right. He had to be. The Otherness was not capricious. It was infinitely patient and glacially deliberate. It would not suddenly designate another over him without sufficient cause. And he had given it no cause.

Roma felt his muscles relax as the terror oozed away. Still, it left him feeling strangely weak.

"I believe the Otherness has plans for the stranger. In good time we will know. If it has delivered the device to him, it is no doubt for a good reason. We will not interfere."

"Your faith is admirable," Mauricio said. "But the Otherness is not infallible. It has made mistakes before, as you well know."

Roma nodded. "Mostly by underestimating the opposition." And he had often paid the price for those mistakes. "But these are different times. The opposition is all but non-existent these days."

"Let us hope you are right," Mauricio said.

Yes, Roma thought with a sharp pang of uneasiness. Let us fervently hope so.

1

Still a little shaky and unsettled from the night before, Jack balanced his cup of coffee atop the lobby pay phone and dialed Gia. Everything was fine there. No signs of anyone lurking about. That was a relief. Next he checked his voice mail. Only one call and—cheers—not from his father. Oscar Schaffer had left him a terse message.

"I've got the rest of your money. Just tell me where you want me to drop it."

Jack dialed the number and Schaffer picked up.

"Good morning. It's Jack."

"Oh. Where do you want me leave the money?"

And a gracious good morning to you too, Jack thought, wondering at Schaffer's tight, brusque tone. Go back to bed and get up on the other side.

"Drop it off at Julio's this morning. What's the story with—?"

"You going to be there?"

"Probably not."

"Good. 'Cause I don't even want to be in the same building as you, you sick, perverted bastard. I'll drop off your money, and then I don't want to see or hear or even think of you again!"

And then he hung up.

What's his problem? Jack wondered as he cradled the receiver. Schaffer should be one happy guy this morning. His sicko brother-in-law was in the hospital by now, and his sister was on vacation from her job as part-time punching bag.

Jack got a sour feeling in his stomach. Had Gus come to and managed to hurt Ceil worse than he had before? Jack couldn't see how—not with two broken legs. Had to be something else. He decided to hang out at Julio's this morning and find out firsthand what was bugging Oscar Schaffer.

He was almost to the lobby door when a familiar gangly figure limped through.

Lew. Jeez, he'd almost forgotten about him. Sometimes Jack became so immersed in a job that he lost sight of why he'd got involved in the first place. This missing Melanie thing wasn't the first gig that had taken on a life of its own, engulfing and carrying him along.

Lew looked terrible—pale, bags under his eyes, clothes wrinkled enough to look like he'd slept in them, except Jack had a feeling the guy wasn't sleeping much. Or showering much either: He needed a shave and his presence wasn't exactly a breath of fresh air.

"Lew. I thought you were out on the island."

Lew blinked heavy-lidded, red-rimmed eyes as he focused on Jack.

"I just got back. I stayed up all night out there, sitting in front of the TV, and then first thing this morning I was overcome with this feeling that I shouldn't be there. I should be ... " His voice trailed off, followed by his gaze, settling somewhere over Jack's right shoulder.

"Should be where, Lew?"

He shrugged, still staring at some far corner of the ceiling. "I don't know. Somewhere else. So I came here." He focused on Jack again. "Any progress? Any news?"

Yeah, Jack thought. Something tried to kill me. But the call luring him to the basement yesterday had mentioned Olive instead of Melanie, so maybe there was no connection.

On the other hand, someone else had mentioned Melanie's name.

"Well," Jack said, "I discovered last night that I'm not the only one looking for Melanie."

Lew blinked and straightened. "Who? Who's looking for her?"

Jack told him about his run-in with the black-clad men in the black Lincoln.

"Men in black," Lew said, rubbing a hand over his rubbery features. "Everybody's heard of them, but ... despite all the stories, I've never believed they were real. Maybe these were just guys dressed up and trying to scare you."

"Maybe. But I'll tell you this, if they were just hired meat, they were good actors; and if they were just actors, they were pretty damn tough meat. And they weren't trying to scare me off; they wanted to know where she was." He changed his tone to imitate the voice from last night. '"Where is Melanie Rubin Ehler?'"

Lew stiffened. "'Melanie Rubin Ehler?' They said that? They used her maiden name?"

"Every time. Something wrong with that?"

"I don't know about wrong, but it's certainly odd. Melanie never used her maiden name. She hardly ever used a middle initial."

"Well, whoever they were," Jack said, trying to boost Lew's spirits, "at least they think she's still alive—and findable."

He brightened. "Hey, that's right. That's right. Jack, I think you just made my day."

"Great, Lew. Why don't you go to your room and crash for awhile. You look dead on your feet."

"I think I'll do just that."

Jack watched Lew limp off, and couldn't help thinking of the other husband he'd dealt with in the past twenty-four hours. Could any two people be more different? Maybe someday Ceil would find herself a Lew to help her forget Gus.

As he was turning toward the door, Jack caught Roma staring at him from the other end of the lobby. Roma raised his hand, and for an instant Jack thought he was going to wave. But no—he made that three-fingered clawing gesture again.

Jack was tempted to make a gesture of his own, a more economical one employing only a single digit, but thought better of it. Instead, he held Roma's dark gaze until the monkey jumped up on his shoulder and added his own stare to his master's.

That was enough for Jack.

Later, Roma, he thought as he turned and pushed through the revolving door. We're not finished yet.

2

Roma watched the stranger leave, wondering where he was headed with such purpose at this early hour.

"Why did you do that?" Mauricio whispered when no one was looking.

"I wanted to rattle his cage, as they say."

"To what end?"

"To keep him off balance until we know the part he plays in this. Did you check his room?"

"As we assumed: the rest of the device is there."

Roma had expected this, would in fact have been shocked if Mauricio had reported otherwise, yet still it elicited a pang of dismay in his gut. Why, why, why?

"Undamaged?"

"Yes, but still, I am worried."

"No need to be," Roma said, forcing a casual tone. "As I told you, he knows nothing of the Otherness. And yet the Otherness seems to want him involved. Else why deliver the device to him—and protect him from you? No, my friend. We must watch carefully and see how this plays out ... before another sunrise we will know what part this stranger is to play."

Mauricio growled his dissatisfaction, then said, "By the way, I ran into Frayne Ganfield this morning. He's looking for you. Says he has something important to tell you."

"That despicable little hybrid always thinks he has something important to tell me. He will have to wait. I have better things to do than listen to his prattle."

Much more important, Roma thought, feeling his excitement grow. Less than twenty-four hours until his hour came round. He needed solitude. The growing anticipation made further human contact almost unbearable.

3

Jack was on his second coffee in Julio's when he spotted Schaffer through the front window. He was moving fast, no doubt as close to a run as his portly frame would allow. Jack had told Julio that Schaffer was coming and to do the usual interception, but tell him Jack wanted a word with him.

Schaffer entered clutching a white envelope. Perspiration gleamed on his pale forehead. His expression was strained. Here was one very upset real estate developer. He handed Julio the envelope; after they exchanged a few words, Schaffer glanced around like a rabbit who'd just been told there was a fox in the room, spotted Jack, and bolted out the door.

Jack got up and started after him. He passed Julio along the way.

Julio was grinning as he handed Jack the envelope. "What you do to spook him like that?"

Jack grabbed the envelope and kept moving. "Don't know, but I'm going to find out."

Out on the sidewalk, where spring was reasserting herself, he stopped and scanned the area. Quiet and sunny this morning, almost deserted. New York City is a different town on weekend mornings. Cabs never completely disappear, but only a few are on the prowl. No commuters, and the natives are sleeping in. Most of them, anyway. To his left, a guy stood with a pooper scooper in one hand and a leash in the other, waiting patiently while his dachshund relieved himself in the gutter. Far down to his right a young guy in a white apron was hosing last night off the sidewalk in front of a pizza shop.

But where the hell was Schaffer?

There—across the street off to his left, a bustling portly form hurrying away. Jack caught the developer as he was opening the door to his Jaguar.

"What's going on?" Jack said.

Schaffer jumped at the sound of Jack's voice. His already white face went two shades paler.

"Get away from me!"

He jumped into the car but Jack caught the door before he could slam it. He pulled the keys from Schaffer's trembling fingers.

"I think we'd better talk. Unlock the doors."

Jack went around to the other side and slipped into the passenger seat. He tossed the keys back to Schaffer.

"All right. What's going on? The job's done. The guy's fixed. You didn't need an alibi because it was done by a prowler. What's your problem?"

Schaffer stared straight ahead through the windshield.

"How could you? I was so impressed with you the other day. The rogue with a code: 'Sometimes I make a mistake. If that happens, I like to be able to go back and fix it.' I really thought you were something else. I actually envied you. I never dreamed you could do what you did. Gus was a rotten son of a bitch, but you didn't have to ... " His voice trailed off.

Jack was baffled.

"You were the one who wanted him killed. I only broke his legs."

Schaffer turned to him, the fear in his eyes giving way to fury.

"Who do you think you're kidding? You really think I wouldn't find out?" He pulled a couple of folded sheets of paper from this pocket and tossed them at Jack. "I've read the medical examiner's preliminary notes!"

"Medical examiner? He's dead?" Clammy shock wormed through him. Dead hadn't been in the plan. "How?"

"As if you don't know! Gus was a scumbag and yes I wanted him dead, but I didn't want him tortured! I didn't want him ... mutilated!"

Confused, Jack scanned the notes. They described a man who'd been beaten, bludgeoned, bound by the hands, and had both tibias broken; then he'd been tortured and sexually mutilated with a Ginsu knife from his own kitchen before dying of shock due to blood loss from a severed carotid artery.

"It'll be in all the afternoon papers," Schaffer was saying. "You can add the clippings to your collection. I'm sure you've got a big one."

Jack squeezed his eyes shut for a few heartbeats, and reread the second half of the notes. His first reaction was relief of sorts—he hadn't killed Gus. Then he thought of Olive's mutilated body. A connection? No, this seemed different. Olive's mutilation had been almost ritualistic, Gus's sounded far more personal, a revenge thing, fueled by boundless rage and betrayal.

Jack tossed the report onto Schaffer's lap and leaned back. He lowered the window. He felt the need for some air.

Finally he looked at Schaffer. "How'd you get those notes? Are they the real thing?"

"Who do you think you're dealing with? Half the new construction in Queens is mine! I got connections!"

"And where was Ceil supposed to be when all this"—Jack waved the notes—"was happening?"

"Where you left her—locked in the hall closet. She got out after she heard you leave. And to think she had to find Gus like that. Poor Ceil ... no one should have to see something like that. Especially her. She's been through enough." He slammed his fist against the Jag's mahogany steering wheel. "If I could make you pay—"

"When did she phone the cops?"

"Don't worry about the cops. I paid you and that puts me in this as deep as you, so I won't be saying anything."

Jack was getting a little tired of Oscar Schaffer. "Answer me, dammit. When did she call the cops?"

"Right before calling me—around three A.M."

Jack shook his head. "Wow. Three hours ... she spent more than three hours on him."

"She? She who?"

"Your sister."

"Ceil? What the hell are you talking about?"

"When I left their house last night, Gus was on the living room floor, trussed up with two broken legs—out cold, but very much alive."

"Bullshit!"

Jack gave him a cold stare. "Why should I lie? As you said, you're not going to dime me. And someday when you have time you should try to imagine how little I care what you think of me. So think hard about it, Oscar: why should I lie?"

Schaffer opened his mouth, then closed it again.

"I left Gus alive," Jack said. "When I was through with him, I opened the door to the closet where I'd put your sister, and took off. That was a little while before midnight."

"No," he said, but there was no force behind it. "You've got to be lying. You're saying Ceil—" He swallowed. "She wouldn't ... she couldn't. Besides, she called me at three, from a neighbor's house, she'd only gotten free—"

"Three hours. Three hours between the time I opened the closet door and the time she called you."

"No! Not Ceil! She ... "

He stared at Jack, and Jack met his gaze evenly.

"She had Gus all to herself after I left."

Slowly, like a dark stain seeping through heavy fabric, the truth took hold in Schaffer's eyes.

"Oh ... my ... God!"

He leaned his forehead against the steering wheel and closed his eyes. He looked like he was going to be sick. Jack gave him a few minutes.

"The other day you said she needed help. Now she really needs it."

"Poor Ceil!"

"Yeah. I don't pretend to understand it, but I guess she was willing to put up with anything from a man who said he loved her. But when she found out he didn't—and believe me, he let her know in no uncertain terms before he pulled the trigger on her."

"Trigger? What—?"

"A long story. Ceil can tell you about it. But I guess when she found out how much he hated her, how he'd wanted her dead all these years, when she saw him ready to murder her, something must have snapped inside. When she came out of the closet and found him helpless on the living room floor ... I guess she just went a little crazy."

"A little crazy? You call what she did to Gus a little crazy?"

Jack shrugged and opened the car door.

"Your sister crammed ten years of payback into three hours. She's going to need a lot of help to recover from those ten years. And those three hours."

Schaffer pounded his steering wheel again. "Shit! Shit! Shit! It wasn't supposed to turn out like this!"

Jack got out and slammed the door. Schaffer leaned over the passenger and looked up at him though the open window.

"I guess things don't always go according to plan in your business."

"Hardly ever," Jack said.

"I gotta get back to Ceil."

Jack listened to the Jag's engine roar to life. As it screeched away, he headed for Abe's.

4

"Occam's what?"

"Occam's Razor," Abe said.

Jack had picked up half a dozen raisin bran muffins along the way. He'd also brought a tub of Smart Balance margarine in a separate bag. Abe had spread the sports section of the morning's Times on the counter and the two of them were cutting up their muffins. Parabellum hopped about, policing the crumbs.

"Kind of flaky, these muffins," Abe said. "They fresh?"

"Baked this morning." Jack didn't want to tell him they were low fat.

"Anyway, Occam's Razor is named after William of Occam, one of the world's great skeptics. And he was a skeptic back in the fourteenth century when it could be very unhealthy to be a skeptic. Such a skeptic he was, one of the popes wanted his head. Occam's Razor is something your friends in that chowder club—"

"SESOUP," Jack said.

