Stages of Grey

by Clea Simon

  ‘Well, I would’ve done the survey. They probably need the info.’

  ‘Dulcie, you shouldn’t.’ Chris was looking at her and shaking his head.

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s wrong—’ He raised a hand to stop her protest. ‘I don’t mean morally. There’s something wrong with a page you can’t dismiss. Probably a bug of some sort.’

  ‘Is my laptop okay?’ Dulcie held her breath. She’d had the little machine for so long now that Chris and his buddies tended to laugh at it. And although he’d offered countless times to build her a new one – assemble, he would have said, from spare parts – she felt strangely loyal to it, its familiar bulk in her shoulder bag a companionable weight. Besides, she didn’t want to learn the ins and outs of a new computer.

  ‘Yes, I think so.’ He tapped a few more keys. ‘Yeah, everything seems to be working properly. Let me know if it freezes up again, though.’

  ‘I will, Chris, and thanks.’ Dulcie took the machine from Chris and let her hands wander idly over the keys. ‘I wonder if they know.’

  ‘Seems like they should.’ Chris reached for the remote. ‘Sending a virus out to potential clients isn’t going to endear them to anyone.’

  ‘I’ll call Roni in the morning.’ Dulcie took the machine from Chris and closed it. ‘It’ll give me an excuse to follow up about Gus.’

  ‘Maybe he’s turned up by now.’ He turned back to the television and hit the button.

  ‘Maybe.’ Anything else Dulcie would have said was drowned out by the cheers of a faraway crowd.

  TWENTY-TWO

  ‘Flee,’ said the Stranger, his words as clear as a bell despite the turmoil of travel and the riotous Storm. ‘Take that which grows within you and fly beyond the nefarious Reach of he whose claims upon you would give the arguments of lesser minds weight, he who would empower the ill-wishes of the very same who would have you broken.’ Inside the coach, as if his voice were the very Dawn itself, the gloom was lifting. Light filtering in through the worn and tattered silken curtains, made dusky shadows on the cracked and stained leather of the bench behind him. ‘Flee,’ he pleaded, voice as soft as the Robe he had wrapped her in and yet rising, somehow, above the very Noise of the hard road they still followed. ‘Flee,’ he said, the fiery Spark of those green eyes flaring at the silken touch of dawn. ‘Flee he who would do both you and yours harm.’

  Dulcie’s heart pounded as she woke. A woman in danger. A green-eyed stranger warning her. A …

  Esmé, lying beside her, twisted around to scratch.

  A flea?

  ‘Esmé!’ Dulcie sighed and fell back on the pillow. ‘Please don’t let my dream be some kind of verbal pun,’ she whispered. ‘Please.’

  It wasn’t likely. Esmé was an indoor cat, and no other animal had come by. In fact, she realized as she lay there, it was much more likely that her dream had been spawned by her work, as well as the events of the last four days. The setting – a coach on a journey, complete with mysterious stranger – came straight from the manuscript she was reading. And the idea that the green-eyed stranger was trying to help the woman? Well, she might have been thinking of Gus, but Mr Grey had helped her out often enough. Unless, she thought, there was a message for her here, now.

  ‘Mr Grey?’ Chris, by her side, muttered and shifted, and she waited until his breathing was once more soft and even before she addressed the darkness again. ‘Was my dream some kind of message for me?’

  The sound of Esmé bathing, lapping at her fur, was the only reply.

  ‘Was it a warning?’ Images of Amy. Gus. Even Mr Thorpe swirled through her mind as she waited for a response from the one creature – a long-haired grey cat – who could comfort her.

  She waited. There was a quiet ‘mrup’ as the cat by her side switched positions.

  ‘Mr Grey, are you there at all?’ A slight snore from Chris was her only answer. ‘I guess it was just a dream, then.’ Dulcie rolled on to her side, facing away from her cat and her boyfriend. Right now, they weren’t much of a comfort to her, and she felt her hot tears rolling down on to the pillow as she drifted back to sleep.

  ‘Right now?’ The voice, as soft as Esmé’s fur, startled her back awake.

