The waiter had already delivered his Coca-Cola by the time they arrived.
Sun behind clouds, the air sprites sent as a message to his mind. Keith studied the filmy white beings dancing on the air just outside the window. Each was no larger than a cat. Their slender, winged bodies were nearly translucent, tapering away to wisps where feet might have been on a ground-bound creature. He tried to figure out which was the one he had met first, but decided that what details set them apart to one another just escaped his powers of observation. The large eyes in their otherwise featureless faces regarded him with sympathy.
“Yeah, I feel a little gloomy,” Keith admitted. “Things have been rough at work.”
A picture of a box with his picture on the lid opening appeared in his mind. “Reveal what I’m talking about, huh?” He tried to organize his thoughts like a slide show, giving them a series of pictures of his job at PDQ: Playing with the prototype of the Origami, working with a laughing Dorothy, leaning over a layout of the “One of Everything” ad, the faces of the people he was working with, especially Paul, then the strange, narrow-faced man and the ad copy in his hand. That last image was burned into Keith’s memory as if with a branding iron. He’d never forget the shock of the moment, and wondered if there was any way he could have handled it better. The sprites hung on air currents outside the window, dancing like kites. He never knew just how much they could understand, but they sent back parts of the images, including a large image of the vice president’s angry face to show they knew one of the things that was troubling him.
“You’re right. That is what’s bothering me. I know I’m not responsible for the leak. Everything was going so well, too,” Keith said. “If they pull the ad, I don’t know what I’ll do. I was so happy I managed to get the invitation incorporated into it. If they let it pass it will go all around the world! Every creature that can read it will know they’re invited. I just hope that I don’t miss anyone. Holl, you remember him?”
Holl’s face appeared in his mind, blond hair flying, cheeks, and ear-tips red with excitement and cold, brow furrowed with worry. Keith recognized the image from their balloon ascent, more than a year before. “Right. He sends his greetings. I wrote up what I wanted to say and his people translated it for me. It looks kind of pretty. Maybe English looks like that to people who read a different alphabet, but I doubt it. As long as people see it. That’s the important thing.”
The sprites sent pictures of billboards, murals from the sides of buildings and a streamer pulled through the air by a skywriter. Keith grinned. “You guys want my job? You’d probably tick off fewer people than I’m doing.”
Sun behind clouds, the sprites said very positively.
“You don’t think so, huh?” Keith paused and glanced around to make sure no one was watching him, “Any news on other magical beings?”
The small white creatures began to dance excitedly on the air, describing figure-eights and Immelmann turns. In his mind, Keith saw a two-legged shadow stride across a twilit landscape. At first he wondered why they were sending him pictures of a human being, until the figure passed a water tower. In proportion, it seemed no higher than a beach umbrella.
“Cool,” Keith breathed, just as the waitress plumped his plate down in front of him. The woman, about his own age, gave him a very puzzled look. Behind her, the sprites fled. “Um, I mean, thanks. I’m really hungry.”
She gave him another odd glance, disgorged a ketchup bottle from her apron pocket, and stalked away. The sprites returned at once. Keith attacked his sandwich and fries with gusto.
“’Scuse me while I eat,” he whispered, behind the cover of his glass of soda. “I never thought I’d be hungry again. A giant? You saw a giant around here?”
He almost got dizzy as the perspective of the image in his head zoomed out and out, until he was looking down at the Earth from miles up. The sprites commanded the air all the way up to the top of the atmosphere, possibly higher. The view in his mind’s eye tilted to the right. He saw a broad stripe, a highway. It centered itself in his vision, then scrolled up as his point of view traveled south then east at speed. It took him a while to recognize landmarks. Then, he reconstructed the whole map in his memory.
“Near Madison?” he squawked, then shrank down in his chair as the waitress came up.
“Everything all right here?” she asked, with the sort of expression that suggested she didn’t think so.
