A Cook in Time

by Joanne Pence

  “This is Triana Crisswell,” the woman said in response to Angie’s cheerful hello.

  “Mrs. Crisswell, I was just thinking about you,” Angie said.

  “Good, because I’ve just got to tell you, sweetie, you’ll need to come up with an idea that’s a lollapalooza. This party is simply taking off!”

  “What do you mean?” Angie asked.

  “I mean the abduction!” Angie had to hold the phone away from her ear. “Didn’t you hear about it? It’s the talk of the whole city.”

  “I was there,” Angie said.

  “You saw it? I can’t believe this. How I envy you!” Triana lowered her voice and said, “So you must realize what this means, sweetie.”

  “No, I’m afraid I don’t,” Angie said.

  “It means this party will be so hot, I can’t tell you! Already I’m getting calls from people who want to be sure to be included. We’re going to have at least two hundred. Maybe more. It won’t be held at my house. This place is simply too small. And I don’t want to wait. I want the party now. Immediately.”

  Now Angie was the one shouting into the phone. “That’s impossible.”

  There was a pause. “A week from Friday, then.”

  “That gives me no time,” Angie wailed. “I need a theme, catered food, special decorations—these are supposed to be fantasy dinners, after all.”

  “Fantasy, shmantasy. Forget the dinner. All I want is a party, right away, with something to munch on. Heck, I don’t care if you serve hot dogs!”

  “We need to talk about this,” Angie said, desperately attempting to calm her first—and maybe her last—client. “Keep in mind that the best caterers are already booked for next week. In fact, all the caterers are booked. This is the time for holiday parties. Also, to cook for two hundred people is no small potatoes. You do want the best, don’t you?”

  “Honey.” Triana sounded even more annoyed. “You think this is about food? It’s about publicity. Getting people to join our cause. It’s about making a great name for Algernon.”

  “I haven’t even met him yet.”

  “I suppose you have a point,” Triana said, her tone suddenly hard as chipped ice. “He should be at a meeting of the group Thursday night. I’ll meet you there and introduce you.”

  Angie sighed as Triana brusquely gave her the address. If Triana didn’t care about the tastiness of the food or the imaginativeness of the fantasy, why should she? Except that it was her first fantasy dinner, and she had hoped to use it to build her reputation. But she was a clever person, and if this is what her client wanted, she would find a way to deliver it. “Thank you, Mrs. Crisswell. I’ll see you tomorrow night. Tell me, since the dinner is now too big for your home, where will it be held?”

  “There’s only one place. Tardis Hall, of course.”

  Criminologist Ray Faldo reached his gloved hand into the evidence bag and took out the heavy goggles that had been found on Bertram Lambert’s body. Blowing on them to remove a trace of fingerprint powder, he placed them on the table in front of the two inspectors. Faldo was a pro. Even though he’d worked in the crime lab nearly fifteen years, he didn’t simply put in his hours and go home at the end of the day. He still approached his work ready for the excitement that discovery could bring. For that reason, Paavo had gone to him about the goggles in the first place. “Do more than test for prints,” Paavo had said. “Find out what in the hell they are.”

  When Faldo had called a few minutes earlier and asked Paavo to come down to the lab when he had time, Paavo made time right then. Yosh joined him.

  “They’re old,” Faldo said as they peered down at the heavy black object. “Fifty years, at least.” He picked up a black lacquer Japanese chopstick and used it as a pointer. “You can tell that from the way they were made, and the way the glass and metal sheathing have become scratched and worn from handling. For the longest time, I had no idea what the goggles were supposed to be used for, until I happened to have them on at the exact right moment.”

  He picked them up and gave them to Paavo. “Take a look.”

  Paavo peered through the goggles. The lab looked fuzzy and distorted. Faldo switched off the light.

  “Hey!” Yosh cried. “What’s going on? I can’t see a thing!”

  But Paavo could.

  “Don’t reach out that way, Yosh,” he said. “You’re about to hit a beaker.”

  “What?” Yosh pulled back his hand. “You can see in the dark with those things?”

  Faldo spoke. “That’s what I discovered. I was looking through them when the lights flickered. That’s when I realized the view had changed. I didn’t understand how it changed—but it had to do with the light.

  “I turned off the lights in the lab and put the goggles on. What Paavo sees is what I saw. They’re not as sophisticated as the night-vision glasses the military has now, of course, but an early version of that very technology. Something is strange about them, though.”

  Paavo took the goggles off and handed them to Yosh.

  “Holy Toledo!” Yosh cried. “Will you look at that! You know, Paavo, we should use something like this when we travel around at night in the city. Can you imagine? We could see the crooks but they couldn’t see us. It’d be great! Maybe I should ask Nancy to get me a pair for Christmas. I wonder what they cost.”

  Faldo flicked the lights back. “There you have it.”

  “You said there was something strange about them,” Paavo said to Faldo as Yosh took the goggles off and gazed at them admiringly.

  “I looked through catalogs and manuals about old military gear—early night goggles and such. The earliest versions were very poor. Huge, bulky things. The current generation of them, issued during the Vietnam War, used a very different technology—they were slimmer, more reliable, easier to use and see with. These seem to be a prototype of the current generation. What’s strange is that they’ve never shown up in a catalog or anywhere else. I could find no documented history of the evolution from the early ones to the night goggles of today. It’s as if there was a missing link in night-vision technology. These are that missing link—a secret prototype, from all I can tell. But I have no idea where they’re from or who made them. Nada.”

