by Ward Wagher
“We do not see too many of these here,” the jeweler said as he turned the coin in the light. “However, it is fully acceptable in payment.”
He handed the coin back to Larry. “We try very hard to carry appropriate items for every budget, Sir. If you will give me a moment, please.”
He turned and unlocked a cabinet behind him, and then slid a tray out. He turned back and set it on the countertop.
“We have a selection of items here in pewter, stainless steel, and bronze. With your budget, we can manage a small diamond.”
Maggie tried to raise herself up to look at the rings in the tray.
“Oh, excuse me, Ma’am,” the jeweler said. “Let me carry the tray over to the table there. That will give you a better look.”
“Thank you,” Maggie said. “I’m still getting used to this contraption.”
“Are you the young lady who recently arrived from Boston, then?” he asked.
She nodded.
“Welcome to our city, then. Everyone is delighted you survived your accident.”
“Thank you,” she said. “I had a lot of help from Larry.”
“And may I congratulate you on your engagement?”
“Thanks,” Larry said.
He wheeled Maggie over to the table that was at a height where she could easily look at the rings.
“Oh, these are lovely,” she said. “What do you suggest for the metals?”
“That is really up to you,” the jeweler said. “The stainless steel would be the most durable, although some people have problems with the trace metals in the alloy. The pewter, likewise. The bronze is a bit soft but would wear well with good care.”
“My ma gave me a ring that had belonged to Gran. It made my hand start to blister around the ring.”
“In that case, I would recommend the bronze. We use a copper-tin alloy, and people rarely have problems with it.” The jeweler pointed to a row of rings. “That would be this row.”
“Oh, I like that one,” Maggie said, pointing to one of the rings.
She looked up at the jeweler. Behind him was an open door into the jeweler’s workshop. Seated at a workbench was a large old woman wearing horn-rimmed glasses. She turned and glared at Maggie. Maggie sucked in a breath. The jeweler turned to see what Maggie was looking at. Alex quickly walked over to where Maggie sat.
“Oh, that’s just Mrs. Salice. She can be kind of scary, but she’s harmless. Now, this is the ring that interests you?”
Alex studied the old woman and then stepped back.
Larry and Maggie looked at each other, and back at the ring. “Yes, may I try it?” she asked.
“Yes, of course. And, we can adjust the size for you. That would be included.”
She put on the ring and held it up for Larry to see. The small diamond sparkled in the light, as she twisted the intricately worked ring.
“Oh, I love it,” she said to Larry, her eyes glowing.
“We also have some others here,” the jeweler said, helpfully.
“What do you think of the others, there?” Larry asked.
“Those are very nice, but this is just special.”
“And you have matching wedding bands?” he asked.
“Of course, Sir. Right next to where the engagement ring was nested.”
Larry tried the wedding band. It was a little tight for his ring finger, so he put it on his pinky. “This looks very nice,” he said.
“I think it is wonderful,” Maggie added. “Do you see the need to look further?”
Larry shook his head. “No, if you’re satisfied, then I am as well.”
He turned to the jeweler. “I guess this is what we want. Er, what do we do now?”
“After you pay us for the rings, we will get your sizes. I will give you a receipt. We are not very busy right now, so I can have these ready in a couple of days, say, Monday.”
Larry laid the Bunker on the counter.
“Very well, Sir,” the jeweler said. “We can go ahead and measure your fingers.”
After the jeweler wrote up the order and presented Larry with the receipt, Larry nodded to the old woman in the shop.
“She looks just like somebody we know back in Boston,” he said.
“Oh, Mrs. Salice has worked here for thirty years. My Da hired her.” He leaned forward to speak softly. “You know, I used to come into the shop when I was a boy, and she looked just as old as she does now.”
“Is that so?” Larry said.
“But I could not get along without her. She has a magic touch with the pieces.”
“I guess we’ll see you on Monday, then,” Maggie said.
“Good day,” the jeweler said. “And, thank you very much for stopping by.”
Alex held the door so Larry could push Maggie’s wheelchair out of the small shop.
“Where to, now?” Brad asked.
“Could you drive around the city a little bit before we return to the hotel?” Maggie asked. “I’m tired of being cooped up in buildings, and I’d like to see this place.”
“We can do that,” Alex said.
§ § §
The two stocky old women stood in an anonymous room far away from Indianapolis and Cambridge. One, wearing a worn-looking hot pink pantsuit stood with her hands clasped behind her back and gazed out the window. She seemed not to notice the winter view of the Finger Lakes and the upper-Hudson Valley.
“What will it take to stop this?” she asked with a querulous tone.
The other, wearing a baggy, blue floral-patterned dress folded her arms across her plump bosom and glared at the first woman.
“I must confess the task seemed easy when we began this project. The timidity of the principal should have completely halted everything.”
“Clearly that was not the case,” said pink pantsuit. “The introduction of other actors has not helped, either.”