  ‘I didn’t mean …’ Dulcie forced herself to stay still, afraid that the presence she now felt beside her would disappear or, worse, prove to be simply another dream. ‘When I thought … wait …’

  ‘Your thoughts are dear to me, Little One.’ Low and warm, the voice continued. ‘Your dreams, as well. But you, too, must learn to listen—’

  ‘Dulcie, you awake?’ Chris flipped on his back. ‘I just thought of something.’

  Dulcie sighed with frustration. ‘I’m up now.’ It wasn’t the whole truth, and it certainly wasn’t fair, but it was the best she could manage. Or, no, it wasn’t. ‘Sorry, Chris, what is it?’

  ‘I had the strangest dream just now.’ He propped himself up on one elbow to look at her, over Esmé who stretched out between them. ‘Or maybe it wasn’t a dream.’

  ‘Mr Grey?’ She didn’t need to say more. Chris not only knew about her spectral pet, but he’d been visited by the feline spirit as well.

  But he was shaking his head. ‘No, I don’t think so. This was, I don’t know, the feeling of something eating its way through something. Like a worm in a flower or a piece of fruit.’

  Dulcie wrinkled her nose in disgust, but tried to keep her voice even. ‘Like something is bad at its core?’

  ‘Like there’s something wrong inside, anyway.’ Chris began stroking Esmé in an absent-minded way. ‘I kept thinking, “a sickness of the heart”.’ He shook his head. ‘Sounds like one of your stories, Dulcie. But then it hit me – that email?’

  ‘I don’t follow.’

  ‘What if it wasn’t just a bug, but an actual worm in it?’

  Now he had lost her. But even in the dark, he must have sensed her confusion. ‘I mean, some kind of malware,’ he continued. ‘I’m thinking that either their email company is ripping them off – or it wasn’t a real email. It was something that had hijacked their list to go phishing.’

  ‘Chris?’ Dulcie was beginning to wonder whether she was indeed awake. None of this was making sense.

  ‘Phishing – with a “ph”. Trolling for info. If they have the list, then they already have your email address and your name. Before you know it, they’re getting your passwords, financial info. Whatever.’

  ‘Well, I’m sure I know better than to give that stuff out.’ Chris looked at her.

  ‘What?’ she asked. ‘I know I buy stuff online, but I’m careful about …’

  ‘But not everybody is, Dulce.’ Even in the dark, she could make out his smile. ‘And not everyone has someone who can clean their drive off when a program refuses to even force close.’

  ‘And I didn’t even thank you before.’ She put her hand on his, when a thought struck her. ‘Do you think that’s why they’re broke?’ Dulcie looked up at her boyfriend, trying to make out his features in the dark. ‘Hey, maybe it’s not about the customer base. Maybe someone’s stealing from them.’

  She felt as much as saw him shake his head. ‘I think there’s probably a lot of reasons for a theater company to be losing money, Dulce. Even with subsidized rent, they’ve got to pay something. And can you imagine what it costs to heat that place? When it was a bookstore, it was always drafty and cold.’

  ‘But it’s got to survive.’ She knew she was fading. The scene from her dream was coming back, almost like a scene from a play. ‘We all still love drama. We all root for the hero.’ She thought of the Stranger and then of Heath Barstow, dark and light. Shadow and gold. ‘We all want the heroine to come out all right.’

  ‘Good night to you, too, sweetie.’ Chris looked over at his girlfriend, her lips still moving even as her eyes closed. Pulling the edge of the blanket out from under the sprawled cat, he tucked it around her, as her murmuring gave way to the even breath of sleep.

  TWENTY-THREE

&n
bsp; ‘Hey, stranger.’ Slightly fuzzy from lack of sleep, Dulcie didn’t immediately recognize the voice on the line.

  ‘Suze!’ Memory kicked in, as Dulcie poured her coffee. ‘I’ve missed you!’

  ‘I know, I’m sorry.’ From the background noises, Dulcie figured her friend was already at her South End office. ‘It’s just been so crazy.’

  ‘The credit fraud?’ Just to hear her old friend’s voice was comforting.

  ‘Yeah, it’s funny,’ said Suze. ‘The credit card companies don’t seem to care. I guess it’s just a write-off for them. They’ll reimburse the false charges, which is good. But they won’t prosecute.’

  ‘Why not?’ Dulcie wasn’t sure she cared, but it felt good to talk about something other than her own work – or murder.