"Whatever—it's something everyone of them should memorize by heart, and then take to heart."

"How do you memorize a razor?" Jack said.

Abe stopped sawing at the muffin and stared at him. He raised the knife in his hand.

"Occam's Razor is not a cutting instrument. It's an aphorism. And it says, 'Entities ought not to be multiplied without necessity.'"

"Oh, well, I'm sure that will make everything clear to them. Just tell them, 'Necessity cannot be multiplied unless you're an entity,' or whatever you said, and all talk about antichrists and aliens and New World Orders and Otherness will be a thing of the past."

"Why do I bother?" Abe sighed, glancing heavenward. "Listen carefully to the alternate translation. 'It is vain to do with more what can be done with fewer."

"Fewer what?"

"Assumptions. If you've got two or more possible solutions or explanations for a problem, the simplest, most direct one, the one that requires the fewest assumptions, tends to be correct one."

"The shortest distance between two points, in other words."

"Something like that. Let me illustrate: You and I are walking down a country road in Connecticut, and all of a sudden we hear lots of hoofbeats around the bend. When we reach the bend, however, whatever was making those hoofbeats is now out of sight, so we must make assumptions on what they could have been. What's the most logical assumption?"

Jack shrugged. "A horse, of course. What else?"

"What else, indeed. But I bet that some of your friends in Paella—"

"SESOUP."

"Whatever—would probably imagine a herd of zebras of wildebeests, am I right?"

"Or UN invaders on horseback ... or hoofed aliens ... or the legions of hell ... "

"That far out we won't go," Abe said. He'd finished slicing his muffin in half and was reaching for the bag with the margarine. "Wildebeests will serve fine. But you see my point? We're in the country in Connecticut where a lot of people keep horses. I should expect wildebeests? No. Horses require very few assumptions.

Wildebeests, however, require assumptions like someone has been importing the creatures and keeping their existence secret—I don't know about you, but I haven't seen any stories in the paper about a black market in wildebeests. So Occam's Razor demands we assume, until proven otherwise, that the noise was made by horses and—"

Abe had pulled the Smart Balance from the bag and was staring at it like a wino contemplating a bottle of O'Doul's.

"What on earth is this?

"It's a kind of margarine."

"Margarine? So? What happened to my Philly? Or my nicely salted Land o' Lakes?"

"This is supposed to be good for your heart."

Outwardly Jack remained casual, but inwardly he cringed, waiting for the explosion. This was sacred ground. Not counting a few friends like Jack, Abe didn't have a hell of a lot in his life beyond his business and his food.

Yeah, he had every right to eat himself into an early grave, but Jack had just as much a right to refuse to shorten that trip.

"My heart? Who should be worried about my heart?"

"You," Jack said.

"And I suppose this is a low-fat muffin?"

"No fat, actually."

Abe looked at him, his face reddening. "Since when do you worry about my heart for me?" Before Jack could answer, he added, "Maybe I should worry about my heart, and you should worry about yours."

"That would be fine if you seemed to give a damn, but—"

"So now my doctor you've become?"

"No," Jack said levelly. He was acutely uncomfortable with this role, but wasn't going to back down. "Just your friend. One who wants you around for a long time."

Abe stared down at the Smart Balance, and Jack waited for him to toss it across the store. But Abe surprised him. He flipped the lid, peeled back the seal, and dug his knife into the yellow contents.

"Well," he said with a sigh. "Since there's nothing else ... "

Jack felt his throat tighten as he watched Abe spread a glob on the muffin. He reached across the counter and clapped Abe on the shoulder.

"Thanks, Abe."

"You should be thanking me? For what? For poisoning myself maybe? Probably full of artificial ingredients. Long dead and in the grave I'll be from chemical preservatives and toxic dyes before my cholesterol even knows I'm gone."

He bit into his muffin, chewed thoughtfully for a moment, then swallowed. He picked up the container and stared at it.

"This I hate to say, but ... not bad."

"Keep this up," Jack said, "and maybe someday you'll die of nothing too."

They finished their muffins in silence.

"Nu?" Abe said finally. "You next look where for this missing lady?"

"That's the million-dollar question. I get dizzy and disoriented whenever I talk to these people. They've got an elaborate answer for everything except where Melanie Ehler might be." He shook his head. "Isn't life complicated enough without seeing a conspiracy behind everything? I mean, why is everybody so into conspiracies lately?"

"Lately?" Abe said. "What's lately about it? Conspiracy theories have been with us since humans could organize thought. What were the first religions but conspiracy theories."

"You mean like Olive's Satan and the Antichrist conspiring to take over America?"

"No. Long, long before the Bible was dreamt up. Cavemen I'm talking. Hut dwellers. Gods were created to make sense of the seeming randomness of nature and everyday life. Why did the lightning spare the tall tree but strike my hut and kill my wife and children? Why did it not rain during the growing season, and then pour after the meager harvest? Why was my child stillborn? Powerful supernatural beings explain it all very nicely, so early humans created a pantheon of cosmic kibitzers—a god of thunder, a god of trees, a god of wine, one for each aspect of the world that affected them—and imagined them conspiring against humanity. You think these Finnan Haddie people—"

"SESOUP."

"Whatever—you think their conspiracies are elaborate? Feh! Look at the old mythologies—Babylonian, Greek, Roman, Norse—so rife with divine plots, either against each other or against humans, your head will spin."

Jack nodded, remembering tales from Bullfinch's in high school. "The Trojan War, for instance."

"Right. Gods conspiring with gods, gods conspiring with humans, such a mess. But no matter how many entities we humans created, the purpose was the same: When something went wrong, we had an explanation. Bad things happened because a certain good deity was angry or displeased, or an evil deity was at work. We might be at the mercy of these entities, but at least we've ordered the randomness, we've appended a name to the darkness, we've created symmetry from chaos."

"Sort of like the old fairy tale thing that if you know someone's name you can control them."

"Control is the key. Once we identified the deity, we tried to control it—sacrifices, chants, dances, rituals anything you could dream up was tried. And sometimes certain actions did appear to work. If slaughtering a lamb at the vernal equinox seemed to convince the deity to bring rain for the growing season—or stop the recurrent floods that were plaguing the area—suddenly a lamb was not such a healthy thing to be."

"But dead lambs have no effect on El Nino."

"They can seem to if the timing is right. And I'm sure knowledge of El Nino would have done wonders for the lamb population. Still, we now have to wonder what causes El Nino."

"UFO exhaust," Jack said. "I have it on good authority."

"Then someone should inspect those things. Fit them with catalytic converters, at the very least."

"Could also be CIA solar mirrors."

"The CIA," Abe said, shaking his head. "I should have known. But the point is, the effect of thousands of years of accumulated knowledge is a general pushing back of the darkness. As we discover more and more non-supernatural explanations for the formerly inexplicable, the gods and demons recede. The magic goes away. But—a certain amount of randomness remains."

"Shit still happens."

"How eloquent you are today."

Jack shrugged. "It's a gift."

"I envy you. But as you say, shit does indeed still happen. So, people who don't use Occam's Razor tend to go two ways. Some drop into denial and reject all our centuries of rational and scientific evidence; they seek shelter in orthodoxy and cling to potty beliefs like creationism."

"Some of them must belong to SESOUP. I saw a flyer about a book exposing 'the Evolution Hoax.'"

"With Darwin as the chief conspirator, I'm sure. But if you're Occam-impaired and choose to keep your head out of the sand, you must come up with new brief systems to explain what's wrong with your world and who's pulling the strings attached to your life. For half a century international communism was such a wonderful bad guy, but when the USSR went kaput it left a huge vacuum that had to be filled—because we all know there's something in those shadows. King and the Kennedy brothers weren't killed by lone meshuggeners, the changes in family life and society aren't part of long processes—they're all part of a plan. The result is that fringe groups, with the help of a jaded, sensation-hungry public and accommodating mass media, get main-streamed. We find comfort in the wackiness."

"I don't know," Jack said. "Aliens, antichrists, New World Orders ... that's comforting?"

"For lots of people, most certainly yes. There's a certain comfort in being able to point a finger and say 'That's why,' in being able to explain events, no matter how scary the explanation. If the cause is a conspiracy, then it can be identified, it can be broken up, and the world will be on track again."

"Which brings us back to control. You know," Jack said, remembering his conversations with various SESOUPers, "the fear of mind control seems to play a big part in all their theories."

"And shadow governments. A shadow government you need, subverting the will of the electorate in order to implement mind control."

"Yeah. Olive worried about the 666 chip, Zaleski talked about mind-control devices implanted by aliens, and Kenway went on about the CIA's mind control programs."

"That you should lose control over your thoughts and actions is a terrible fear. You would think about things that frighten you, you could injure or hurt people you love."

"Start talking about mind control and I start thinking about Dirty Eddie," Jack said, referring to a homeless guy of indeterminate age and race who used to wander Columbus Avenue.

Abe smiled. "Eddie ... where is he these days? Haven't seen him for a year at least."

"Me neither, but you remember the aluminum foil cap he used to wear? Told me it was to keep out the voices that kept telling him to do things."

"I'm sure any conspiracy theory has its paranoid schiz mavens; that sort of stuff is tailor-made for them. But for the rest who haven't completely broken with reality, the cult aspect is probably as important as the conspiracies themselves. Fellow True Believers form a sort of intellectual commune. Not only do you share The Truth with them, but appreciation of that common knowledge sets you apart from the workaday schlmiels who remain in the dark. You form an elite corps. Soon you're associating only with other True Believers, people who won't challenge The Truth, which in turn reinforces The Truth over and over. I'm sure no small number of people are involved for fun and profit, but the core believers are searching for something."

"Control."

"Yes ... and something else, maybe. Something they're not finding in modern society. Family, I think. Fellow believers become a family of sorts. And in this rootless, traditionless, culturally challenged society America has become, family is hard to find."

Family ... Jack thought about how violent death had hurled him on a tangential arc from his own family, how his father and sister and brother were scattered now up and down the East Coast. And he thought of how Gia and Vicky and Abe and Julio had become a new family of sorts. Anchors that kept him from drifting into a dark no-man's land.

"Yeah," he said. "I guess everybody needs a family of some sort."

"And this fish yoich group—"

"SESOUP."

"Whatever—is a sort of extended family. And like any family, they have squabbles."

"Deadly squabbles?" Jack said. "Neck-twisting, eye-gouging, lip-removing squabbles?"

Abe shrugged. "Hey. When the police find a dead body, who's the first suspect? Someone in the family. And here you're dealing with one meshugge family."

"Yeah, maybe," Jack said. "But I've got to tell you, Abe, after what's been happening, I'm starting to wonder."

"Oy, you're not serious? I'm starting to think maybe you've been hanging around these people too long."

"Something's, going on, something a lot bigger than a bunch of conspiracy nuts sitting around and trading theories. I sense it, Abe. Someone's moving around behind the scenery. I don't know if it's one of these fabled secret organizations or a government agency—"

"If it's a government agency, then you should include yourself out of this mess immediately, if not sooner. You and government weren't meant to mix. Let someone else find the missing lady."

"But I can't," Jack said, wishing he could get out, but haunted by what Melanie Ehler had told Lew.

"Why the hell not?"

"Didn't I tell you? Because only I can find her. Only I will understand."

5

Jack closed his apartment door behind him and froze. He scanned the front room as he snatched the Semmerling from his ankle holster.

Something wrong here.

He listened. No sound except the hum from the computer's CPU fan and the ticks and tocks from the various pendulum clocks—a Shmoo, Felix the Cat, Sleepy the Dwarf—on the walls. No unusual odor.

He didn't sense anyone in the apartment, yet something was not right. With his pistol against his thigh, he did a quick search of all the rooms—he knew every possible hiding place, and each was empty. All the windows were double-locked with no sign of forced entry. Times like this he wished he'd put bars on the windows; trouble was, bars worked both ways, and there might come a time when he wanted to go out one of those windows.

Jack and his fellow tenants had a mutual watchdog society and were extremely careful who they buzzed in. A four-way bar-bolt secured his door. No one was going to break it down, but as he well knew from experience, no lock was bypass-proof. No system was perfect.

Long ago he'd considered and rejected an alarm system; that would bring the police, and the last thing he wanted was a couple of cops—city or private—snooping through his place looking for an intruder.

He thought of Kenway's motion recorder and wished he had one. That would have settled the question once and for all.

Jack turned in a slow circle. He was the only one here now. And from all appearances, he was the only one who had been here since he'd locked up and left yesterday.

But he didn't put the Semmerling away. His hackles were up and his nervous system was on full alert.

Why?

He couldn't put his finger on it, but the apartment and its contents seemed subtly out of kilter, just the tiniest bit askew.

He checked his computer, the filing cabinet, riffled through the papers on his desk, did a count in the weapons cache behind the secretary. Nothing appeared to be missing, everything seemed to be just where he'd left it. He checked his shelves, still crammed with all his neat stuff. Nothing had been disturbed—

Wait. At the base of the Little Orphan Annie Ovaltine shake-up mug ... a crescent of clean wood reflecting the sunlight from the window. The rest of the shelf's lacquered surface—what little wasn't obscured by the crowded mementos—sported a down of dust. Jack had never been one to expend much energy in the housekeeping department, tending to wait until the situation reached crisis proportions, and now he was glad of it. Because that bright sliver of polished wood meant the mug had been moved.

If Jack were searching this room, he knew he'd want to know if anything was hiding in that old red domed mug. And since it sat at eye level, the only way to check would be to take it down, lift the cap, and look inside, then replace it.

No question—the mug had been moved. But by whom?

Me?

Had he adjusted the mug or looked at it when he'd bought the Daddy Warbucks lamp? After all, Daddy and Annie were connected. He couldn't remember.

Damn. If he'd known it was going to matter, he would have paid more attention at the time.

Or was all this simply his imagination? Maybe all the hours he'd been spending with the SESOUP crowd were having an effect.