“The other actors served to confuse the issues in a very helpful way,” blue floral dress said. “It has left the principal and those around him completely confused.”
“True. And it is important for us to remain in the shadows.”
“I am concerned about those we have coerced,” pink pantsuit continued. “In one case, he is now identifying with the principal. I am not confident we can continue to exert control.”
“We must not engage in overt action,” blue floral dress argued. “It would destroy our effectiveness.”
“Then we must continue to manipulate our pawns.” The first old woman leaned against the windowsill with her hands, and her gelatinous buttocks swelled alarmingly against the threadbare slacks. “If necessary, we will have to discipline them to our needs.”
“Will that not raise awareness of our activities?” blue floral dress asked.
“It should not,” pink pantsuit replied. “Obviously, we must continue to exercise caution in our dealings with these people. They are highly intelligent, even if we have succeeded in keeping them confused.”
“Should we transfer our operation to Indianapolis?”
“I think not. I believe we could maintain a lower profile in Urbana. Whenever the principal moves to Urbana, we should effect our relocation.”
Blue Floral Dress shook her head. “I do not understand how we can avoid discovery in a small town like Urbana.”
Pink Pantsuit turned with an evil smile. “There are several locations on the old campus that are believed to be haunted. I intend to play upon that.”
The other old woman snorted. “The two principals are sufficiently terrified. We should be able to encourage the fear.”
“That fear seems to reinforce their determination. I am concerned about ultimate failure on our part. It would not be warmly greeted by our benefactor.”
Blue Floral Dress heaved a great sigh. “I plan to do my best. If our benefactor is not satisfied, there is little else I can do.”
The first old woman in the hot pink pantsuit turned again to look out the window. “I suppose you are correct. However, I d
o not intend to fail. Failure happens because people plan for it. I plan to succeed. Remember, my friend, you are not crucial to my success.”
There was a long pause. “I… understand.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
“This has possibilities, I think,” Maggie said as Larry rolled her into the low-slung concrete house.
He wrinkled his nose at the dank smell from the house being closed up all winter. “Needs some airing out, I think.”
“And some paint,” Maggie added. She looked down. “Ceramic tile, though. I like that. Makes it easier to move around on my own.”
Abby Creitzman followed them into the house. “And the sidewalk goes straight through the block to the campus.”
Maggie rolled her chair across the living room, into what looked like a dining area. “An open kitchen, too. At least this part of the house seems to work for me.”
Larry walked through a doorway to one side into a short hallway between two bedrooms. The bathroom was situated between them. He walked back out.
“We would have to widen a couple of doorways, I think.”
“Let me see,” Maggie said as she rolled over to the doorway. By backing and filling a couple of times she was able to work her way into the hallway, and then to one of the bedrooms. She rolled back and forth as she studied the room.
“This will work. It’s a nice size. We would need to put a shelf about halfway up in the closet, so we can hang my clothes where I can reach.”
Larry followed her into the bedroom and looked around, nodding. “Other than paint, and the doors, it doesn’t need much. I wonder if the landlord will mind the changes.”
Abby stepped into the room. “There will be no problems with modifications.”
Larry walked back into the living room, and then over to the door leading to the garage. The bare concrete walls and floor were a contrast to the interior of the house. The garage door was of heavy, reinforced steel construction, with a motorized opener.
He stepped back into the house and into the kitchen. He examined a row of switches that controlled the lighting for the room. Experimentally, he began trying switches to see what they did. The first turned on the ceiling lighting, and the second displayed indirect lighting from under the cabinets. He nodded and flipped the third switch. With a rumble, steel shutters moved into place, covering the windows on the outside.
Maggie’s voice came from the other room. “What did you do, Larry?”
He flipped the switch again, and the shutters rumbled away from the windows. “Trying switches, Mags.”
“It got dark in here.” He heard the two girls giggle.
“This place is a fortress,” Larry said. “Are you expecting Indian attacks, or what?”
“No,” Abby laughed. “The summer weather here is somewhat energetic. Most of the buildings are constructed to withstand tornadoes.”
“Do they get tornadoes here?” Maggie asked.
“They come near quite often; although I think it has been ten years since they had a direct hit. The thunderstorms, however, are a weekly occurrence from the early spring until the fall. They tend to get violent. The town set a building code after the last tornado that hit here. That is why the newer houses are built like this.”
“That’s interesting,” Larry said. “I think this will be an interesting place to live.”
Maggie rolled across the dining area into the kitchen. “I am going to have to make sure I have a ruler or something to reach across the counter to the switches.”
“Each room has a switch to control the shutters,” Abby said. “You will notice the fireproof construction. Even the roof is reinforced concrete.”
“What about an earthquake?” Maggie asked.
Abby laughed. “The town council even thought of that. All of the concrete is reinforced. The New Madrid fault completed what the Carrington Event started, at least for the Mississippi Valley. I understand they received a pretty sharp jolt here, although it was nothing like what Peoria experienced. Points west were completely leveled.”
