by Steven James
“Usually. Yes.”
“Well. I’ll take that under consideration.”
“Uh-huh . . .” She taps a finger against the glass case, then brushes her hand across the case that holds the engagement rings and looks at me demurely. “I’ll have to think more about what would be ideal as far as jewelry goes, but for right now I don’t think any of those necklaces are quite right for a woman that special to you.”
I flag the man behind the counter. “Not today. Maybe another time.”
He opens his mouth partway as if he’s going to reply, but decides against it and goes back to needlessly polishing his already spotless display cases.
I catch up with Charlene outside the store, and we leave for the hospital to do the children’s show.
Derek decided it was time to wake up Dr. Jeremy Turnisen.
“Can I do it?” Calista asked.
“Sure.”
She did it with a kiss.
Well, more than one.
As he regained consciousness, she stepped back.
Derek stood beside her, fingering the needle and suture thread. “We’ll give him a little time to recover. Then we’ll get started.”
Eyelids
12:46 p.m.
8 hours left
Xavier meets us in the parking lot near the main entrance. He has a duffel bag full of props with him. We tell him about our rather truncated meeting with Agent Ratchford.
“So he didn’t want to see Fionna’s findings?”
“No,” I reply. “To be frank, it was all very odd. I couldn’t quite put my finger on what he wanted—it seemed like he wanted information about Akinsanya, but . . . Well, all I can say is that I got the impression something more is going on here with Ratchford’s interest in the case.”
“So did I,” Charlene adds.
Xavier takes a moment to reflect on that. “Well, let’s do the show and then figure out where to take things from there.”
For the performance, I plan on card tricks and small effects, and I figure there’ll be plenty to choose from in the voluminous bag Xavier is toting.
We’re on our way to the front door when I get a call from Mr. Fridell that tonight’s show has been blacked out.
I imagine this must be related to what happened last night during the finale. “Is it because of the accident involving the piranha tank? I don’t think the audience even knew it wasn’t part of the effect. Seth’s prestige salvaged things. We can still make that effect work.”
“The show manager and I talked it over. There are other factors to consider. Legal matters. And public relations. I know the audience members weren’t supposed to be filming your escape, but someone took cell phone footage of it and posted it online. The media got ahold of it and has been running with it this morning. Our lawyers think it would be best to take a day off so we can respond appropriately to the news stories and the queries we’re getting.”
I blame myself, and I hate the feeling it gives me.
“I’m not upset with you or your team,” Fridell assures me. “I’m just glad you weren’t hurt any worse. We’ll have to consider the possibility that our lawyers will want that trick out of your show.”
Though I can understand where he’s coming from, I’m not sold on the idea. “I’d like to be in on that conversation.”
“I understand. I’ll keep you in the loop.”
“And there’s no way we can still go on tonight?”
“The box office is already in the process of refunding tickets. For now, tomorrow’s show is still on. I’ll pass your views on to our lawyers, but I can’t promise anything. We’ll talk as soon as I know anything more.”
After we end the call, the hospital’s receptionist directs Charlene, Xavier, and me to the administrator’s office, where Ms. Sage-Turner enthusiastically leads us up to the third floor’s conference room/lounge in the children’s wing where we’ll be performing.
Akio Takahashi did not take the undersecretary down to sublevel 4.
He thought that by showing her some of the research that happened on the level directly above, he might quell her curiosity. So, he led her to sublevel 3 instead and began explaining the company’s findings on swarm technology using insect-sized reconnaissance robots.
It’d better be enough for her.
Because if it wasn’t, he didn’t know what he was going to do.
Putting the thoughts of tonight’s cancelled performance out of my mind, I focus on entertaining the children. Though my arm is aching, thankfully the show goes by without a hitch.
I do a series of street magic effects and mentalism, and the kids love it.
Although some hospital staff are present, most of the audience of three dozen or so is made up of children who are cancer patients. Some kids are recovering from operations, injuries, or broken bones.
It’s great to see smiles on their faces as I rip up oversized playing cards and then restore them, pull a chain through my neck, and toss my Morgan Dollar up and vanish it in midair.
Charlene helps me with some of the illusions, and even Xavier gets in on the act, doing a cups and balls routine and then showing the children how it’s done so they can perform it for their friends. He wants to do his new flaming bubbles effect, but as he’s pulling out the necessary chemicals, Ms. Sage-Turner quickly but politely puts a nix on that.
Derek sat on the edge of the bed and told Jeremy Turnisen what lay in store for him if he was not cooperative.
His eyes were wide with fear, his voice quavering. “If I can help you, yes, yes, I’ll do anything. Just please, don’t hurt me.”
In response, Derek freed the man’s hands, but left his feet bound to the chair.
“I want to show you something.” Derek nodded to Calista, who went to retrieve a tablet computer from the desk. “I’m going to ask you a series of questions. I want you to be as forthcoming in your answers as you can be. It’ll save us both a lot of time and effort.”