Is this what it's like? he wondered. Is this how Zaleski and Kenway live, suspicious of every little inconsistency, always looking over their shoulders and under the bed?

Had somebody been here or not, dammit?

He was surprised at how rattled he was by the mere hint that the seal on his sanctum had been broken. And rage accompanied the rattle. He had to get back to the hotel, but he didn't want to leave. He wanted to hunker down in the easy chair with a scattergun across his knees and wait. Anybody came in—men in black, men in blue, men in chartreuse or paisley, Jack didn't care—they'd get bellies full of magnum double-O buck, fifteen pellets per round, one after the other.

But he had to find a missing lady ... and talk to a weird guy with a monkey.

He holstered his pistol and stepped into the bathroom. Positioning himself before the mirror, he pulled up his shirt, exposing his chest. He stared at the three ragged lines, angry red now instead of pale, running diagonally across his chest.

How could Roma possibly know about these scars?

And what was it he'd said? Something about being "marked by the Otherness."

They're not marks, Jack thought. They're ordinary scars. No big deal. I've got lots of scars. These are just part of the collection.

You are much more a part of this than you realize.

No. I'm not part of anything, especially this Otherness junk. And you're not sucking me in. I'm not like you people.

But were these scars why Melanie had said that only Repairman Jack could find her ... that only he would understand?

And he remembered something else Roma had said yesterday, just minutes before that creature had attacked him.

You would do well to take care, Mr. Shelby. You might even consider returning to your home and locking your doors for the rest of the weekend.

Had Roma known he was going to be attacked?

Too many questions ... and he could think of only one man who might be able to answer them.

Roma.

Jack tucked in his shirt and—reluctantly—left his apartment. But in the hall, after locking the door, he pulled a hair from his scalp, wet it with saliva, and stretched it across the space between the door and the jamb. After the saliva dried, it would be invisible. A crude little telltale, but very effective.

He headed back to the hotel, glancing over his shoulder all the way.

6

Jack sat on one of the benches in the common area on the second floor as various SESOUPers wandered in and out of the huckster room and the MK-ULTRA panel. He watched them smile and greet each other, laugh at an in-joke, throw a friendly arm over another's shoulder, and he thought about what Abe had said. They truly were like a family, not genetically related, maybe, but they did share a heritage of sorts. He'd bet the majority of them spent a lot of time alone, their contact for most of the year limited to newsletters and the Internet, and maybe an occasional phone call. This conference was a family gathering of sorts ... a gathering of loners, mostly.

Loners ... Jack knew the Loner family ... he was a charter member.

But one member of this particular branch was dead. Maybe two, if Melanie already shared the same fate as Olive.

"Working hard?"

Jack looked up and saw Lew Ehler standing over him.

Lew looked worse than he had this morning. Wasn't he sleeping at all!

"Sit down, Lew" Jack said, patting the spot next to him on the bench. "Want to ask you a couple of questions."

Lew wearily slumped his gangly frame onto the bench. "Have you learned anything since this morning?"

"Nothing useful."

"Sitting here daydreaming isn't going to improve that situation."

Jack gave him a raised-eyebrow look.

"Sorry," Lew said, looking away. "I'm a wreck, just a wreck. With each passing hour I become more and more convinced I'll never see her again." He bit his lip. "I'm going out of my mind."

"You were feeling better when I left you this morning."

"For a while, yes. The men in black ... I figured that's why she's missing, and why she doesn't contact me—she's hiding from them." He slumped further. "But then I started asking myself, How can I be sure? And if she is hiding, where is she hiding? I can't bear to think of her huddled somewhere alone and afraid."

Jack sensed Lew was going to puddle up again. "It may not be that bad. She may be holed up in a motel—"

"How? Using what for money? I checked our bank account and she hasn't made any ATM withdrawals. I called our credit card companies and there've been no charges on her cards. It's like she dropped off the face of the earth."

"Maybe she's with a friend," Jack offered.

"Olive, maybe?" he said, brightening just a little. "She's still missing, you know."

"I'd assumed as much," Jack said carefully.

"She still hasn't contacted anyone—just like Mel. Do you think Olive could be with Mel, maybe helping her?"

Jack debated telling him about Olive. Did Lew have a right to know? Maybe. Would it make his life any easier at the moment? After seeing the flicker of hope the mention of Olive had lit in his eyes, Jack was certain the truth would sink him.

Some other time, Jack decided.

"I don't know what to tell you about Olive," Jack said.

Not an answer, he admitted, but at least it's true.

"I keep thinking about that rope ladder in Mel's folks' basement," Lew said. "It's so bizarre ... I can't seem to get it out of my head. Don't ask me why, but I just know it has something to do with Mel's disappearance."

"All right," Jack said, grasping at anything to steer the subject away from Olive. "Maybe we'll go take another look at it."

"Now?" Lew said eagerly.

"Well, no. Not right now. I want to have a talk with Professor Roma first."

"How can he help?"

"You said he was in contact with Melanie a lot before she disappeared. Do you know if they ever met?"

"No. I'm sure they didn't. Why?"

He told Lew about his trip to Monroe yesterday, and what the librarian had said about seeing Melanie last week with a man who had a monkey on his shoulder.

Lew looked stunned. "Professor Roma?"

"Do you know anyone else with a pet monkey?"

Lew shook his head. "I don't understand."

"Neither do I. That's why I'm looking for him."

Jack looked away. He didn't mention that his interest in Roma was of a more personal nature. Sure, Roma might know something about Melanie, but that wasn't the only reason now. Jack wanted to find out how much he knew about Jack, and how he knew it.

"Don't forget Frayne Canfield while you're at it," Lew said. "He and Mel were close. They shared a bond that excluded me."

Jack looked at him now. Was that a hint of jealousy in Lew's voice?

"But I guess it's to be expected," Lew went on. "They grew up near each other in a small town, both disabled ... " He shook his head. "For a while there I suspected they might be having an affair, but ... I realized I was wrong. Mel wouldn't do that to me."

"By the way, what's wrong with his legs?"

"I don't know. I've never seen them ... but Mel has."

"How do you know?"

"Because I asked her just what you asked me. 'What's wrong with Frayne's legs?' She told me, 'You don't want to know.'"

7

Jack spent the rest of the morning and some of the early afternoon looking for Roma, but man and monkey seemed to have vanished. No one at the hotel knew his whereabouts. He tried to listen to some of the El Nino panel but found it so lame he fled after a couple of minutes. It irked him that he could have been using the time to coach Vicky on her baseball basics.

Finally he went outside in search of a phone. A sunny spring Saturday greeted him. And what did New Yorkers do when the sky was bright and the air balmy? Without lawns to mow or gardens to weed, they were free to hit the streets. And today they were hitting with a vengeance—strolling, jogging, shopping, snacking, parents pushing baby carriages, couples in shorts and sun dresses walking arm in arm or hand in hand, kids chasing each other along the sidewalks.

An abundance of navels on display, many of them pierced.

And all these pretty girls with really ugly guys ... almost as if they were dating outside their species. Then Jack wondered if people thought the same when they saw Gia with him. Probably.

The people-watching served only to make Jack long all the more to be with Gia and Vicky. But he knew that even if he'd already found Roma and finished questioning him, he'd probably be keeping to himself today.

He couldn't shake the feeling that Gia and Vicky might be safer if he stayed away.

He found a pay phone at the corner of Ninth and Fiftieth. A huge painting of the Toxic Avenger grinned at him from the side of the building half a block down the street where Troma Rims had its offices. He called Gia, cupping his hand over the buttons as he tapped in her number.

Dammit, he thought. Why don't I just become a card-carrying member of SESOUP? I'm becoming just like them.

Except I'm really being watched.

Which was no doubt how Kenway and Zaleski saw themselves too.

What next? Start getting myself X-rayed for mind-control implants?

Jack could not remember ever feeling this spooked.

"Hey, it's me," he said when Gia answered.

"You're late," she said. "Vicky's been waiting for you."

He hated the thought of disappointing Vicky. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to cancel out of baseball practice, Gia."

He heard her sigh. "You shouldn't have promised if you weren't sure you could make it."

"I was sure I could get away for a couple of hours, but ... "

"Tomorrow, then?"

"I don't think so. I—"

In the background he heard a little voice saying, "Is that Jack? Is that Jack?" And then Gia saying, "Yes, hon, and he has something to tell you."

"Hi, Jack!" Vicky said, and rattled on with her usual ebullience. "How come you're not here yet? I've had my glove on since one o'clock and it's getting all sweaty inside while I've been waiting. When are you coming?"

The image she conjured tore at his heart.

"Uh, I'm, sorry, Vicks, but I have a job that's going to keep me away for a while. I'm really sorry, but—"

"You're not coming?" she said at about half her previous volume.

"I promise I'll make it up to you," he said quickly. "We'll have a nice long practice as soon as I can get away."

"But tryouts are next week."

Please, Vicks, he thought. Please understand.

"Vicks, I'll be there for you. I won't let you down. I promise."

"Okay." She was at quarter volume now. "Bye."

Jack leaned against the phone booth's shielding and stared at the pavement. An ant was crawling along the curb. He felt low enough to challenge it to a foot race.

"Really, Jack," Gia said, her voice taking on a vague scolding tone, "is what you're doing right now so all important that you can't come by and see her?"

"It's not that. It's just that I don't like the way things are going here."

"Meaning?"

"I'm being followed."

"By whom?"

"Not sure, and that's what worries me. I don't want them to know about you and Vicks, so I'm thinking it might be best for you two if I keep my distance until this job was finished."

"Oh," she said. "And when will that be?"

"Real soon, I hope."

Another sigh. "Jack, when are you going to give this up?"

"Please, Gia. Not now. A pay phone on a crowded sidewalk in Hell's Kitchen is not where I want to discuss this."

"You never want to discuss it."

"Gia ... "

"Don't you see what this Repairman Jack stuff does? It doesn't involve just you. It affects all of us. And now you're afraid to see us because of it."

"I hate it when you're right."

That seemed to mollify her. "All right. To be continued. Please be careful, Jack."

"Always. Love you."

"Love you too."

His insides roiling, Jack hung up and stood staring at the phone. Gia was right. He should be more careful with the kinds of jobs he took. He guessed this was the price of caring, of close attachments. None of it had entered the picture in his lone wolf days when he'd done his share of rough-and-tumble gigs. But now ... what was worth disappointing Vicky—or possibly endangering her?

What irked him was that he'd been so darn choosy lately. This gig, for instance—a missing wife should have been a no-risk, no-sweat fix-it. How had everything spun so damn far out of control?

Sooner or later he was going to have to face it: He couldn't have it both ways. Some hard choices were coming.

But he couldn't think about that now.

He picked up the receiver as if he were about to make another call, then whirled—

—and startled a young woman waiting behind him.

She wore jeans and a chopped Orioles T-shirt, had buzz-cut hair, and at least a dozen rings in her left ear. She recovered quickly.

"You finished with that?"

He scanned the area to see if he could catch someone watching him.

No one ... at least no one he could see.

He handed her the phone and moved on. He wished he were done with this job. It was making him crazy.

8

Jack returned to his hotel room and hauled the crates out of the bathroom. He propped the lids against the headboard of his bed and made a stab at assembling some of the Erector Set-type struts, but soon realized the job required an extra pair of hands. He tried to decipher the scrawl in the corner of the smaller lid but it didn't make much sense.

Frustrated, he sat on the bed and stared at the two crates full of puzzle parts. He thought of Vicky. She loved puzzles. Under normal circumstances, this might have been a fun project to tackle with her, but something in his gut didn't want Vicky anywhere near these crates.

After a few more hours of haunting the conference areas, he was hungry. He couldn't bear the thought of another meal in the coffee shop, so he wandered out and found a place on Tenth called Druids. A pint of Guinness and a steak had him in a somewhat better state of mind and body by the time he returned to the hotel, He was halfway to the escalator when he saw Frayne Canfield rolling toward him across the worn carpet of the lobby. He wore a bright green shirt that, along with his red hair and beard, gave him a Christmas look.

"Have you found Sal yet?" Canfield said.

Jack tried to look barely interested. "You mean Professor Roma? Who told you I was looking?"

"Evelyn. Lew. I've been looking for him too. Any, luck?"

"Nope."

"Maybe we can look together."

Is he really looking for Roma, or trying to keep an eye on me? Who's he working for?

Then he remembered that Canfield had been the first to mention this Otherness stuff. Maybe Jack could pump him about it, and maybe he'd slip—maybe he'd drop something about Melanie in the process.

"Maybe," Jack said. "We had a long discussion about the Otherness yesterday, and I wanted to get back to it."

"The Otherness, ay?" Canfield's bulging eyes narrowed as he looked up at Jack. "And how you're tied into it?"

Jack fought to hide his shock. What have I got—some sort of sign around my neck?

"We, uh, never got that far into it."

Canfield looked around. "Well, if you want to discuss it, this isn't the place. My room or yours?"

Jack considered that for a second. If he went off with Canfield, he might miss Roma. But finding Roma was looking pretty iffy; Canfield was a sure thing. He didn't want Canfield to see the mystery crates and their contents, however.

"Yours," he said, and didn't offer an explanation.

As Jack followed him to the elevator, he glanced up and saw Jim Zaleski and Miles Kenway huddled in a comer, heads close in deep conversation. They stopped talking as they spotted Jack.

Kenway called out, "I'm expecting a photo to be faxed to me any time now."

Jack gave a thumbs-up and kept walking.

So Kenway had taken his advice about getting visual confirmation on the Roma here and the Roma in Kentucky. That could be very interesting.

"What photo?" Canfield asked.

"Just a mutual acquaintance," Jack said.

Jack and Canfield rode up in silence, with Canfield busily gnawing at a fingernail, and Jack trying to avoid looking at his flannel-wrapped legs and the disconnecting way they moved beneath the blanket. He couldn't help thinking about what Melanie had said to Lew about what was wrong with those legs ...

You don't want to know.