“I guess I’m going to have to read up on that,” Larry said. “I had heard about that quake, but never really studied it.”
“Strangely enough, I have studied it heavily,” Abby said. “It was ironic that everyone expected the San Andreas Fault to let go along the west coast long ago, but it seems to relieve itself with medium duty shocks on a regular basis, but they’ve somehow missed The Big One. The New Madrid cut loose in the early eighteen-hundreds, and nobody expected it to do anything significant for another thousand years or so.”
“I guess that shows what we know about geology,” Maggie said.
“All too true.”
“I do look forward to studying the weather here,” Maggie continued. “I love thunderstorms.”
“Not today, thank you very much,” Abby said. “The weather people are predicting something for early this afternoon. We need to be on our way before lunchtime.”
“After that winter storm, I think I would listen to your advice,” Larry laughed.
Abby nodded emphatically. “Believe me, you do not want to go near a thunderstorm cell in a grasshopper. It would be an exciting way to commit suicide.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Larry said dryly.
After looking at several houses, Abby drove them to the building site for the quantum physics laboratory. It was situated outside of the town, and the new laboratory would be nestled in a wooded copse at the end of a winding lane. The turbine whined in protest as Abby negotiated the rutted pathway to the building site.
“This isn’t an electric?” Larry asked.
Abby shook her head as she kept her eyes on the winding path. “No, we use compressed natural gas to power some of the vehicles. The technology for the electrics is a bit more expensive.”
“We used the natural gas in the fuel cells in most of our vehicles, both in Quebec and Cambridge.”
“One of the Paladin’s companies has done a lot of development work on the turbine engines. We use them in heavy vehicles and in agriculture. Many of the passenger cars are electrics, though, because they are so convenient. We will probably begin using the turbines in our aircraft, eventually.”
“Not on the grasshoppers, though?” Maggie asked.
“No,” Abby laughed. “Wilton Industries makes the grasshoppers. Jasper Wilton and the Paladin are friends, and they do a lot of business with one another.”
She pulled to a stop on the edge of the dusty building site. The builders had laid a large concrete pad, and it looked like they were pouring another pad on top of it.
“That’s going to be a thick floor,” Larry commented after they had gotten out of the car. Abby retrieved the wheelchair from the luggage compartment and unfolded it. Maggie leaned forward in the chair to study the building.
“This is called tilt-wall construction,” Abby said. “They actually pour the walls on top of the floor, and then tilt them upright.”
“That’s very interesting,” Maggie said. “Somebody was really clever.”
“The technique is hundreds of years old,” Abby replied. “Once the walls are tied together with the steel, the buildings are very solid. You see them used mostly for large, open-span buildings. This is a little unusual. The Paladin wanted to make it easier to roll large pieces of equipment into the lab. But, then, I guess he told you that, Larry.”
“He didn’t describe the construction methods, but we did review the building plans. It’s really amazing to see the physical building, though.”
“I imagine the building will go up quickly,” Maggie commented.
“Indeed,” Abby agreed. “We are estimating we will have the shell complete in thirty days if the weather cooperates.”
Larry spun in a circle, looking at the sky. “Which weather will not be cooperating this afternoon, right?”
“Exactly. Mr. Winkleman insisted I show you the laboratory site, but we dare not dawdle.”
“I think this area is a lot more int
eresting, now that it isn’t covered with snow,” Maggie said.
“It’s warmer, anyway,” Abby said.
They studied the site for another fifteen minutes, before packing up again, and driving back to Urbana.
“Mr. Winkleman insisted that I not rush you,” Abby said as they now rode along a smooth metaled road. “But, I am curious. Did you find any of those houses interesting?”
“I think we both liked the first house,” Maggie said. “But nobody has mentioned the price.”
“Everything is in the same general price range,” Abby said. “But, just as a reminder, the housing is provided as part of your compensation. We want you to be comfortable in a home in Urbana. Mr. Winkleman will arrange for the necessary modifications to the house for you.”
“Do we have time to return to the first house?” Larry asked. “We need to make a list of changes we would like.”
Abby glanced at the clock on the dash of the car. “If you do not mind a late lunch in Indianapolis, I think we will be fine.”
They walked through the house again, and Abby wrote down the items Larry and Maggie requested. They returned to the small airport and boarded the grasshopper for the return to Indianapolis. The little craft leaped into the air with surprising willingness.
“The air is a lot smoother than it was for our last trip out here,” Maggie commented.
“Look behind us,” Abby said.
Larry and Maggie both looked out the rear of the plastic bubble at mountainous ranks of clouds on the horizon.
“Yep, I’m glad we left when we did,” Larry said. “That looks nasty.”
“If one of us ever suggests flying through something like that,” Maggie said, “I trust you will knock some sense into them.”
“Rest assured,” Abby said. “Mr. Winkleman can get away with quite a bit, because of his position. He and I had a heated discussion, though, after that last trip when we flew out here with you. He is now more circumspect.”