Keith gave her an apologetic grin. “Yup. Thanks.” Wow, he thought. A giant in Wisconsin. Maybe Paul Bunyan was down from Minnesota visiting the Dells.… Nah.
Outside the window, the sprites danced in the sky. Shaking his head in wonder, Keith ate his lunch. Nothing cheers you up like knowing you aren’t the only person on the planet Earth, he thought.
He paid the tut-tutting server and prepared to leave. Over her head, birdlike eyes offered him a kindly farewell.
“Thanks,” Keith thought at them, hoping they understood. “Keep me posted if you see anyone else. Nice to see you.”
The image of a setting sun appeared in his mind. Keith enjoyed it most of the way toward the elevator, when a hand reached out and caught his wrist. The spy! he thought, alarmed.
Worse than that, it was Mr. Allen from the agency. It was a shock to see the face he’d just been thinking about appear right in front of him.
“Hey, Keith,” the executive said. He was seated at a table for four with three other men, all in expensive designer suits that must have cost thousands each. Keith felt underdressed in his off-the-rack best. “This is Keith Doyle. We’ve just brought him on as a copywriter.”
“Hello, sir,” Keith said nervously. “Um, gentlemen.” He pointed back toward his table. “I was just …”
Allen gave a humorous glance to his companions, then addressed Keith.
“I saw you talking to the birds out there. Lake gulls?”
“Something like that,” Keith said. They must have watched his animated conversation with the sprites. They must think he was crazy. He felt his cheeks burn. “I just talk to them when I have something on my mind. I hope that’s okay. They’re not human, after all.”
“Oh, sure,” Allen said with a genial nod. He leaned back and crossed his long legs. Gadfly must not have been too upset about the revelation of the ad leak. “And do they ever talk back?”
Keith paused for a moment, wondering what the man would do if he told him the truth.
“Oh, yeah,” he said, trying not to grin all over his face. “All the time.”
On the way out of the Hancock Center, he passed a woman with long black hair and armfuls of shopping bags staring up the side of the building with a fascinated, wondering expression on her face. She must be a tourist, Keith thought. He followed her rapt gaze, taking in the crossed girders and high tower just visible on the roof. It was a pretty impressive sight, all right.
* * *
Mr. Collier leaned out into the waiting room. His face brightened when he saw Keith.
“I thought it was you. Come on back. I was going to get a Coke. Want one?”
“Thanks,” Keith said. He followed the man to his office and waited patiently for him to finish the motions of hospitality.
“So, what can I do for you?”
Keith brought the photos out. He’d arranged the stack carefully. The best one of Enoch, the one with the least dour expression, was on top. He slid it across to Mr. Collier. “I thought you might like to see the man your daughter wants to marry. This is Enoch.”
Mr. Collier took the picture, and leaned back in his chair, relaxed. “Hey, he was a cute kid. Marcy’s been so cagey about bringing him up here I was afraid he was deformed or something. When was this taken, when he was about ten?”
“No.” Keith glanced at the fancy leather-bound desk calendar. “About two weeks ago. I’ve been kind of busy or I would have brought them in sooner.”
The chair lurched forward and Mr. Collier sat up. “You’re kidding, aren’t you? My daughter’s dating
a child? This is … disgusting.”
“He’s not a child, sir. I swear. He’s one of the Little Folk. An elf. I know Marcy told you. You should have believed her, sir. She’s telling the truth.”
No time for the easy build-up. Keith fished through the collection and found the good picture of the pair side-by-side and cheek-to-cheek. It was a tender moment, full of warmth, trust and, yes, passion. Snapping the shutter had been such an invasion of privacy at that moment he’d almost been ashamed to do it, but it was a good shot. Without saying anything, he passed the picture across the desk. Mr. Collier saw his daughter, noticed her expression, and started to push it away. To give him credit, he stopped at the last moment, to study Enoch’s face. It was not a child’s face in that instance, but mature and very loving. Marcy’s father’s brows went down, then way up. Keith knew he’d spotted the ears. You couldn’t miss them. His hands began to shake. The shock must have hit him hard.