Canfield's room was laid out exactly like Jack's. In fact, it could have been Jack's ... except it had no weird green crates lying about.

"Let's see now," Canfield said, grinning through his Hagar beard and motioning Jack to one of the chairs. "Where were we?"

He sat there snacking on fingernail and cuticle crudites as he regarded Jack with too-bright eyes. He seemed more wired up than usual. Salt-rimmed crescents darkened the armpits of his shirt.

"Yesterday you and I were in the 'Children of the Otherness' zone—inhabited by you and Melanie Ehler," Jack said. He settled into the chair, dropping to eye level with Canfield. "Later Roma said something about my supposedly being 'marked by the Otherness.'"

"Not supposedly—the mark is there and you know it."

You can see it too? Jack thought, stiffening. He shrugged with as much nonchalance as his tight muscles would allow.

"Do I?"

"Of course you do. Open your shirt and I'll prove it."

"Sorry. Not on a first date."

Canfield didn't laugh. "What's wrong? Does it disturb you that your scars might link you to me and my birth defects?"

Jack repressed a shudder as Canfield's legs stirred under the blanket.

"Whatever scars I have came along long after my birth. You told me yourself that your defects happened before you were born. I don't see any connection."

"Ah," Canfield said, raising a well-chewed index finger. "But what made your scars? A creature, right?"

Jack stared at him. He knows too? Finally he said, "Where do you get your information?"

"About the Otherness creatures?"

Why doesn't he call them by name? Jack wondered.

"Yeah. How do you know about them?"

"Melanie and I sensed their presence last year. Just as I sensed those scars on your chest, we became aware of the Otherness creatures approaching from the east."

That's right, Jack thought. The rakoshi had come from the east ... from India ... by freighter.

"I get the impression you never saw one."

"I never had the honor. We searched, but we never could locate them."

"Lucky for you."

"I don't see it that way. I could consider them almost ... brothers. After all, they too were children of the Otherness, like Melanie and me, although they contained far more of the Otherness than either of us."

"The Otherness ... I'm getting real tired of that word."

"Well, it's a perfect name, really. The Otherness represents everything that's not 'us'—meaning the human race and the reality we inhabit. Melanie thinks it's vampiric in a way, sucking the life—the spiritual life—out of everything it encounters. Monstrously dark times will ensue if and when it takes over."

"And how would it manage that?"

"Sneak in when the other side's not looking. It can't charge in because the current landlord's got it locked out, but it's always there, hovering just beyond the threshold, keeping an eye on us, making tiny intrusions, creating strange, fearful manifestations, using its influence to sow discord, fear, and madness wherever and whenever it can."

"Like through the folks downstairs?"

Canfield nodded. "Some people are more aware, others less, but each of us knows—I don't care whether it's in our preconscious, post-conscious, subconscious, in the most primitive corners of our hindbrains, in the very cells of our bodies, we all sense this battle raging. And that subliminal perception has been reflected in human religions since earliest recorded history: Horus and Set, the Titans and the Olympians, God and Satan. The war is out there, and it's been going on since the beginning of time. We're aware of it. We can sense the Otherness on the far side of the door, we can smell its hunger."

"Okay. Fine. Let's just say that's true. How's this ... this evil Great Whatever screwing with things now?"

"It can influence certain susceptible individuals—'touched by the Otherness,' as Melanie used to say."

"Touched is right," Jack said.

Canfield smiled. "Interesting, isn't it, that 'touched' has two meanings."

Jack hadn't thought of that, and thinking about it now was no comfort.

"Keep going."

"The willing susceptibles give in to the influence and go to work for it—they're the ones behind all the discord and cover-ups."

"Controlled by the Otherness."

"Not so much controlled, as simpatico. They're not taking orders, per se, but they feel a certain solidarity with its ethic."

"Ethic? What ethic?"

"All right, perhaps ethic isn't the best term. How about 'esthetic'? Does that sit better? Whatever the term or the reason, they're quite willing to inject as much chaos and discord as possible into everyday life. The unwilling fight back, but not without paying a price."

"SESOUP folk, in other words."

"Yes. They're what we call 'sensitives.' For better or worse, their nervous systems are more attuned to the Otherness. Their minds have to make sense of the external will impinging on them and so they think they're hearing voices, or come up with these wild-sounding theories."

"Like gray aliens, reptoids, Majestic-12, the New World Order—"

"You're thinking small: from Christianity and its Book of Revelations to the Hebrew Kaballah, to the Bhagavad Gita, they all come from the same place."

"So in other words, there's no shadow government trying to control our minds."

Canfield shook his head. "You're missing my point. I believe there is a shadow government with our worst interests at heart, but it's not controlled by aliens or the UN or Satan, it's run by people under the influence—note I said 'influence,' not 'direction'—of the Otherness. Aliens, devils and the NWO are simply some of the masks worn by that single, nameless chaotic entity ... the many faces of a single truth."

"Melanie's Grand Unification ... " Jack said.

"Exactly. But this conference is a unification of sorts too. The members of SESOUP are particularly sensitive to the Otherness, that's why membership is so selective. And now they're all gathered here, packed into a single structure, each one of them a lens of sorts, perceiving the Otherness, and focusing it, distilling it. Surely you've noticed the charged atmosphere in the hotel?"

"Sort of. But focusing it for what purpose?"

"Only time will tell. We must believe now, but soon we shall have proof."

"Proof?" Jack said. "Real hard proof? That'd be refreshing."

"Your scars are a form of proof, wouldn't you say?"

Jack was glad to get back to the subject of his scars. He remembered something Canfield had said.

"You mentioned that you and Melanie 'sensed' the creatures. You 'sensed' they were in New York but you didn't know where they came from."

"Of course we did. They came from the Otherness."

"I mean, what country."

"Country? What is a country but an artificial boundary agreed on by ephemeral governments."

"And I'll bet you don't know what they were called, either."

"What's in a name? Just a label attached by some primitive people. All that matters is that the creatures were fashioned ages ago by the Otherness, and they carry the Otherness in them."

Odd. He seemed to know the big picture, but not the details.

"Carried," Jack said. "Past tense. They became fried fish food at the bottom of New York Harbor."

Canfield nodded. "Yes. I remember waking from a nightmare about their death agonies. When I read about the ship that had burned in the harbor, I guessed that was what had happened." He shook his head. "Such a shame."

"Shame, hell. Probably the best thing I ever did."

Canfield stared at him. Jack couldn't read his expression through all that hair. When he spoke his voice was just above a whisper.

"You? You're the one who killed the Otherness creatures?"

Something in Canfield's wide eyes made Jack uneasy.

"Yeah, well, somebody had to do it. They happened to pick on the wrong little girl for their next meal."

"Then it's no wonder you're here. You are involved ... more deeply than you can possibly imagine."

"Involved in what?"

"In Melanie's Grand Unification Theory. The Otherness creatures are part of it, I'm sure, and therefore so are you."

"Whoopee," Jack said. "And does her theory involve weird contraptions as well?"

"You mean machines? I don't think so. Why?"

"Well, I've got a couple of crates of parts sitting in my room. I don't know why they're there—I don't even know how they got there—but I've got a funny feeling their appearance is somehow connected to Melanie's disappearance."

"I can't imagine how. You mean, you don't know who sent them or where they're from?"

"Tulsa, I think. North Tulsa."

Canfield grinned. "Ever been to Tulsa?"

"No."

"I have. It's not big enough to have a 'north.'"

"Maybe it was something else then. All I know is the plans for assembling this gizmo are printed inside the lid, and I saw 'N. Tulsa' scribbled along an edge."

"N. Tulsa ... " Canfield said softly. "N. Tul—" Suddenly he straightened in his wheelchair. "Dear God! It couldn't have been 'Tesla,' could it?"

Jack tried to picture the lid. "Could have been. It was kind of scrawled and I didn't pay that much attention because—"

Canfield was wheeling toward the door. "Let's go!"

"Where?"

"Your room. I want to see this myself."

Jack wasn't crazy about a guest in his room, but if Canfield knew something about those crates ...

"Where's Tesla?" Jack said as they took the elevator down one stop.

"Not where—who. I can't believe you've never heard of him."

"Believe it. Who is Tesla?"

"A long story, not worth telling if I'm wrong."

Jack followed him to his own room. A disturbing thought struck him as he was unlocking the door.

"How come you know where my room is?"

Canfield smiled. "After I sensed those scars on you, I made it my business to find out. And I'm sure I'm not alone. Probably half the people here know where you're staying."

"Why the hell should they care?"

"Because you're an unknown quantity. Some may suspect you're with the CIA, some may think you were sent by MJ-12, or maybe even an agent of the devil."

"Swell."

"You're surrounded by people who believe that nothing is as it seems. What did you expect?"

"You've got a point there."

That does it, he thought. This was like his worst nightmare. First thing in the morning, I'm out of here.

Jack had left the lights on, and allowed Canfield to precede him into the room. The crates lay open on the floor dead ahead, and Canfield rolled directly to them. He picked up one of the lids, scanned its inner surface.

"The other one," Jack said.

Canfield checked that one and slapped his hand against it when he found what he was looking for.

"Yes!" he cried, his voice an octave higher than usual. "It's him! Nikola Tesla!"

Jack read over his shoulder. Now that he really looked, he could see that the scrawl was "N. Tesla."

"Okay. So who is Nikola Tesla?"

"One of the great geniuses and inventors of the last three or four generations. Right up there with Edison and Marconi."

"I've heard of Edison and Marconi," Jack said. "Never heard of Tesla."

"Ever had an MRI?"

Jack leaned back against the writing table. "You mean that X-ray thing? No."

"First off, it's not an X ray. It's magnetic resonance imaging—M-R-I, get it? And the units of magnetism it uses are called 'Teslas'—one Tesla equals ten thousand Gauss—named after Nikola Tesla."

Jack was trying hard to be impressed. "Oh. Okay. But why is this genius inventor sending me stuff?"

"He's not. He died in 1943."

"I'm not happy to hear that a dead man is sending me boxes," Jack said.

Canfield rolled his eyes. "Somebody sent you these crates, but I don't believe for a moment it was Nikola Tesla. He was unquestionably a genius, but he didn't invent a way to come back from death. He was in his late twenties in the 1880s when he arrived here from Yugoslavia, and barely into his thirties when he perfected the polyphase alternating current power system. He sold the patents to Westinghouse for a million bucks—real money in those days, but still a bargain for Westinghouse. Today, every house, every appliance in the country uses AC power."

Now Jack was impressed. "So this was a real guy, then—not one of these make-believe SESOUP bogeymen?"

"Very real. But as he got older his ideas became more and more bizarre. He started talking about free energy, cosmic ray motors, earthquake generators, and death rays. Lots of fictional mad scientists were inspired by Tesla."

Something about death rays and mad scientists clicked in Jack's brain.

"The Invisible Ray," he said.

"Pardon?"

"An old Universal horror flick. Haven't seen it in ages, but I remember Boris Karloff playing a mad scientist with a death ray."

"Was he made up with bushy hair and a thick mustache?"

"As a matter of fact, yes. And he had an Eastern European name—Janos, or something."

"There you go: That was Nikola Tesla all the way. He lived in the Waldorf and had an experimental lab out on Long Island at the turn of the century where he was trying to perfect broadcast power."

"Broadcast power?" Jack said.

"Yes. You've heard of it?"

Jack only nodded. Heard of it? He'd seen it in action.

"Anyway," Canfield continued, "Tesla starting building this tower way out on Long Island in a little town called Wardenclyffe ... "

Canfield's voice trailed off as his face went pale.

"Wardenclyffe, Long Island?" Jack said. "Never heard of it."

"That's because it doesn't exist anymore," Canfield said slowly. "It was absorbed by another town. It's now part of Shoreham."

Jack felt a cold tingle rush down his spine. "Shoreham? That's where Lew and Melanie live."

"Exactly." Canfield slapped a palm against his forehead. "Why didn't I see this before? All these years I've never understood why Melanie left Monroe to live in Shoreham, but now it's clear. She's been living near Tesla's old property. She must have thought some of his wilder theories and never-executed plans had to do with the Otherness."

Jack remembered what Lew had told him that first day out in their house in Shoreham.

"Lew said she was buying and selling real estate, saying it had something to do with her 'research.'"

"I knew it!"

"He said she'd buy a place, hire some guys to dig up the yard, then resell it."

Canfield was leaning forward. "Did he say where she'd buy these places?"

"Yeah. Always in the same development ... along some road ... " Damn. He couldn't remember the name.

"Randall Road?'

"You got it."

"Yes!" Canfield pumped his fist in the air. "Tesla's property ran along Randall Road in Wardenclyffe! That's where he built his famous tower. The old brick building that housed his electrical lab is still standing. No question about it. Melanie was definitely searching for old Tesla documents."

"You think she found something?"

"Most definitely." He nodded and pointed to the crates. "And I think it's sitting right in front of us."

"You think Melanie sent this stuff?"

"I do."

"But why to me? Why not to you?"

Only Repairman Jack can find me. Only he will understand.

Was that why?

"I wish I knew," Canfield said. He sounded hurt. "I certainly wouldn't have left it sitting around for days. I can tell you that."

"Really. What would you have done?"

"Assembled it, of course."

"Maybe she thought you might have ... " He glanced at Canfield's blanket-wrapped lower body. "You know ... trouble putting it together."

"Maybe," he said. He seemed cheered by the thought. "And she was probably right. But now there's two of us, so let's get to it."

"Whoa. We don't know what this thing is, or what it does. We don't know how it got here and we don't even know for sure it's from Melanie."

"It's from Melanie," he said. "I'm sure of it."

Jack wasn't sure of anything about these crates. Assembling the pieces might seem like the next logical step, but something inside him wasn't too keen on taking it.

"I only have one wrench and a couple of screwdrivers. We'll need—"

"Never fear," Canfield said, reaching around the back of his wheelchair. He removed a tool kit from the pouch back there. "I never travel without this. Let's get to work."

