Still, thought Scarborough, musing through the last of the canned beer, sourly surveying his surroundings, Camden was right: Those writings and Davis’s theories were quite close to what seemed to be shaping up as the truth. Jake had been right to come here to consult; Scarborough had been wrong to put up such a stink.
Hell, maybe the old stuck-up cockeyed bastard in there was somehow linked up with the Others; or at least in contact, like he’d hinted he was in his articles, though never in person—Davis was a wily guy, and you couldn’t pin him with questions about that kind of thing. Scarborough knew, because he’d tried to once on “Nightline.” Even Ted Koppel couldn’t skewer the guy, and that meant fancy footwork. Scarborough shouldn’t have had that adverse reaction; he should have just gone right on in there with the others and laid down his cards. Hi there. Maybe I was wrong. We need help.
Yes.
Even as the last of the beer washed down his throat, Scarborough knew what he was going to have to do.
He was going to have to go in there and face up to his own past arrogance, apologize, and join in his companions’ plea for help.
His queasy stomach gave a rebellious roll, but he ignored it. He got up, tossed the can into the sack with its fellows, and then exited the Winnebago, making sure the door was locked behind him. (Paranoia here was a healthy quality; when you were on the run from government and presumably state authorities, you didn’t want your mode of transportation stolen out from under you!)
The night had cooled things down considerably. Here near Prescott, they were at a higher altitude than where they had been before, and so the temperatures tended to be lower. The night was clear with a rising half-moon over hills of ponderosa pine. It had the bracing smell of forest to it, the taste of mountain flower, and this bucked Scarborough up considerably.
He straightened himself, tucked in his shirt, tied a shoe, and then strode up the pathway.
At the door, he almost turned back. A sudden fear seized him; a dread of being laughed at. “Ah! So here is that asshole Scarborough,” Davis might say. “Come to grovel and lick my boots. Come on in, Dr. Fool, I’ve got a nice pile of shit for you to chomp down on!”
But then he remembered that Davis, even at his most sarcastic and biting of his remarks in print and in public debate, had always remained civilized. And once, after a particularly acrimonious discussion at a conference in Denver, he’d tried to patch things up by offering to buy the skeptic a drink. Scarborough had declined, but he’d declined politely with a thank you. Thank God for that!
There was an impressive door knocker shaped like a dragon; perhaps the gift of some fantasy-oriented fan. There appeared to be a doorbell as well, but for some reason Scarborough felt that using the dragon would be more appropriate—an acceptance of fantasy-turned-reality, if you will.
Scarborough lifted it, dropped it; lifted it, dropped it. The sound that boomed through the house beyond was like a death knell for the last of his pride. Rest in peace, he thought.
He recognized Davis’s youngish eye-glassed face as soon as it appeared at the door. The writer blinked at him for a moment, and then astonishment flashed—along with a little glimmer of fear, as though he were some kind of ghost on the threshold. “Jesus Christ,” he whispered. “Everett Scarborough!”
“The latter, though it is confusing sometimes. Hello, Davis. Got any peace pipes in there?”
For a moment the man looked indecisive. But then a light broke out of his face in the form of a smile, and he gestured for his intellectual adversary to come in. “Certainly, though you look like you need a drink and a shower more than a smoke. I take it you were with my dinner guests all along—you just didn’t want to come in because of our past.”
“In a nutshell.”
“Marsha! Jake! Look who we have here!”
Marsha Manning wobbled into the foyer first. She was holding an almost empty glass of red wine, and Scarborough could tell she was squiffed. She advanced on him in a cloud of alcohol vapors. “Everett! I’m so glad you decided not to be such a stick-in-the-mud.” She kissed him. “Lowell’s been such a wonderful host! And he’s had such an interesting tale to tell. I think this is it, Ev! I think this tells the whole story. That’s why the aliens put us here! Definitely! They wanted us to come here and meet this fascinating man!”
As though to spread the wealth, Marsha hugged and kissed Lowell Davis as well—who took it not with surprise, but with obvious pleasure. A surge of jealousy coursed through Scarborough. Just what the hell was going on here?
“Yo! It’s da man himself!” Jake Camden toddled in, and slapped Scarborough on the back. “Good choice, chum. Good choice. Now we can all have a good talk. Davis here has got some interesting things to say!”
“Right. Come on into the sitting room. I’ve got some coffee brewing, and I’ve got some very nice brandy or maybe even cognac that I’m sure a man of your tastes would appreciate, Dr. Scarborough.”
Yes, he had to admit he could do with something strong. He noticed that Camden had definitely been in the sauce even though he’d promised not to, but for some reason that didn’t bother him as much as Manning’s obvious inebriation—and her attentions bestowed upon her host.
“Cognac! My favorite!” said Camden.
“I thought your favorite was grain alcohol with a twist, Jake,” said Scarborough. “Maybe you’d better stick with the coffee, hmm?”
“Ah, be a sport, Doc! They put me through hell back there in that base! I need this!” Jake turned to Davis. “Just a small tot. That won’t hurt, huh, buddy?”