“I’m telling you,” Turnisen pleaded, “whatever it is you want, I’ll help you, but you have the wrong man. I’m just an engineer—”
“Where?”
“Where?”
“Where do you work? Where do you do your research?”
“I’m self-employed. I can give you my files, my client list, everything.”
“I’m sure you can.”
Calista returned and stood expectantly beside Derek. “Show him,” he said.
She swiped her finger across the screen to pull up the photos she’d taken for Derek out in the desert, the pictures of Heston Dembski, RN, former special assistant to Dr. Malhotra. There were a dozen photos of the man after Derek had finished his target practice on him.
Turnisen gulped, almost imperceptibly. “What is it you want from me?”
“The launch codes.”
“What?”
“The launch codes. For the test flight scheduled tonight at 8:46.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I know where you work, Jeremy.”
“I told you, I’m—”
“Please. No lies.”
Calista scrolled through the photos again, to make sure Jeremy got a good look at all of them, but he closed his eyes and turned away halfway through.
“Why did you kill that man?” he whispered.
“To make clear to you how serious I am about getting what I want.” Derek patted Calista’s arm, and she bent and straightened out the plastic sheet that was spread out beneath the chair.
“What’s that for?” Turnisen’s voice trembled as he spoke.
“Easier cleanup.” The colonel removed the needle and heavy, black thread from his pocket. “Hold out your wrists.”
“No. Listen, I’m telling you, I—”
“Hold them out or I’ll start with your eyelids.”
The French Drop
1:46 p.m.
7 hours left
The boy with progeria, who I find out is named Tim, isn’t there in the conference room, w
hich is okay by me because I was actually hoping to talk with him privately.
Some of the children who couldn’t come are asleep, a few are contagious, one is in a coma. One burn patient, who tipped a deep-fat fryer of hot grease onto her head, was so easily prone to infection that she was isolated in a section of a room partitioned off with a plastic tent.
Since our performance tonight at the Arête was cancelled, I call off our afternoon rehearsal. That means we aren’t under any time constraints, so after the show, Xavier, Charlene, and I split up the remaining rooms and do some walk-around effects for the kids we’re allowed to see. I’m even able to do some card tricks for the girl with the burns, from the other side of the plastic sheet where the nurses do most of their work.
The last room I visit is Tim’s.
Children with progeria don’t need to stay in hospitals, but they often have recurring health issues that cause them to spend more time there than other children, and the nurse who’s leading me to Tim’s room informs me that that’s been the case with him.
We arrive and she knocks gently on the door. “There’s someone to see you, Tim.” We wait for him to invite us in, then we enter.
It’s hard to describe how a child with progeria looks.
Tim has lost nearly all of his hair. His face gives you the impression of an old man and a young boy mixed together into the same body. He has a high forehead and a sharper than average nose. A movie I once saw about Benjamin Button comes to mind, but even that doesn’t do justice to portraying someone who has progeria in real life.
Tim remembers me from the time I was here doing a show before, and his eyes light up. I join him by his bed and the nurse gives us some privacy, closing the door quietly behind her.
Tim is seven. Unless there are unforeseen complications or unexpected treatment breakthroughs, he’ll likely die of old age within seven or eight years.
My boys were five when they died, and even though Tim looks nothing like them, I end up thinking of them when I see him.
I do a few vanishes with the cards and then offer to teach him how to do a French Drop for coin tricks, but he tells me he already knows how to do it.
Sure enough, when I hand him my Morgan Dollar, he goes through the proper mechanics of the move. His technique is good, and even though I can follow the coin, to an untrained eye he would have likely pulled it off.
I’m impressed. “Who taught you how to do that?”
“Emilio.”
“Emilio Benigno?”
Tim nods. “He was my friend. He went to heaven.”
“Yes.” I fumble for how to reply. “He did.”
“We’d go and watch the fountains sometimes. You know, at the Bellagio. My parents are divorced. My dad can’t see me anymore. Emilio was nice to me.”
Emilio’s friendship with Tim is news to me. I knew about my friend’s shows here at the hospital, but I didn’t know about his personal connection with any of the patients. However, from all I do know about Emilio and his sense of compassion, the extra time he spent with Tim doesn’t surprise me.
Tim didn’t seem sad a moment ago when he said that Emilio went to heaven, but his mood has shifted and he becomes more melancholy. “He said he was gonna help me.”
“How was Emilio going to help you?”
“To not get old so fast.”
Immediately, Emilio’s transhumanism books and his research on the jellyfish and progeria come to mind.
“Do you know how he was going to do that? To help you not get old so fast?”
“The drug people.”
“The drug people?”
“From RixoTray. The doctor who asks me all the questions and gives me the medicines. Dr. Schatzing.”
Tim looks past me out the window. The whole idea of coming in here to cheer him up seems to have backfired, and it looks like the conversation is only serving to make him somber.
I’m trying to figure out the best way to turn things around again when he offers to show me another trick.
“That’d be great.”