Still Jack hesitated. He could buy that this contraption was linked to Melanie, but he was far from convinced she'd sent it. Figuring there was safety in numbers, he decided to get some other people involved.

He pulled Kenway's pager number from his wallet and started dialing.

"What are you doing?" Canfield said.

"Calling in some help."

"We don't need help."

"Look at all those pieces. Sure we do."

"Who are you calling?"

"Miles Kenway."

"No!" He seemed genuinely upset. "Not him!"

"Why not? What's that old expression? Many hands lighten the load."

"He won't understand."

"Then we'll explain it to him."

When Kenway's beeper service picked up, Jack left a simple message: "Call Jack. Urgent." He was sure Kenway knew his room number. Everyone else seemed to.

"You shouldn't have done that," Canfield said, almost sulking. "Kenway doesn't belong here."

What's his problem? Jack wondered.

"He doesn't, but you do? How'd you reach that conclusion? The crates wound up in my room, remember?"

"He isn't part of this. We are."

"If what you've said is true, we're all part of this—whatever 'this' might be."

The phone rang. It was Kenway.

"Get up to my room," Jack told him. "I've got something to show you."

"Be right up," Kenway said. "And brother, have I got something to show you."

"Bring Zaleski," Jack told him. "And if you've got any tools, bring them along too."

"Will do."

Canfield groaned as Jack hung up the phone. "Not Zaleski too!"

"The more the merrier, I figure," Jack said as he dialed Lew's room number.

"Who now?" Canfield said. "Olive Farina?"

"Olive?" Jack said, watching Canfield closely. "She's been found?"

"No. Where have you been? She still hasn't shown up. A missing person report has been filed. Everybody's still looking for her."

Jack sensed that Canfield didn't know any more about Olive than he was saying.

No answer at Lew's room.

"I was going to ask Lew Ehler too," Jack said, hanging up. "But I guess he's gone back to Shoreham."

"Just as well." Canfield grunted with annoyance. "Zaleski and Kenway will be more than enough to handle. Whatever you do, don't mention the Otherness or that this device may be a link to it."

"Why not?"

"Because proof of the existence of the Otherness will expose Zaleski's UFO's and aliens and Kenway's New World Order for the shams they are. Who knows how they'll react. They might not be able to handle it." He pounded his fist on the armrest of his wheelchair. "I wish you hadn't called them!"

"Relax," Jack told him. "We'll order pizza and beer. We'll make this a party. Like a mini barn raising. You'll see. It'll be fun."

9

Kenway and Zaleski arrived less than fifteen minutes later. They both knew Canfield who finally seemed to have resigned himself to sharing the stage with the two newcomers.

"Take a gander at this." Kenway said, holding out a folded sheet of fax paper.

Jack opened the flimsy sheet and stared at the photo of a portly young man, blond, with a fuzzy attempt at a beard.

"Our mutual friend, I presume?"

"Exactly!" Kenway's grin was shark-like, his gray crewcut more bristly than ever as he took back the fax. "Oh, brother, is the shit ever gonna hit the fan when I pass this around tomorrow. I knew there was something phony about our fearless leader!"

Zaleski tried to get a look. "Who? Roma? What've you got there?"

"You'll find out tomorrow," Kenway said.

Jack's thoughts drifted as they argued. If Roma was a bogus identity, who was the guy running the show? Why had he created SESOUP and organized this meeting? Was he connected to Melanie's disappearance? To these boxes? And if so, why had they wound up with Jack, when he hadn't even known he was coming until the night before?

Jack's head was spinning.

"Whatever," Zaleski finally said to Kenway, then grinned at Jack as he displayed an elaborate ratchet set. "You want tools, man? We got tools. What the fuck for?"

Jack explained what he could. Neither of them needed any introduction to Nikola Tesla, it seemed. Zaleski and Kenway were awed by the prospect of assembling a contraption designed by him.

They divided the workload. Jack and Zaleski would assemble the base while Kenway and Canfield tackled the dome. The contents of each crate were dumped onto one of the two double beds, and they had just begun to work when Canfield lifted his hand.

"Shhh! What's that?"

Jack listened. Something scratching at his door. He went to the peephole but saw nothing. Yet the sound persisted. He pulled open the door—

And Roma's monkey scampered in.

"Get that fucking oversized rodent outta here!" Zaleski shouted, tossing a pillow at the monkey.

It screeched and dodged the pillow, scampered a single circuit of the room, then fled. Jack slammed the door after it.

"Don't let that damn thing in again!" Zaleski cried, brushing his hair off his forehead. "Little fucker gives me the creeps."

"For once we agree on something," Kenway said. "It shouldn't be allowed to run free."

Jack was remembering what Olive had told him about that monkey, how she'd overheard it talking to Roma ... or whoever he was.

"Let's get back to business," Canfield said.

"Tesla got royally screwed by J. P. Morgan, you know," Kenway said after a few minutes. "Morgan promised to fund his broadcast power project back at the turn of the century. He let Tesla get the Wardenclyffe tower three-quarters built—"

"That would be out on Long Island?" Jack said, glancing at Canfield.

"Yes, of course," Kenway said. "Morgan let him get to a certain point, then suddenly pulled the financial rug out from under him."

"Why do that?" Jack said. "Broadcast power would be worth zillions."

"Because Morgan was one of the bankrollers of the One World conspiracy, and he and his fellows came to realize that a cheap energy source like Tesla's broadcast power would rev all the world's economies into high gear. They figured that once the secret was out, they'd lose control of those economies. Tesla had a mysterious breakdown somewhere around 1908 and was never quite the same after."

"Bullshit," Zaleski said from the other side of the room. "He had a breakdown in 1908, but it wasn't caused by no J. P. fucking Morgan. Tesla had an in on alien technology, that's why he made all his breakthroughs."

Jack glanced again at Canfield who mouthed, I warned you.

"Back in 1908, with Morgan pulling the plug on his finances, Tesla needed a dramatic demonstration that his Wardenclyffe tower worked. Peary was making a second try to reach the North Pole at the time, so Tesla contacted the expedition and said they should be on the lookout for an unusual occurrence. On June 30, he aimed a beam of energy from Wardenclyffe to an arctic area where the explosion would be seen by the Perry team. But nothing happened. He thought he'd failed. Then he heard about Tunguska."

"What's Tunguska?" Jack asked.

"A place in Siberia," Canfield said. "Half a million square acres of forest were utterly destroyed by a mysterious cataclysmic explosion on June 30, 1908."

"Right!" Zaleski said. "The same day as Tesla's demonstration. And Tunguska is on the same longitudinal line as Peary's base camp."

"Researchers have estimated the force of the blast at fifteen megatons," Canfield added. "The boom was heard over six hundred miles away. It's never been explained."

Zaleski grinned. "But Old Nik knew the truth. His beam had overshot its mark."

"It was a meteor!" Kenway said.

"Really?" Zaleski's eyebrows floated halfway to his hairline. "Then how come no meteor fragments were ever found?"

"An antimatter meteor," Kenway said, not backing down an inch. "When antimatter meets matter, there's cataclysmic destruction, with total annihilation of one or the other."

"Uh-uh, Miles, old boy. Tesla did it, and the total awesomeness of the destructive power he'd unleashed blew his circuits. He had a nervous breakdown."

"Wrong," Kenway said. "J. P. Morgan's betrayal caused the breakdown."

"Gentlemen, please," Canfield said. "We're not going to decide this here. Suffice it to way that something happened to cause Tesla to stop communicating with people for a while and to sell his land and dismantle his tower. Let's just say that Nicola Tesla was never the same after 1908 and leave it at that."

"All right," Kenway said. "As long as there's no more talk about alien technology."

"Or New World Order bullshit," Zaleski said.

"Can we just build this damn thing!" Jack snapped. "I don't want to be at it all night."

He avoided looking at Canfield. Maybe he'd been right. Maybe including these two had been a bad idea.

10

"They're assembling it!" Mauricio cried as he rushed into the room. "And as I was listening at the door I heard Miles Ken way say something about a 'our fearless leader' being a 'phony!' It's all falling apart!"

"Keep calm," Roma said. "We knew the deception would not last forever."

Sal Roma—he'd immersed himself in the character so deeply that he'd become comfortable with the name. Might as well keep up the pretense. He didn't care what name he was known by, as long as it was not his own.

"But this is too close. And we do not have the device—they do!"

"Just who is 'they?'"

"Canfield, Kenway, Zaleski, and the stranger."

"Quite a crew. I wonder if this was what Canfield wanted to see me about—that he had learned about the device?"

"Who cares why he wanted to see you?" Mauricio screeched. "The device is ours! We are supposed to use it!"

"And we shall, dear friend. Without the bother of assembling it ourselves. This is all working out very nicely."

"You are insane! The plan was—"

"Hush now, Mauricio, before you anger me. The plan is heading for the right place, it is simply taking a different course—I do not know why that is, but in good time I am sure I shall. We need only watch and follow, and step in when it is to our advantage."

Mauricio crouched on the bedspread, and wrapped his thin arms around his folded legs. His sulking pose. "This will come to a bad end, I tell you."

"A bad end ... " Roma smiled. "That is the whole point, is it not?"

SUNDAY

1

Assembling the Tesla gizmo turned out to be a much more complicated chore than Jack had anticipated, especially the dome. It was close to two A.M. when they finished.

The beds had been pushed aside and now a five-foot oil derrick topped with a giant, warty mushroom cap stood in the middle of the floor.

One weird-looking contraption, Jack thought.

Something about it gave him the willies.

Nothing terribly strange about the eight-legged base. A bitch to assemble with all those crisscrossing struts, but it functioned as nothing more than a supporting framework. The dome was a whole other story. Curved sheets of shiny copper studded with dozens of smaller copper globes, larger toward the perimeter, and getting progressively smaller as they neared the center.

Jack could almost go along with Zaleski about its having been inspired by alien technology. He'd never seen anything like it.

"This looks a lot like the Wardenclyffe tower," Zaleski said in an awed tone.

"Tesla never finished the tower," Kenway said.

"So we've been told," Zaleski replied. "But I've seen renderings of how it was supposed to look, and this is it."

"Swell," Jack said. "But what's it supposed to do? Broadcast energy? Blow up Siberian woods? What?"

"I doubt we'll know that until it's finished," Canfield said.

Kenway tapped one of the gizmo's legs with his booted toe. "What do you mean? It is finished."

"Not according to this." Canfield held up one of the lids and pointed to the diagram of the dome. "See here? There's supposed to be some sort of light bulb or something in the top center of the dome. Has anybody come across anything like that tonight?"

Jack shook his head, and saw Zaleski and Kenway doing the same.

"Kee-rist!" Zaleski said. "Isn't that fucking typical? Just like the model kits I used to get when I was a kid—always a piece missing."

"You sure that's a bulb?" Kenway said, taking the lid from Canfield. He pulled out a pair of reading glasses and studied the diagram more closely. "Looks more like some sort of crystal to me."

"Lemme see that," Zaleski said. He peered closely, tilting the lid back and forth. "For once I agree with you, Miles. Look at the facets there. That's definitely some sort of crystal. Big one, I'd guess."

"Anyone seen a large crystal anywhere?" Canfield said, lifting and shaking the spread on the nearest bed.

"I have," Jack said, wondering at the surges of excitement suddenly pulsing through him as he remembered a basement ... and an old desk ... and on it, three large, oblong, amber quartz crystals ...

"Where?" Kenway said.

"Out on Long Island ... in a little town called Monroe."

2

Jack checked out the moonless sky as he followed Ken way's pickup truck north along Glen Cove Road. Dawn was still hours away and they were all headed for Monroe.

But what a job to get to this point.

First the debate on whether or not to send someone out to fetch a crystal and bring it back. Eventually it was decided that that would take too long, so they all agreed to haul the mini Tesla tower out to Monroe. Canfield, still convinced that the crates had come from Melanie, said that seemed fitting.

But how to get it there?

Canfield reluctantly volunteered the back of his specially outfitted van—reluctantly because he didn't see any need for Kenway and Zaleski to come; he and Jack could handle everything just fine.

But no way were Kenway and Zaleski going along with that.

So they separated the dome from the tower and loaded both sections into the back of the van.

But that wasn't the end of it. Zaleski didn't want to ride in Kenway's truck, Kenway didn't want to ride in Zaleski's car. Neither wanted to ride in Canfield's van, and Jack had had enough of them all for one night.

Finally they got underway—a four-car caravan with Canfield in the lead, chugging through the wee hours of Sunday morning. At least they had the road pretty much to themselves.

Jack felt a raw uneasiness wriggling through his gut, a vague awareness that he was riding toward big trouble. But he couldn't turn back now. He sensed that the end game was at hand, and wanted this crazy weird gig over and done with—tonight.

He'd tried to call Lew out in Shoreham to tell him where they were going and ask him if he wanted to meet them in Monroe. But all he'd reached was the Ehler answering machine. He'd tried Lew's hotel room again, but still no answer.

So where was Lew? Not with Olive, Jack hoped.

3

The first thing Jack noticed about Melanie's family home was that the lights were on. The second was Lew's Lexus by the garage—he spotted that when Canfield's headlights raked the front yard as he turned his van into the driveway.

As Zaleski and Kenway pulled into the curb, Jack drove past the house and parked at the corner of the property, near where he'd spotted the black sedan pulling away after his first visit to the house. He got out and looked around, zipping his warm-up top against the chill. No other cars on the street besides the ones he'd come with.

Satisfied they hadn't been followed, he walked over Zaleski and Kenway who were watching Canfield lower himself and his wheelchair to the ground on the special elevator platform built into his van.

"Wait here," Jack told them. "I think Lew's in the house. Let me check first."

He stepped up to the front door and found it unlocked. He pushed it open and entered the living room.

"Lew?" he called.

No answer. He started forward, but a sound—an odd, rasping clink—stopped him. He paused, listening, and heard it again. And again. Slow and rhythmic ... coming from below ...

Jack slipped through the dining room and kitchen and stopped at the head of the cellar steps. The lights were on below, and no doubt about it—the clinking was coming from down there. Along with another sound.