  ‘I think it’s a combination of things.’ Suze, however, sounded tired. ‘Partly, it just isn’t worth their time. They’ve got insurance. And partly, it’s really hard to prove – you can say that a charge was a mistake and you’ll delete it. Unless you catch someone in the act, who’s to say that you did it? Maybe your system was hacked or something.’

  ‘Morning.’ Chris walked in, reaching past Dulcie for the coffee and interrupting her thought.

  ‘That’s terrible,’ Dulcie said into the phone. Chris barely raised his eyebrows. ‘What were you saying about hacked?’ Something was tickling her memory, if only she could place it.

  ‘Oh, I doubt that happened here.’ Suze sounded resigned. ‘Usually these jerks just steal mail or receipts, if they have access. If they can get their hands on someone’s check paying for a bill, they have the account number, the bank number – they can get a new card sent to their address and, voila, suddenly the client is buying high-end stereo equipment.’

  ‘Free entertainment.’ Dulcie caught herself. She didn’t want Suze to think she admired thievery. ‘For someone, that is.’

  ‘Not even,’ said Suze. ‘Most of the time, they sell the stuff for cash. I guess someone gets a bargain out of it. Oh, hey, Dulcie, I’ve got to run. Call me later? I want to hear what’s up with you.’

  ‘Sure,’ Dulcie said, warmed as much by the call as the coffee.

  Dulcie was halfway through the metaphysical poets section when it came back to her.

  ‘What do you mean by a conceit?’ Adam, a particularly dense sophomore, was asking for the third or fourth time. ‘You mean, like, it’s an idea or something, right?’

  ‘Close.’ Dulcie had made herself smile. At least he hadn’t asked if Donne had been bragging again. ‘A conceit is more like a theme. A metaphor, like when Donne writes about the flea who bites both the speaker and his lover.’

  ‘Ew.’ Celia grimaced. ‘Bugs.’

  That was it: bugs. When Suze had mentioned hacking, she’d wondered if the University Rep bug might be what was draining the theater’s finances, in some way. Chris had pooh-poohed the idea, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t possible. Maybe someone had hacked into the company’s bank account. Maybe the email bug was a mistake. A clue …

  ‘Ms Schwartz?’ Celia’s voice broke in. ‘I’m sorry. That was out of line. It’s just that I have a phobia, you know, like a really bad fear …’

  ‘That’s fine, Celia.’ Dulcie broke in before her student could define the word for her. ‘I was reminded of something. But you brought up an interesting point. Can any of you tell me why Donne might use something as, well, disgusting as a flea to make his point?’

  It wasn’t a bad question, and it got the students talking. It’s primary advantage, however, was that it let Dulcie sit back and think about what might have happened.

  For starters, who would want to steal from a theater company? It must be pretty obvious that a small venue wouldn’t have much money. Then again, none of Suze’s clients were rich, either. The legal clinic was open to all, but in reality it only took on cases for people who couldn’t afford pricier (Dulcie was loath to say better) representation. Maybe aiming small was a way to stay off the radar. If a thief stole too much then maybe the credit card companies would bother to pursue legal action. Or was it the university affiliation that had attracted the hacker?

  ‘Ms Schwartz?’ This time, eight sets of eyes were on her. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘It’s a mystery, isn’t it?’ For this class, that usually worked, and from the nods around the table, she guessed that once again it had. And since the Memorial Church bell was ringing, Dulcie was content to leave it at that.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Thoughts of Gus, as much as anything, determined her next move. Even if the city police were already looking for the murder weapon, surely, she reasoned, Detective Rogovoy would want to know about the hacking – well, the suspected hacking, she silently amended – especially if it involved someone getting into the university email system. And after the dressing down she had received, Dulcie wanted to prove herself useful again. But her concerns for the silver-grey cat urged her to visit the small theater first. Besides, she acknowledged, there might be a simpler reason for the faulty email, something that Roni could explain or had already fixed.

  Still, she slowed as she made her way from the Emerson Hall classroom down to the theater. The police tape no longer fluttered, yellow and shiny, at the end of the alleyway where Amy Ralkov had been killed, but Dulcie found her eyes drawn to it anyway.