When Mr. Collier spoke again, his voice was hesitant.
“How old is he?”
“About fifty,” Keith said. “But don’t worry about the age gap. That’s considered a medium-young adult in their culture. And they’ve really got a lot of interests in common.”
“He’s … a good … man?”
“He’s great,” Keith said firmly. “He’s a very good friend of mine. I hang out with them all the time when I’m down there. Enoch’s brother-in-law, Holl, is my best friend. He and his wife are as close to me as any Big People in this world. Closer than most.”
“This Holl is one of them? And his wife, too?”
“Yep.” Keith had to give Mr. Collier credit; he was trying to grasp the ungraspable. He just started talking, trying to give the man a chance to absorb it. “I’ve been trying to figure out a way to tell you about them, so you wouldn’t get excited and judge Enoch by the fact he only comes up to the middle of your chest. That’s never made the slightest difference to me, or Marcy, or any of the other students—the lucky ones,” he amended, “who’ve gotten to know him and his people. They’re intelligent, kind, generous, and very patient, which is good in my case. They’ve helped me in a thousand ways. Enoch’s father tutors a special class of just a few Big Folk at a time. College level. Better than college. He’s a terrific teacher. I sure wouldn’t have done as well without them, and they’ve been my friends. I think maybe Marcy’s the only one of us ever to fall in love with one … I mean, the only one I know of who intends to marry and settle down with one of them. On this side of the water, that is. There’s a lot of relatives in Ireland. They’ve been keeping in touch by e-mail. The Internet’s terrific, but there’s never a good substitute for face-to-face contact. That’s just my opinion. I’m planning a big party to have all the Little Folk in the world come to get acquainted. You could come, too, if you wanted.” Mr. Collier continued to thumb through the pictures, stopping longer and longer on each one. He turned up a slightly dazed face to Keith.
“Do you mean my daughter is the only … human being down there?”
“Well, she does kind of stick out in family portraits,” Keith admitted, “but she fits into the society really well. Better than me, in some ways. They all like her. She’s accepted. She’s not alone, sir, and they never stop her from associating with other people. She just doesn’t want to, very often. Well, you know her. She’s kind of shy. They’re good at bringing out her best. She’s gotten a lot more assertive since she started dating Enoch.” His chatter was giving Mr. Collier a chance to recover his wits. When he spoke again, he was an ordinary parent.
“I don’t like the idea of her living in a commune.”
Keith almost smiled. “It’s not a commune, it’s a village. Everyone respects everyone else’s privacy. They’ve got 20 acres, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they weren’t trying to buy some more of the surrounding land. Holl and Maura live in a cottage outside the main farm house. I’m pretty sure that’s what Enoch has in mind for Marcy after they get married. Right now Marcy has a room of her own.”
“Really?” Mr. Collier focused on Keith’s face, his eyes boring intently into Keith’s own.
“Oh, sure. They want her to feel welcome. I owe her a lot, Mr. Collier. She introduced me to them. I want her to be happy. I know you do, too. I just wanted you to see that the truth isn’t so scary.”
Alan Collier nodded slowly several times. He squared the photos in a neat stack, but he didn’t give them back to Keith. He put them on his side of the desk. Standing up, he extended a hand.
“You’ve given me a lot to think about, Keith. Thanks for coming by.”
Keith retreated, not wanting to undo all his good work by overdoing. “Thank you, sir.”
* * *
As soon as he could get to his home computer, he brought up the e-mail program. He wanted to send the good news to Marcy before her father called her. He typed out as much of their conversation as he could remember, finishing up with a triumphant note of his own. “Your dad didn’t quick-shuffle me out like he did the last time. I think I got through,” he said. “Tell Enoch the photos made all the difference.”