Sobbing.

Just to be on the safe side, Jack pulled the Semmerling as he crept down the stairs. He pocketed it when he saw Lew Ehler kneeling on the basement floor. Lew's back was to Jack, he clutched a heavy pickax, and was chipping away at the concrete around the embedded rope ladder.

He jumped when Jack touched his shoulder.

"Wha—?" he cried, looking up at Jack with a tear-streaked face.

"Hey, Lew," Jack said softly. "What's up?"

"It's Melanie," he sobbed. "She's down there! I know she's down there and I can't reach her!"

"Easy, guy," Jack said, hooking a hand under Lew's arm and helping him to his feet. "Come on. Get a grip, okay. You're not going to find her that way."

He felt the scars on his chest begin to itch again. What was it with this cellar?

Lew let the pickax fall into the shallow depression he'd chipped in the concrete. As Jack bent to retrieve it, he noticed again the scorch marks around the ladder ... eight of them ...

And eight legs on the Tesla contraption.

Suddenly excited, he guided Lew to the chair by the desk—and yes, the big amber crystals were still there, all three of them—then ran upstairs to find the others.

Outside in the front yard, it took Jack's eyes a few seconds to adjust to the darkness. He saw that Canfield's van had been backed onto the lawn. Canfield was watching Kenway and Zaleski as they offloaded the mini tower from the rear.

"Where we going to set this up?" Zaleski said.

"I think I know just the place. Come inside and see if you agree."

They left the tower in the van and headed for the house. The three of them lifted Canfield and his wheelchair up the front steps and inside.

"Boy, does this bring back memories," he said as he rolled through the living room. "Where to?"

"The basement," Jack said.

"There's nothing down there."

Canfield's voice didn't ring quite true. Did he know more about this than he was letting on?

"You're sure of that?" Jack said.

They carried Canfield and his chair down the stairs. Lew leaped to his feet when he saw them, his expression shocked.

"What's going on?" he said.

"I'll explain in a minute, Lew," Jack told him.

He led the others over to the spot where Lew had been working with the pickax.

"What the fuck?" Zaleski said, squatting and tugging on the rope ladder where it disappeared into the cement.

Kenway stood next to him, hands on hips. "Most unusual."

"But that's only part of it," Jack said. He touched a number of the scorches with the toe of his sneaker. "Check this out. Eight marks in a rough circle. Can anybody think of anything we've seen recently with an eight-legged, roughly circular base?"

Canfield cried, "I knew it was from Melanie!"

"Melanie?" Lew said, pushing his way into the ring. "What's from Melanie?"

"Explain it to him," Jack told Canfield, "while we get the gizmo."

He led Zaleski and Ken way back to the van. Zaleski carried the dome on his own, while Jack and Kenway shared the larger, heavier, ungainly load of the derrick-like base.

Lew grabbed hold of the base as they eased it down the basement steps.

"Can it be true?" he said to Jack. He had hope in his eyes, and his face wore the closest thing to a smile Jack had seen for days. Obviously Canfield had given Lew his own slant on the origin of the crates. "Is this really from Melanie?"

"I'm going to have to reserve judgment on that, Lew."

Zaleski leaned the dome against the couch, then he helped Jack and Kenway guide the tower base toward the chipped concrete and set it down over the end of the ladder. A few minor adjustments in positioning and ...

"I'll be damned," Kenway said. "You were right."

The feet of the tower's eight vertical supports fit perfectly over the eight scorch marks.

"Yeah," Jack said, feeling a growing uneasiness. "But I'm not sure I'm all that glad."

"Why not?" Canfield said. He cradled the big amber crystals in his blanketed lap.

"Well, for one thing, it's kind of obvious that another contraption just like this one was positioned here before. Where is it now? The question wouldn't bother me except for the fact that all we have left of the first are these marks that have been burned into the concrete."

"No scorch marks on the ceiling, though," Canfield said. "Nor on the furniture."

Good point, Jack thought. It made him feel a little better, but not a whole hell of a lot.

Zaleski stepped over to the couch and hefted an edge of the dome. "Let's get this sucker attached and see what happens."

Jack removed his warm-up jacket and dropped it onto the couch. He gripped the other side of the dome; together they raised it and set it on the base. A few minutes of tightening nuts and bolts, and the mini Tesla tower was reassembled. Light from the naked incandescents overhead gleamed off the dome's rows of copper globes.

"And now for the final piece," Canfield said, holding up one of the crystals.

"You really think that's all it'll take?" Jack said.

Canfield looked at him. "You have doubts?"

Jack pointed to the tower. "Where do we plug it in?"

"Tesla theorized that energy could be gathered free from the atmosphere," Kenway said. "That was why he was such a threat to the One-Worlders."

"Fine," Jack said, shrugging. "But a crystal? It seems so ... so New Agey. It's just a pretty rock."

"Not just any rock," Canfield said, twisting the crystal back and forth to catch the light. "It's quartz—which has piezoelectric properties. You've heard of crystal radios, I assume?"

"Sure."

"And how many rocks do you know that can rotate the plane of polarized light? Trust me, a crystal is a lot more than 'just a pretty rock.'"

"Enough bullshitting," Zaleski said, grabbing the crystal from Canfield's hand. "Let's do it."

Standing on tiptoe, he inserted the crystal into the top center of the dome.

"Perfect fit," he said, then stepped back.

Jack did him one better. He retreated all the way to the steps. He didn't trust this thing. All he knew about this Nikola Tesla guy was what he'd been told, and one of the stories involved destroying half a million acres of forest on the far side of the North Pole.

Come to think of it, the stairs weren't nearly as far away as he would have liked. Albany might not even be far enough. But he stayed where he was and watched.

Nothing happened.

That didn't seem to faze the others. They kept waiting patiently in a rough semicircle.

Jack backed up a little more and seated himself on one of the steps.

How long do we wait before we call this a bust? he wondered.

Then he sensed a change in the cellar. He wasn't sure what was happening, but he could feel the hairs rising along his bare arms. Not from fear or alarm, but from the charge that seemed to fill the air. A little like what he'd felt in the hotel, but stronger, more concentrated.

Jack wasn't the only one to notice. He saw Ken way rubbing his arms, tugging at his shirt collar.

"Do you feel it?" Canfield said, grinning.

The lights flickered.

Lew looked around. "Did anyone just see ... ?"

The others nodded silently.

Then all four sixty-watt bulbs in the ceiling dimmed to about thirty—and stayed dimmed. As they lost power, the crystal atop the dome began to pulse with a faint amber light.

The air became more highly charged, and then the mini tower began to hum, low at first, but steadily rising in pitch. Jack saw the semicircle widen as all but Kenway eased back.

Where's that thing getting its power? he wondered, tensing on the steps. He didn't like this one bit.

The crystal pulsed more brightly, strobing distorted shadows against the walls; the hum rose further in pitch as the pulses cycled faster and faster, finally merging into a steady glow.

And then the tower began to rise off the floor.

"Holy shit!" Zaleski said. "This is too fucking much!"

Kenway looked grim, Lew looked puzzled, and Canfield ... Canfield looked absolutely rapt.

It continued to rise—one inch ... two ... six ... a foot ...

Jack sat frozen, bloodless. This was no trick. No invisible wires on that thing. He'd set it up himself. The tower was really and truly floating in the air.

"Didn't I tell you, soldier boy?" Zaleski said, clapping Kenway on the shoulder. "Alien technology! This is how they make their saucers go!"

Kenway said nothing, but his quick glance at Zaleski was pure malice.

Jack fought the urge to pack it in and head for his car. The crawling sensation in his gut was more intense than ever, telling him he wasn't needed here, and didn't even belong here.

This isn't what you were hired for. Get out while you can.

The tower rose until the blazing crystal set in its dome was poised between two rafters. And then it simply hung there.

Jack felt a cool breeze against this back. Had somebody opened a door upstairs? He was about to get up to go look when Canfield's shout stopped him.

"Look!" he cried. He was pointing at the floor.

"Good Lord!" Kenway said, finally retreating a step.

A hole was opening. The concrete wasn't melting or crumbling, it was simply fading away. But no dirt was visible beneath, just ... hole. And the wider it got, the stronger the breeze against Jack's back, rushing toward the opening.

"Good God!" Lew said. "What is it?"

"What's it look like?" Zaleski said without looking up. "A pizza? It's a fucking hole."

A hole ...

Jack gripped the edges of the step that supported him. His dreams the past two nights had been nightmares about a hole ... one that looked like it wanted to gobble up the world.

"Hey, guys," he said, "I think we should call this off."

"Relax, Jack," Kenway said. "You won't fall in from there."

Idiot, Jack thought. "What if it keeps enlarging?"

"I gotta feeling this ain't the first time this hole has opened," Zaleski said. "And the house is still here, ain't it?"

Jack watched with mounting alarm as the hole kept expanding, widening until the concrete entrapping the rope ladder disappeared, leaving it hanging free over the rim and dangling into the opening.

And then it stopped enlarging.

Jack sagged with relief.

"I think that's it," Zaleski said.

Kenway leaned his body forward but kept his feet where they were. "How deep, I wonder?"

Zaleski inched forward, shuffling his feet nearer and nearer to the edge. "Only one way to find out."

He stopped with his toes perhaps half a foot from the rim, then craned his neck to peer over the edge.

"I see some light way down there and—holy shit!" He jumped back from the edge.

"What?" Lew said. "What's wrong?"

"Look!" Canfield said, pointing to the ladder.

The ropes were moving, vibrating as they stretched over the rim.

"Something's coming," Zaleski said. "Climbing the ladder."

I hope he means someone, Jack thought, backing up another tread on the steps.

He sensed something ugly, something sinister slipping from that hole and coiling through the cellar. He held his breath as the gyrations of the ropes grew more pronounced, and then a single black talon rose above floor level and hooked onto the concrete ... followed by a head ... a dark-haired human head ... with a woman's face ...

"Melanie!" Lew cried and rushed forward.

He grabbed her arms and lifted her from the opening. Then he wrapped her in a bear hug that left her shoes a good foot off the floor.

"Oh, Mel, Mel!" he sobbed. "I've been so worried. Thank God, you're back! Thank God!"

Jack couldn't see Melanie's face, but her arms didn't seem to be returning Lew's hug with anywhere near his fervor. Especially the left arm ...

This was the first time Jack had seen Melanie's deformed forearm, and it wasn't what he'd expected. It seemed a little thinner than the right as it tapered down to the wrist; beyond that it stayed rounded instead of flattening into a palm. Lew had told him that all the fingernails had fused, leaving her with one large thick nail. But Jack hadn't pictured this big, sharp, black claw.

She'd supposedly kept it bandaged in public, and now Jack could see why. It was wicked looking.

"Lewis, please," Melanie said in a strained voice. "You're crushing me."

He released her. "Sorry," he said, wiping his eyes. "It's just that I've missed you so."

"You two can snuggle later," Zaleski said. He indicated the hole and the still floating tower. "What is all this, Melanie? And where the hell have you been?"

"Home," she whispered. A strange fevered glow lit in her eyes as she said the word.

Jack eased down the steps for a closer look. Finally he was getting to see the notorious Melanie Ehler in the flesh. She seemed far more intense than her photographs had indicated. Her hair was darker, her black eyebrows thicker, and her thin lips were split into the rapturous grin of a zealot who'd just heard the voice of God.

"Not here," Kenway said. He pointed to the hole. "What's down there?"

"Home," she repeated, then turned to Frayne. "It worked. I've found the way to the Otherness. We can go home now."

Canfield clasped his hands together and looked as if he was going to puddle up along with Lew.

"Mel," Lew said, pointing to her arm. "What happened to your nail?"

"It changed," she said, raising her black talon to eye level. "As soon as I got there it changed shape and color ... to the way it's supposed to look."

She looked around and Jack felt something like an electric shock as her gaze locked on him.

"And you must be Repairman Jack," she said.

Jack stepped off the steps onto the floor. "Just Jack'll do."

He glanced at the others, but the "Repairman" remark didn't seem to have registered. They were all still fixated on that hole. Good.

"Thank you so much," she said, stepping forward and extending her hand. "I knew you were the right man for the job."

Jack was about to protest that he'd done very little when Melanie's touch stopped him. Her hand was cold.

"Come on, Melanie," Zaleski said. "Enough with this 'home' shit. What's going on?"

She stepped back to where she could face everyone. "I've found a gateway to the Otherness," she said.

Kenway snorted. "The what?"

"It would take too long to explain fully," she said, "and I've neither the time nor the inclination. Suffice it to say that the single solution to all the mysteries that have plagued you, the answer you've spent so many years searching for, lies on the far side of that opening."

Jack had heard all this from Roma and Canfield. Hadn't believed a word of it before, but now ...

He hooked his arm around the support column at the foot of the stairs and looked around. He still sensed something nasty in the air. Was he the only one?

"Is this that 'Grand Unification' thing you've been talking us to death about?" Zaleski said.

"Yes, Jim," she said with a small, tolerant smile. "It's all there. The secrets behind your UFOs and Majestic-12."

"Yeah, right."

She turned to Kenway. "And for you, Miles ... the identity—and the real agenda—of the power behind the New World Order conspiracy."

"I sincerely doubt that," he said huffily.

She looked around. "If only Olive were here."

"She's been missing for days, Mel," Lew said.

Jack watched her closely. She seemed genuinely puzzled and disappointed." Didn't she know?

"That's too bad," she said. "The truth behind her cherished Book of Revelations is on the other side as well."

"All down there?" Zaleski said.

"'Down' isn't quite right. 'Over' there would be more accurate."

"But how?" Lew said. His face had a hurt look. "And why?"

"How?" she said. "I learned from talking to some old timers out in Shoreham, people who had relatives who'd worked in the Tesla lab, that before he sold his property and dismantled his tower, Tesla had buried mysterious steel canisters here and there around his property, and even beyond it."

"After the Tunguska explosion!" Zaleski said. "Must have scared him shitless."