He picks up the straw from his lunch tray, tears off one end of the paper wrapper covering it, and slides the part that’s still around the plastic up and down five or six times. Finally, he removes it, then slides the miniature pepper shaker to the center of the tray.
After carefully balancing the straw on the pepper shaker’s lid, he passes his hands close to the straw and it begins to spin.
“I’m not blowing it,” Tim tells me proudly. “It’s magic.”
I know it’s the static electricity that builds up from the paper rubbing against the plastic straw, but who’s to say there’s nothing mysterious or magical about that? An invisible force that seems to come from nowhere and that most people couldn’t explain if given the chance? Sounds like magic to me.
“Yes,” I tell him. “It is.”
At last the nurse appears in the doorway and it’s time to leave. I promise Tim that I’ll be back. He puts his frail arm around me, and it both breaks my heart and lightens it when he gives me a hug. “And maybe I can teach you some more tricks,” he says.
“I’d like that.”
In the hallway, I meet up with Charlene and Xavier. We thank Ms. Sage-Turner for scheduling the show on such short notice, but she tells us that she’s the one who should be thankful.
“We’ll be back,” Charlene promises her.
“We’ll look forward to it.”
I venture a guess. “I understand there’s some progress being made on the progeria research front.”
“It looks like a sizable anonymous donation is coming in.” She looks very pleased. “We’re working with RixoTray Pharmaceuticals on a joint project.”
“That’s fantastic.”
A nurse flags her down, she excuses herself and steps away.
As my friends and I head for the elevator bay, I tell them about my encounter with Tim. “Emilio promised he would help him to not grow old so fast. How could he make a promise like that?”
“He wouldn’t have,” replies Xavier, “unless he knew for sure something was on the horizon. Some sort of breakthrough.”
“Maybe he learned something from the RixoTray researcher?” Charlene says. “This Dr. Schatzing?”
Is he the one who gave Emilio the RixoTray USB drive?
What about the DoD encrypted files? Why would Schatzing have those?
Well, either he has a connection to Groom Lake, or Emilio did.
It was a lot to chew on.
As we ride the elevator down to the first floor, Charlene continues, “Remember how we were talking about why Emilio might have been interested in all this, and we were thinking it might be because he wanted to find a way to live longer, or he might have wanted someone else to live longer?”
“It looks like we just found that person,” Xavier answers.
“Yes,” I agree. “I think we did.”
Outside the hospital, Charlene surprises me by saying she really does think we should talk with Solomon again.
“About Akinsanya?”
“Yes. I mean, think about it, he’s really the key behind all this, isn’t he? If we can find him and turn him in to the FBI, they’ll be able to dig through all the layers and find out what’s really going on. Besides, as far as we know, he’s the one who hired Tomás to kill Emilio. And somehow, Solomon knows about him. He might be able to lead us to him.”
Even though I’m more than a little hesitant to contact Solomon again, at this point I have to admit that it might actually be worth it.
“If we go this route, I’m talking to him alone this time.”
“Betty and I are coming along,” Xavier says unequivocally. “And no, that’s not up for discussion.”
Rather than argue or ask to come along, Charlene just nods. “I can accept that. As long as you three are careful.”
“Three?”
“Two guys plus one Betty.”
“Gotcha.”
“Call me. Keep me up to speed.”
“I will.” I hand her my keys and she takes the DB9 back home while I ride with Xavier in his RV toward the Hideaway. A very low-profile vehicle. Perfect for searching for clandestine crime lords.
We don’t see Martin when we walk into the bar. There’s a different bartender working today, and when we ask her about Solomon, she tells us she has no idea who that is. She doesn’t know any Martins either.
Even laying a hundred-dollar bill on the table doesn’t jog her memory, and I believe her.
At last we go back to the RV and Xavier says, “Okay. Let’s swing by the alley.”
I have the feeling that we won’t be granted access to see Solomon without Martin’s help, but it’s worth a shot.
Between the two of us we’re able to find the alley without too much trouble. Xavier parks the RV along the street beside it.
No one answers the rusted door when we knock. I try opening it but find that it’s firmly bolted shut. There’s no lock for me to pick on this side of it.
“Well,” Xavier says, “at least we gave it a shot.”
“Back to square one.”
“Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.”
On the way back to the house, Fionna calls. I put her on speakerphone so Xavier, who’s driving, can hear what she has to say.
She tells us that when Charlene was at the front gates of my house waiting for them to open, she saw a sedan with two men sitting in it across the street. “They’re still there,” she informs us. “I can see them from the window in the library.”
“It might not be anything.” But I don’t exactly believe that.
“I had Lonnie and Donnie go outside to play some catch. Football. They got a closer look. One of the men is watching the house through binoculars.”
“Feds,” mumbles Xavier.
“Or cops,” she suggests.
If we’re going to keep looking into all this, I don’t want anyone—not cops or FBI agents—staking out my place.
I think things through and come up with something that should be able to free us up from being watched by whoever’s outside those gates.
“Okay, listen, Fionna. Have everyone stay in the house. I have an idea.”