Davis shrugged. “I have absolutely no idea, Jake. But you mentioned a base... just what is going on?” He looked squarely and seriously at Scarborough. “I take it, Scarborough, that you are on the lam, so to speak.”
Scarborough nodded. He’d expected this. Davis was a man who kept abreast of current events. “From the law. That’s correct. However—”
“However, you’re an innocent man. Of course you are. When I saw the reports it seemed so obvious.” The sweatered man went over to the large wet bar where he found a large bottle of spirits and began distributing the liquor into four snifters. “MacKenzie, a good friend and fellow writer... A spook operative... Your own editor...! It looks like some sort of weird setup, I thought. And you know, as soon as I heard about you, some instinct told me, I’m going to see old Dr. Scarborough. There’s something about this whole thing that’s going to lead him here to me!”
“I hardly came here of my own accord!” objected Scarborough, a little bit indignant at the very thought.
“Funny how these things work, though, hmm?” Davis handed Scarborough his drink. “I was just telling your companions about my work and my theories... Marsha seems to think they have a great deal to do with your present situation... But at this point I should admit that I am at a total loss... bemused and baffled. Clearly, you all are traveling together in that Winnebago, and just as clearly, Jake’s claim of researching a book is far from the entire truth. You are also here, I can tell, for some kind of help, and I’d like to provide whatever help I can as long as I don’t bend the law too much.”
“You’re breaking the law merely by harboring us, you know!” said Scarborough.
“I can claim I didn’t know you were a criminal! We do know each other, Scarborough.”
“Thank you.” The words stuck in Scarborough’s craw—Oh! He had never imagined he would ever be grumbling words of gratitude to the man who had once called him “the paradigm of a tight sphincter anthropomorphized.”
“Right! And you know me, that’s for sure! We’re good buddies,” said Camden, striding forward and assertively plucking up one of the poured brandies. “To friendship!” He picked another glass up and brought it over to Marsha, who accepted it and immediately hoisted it in toast.
“Yes, why not, Scarborough. Bury the hatchet, as it were.” Davis held up his glass. “Or at least make the attempt.”
Scarborough didn’t know about this frien
dship business; but he did know he felt a profound need for this cognac. He tossed back a healthy swallow and it burned down his throat in a satisfying manner, making a warming splash into his interior.
“Have a seat, fellow. Relax!” said Davis in a thoroughly convivial fashion. “Are you hungry?”
“No. I had something in the RV.”
“We had a delicious dinner!” said Marsha enthusiastically, again shooting Davis an admiring look.
There was another twist in Scarborough’s feelings. He repressed the pain; it was the only way he knew how to deal with it, short of saying something; and damned if he was going to let the drunken woman have that satisfaction—let alone Lowell Davis.
“My loss, I guess.” Scarborough did sit, though, frowning in a slightly surly fashion.
“Well, let me know if you want something. I’d be glad to heat something up for you.”
“You’re too kind.” Scarborough let another large sip of the cognac soothe his frazzled nerves.
“Now then. As Marsha was saying, I’ve been sharing with her my life’s work,” said Davis. “I don’t think I need to summarize it for you, Everett. Marsha says that it comes quite close to what you’ve experienced in the past weeks, and I must say that I am dreadfully intrigued.”
With the faintly droll, almost English irony in his inflections, Scarborough was certain that the man was putting little needles through him. However, he had no choice but to ignore them. The man and Marsha and even Camden were quite right; there were extraordinary parallels between Davis’s theories and some of the scenarios that were slowly fading into Scarborough’s splintered reality. It would be best to bite the bullet and listen to the man.
“Yes, you would be. It would appear, Davis, that all along I was wrong. There do appear to extraterrestrial presences on the planet. And, all along you were correct. I was a dupe of the government—or perhaps a secret part of the government.”
“Well, Everett. I never claimed you were a dupe, and I never questioned your intelligence or your sincerity. Perhaps I was a little hard on other aspects of your character... as you were on mine. Let me be the first to extend my apologies. However, I do hope that you will tell me—just what’s been happening to you?”
There was no needling in the tone whatsoever this time; only complete empathy and open curiosity. It was disarming, and that, along with the alcohol, forced Scarborough to reassess the man. He thought it over for a moment while he tasted the cognac yet again, and decided it would be best for Diane’s sake, his companions’ sake (and maybe even his own sake), to be as open as possible.
And so he told the tale.
It was a severely edited version, leaving out a great deal of important but relatively extraneous matter—and most certainly leaving out the more personal material, such as his growing intimate relationship with Marsha Manning.
It took him another snifter of cognac to tell it, and by the time he was finished and had answered Davis’s questions, he was definitely feeling the alcohol. However, it made him feel slightly depressed, rather than drunk—the opposite effect that it clearly had had on Marsha, who seemed quite well lubricated.
“Some story, eh?” the woman said, shaking her head and giggling.
Davis shook his head. “Extraordinary! You are indeed a lucky man, Everett.”
“Lucky! What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Well, only lucky inasmuch as I have been lucky. I’ve never felt less than fascinated with this whole business, but from time to time—and here I will let down my guard just as you’ve let down your guard to me—I have felt incredibly burdened. But lucky in that it is a burden of great importance to the human race... and perhaps your tribulations... just as my work hopefully will prove... will be a great contribution to the cause of the advancement of the Earth’s human consciousness!”