Jack had already heard enough about Nikola Tesla and Tunguska to last a lifetime, but he couldn't bring himself to leave just yet ... not with that tower floating in the air and the hole yawning in the floor. He remembered the holes in his recent nightmares, and wanted to see this one closed before he headed home.

Melanie said, "I don't know if Tesla caused the Tunguska explosion, and I don't really care. But I can tell you this: Nikola Tesla was not the type of man to be frightened by a mere explosion, no matter how powerful. I've suspected all along that something else was at the root of his breakdown. And now I know."

"This ... Otherness?" Kenway said.

Melanie nodded. "Yes. During the year I spent searching for those canisters, I found three. One of them confirmed my suspicions. I gave the others to Ron Clayton and—"

"Clayton?" Jack said. That name rang a bell. "You knew Ronald Clayton?"

Melanie shrugged. "We shared an interest in Tesla. Ron was more interested in his electronics theories."

"I'll bet he was," Jack said, remembering the transmitter he'd seen on a hilltop upstate. Apparently the creep hadn't been the great innovator he'd wanted everybody to believe.

"Whether Tesla's tower was able to broadcast energy is irrelevant," Melanie said. "What I do know, or rather what I have proven"—she gestured toward the hole—"is that it can open a gateway to the Otherness. And I think that's what unhinged Tesla. He made contact, saw what was on the other side, and immediately slammed the door."

"It's that bad?" Lew said.

"Not for me," she said. "And not for Frayne. But for the rest of you ... " She slowly shook her head.

"Hey!" Zaleski said. "How bad can it be?"

"It is the truth ... and the truth at times can be unbearable."

Somewhere in the back of Jack's head another Jack shouted, You can't handle the truth!

Zaleski stepped to the rim of the hole and peered over the edge. "And you were down there how long?"

"What day is it?" Melanie said.

Jack glanced at his watch. "Just about four A.M. Sunday morning."

"You've been gone almost a week, Mel!" Lew cried.

She shrugged. "Time is different there. It seemed like barely two days."

"Well, if you can fucking handle it," Zaleski said, "so can I." He turned to Kenway. "Whatta y'say, Miles? Want to get up close and personal with Melanie's Grand Unification Theory?"

"I don't know," Kenway said slowly. He sidled to the edge and looked down. "Awfully dark down there."

"You can see some light way down. Besides, you're carrying aren't you?"

Kenway stared at him.

Zaleski snorted a laugh. "Look who I'm asking! Does the Pope wear a cross? Come on, Miles. You're armed and dangerous. Don't be a pussy."

Kenway glared at him, then hitched up his belt. He pointed to the rope ladder. "After you."

Zaleski gave Kenway a thumbs up, then squatted next to the ladder. He grabbed the two ropes, swung his leg over, then started down.

"Is this such a good idea?" Jack said.

"It's a great idea, Jack. You're coming right? Maybe you'll find those missing hours."

"You can have them," Jack said. "Kind of late for spelunking. My job's done here. I think maybe I'll be heading home."

"No!" Melanie said quickly. "I mean, not just yet. I need to talk to you first."

"All right," Zaleski said. "Suit yourself. Here goes nothing."

He started down and disappeared below floor level.

After a few seconds, his voice echoed up from below. "Come on, Miles, you chickenshit bastard. Let's go."

Kenway pulled his .45 automatic from under his sweater, flicked off the safety, then put it away again. He sighed, looked around, and—with much less enthusiasm than Zaleski—started down.

Jack stepped to the edge of the hole and watched the bristling hair atop Kenway's head recede into the depths. Damn, that looked deep.

Lew came up beside him. "I'll be. There is some light down there."

"Way down," Jack said, spotting the faint flickers.

"Are you sure you don't want to go too?" Melanie said, looking at Jack. She sounded almost ... hopeful.

Jack wondered about that. A moment ago when he'd said he was leaving, she wanted him to stay. Now she seemed to be encouraging him to leave by another route.

"I'm very sure," Jack said. "In fact, I don't think I've ever been so sure of anything in my life. But you said you wanted to talk to me."

Lew jumped in before Melanie could answer. "Before we go any further, I need an answer to something. When I asked you if it was so bad down there, you said, 'Not for me and Frayne.' What did you mean by that?"

Melanie sighed and looked away. Jack saw a touch of sadness and regret in her eyes.

"Lewis ... when I called it 'home,' I wasn't exaggerating. When that gateway opened, and I entered the Otherness, that's exactly what it felt like—coming home. For the first time in my life I felt like I belonged. And Frayne will feel it too."

"But I won't?" Lew said, his voice full of hurt.

Zaleski's voice echoed up from the hole then.

"Hey! Something weird down here ... like everything's floating."

Melanie went to the edge and called down. "That means you're almost there. Gravity reverses at the transition point. You'll have to climb up the rest of the way."

She waited, and a few seconds later Zaleski's voice came back, tinged with wonder and excitement, teetering on the verge of hysterical laughter.

"Fucking-ay, you're right! This is the weirdest shit I've ever seen!"

"Never mind them," Lew said. "What about me? Why won't I feel like I belong there?"

Melanie turned back to her husband. She spoke matter-of-factly, as if explaining the obvious to a child. "Because you'd be an outsider there, Lewis. You have no Otherness in you."

"Sure I do," he said, pointing to his leg. "I'm not normal. I'm different too. Not as different as you, maybe, but—"

"Different inside" she said. "Frayne and I are different right down to our genes. You're completely human, Lewis. We're not. We're hybrids."

Lew looked stunned. His jaw worked a few times before he could speak. "Hybrids?"

"Yes, Lewis. Hybrids." She walked over to Canfield's wheelchair and rested her claw on his shoulder. "Neither of us really belongs here."

Jack noticed how Lew's eyes locked on the spot where his wife was touching Canfield. His heart went out to the guy, but he couldn't help him. Lew was pushing for answers and Melanie was giving them to him.

She could take it a little easier on him, though.

"How?" he said. "When?"

"Late in the winter of 1968, right here in Monroe, the Otherness spawned something in this plane. Frayne and I were just tiny, newly formed masses of cells within our mothers at the time. We were vulnerable to the influence of the Otherness then—our DNA was altered forever as it made its beachhead."

"What beachhead?" Jack said.

Obviously she was referring to the "burst of Otherness" Canfield had mentioned. But what exactly were they talking about?

"It was not something anyone would take notice of. But the fate of this plane was sealed in that instant." Her eyes fairly glowed as she spoke. "A child was conceived. A special child—The One. He is grown now, and soon he will make his presence known."

"Sounds like Olive's Antichrist," Jack said.

Melanie smirked. "Compared to The One, Olive's Antichrist would be a fitting playmate for your children. When he comes into his own, everything will change.

The very laws of physics and nature as you know them will be transformed. And after the cataclysm ... Otherness will reign."

Ooookay, Jack thought. Time to go.

"Sounds like fun," he said, turning toward the couch to retrieve his jacket. "But I've got to get moving."

"No, please," she said, moving away from Canfield and gripping his arm—Jack was relieved she used her hand instead of her claw. "Not yet. I must speak to you."

"Hey, that thing's getting hot," Lew said, holding up his palm to the Tesla device but not touching it.

Jack could feel the heat faintly from where he was standing.

"Lewis," Melanie said, "I wish to speak to his man alone."

"Alone?" Lew said. "Why alone? What have you got to say to Jack that I can't hear?"

"I'll tell you about it later, Lewis. Wait for me outside, in the car."

He stared at her. "You've changed, Mel."

"Yes ... I have. I finally know who I am, and I've learned why I'm the way I am. And I'm proud of it. Please, Lewis. Wait for me in the car. I'll be up in a few minutes and we'll go home together."

His eyes widened. "Really? We're going home?" He glanced at the hole. "But I thought ... "

"The gateway will be closing soon. I have some things I must do before it does, and then I'll join you."

Jack didn't believe it for a minute, but Lew seemed to be swallowing the whole package.

"Sure, Mel," he said, nodding as he started toward the steps. "I'll wait for you outside. For a minute there ... "

"I would never hurt you, Lewis. Surely you know that."

"I do, Mel," he said. "I know you wouldn't." He hurried up the steps.

Canfield rolled over to the stairway and peered up, then wheeled around to face Melanie.

"Why did you tell him that?" he said in a low voice.

"Because I don't want him hurt," she said.

"How can he not be?" Canfield was twisted half around. Clinking noises rose from the pouch behind his seat back as he fumbled inside it.

"I mean physically. He was good to me, Frayne. He treated me like a human being instead of a freak. I owe him for that."

Jack felt like he was eavesdropping on a private conversation.

"Should I be hearing this?" he said. "Because frankly, I don't care to."

He glanced at the Tesla device and was sure its dome was starting to glow. He wanted out of here. The growing heat was only part of it; the whole scene was starting to annoy him. Especially Melanie and her hybrid buddy Canfield—something going on between those two, something that made him queasy.

Melanie turned to him and smiled ... not a smile to be particularly trusted. "Everything will be made clear in a minute or two."

"Jack," Canfield said, still over by the steps, still rattling around in his chair's rear pouch, "could you help me with this a minute?"

The Tesla device's dome was glowing a dull cherry red now. Jack was glad to get away from the heat.

Jack came around behind the wheelchair. He noticed a length of sturdy chain running out the rear pouch, around the support column, and back into the pouch.

"Right here," Canfield said, indicating the pouch. "It's stuck. Could you just yank that the rest of the way out?"

Jack reached in next to Canfield's hand, grabbed a fistful of links—

—and felt something cold and metallic snap around his wrist just before Canfield dove out of the wheelchair and slithered—slithered—away across the floor.

"What the—?"

Jack yanked his hand out of the pouch and stared at the chrome handcuff around his right wrist. The second cuff was closed through the links of the chain looped around the support column.

Sudden panic at being trapped rippled through his veins, just as revulsion rippled through his gut at the sight of Canfield's boneless legs jutting from his pant cuffs; they seemed more like tentacles than real legs.

"Good job, Frayne," Melanie said as Canfield squatted beside her like a dog. Jack almost expected her to pat Canfield's head. Instead she turned toward Jack. She was positively beaming now. "It would have been so much easier if you'd chosen to climb down the hole."

Jack ignored her and calmed himself. He wasn't Houdini, but he could get out of this. Lots of options ...

He tugged on the chain. The links were made of eighth-inch steel, and welded closed. He wrapped his hands around the column and tugged—not even a hint of give.

"Don't waste your time," Melanie said. "That column is a cement-filled steel pipe, set into the cement floor and bolted to a six-inch beam above. It's there to stay."

She was right. The column wasn't going anywhere. What about the cuffs, then? Top-grade Hiatts—a heavy-duty hinge model. If he had his pick set, he could have them open in thirty seconds. But the set was back in his hotel room.

Okay—he'd have to shoot himself free.

As he reached for the Semmerling he remembered it was in his jacket ... out of reach on the couch across the room.

Jack's mouth went dry. He felt the entire weight of the house pressing down on him.

Trapped. He looked at them.

Canfield's eyes shifted away. "Sorry, Jack," he said. "It's not personal. Actually I kind of like you. But Melanie's calling the shots here."

"Is that so?" said a voice from the top of the stairs. "Since when?"

Jack recognized the voice, but it was Canfield who announced him. "That sounds like Professor Roma! Professor, I've been trying to reach you all day!"

Melanie, however, was suddenly agitated. "He's not Professor Roma." Her voice dropped to an almost reverential tone. "He's The One!"

Canfield sucked in a breath. "The One? He's The One?"

Jack turned and stared up the steps to where Roma stood in the doorway, his monkey perched on his shoulder as usual.

"The One what?" Jack said.

"The One who will soon be lord and master of this world," Melanie said.

"Oh, brother," Jack muttered.

Roma said, "You have not answered my question, Melanie."

"This man is wanted on the other side, sir," Melanie said. "Some entities there feel they have a score to settle with him."

Jack didn't like the sound of that at all.

"Do they?" Roma sounded like a chef who's just been told that some of the customers think he 'should add more chocolate to his mousse.'

"Yes, they—"

Her reply was cut off by terrified shouts, then gunfire—half a dozen pistol shots—echoing up from the hole. Above it, the dome of the mini-tower was beginning to smoke.

"What's happening?" Jack said.

Roma said, "I imagine James and Miles have found the answers they've been seeking ... and they don't like them."

More shots. Jack noticed the rope ladder begin to vibrate. The shouts turned to agonized screams ... and then the ladder was still.

Above the opening the Tesla device's legs and struts were beginning to glow. Jack could feel the growing heat.

"They've also learned the painful truth," Melanie said, staring at the opening, "that the Otherness has no use for ordinary humans." She turned back to Jack. "Except for you."

Jack yanked futilely on his chains, diluting his fear with anger. "Why, damn it! I never even heard of this Otherness crap until last week!"

"Yes," said Roma—or The One. "Why?"

"The Otherness creatures—they were known as rakoshi, rakshashi, and various other names. They were children of the Otherness, and events were manipulated to have them brought here, to New York, to have them at your side for the Time of Change, but this man killed them. Certain entities in the Otherness went to great lengths to create those creatures, and now they want him brought across so they can do to him what he did to their creations."

"Why was I told none of this?" Roma bellowed, obviously angry now.

Melanie took a step forward but was careful to stay beyond Jack's reach. She bent and looked up the stairs.

"I cannot say, sir. One such as myself cannot contact The One. But I told Frayne and he was supposed to—"

"I couldn't find you!" Canfield blurted. "I searched all day and—"

"Never mind," Roma sighed.

Melanie said, "You see, sir, though I am part Otherness, it is only a small part. Not enough to be welcomed as a lost member of the family. I have to buy my way in. And Repairman Jack is my ticket."

"You mean our ticket," Canfield said.

"Yes." She turned and smiled down at him. "Ours."

"Have done with it then," Roma said—he sounded impatient. "I am going outside to wait."

"Yes, sir," Melanie said, all but kowtowing. "Thank you for your patience."

Jack glanced up at the now empty doorway, then back to Melanie.