  ‘What am I doing? Bothering those poor people when they’ve lost someone?’ Dulcie only noticed that she was talking out loud when a black-clad woman turned to stare, her eyes made unnaturally large by thick eyeliner. ‘Sorry,’ she called after the woman’s departing back, earning another stare. ‘Wow, even the Goths think I’m weird.’

  ‘You notice the eyes, don’t you?’ The voice, gentle and warm in her ear, nearly made her jump.

  ‘Mr Grey?’ Dulcie resisted the urge to turn around. She knew from long experience that when she heard the grey cat, she rarely saw him – and vice versa. To look for him almost guaranteed that he would stop speaking to her. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘The eyes, so striking.’ In her mind, she pictured not the woman’s black-rimmed stare but the green eyes of her pet. Only for some reason she thought of them as a darker green, like a Russian blue’s. Gus’s eyes.

  ‘Oh, no.’ Dulcie gasped. Was she forgetting what Mr Grey looked like? The thought hit her like a punch in the gut, and she dug into her bag for her cell phone. She hadn’t had this phone when Mr Grey had died, nearly two years before. But she’d transferred one of her favorite photos to it for easy access.

  Before she could find the photo, however, she saw another familiar face. Lucy: her mother was calling.

  ‘Dulcie?’ Despite being the one who had placed the call, her mother sounded surprised when she answered.

  ‘In the flesh.’ Phone against her ear, Dulcie started walking again. The wind was getting vicious, which didn’t help her temper. ‘You expected maybe someone else?’

  ‘I wasn’t sure, dear. I’ve had another vision.’ Dulcie rolled her eyes but said nothing. Such ‘visions’, she was sure, were her mother’s way of coping with loneliness now that her only child was gone. ‘I saw you in it.’

  ‘Mom, we’re going to come visit this summer.’ If she could address the underlying issue, Dulcie thought, maybe she could tone down her mother’s wackiness. ‘I promise.’ She softened her voice. Lucy meant well.

  ‘Dulcinea, don’t you talk down to me.’ Dulcie bit her lip. ‘This is serious. I saw you in it – only I wasn’t seeing you as myself.’

  Dulcie had reached the theater and turned to face the glass wall. ‘Did I look like someone else?’ The wall was lined with posters, and she saw her reflection on top of one. Had there been a cat character?

  ‘No, no.’ Lucy sighed audibly. ‘I wasn’t myself. I was different. Shorter.’

  Dulcie made what she intended to be an encouraging noise. It was getting colder by the second.

  ‘And I was seeing you through a crowd of people.’ Lucy kept talking as Dulcie tried to make ou
t the image behind the reflection. Were those whiskers? ‘You were standing at the mouth of an alley. And Dulcie, you looked like you were in shock.’

  ‘Mom?’ Surprised out of her reverie, Dulcie broke in. Too late, it turned out. The line was dead. Dulcie thought about calling back – it was certainly possible that Lucy, in her excitement, had accidentally hung up on her only child. It was also possible that she had done so for dramatic effect. Or that the phone bill for the commune had once again been left too late. Plus, she was freezing.

  Still, to hear that her mother had seen her as she had been two nights before – seen her as only someone in the alley could have – was too much. Dulcie was punching in the numbers when the door to her left opened.

  ‘Ms Schwartz?’ It was the dark-eyed woman who had turned to stare. ‘Would you like to come in?’

  ‘Um, sure.’ She pocketed her phone for later and looked at the waifish figure in front of her. She was familiar, though Dulcie couldn’t exactly place her. ‘Have we met?’

  ‘I’m Avila. I’m that cat-thing. You know, in the show?’ The slim woman didn’t seem to be asking for Dulcie’s confirmation, but she found herself nodding anyway as she followed her into the lobby. This was the woman on the poster; she should have recognized those big dark eyes, the black body suit under the oversized charcoal sweater, even if the character – a woman who morphs into a cat and then back into a woman – wasn’t anything she remembered from the original Ovid. ‘Anyway, Roni saw you and sent me to bring you in.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Dulcie made her way to the theater’s small office.

  ‘Hi, Dulcie.’ Roni looked up from her computer, the rings around her eyes accentuated by those large glasses. ‘I saw you were on the phone, and I had to get these payments in by noon …’ She gestured to the envelopes piled by the computer, all ripped open, and then to the screen in front of her. ‘Anyway, thought you’d want to come in out of the cold.’