Scarborough shook his head with bafflement. “Look! In the words of my late and lamented friend Mac MacKenzie, I don’t give a squat for Earth’s human consciousness or any of that New Age sewage! I want to clear my name! I want to get my daughter back. I want to survive!”
“Yes... now that you mention it, you are in somewhat of a pickle, aren’t you?” Davis shook his head patronizingly. “Ah, but perhaps you should have listened to what I was really saying, Scarborough. You would not even accept the possibility that the Others were on Earth!”
“You wouldn’t, Ev?” said Marsha. “Why not?”
“Look, give the guy a break! That’s what he believed at that time!” said Camden. “I mean, everybody fucks up from time to time! Yes, even I!”
“I laid awake nights wondering how to convince you...” said Davis. “You were my biggest challenge, Scarborough, because you were the most eloquent and perhaps the most accomplished of the people I argued with. You had the most articulate and best thought-out counterarguments. You had the most witty and stinging rebuttals to my statements! Funny how things work out, isn’t it?”
“Funny. Ha-ha. My entire being vibrates with laughter. And if I can recall properly—and I still can, despite my present condition and situation—you hurled some large amount of barbed mud as well, Mr. Davis.”
It was Lowell Davis’s tum to sip his drink. “Nothing that wasn’t deserved. Nothing that you didn’t earn, Scarborough.” The reserve cracked and a bit of smoldering enmity leaked out.
“Whoa! Simmer down there, fellas!” Camden said. “Let’s face it, you guys were top roosters in the henhouse and it’s a wonder with all the slashing both of your egos didn’t sprout leaks!”
Marsha laughed out loud, a jarring silly sound, and it broke the tension that was momentarily thick in the atmosphere.
“We did hurl a few cute bricks, didn’t we, chum?” said Davis. “I suppose I did receive a few bruises that haven’t quite healed.”
Scarborough, however, was still wary. “At the moment I’m one great big bruise.”
“And I for one need another tot!” said Davis, advancing upon the bottle. “Anyone care to join me before we venture into the next portion of this discussion?”
Scarborough held back, but both Manning and Camden eagerly thrust forward their snifters.
“I guess I really shouldn’t talk, Marsha,” said Scarborough, “but don’t you think you’ve had enough? And, Jake—Jake, you promised not to drink again until this whole business is finished and everyone is safe.”
Jake cruised over happily and draped an arm over Scarborough’s shoulders. “C’mon, Scarby! Can’t you see the lady needs a little mental vacation? She’s put herself on the line for us, she saved our butts. Give her some space to party! And as for me—well, what can I say. I’m just a hopeless reprobate in a pleasant oasis with an old buddy. A little buzz ain’t gonna rock the boat!”
“Look, just take it easy on the stuff, both of you,” said Scarborough testily. “We’ve got things we have to do tomorrow, hangovers or no hangovers... And as for me, I smell coffee. I think I’ll have some of that, if you don’t mind, Davis.”
“Certainly, I’ll go and get it.”
Davis smiled stiffly, put his drink down, and trotted off to be about his hostly business. Scarborough used the break as an opportunity to go over to Marsha and ascertain just exactly how inebriated she was. He sat down next to her and said, “Sorry to be a pain about this, but I’m just concerned, that’s all.”
When she looked at him, her eyes were slightly glassy, but she saw him well enough. She gave him a look of amusement, fondness. “You’re really a dear, you know. Thanks very much. But I’m quite all right, thank you. Jake, for once, is quite correct. I need a bit of a mental vacation...”
“It’s that you’re usually not such a drinker...”
“And how do you know so much about me, Scarborough. I’ll have you know I was the real sorority authority on beer! Drank many a frat rat right on his butt, back in the old days. I just reformed when I got in the force, that’s all. I’m having a slight slip... like Camden there. Just a wee little slip... but I want to tell y
ou something, love.”
“Yes?”
Marsha pointed to the direction in which Davis had gone. “Listen to that man! He had important things to say... and it could well be that he’s the one...” She let out a polite belch, raised a hand to the mouth. “Pardon me... the man who can help US contact the people who put us in that Winnebago! And at the very least, he’ll give us a nice room to stay in!”
“You really think we can trust him?”
“Everett, you’ve got to trust somebody. I mean, how do know you can trust me or Camden, really?”
“You both have proved yourselves to me. I don’t know... you can’t blame me, not after the business with my book editor, Cindy Clinton... I mean, when I really get paranoid, sometimes I think that maybe my own daughter is involved in my undoing!”
“Ah, Scarborough give the paranoia the night off,” Camden suggested calmly, browsing a shelf of books, cradling the snifter as naturally as though he’d been born with one in his hand. “I know fakes. I’ve done the fake act from time to time, as you might suspect. And old Davis, he’s the real stuff... Anyway, I figure you can trust anybody who shows right up front that he can be a son of a bitch from time to time... Maybe that’s why I trust you, huh, Scarb?” Camden went back to his perusal of the books.
The UFO Conspiracy Trilogy Page 86