"Your ticket?" he said, holding up the cuffs and chain. "I don't think your ticket is going anywhere."

"Don't worry. The Otherness will take care of that. All I had to do was get you this far. You see, while I was on the other side I learned my own painful truth—that I could not stay in the Otherness unless I earned my place there. So I contacted Lewis and told him to hire you. But I didn't tell him why. The plan was to draw you in through the assembly of the Tesla device, to lure you here to help reopen the gateway to the Otherness. In a way, you helped build your own gallows."

Jack ground his teeth in frustration. So goddamn stupid! How had he let himself get hooked and reeled in like this?

Melanie's smile broadened. "You might even say, Repairman Jack, that you are the victim of ... a conspiracy."

Jack tugged again at the chain as she and Canfield grinned at each other.

"Why kill Olive then?" he said.

Their smiles vanished.

"She's dead?" Canfield said. "How do you know?"

"Don't give me that," Jack said. "You had a couple of your men in black mutilate her back in the hotel, then make her body disappear."

Melanie shook her head as Canfield stared up at her. She looked worried. "I don't know anything about men in black. Whoever they were, I doubt they were from the Otherness. But then, there's so much I don't know. What did—?"

She cut off as the Tesla device began to vibrate. The whole thing was aglow and beginning to drift back toward the floor.

"We don't have much time!" Melanie cried. "Quick! Into the gateway!"

Canfield hesitated, frowning as he stared at the yawning pit. "I don't know ... "

"Trust me, Frayne," she said, beckoning to him with her talon. "You'll see—as soon as you step into the Otherness, all will be made clear. You'll know. You'll understand all its plans. You'll be part of it. You'll feel ... " Her eyes fairly glowed as she looked down into the gateway. " ... wonderful!

"But will ... will I be welcome?"

Melanie was already lowering her legs into the opening. "Yes;" She glanced at Jack. "As long as we have him."

"But we don't have him."

"The Otherness will handle it. And trust me, you don't want to be on this side when it does." Her voice echoed up as she descended below floor level. "Hurry!"

Even as low as Canfield was, slithering on his boneless legs, he had to duck to make it under the descending base of the Tesla device. He wrapped his legs around the rope ladder and slipped over the edge. Before he disappeared, he looked Jack's way.

"See you on the Other side," he said, and was gone.

The device came to rest as Canfield disappeared, the feet of its glowing legs scorching the concrete where they touched down. Almost immediately the legs and struts began to bend like Twizzlers, sinking under the weight of the dome. Slowly they collapsed into the hole. The glowing dome caught on the rim for a few seconds, then it buckled, folded, and disappeared.

Saved! Jack thought."

Almost weak with relief, he slumped against the column. Melanie and Canfield had gone to their new home without an admission ticket. He smiled. He hoped they got a nice warm welcome. Without the Tesla thing to keep it open, the hole would close just as before, leaving the rope ladder embedded in the concrete just as before.

Now to get out of the damn cuff ...

4

"You see, Mauricio? All your fretting was for nothing. The gateway is open, just as planned. My time has come."

"Admit it, though," Mauricio said from his shoulder as they crossed the yard. "Even you must have had moments of uncertainty."

True enough, he thought. But he would never admit it.

"When I learned from the Ehler woman what she had found in one of the buried Tesla caches, I suspected that my time was near. When I saw the plans and read Tesla's notes, I knew."

But the plans had been incomplete. The device they depicted could open the gateway for but a few minutes. Melanie had gone through to the other side to have a completed device sent back from the Otherness, one that would open a permanent gateway.

What matter if forces within the Otherness had directed the device to the stranger instead of him? The first gateway was open ... more would follow, opening spontaneously around the globe. Now that the process had begun, nothing could stop it. The Otherness would seep through, engulfing this world, reshaping it in its own image.

And I will be the instrument of that process.

"Still," Mauricio said, "I would have thought that when your time was truly here, you would need no devices. The gates would open on their own."

He had always thought the same, but the device had presented an opportunity he could not ignore. After all the years, all the ages he had waited, he had grown weary of biding his time until all the signs were right, until something simply happened on its own. He had seen the discovery of the plans as a sign in itself, a chance to make it happen, and so he'd leapt for it.

"And there is still the matter of The Lady."

"Forget her! You can await your destiny, Mauricio, or you can go to meet it."

"At least now I know why I could not kill the stranger," Mauricio said. "I didn't know what stopped me or why. It might even have been the Enemy. Now I know. The Otherness wants the stranger for itself." He bared his sharp teeth. "Better for him if I had succeeded."

They paused by the big oak and faced the house. To his right he saw the Ehler woman's husband sitting in his car, waiting in the darkness for his wife. How pathetic.

You will be reunited with her soon, he thought, but not in any way you can imagine.

He returned his attention to the house. His vibrating nerves sang with joyous anticipation. At last, after all this time, at this moment, in this place, in the little town of his reconception, his time had come.

After all I have been through, after all the battles I have fought, the pain and punishment I have suffered, I deserve this world. It was promised to me, I have earned it, and now, finally, it will be mine.

5

As Jack searched around for a way to open the cuff, he felt the breeze pick up against his back ... and continue to increase in force until it wasn't a breeze any more. This was a wind now.

And that hole wasn't any smaller.

Tiny spiders of apprehension ran up and down his spine. He tried to lose them by telling himself that at least the opening wasn't growing. But what was with this wind? Was the gateway going to try to suck him into the Otherness like some giant vacuum cleaner?

Just then Canfield's wheelchair began to roll toward the hole.

As Jack grabbed for it and stopped it with his free hand, he realized, Yeah, that might be just what the Otherness intended.

But no worry. He was attached to a damn near indestructible steel column. He wasn't going anywhere.

So why didn't he feel safe?

Truly, the only place he'd feel safe was out of here and racing for Manhattan. But first he had to get free of these cuffs. Jack gazed longingly at his jacket on the couch against the rear wall ... but no chance. He'd have to be Plastic Man to reach it.

With the steadily rising wind chugging down the stairs, he looked around for another way.

Canfield's wheelchair ...

He reached into its rear pouch and found the tool kit. He fumbled it open and searched through the tools. He snatched up the biggest screwdriver and a couple of slim paneling nails, then tossed the kit back into the pouch.

The wooden desk chair began to slide toward the hole. It toppled into the opening and caught on the edges. It hung there, its wood creaking and cracking, then its back snapped and the pieces tumbled out of sight.

Jack stared at the hole. Had it grown in size, or did it just seem that way? He watched the rope ladder twisting and gyrating in the downdraft. He didn't remember that wooden tread sitting on the edge before ... hadn't it been further back?

Alarmed, he clamped the nails between his lips and jammed the screwdriver through one of the chain links. He twisted the link, using both hands and putting all his weight and strength behind it. He pushed till he thought he might pop a vein in his head, but the weld held fast.

He heard a scraping sound and looked up. The desk was sliding toward the hole. It stopped after moving a foot or so, but the tools and the two remaining crystals atop it kept rolling. The crystals hit the floor and shattered. The amber shards slid and tumbled across the concrete with the tools and disappeared into the hole.

And still the wind increased ... a full-fledged gale now, blasting down those steps. The wheelchair kept wanting to roll away but Jack had the front of his sneaker hooked through the spokes of one of the wheels.

He shoved the screwdriver into his jeans pocket and began trying to pick the lock with one of the nails. He didn't know if it was possible. Hiatts made serious cuffs. Even if he'd had his pick set, the gale buffeting his arms and body would have made the job a tough go. But with a lousy nail ...

He looked up to see plastic containers of liquid detergent topple off the shelf above the washer and dryer and slide into the hole.

Jack jumped and dropped the paneling nail as the door at the top of the steps slammed explosively. A piece of molding flew down the steps and wind screamed around the edges of the door.

Jack felt like screaming too as the air pressure plummeted, driving spikes of pain through his eardrums. He lost the other nails as he shouted and worked his jaw to relieve the pressure. Nothing was working. Just when he thought his ears were going to burst, the high, pint-sized cellar windows shattered, hurling bright daggers through the air and into the sucking maw in the floor.

Jack realized he'd be stew meat now if one of those windows had been behind him. But at least the air howling through the small openings relieved the negative pressure and the pain in his ears.

The card table and folding chairs fell away from the wall and slid into the hole. Now the desk was moving again, and this time it didn't stop. It skated across the concrete, straight for the hole, and over the edge. But it didn't go down. It hung up in the opening, canted at an angle with the lip of its top caught on the rim.

"Bit off more that you can chew?" Jack said. Maybe there was some hope yet.

The sucking air shrieked around the desk, bucking it back and forth until the top groaned and popped loose. It angled up and snapped in half with a bang as it and the rest of the desk tumbled from view.

And oh Christ, the hole was definitely bigger now. The more it swallowed, the bigger it seemed to grow. The tread that had been on the edge was out of sight now. Only four more treads remained between Jack and the sucking maw.

He was reaching for Canfield's tool kit again when he heard the whine of the air around the door atop the steps change in pitch. He felt the wind grow against his back again. He looked up and saw the door slowly moving back. Fingers appeared, curled around the edge, white-knuckled with the strain of fighting the gale. Finally with a violent lurch the door swung all the way back on its hinges and a tall, ungainly figure appeared in the opening.

"Lew!" Jack shouted. "Jeez, am I glad to see you!"

"Jack?" Lew said as he clumped down the steps, clinging to the banister and the wall to brace himself against the wind at his back. "What's—?"

He stopped and gaped at the partially denuded cellar, then lurched down to the floor.

"Where's Melanie?"

"She left. Look, Lew—"

"Left?" he said, his face screwing up as he stared at the hole. "You mean she went back ... back down there?"

"Yeah. Look, just get me my jacket over there and I'll explain the whole thing."

"But she said she'd meet me out in the car!" Lew cried, his voice rising. He stepped toward the hole. "We were going home together."

"She must've changed her mind," Jack said quickly. If he could just get his hands on that jacket, get hold of the Semmerling in its pocket ... "Lew, my jacket—see it over there?"

But Lew didn't look at Jack ... he started moving away ... never taking his eyes off that damn hole.

"I've got to go find her!"

Jack grabbed his arm. "No, Lew! You can't go there! You'll be killed!"

The movement allowed the wheelchair to slip free of his foot. Jack had to choose between Lew and the wheelchair. He chose Lew. The chair rolled away and tumbled into the hole.

But Lew barely noticed, and he sure as hell wasn't listening. He violently wrenched his arm from Jack's grasp and lurched out of reach.

"I've got to be with her!"

"All right!" Jack shouted. "Be with her. But give me my damn jacket first so I can get out of here!"

Jack might as well have been talking to a mannequin. He kept shouting Lew's name but Lew gave no sign that he heard.

Lew slipped and almost lost his balance in the gale that was tearing at his clothes. To avoid being swept into the opening, he crouched and kept hold of the rope ladder as he crabbed along the floor. When he reached the rim, he snaked his good foot over the edge, snagged the dangling end of the ladder as it danced in the wind, and started down.

Not until his head had descended to floor level did he look at Jack.

"I haven't got a second to lose," he shouted. "I need her, Jack."

"Aw, Lew," Jack said, sensing it was hopeless to ask but giving it a shot anyway. "Just get me my jacket first? Please?"

"I've got to find her and bring her back while the gateway's still open. After that I'll help get you free."

"It's not going to close, Lew! It's—"

Before Jack could tell him he was wasting his time and most likely his life, Lew was gone.

Frustration screamed in Jack's brain, almost as loudly as the wind. He was out of options ... the draw was stronger, and the gateway ever larger—only three rope-ladder treads between Jack and the rim.

The white box of the dryer began a shuddering slide toward the hole. Its electric cord snagged its progress for a heartbeat, then pulled free from the outlet. It wriggled halfway there before its leveling feet hung up on a crack in the floor; it toppled forward and shimmied the rest of the way to the hole on its face, then went down.

Jack wondered if it would clock Lew along the way. He almost wished it would ... the jerk.

Like a Romeo eager to join its Juliet, the washing machine struggled toward the hole, but its connections to the water pipes held it back.

But nothing was holding back the hole. Its far edge had undermined the sister column to Jack's, leaving it dangling from the house's main beam, its lower end wavering over infinity.

Then one of the overhead bulbs shattered, the pieces darting into the hole like glass buckshot.

Jack found it increasingly difficult to hold his position against the gale blasting down the staircase and into the maw. He put the column between the hole and himself, and braced his back against it—safe for now, but when the edge of the hole reached the base of his column ...

He squinted at the couch. It was tucked in a corner with no window, so it had remained unaffected by the draw from the hole. If only he had a stick, a metal rod, anything, he might have a chance to reach his jacket. He wished he'd thought to grab that piece of door molding as it flew down the steps a few minutes ago.

And then, to his horror, he saw the couch move.

Only an inch or two, but that was enough to jostle his jacket, and now one of its sleeves was fluttering in the wind that swirled around it.

"No!" Jack shouted as the lighter side of the jacket flipped over and tugged toward the floor, dragging the heavier, gun-laden pocket after it.

God, he had to get to it. This was his last hope. He dropped to his knees, pulling the loop of chain down to floor level after him.

Another bulb shattered as the jacket hit the floor and began to slip toward the hole. Jack dropped flat, his cheek on the concrete, and stretched his free hand toward it, feeling the edges of the steel cuff dig into the skin of his trapped wrist as he strained every joint and ligament to the max and beyond.

"Damn it to hell!" he gritted as he realized his fingertips would fall at least a foot and a half short. "Not enough!"

Frantic now as he saw the jacket begin to tumble toward the hole, Jack flipped his body around and stretched his legs to the limit—just in time to trap one of the sleeves under the toe of his right sneaker.

"Made it!"

But he began to think he'd spoken too soon as he tried to drag the jacket toward him. With more surface area to work on, the wind was tugging the sleeve from under his sneaker. Jack rolled onto his belly and jammed his other toe onto the sleeve. He trapped a tiny fold of the fabric between them and bent his knees to draw it to his hand.