Keith punched SEND, and waited for the modem to connect. It worked, praise to Dunn. Keith read the news on his browser’s home page, scanned a few online computer-ware sites, partly out of personal interest and partly out of fear of seeing news about the Origami leaked, then clicked over to the e-mail portion. There was a message from Diane dated the evening before, after the two of them had gotten off the phone; a long one, judging by the amount of memory on display. He skipped it to save for last. The other messages were mostly spam, but he had a couple of real letters. His brother Jeff wrote from Seattle to say that he was doing well in his classes, and he’d met a really terrific girl majoring in computer design. He wanted to impress her with some of the image magic that he’d seen Keith using. That sounded like he was moving too fast for his elder brother, who felt exactly like his father when he wrote back with some strong advice to hold off before he blew the big secret. Too many people in the world freaked out when faced with the real thing. Magic was one of those things you saved for when you were sure the relationship was stable, like maybe his silver wedding anniversary. He hoped Jeff wouldn’t think he was nagging.
A message from Holl turned out not to be a letter but instead contained a forwarded message from the chief of all the Little Folk in Ireland.
“The Niall felt there were corrections that ought to be made to the text of your invitation,” Holl’s accompanying note said. “Catra’s translation was essentially accurate, but there ought to be a few more words of courtesy used.”
Keith groaned. He should have foreseen that something like that could happen. He scrambled to hit the reply button.
“I can’t change it,” he typed. “If you give me their address I’ll send him an apology. The graphic’s finished and the keyline has gone to the client for approval. I don’t want to draw attention to the text by making a big deal about it. If I try, they may pull it altogether.”
He worried as he sent the message that if he refused to alter the wording, the elves might withdraw their permission to use the farm for his party. What would he do? Unless he did pull it back in the next few days, it would go out all over the world, and there he’d be, having promised a gala celebration, but with nowhere to hold it.
The message from Diane was full of love, with a little scolding toward the end that he hadn’t been keeping up properly with the promise of a letter every day. Maybe he should just call her again. Keith glanced at the clock. She wouldn’t be back from work for hours yet. He had a while. He could use the time to browse the net for data he needed for the paper on franchising he had to turn in to Professor Larsen. Keith wrote Diane a long letter, telling her all his news and promising a phone call the next day between her classes and work, and hit SEND.
The screen froze. Not believing his eyes, Keith grabbed the sides of the monitor. The program had crashed. Not again!
“Dunn!”
* * *
The warbling of Everette’s cell telephone barely aroused anyone’s attention in the crowded observation deck. He flipped it open and put it to his ear. “Beach.”
“Are you near your computer?” The excitement in Ming’s voice came across clearly even over the tinny earpiece.
“No.” In fact, he was on a version of a snark-hunt. A couple of hours before, Maria and Stefan had pounded on his door, demanding that he come with them at once to the John Hancock building. A vision had led her, Maria had insisted. She had seen magical wonders, flying around the crown of this oh-so-astonishing building. Surely the place was blessed! Running around, trying to see what it was, what had called the spirits to guide her here. The place was soaked with deep emanations, recent ones. It was a shame Beach couldn’t see, but they were there for those who could perceive them. Surely they couldn’t be far from the goal of their journey!
“Tourists,” he explained to passersby who regarded the two excited foreigners with a mixture of amusement, pity, and scorn. “They don’t even have electricity where they come from.” He returned to the phone. “What do you have for me?”
“Another transmission!” His operative’s voice was triumphant. “It came through the same server sometime last night. Heading for a different destination than the last, not as detailed. Only a text of the language, with no other material surrounding it. But there was a change in the typography. An alteration.” Ming savored the word. “We have a fluent speaker with access to a computer not far from where you are.”
“Fantastic,” Beach breathed, watching the antics of his pair of operatives as they ran from window to window. Maria seemed to be trying to get closer to something only she could see or feel. She was so convincing he wondered at his own doubts about her talent. “It came from the agency?”
Advanced Mythology Page 17