  Paavo and Yosh stared at the strange goggles. “Did you find any prints on them, or anything that might help us find out where they came from?” Yosh asked.

  “They’ve been wiped spotless,” Faldo said.

  “Still, thanks for all you’ve found out,” Paavo said.

  “Thank PG and E. They caused the electricity to go haywire. Messed up my VCR at home, but gave me the clue to the goggles. The electric company giveth and the electric company taketh away—too often these days.”

  9

  Derrick Holton opened his eyes. The bedroom was dark, but a flickering light had awakened him. He heard a high, whining noise. He covered his ears with his hands and at the same time struggled into a sitting position. It didn’t help, though, because the sound wasn’t coming from the outside. It came from within him. Not again, he thought.

  He was fully awake now, his eyes wide and fearful. He knew with absolute certainty what was causing the lights, the sounds in his head. And he was afraid.

  A white light shone into his window, dim at first, quickly growing brighter.

  His mind screamed in fright. Knowing that they were back and were out there, taking people, he could think only of hiding.

  He had believed he’d managed to hide from them. He was wrong. He had to get away from them. He had to run. As he got off the bed, he fell, tangled in his bedcovers. The clothes he’d worn the day before were lying in a heap on a chair. He crawled to them, ignoring the pain in his ears.

  He wouldn’t let them take him. He’d die before he let them touch him again.

  Clutching his clothes and shoes in his arms, he ran out to the hallway, pulling the door shut behind him. Not that it mattered much. A closed door meant nothing to them.

  He took the stairs down three
flights to the street level, then kept going, down to the basement parking garage. To his car.

  He had to go somewhere they couldn’t find him. Somewhere until he came up with a way to stop them. Somewhere to be safe. First, he had to run. Run as far and as fast as he could, now that, once again, they were here.

  “I felt terrible lying to Paavo about Derrick, Mamma,” Angie said as she sat across the table from Serefina in her mother’s kitchen. “What if he finds out Connie didn’t go to the lecture with me?”

  They huddled over black coffee and little round Italian cookies with white icing that were so hard that if you didn’t dunk them in the coffee, they could easily crack a tooth. Angie didn’t know if the cookies were good or not, only that she’d eaten them from the time she was a child and they comforted her.

  “When did I teach you to be such a liar, Angelina?” her mother cried, distress evident in her voice.

  “It wasn’t a lie lie. It was a white lie. I said it so I wouldn’t hurt him.”

  “It was a lie!” Serefina jumped up, went into the pantry, and came out with a bottle of what she called her cooking brandy. She poured a splash in her coffee to make a coffee royal, another fine Italian tradition. Or was it Irish? Whatever, she enjoyed it. “One lie here, another there,” Serefina continued, “and pretty soon, you bring down everything. Capisce? Tell him the truth. He’ll understand.”

  “But then I’ll have to tell him about my business. What if it fails?” Angie put her elbows on the table and hung her head. “He’ll think I’m an idiot!”

  “He doesn’t like you for your business sense, Angelina. I’m an old woman, but I’m not so old I don’t remember what it’s like between a man and a woman. If the business fails, it’s all right.”

  “Not to me.” Pouting, Angie dropped another cookie into her coffee. It floated, so she held it down with a spoon until it softened. “I definitely don’t want to tell him about Derrick. Paavo worries that I might change my mind about how I feel about him. I tell him he’s wrong, but if he finds out that I changed my mind about Derrick, he might see me as frivolous again.”

  Serefina peered long at her daughter. “You were in love with the idea of Derrick. You brought home your fancy, intelligent NASA scientist for all of us to admire. You were so proud of yourself for getting him interested in you, you strutted around here like a peacock.”

  “I did not, Mamma!”

  “You did. With my own eyes, I saw you!” Serefina could shout even louder than Angie. “But you never loved the man. You liked what he was, not who he was.”

  “Now it’s my fault! I give up!” Angie threw her arms wide, her face upturned like a martyr. “I thought you and Papà wanted me to marry him.”

  “Maybe your papà did. He was like you, boasting to his amici about Dr. Holton dating his daughter. Your papà never even finished high school, so of course he was impressed. He’s always wanted the best for his girls. Since you’re the baby, Angie, he wants the best of the best for you. You know that. I hoped you’d realize Derrick wasn’t the man for you before it was too late.”

  The realization that her mother had given so much thought to her relationships made her want to know more. She was almost afraid to ask. “Do you feel that way about Paavo, too?” Her voice was soft now.

  Serefina smiled wisely. “It’s different with Paavo. With him, you’ve grown up a lot. You would love him—the man—no matter what his job was.”

  “I do. And that’s why I want him to be proud of me. I’m going to put on a fantasy dinner about aliens and UFOs that will wildly impress the ufologists of this city and anyone else who wants to attend.”

  “Testa dura!” Serefina cried. “Did you hear a word I said?”

  “I know what I’m doing, Mamma.” She stood up. “Excuse me while I call Connie. I’m going to somehow convince her to come with me this afternoon to a science fiction and fantasy convention down at the Moscone Center. It should give me other insights into the world of time and space.”

  As Angie headed for the phone, Serefina called after her, “Ask Connie if she’d like to come here for Christmas dinner with the family. And remember to tell Paavo he can’t work that day.” Then, shaking her head at her single-minded daughter, she made herself another coffee royal.

  Angie and Connie hadn’t yet entered the science fiction and fantasy convention at the Moscone Center when they saw two men with gray bodies, huge heads with bulging almond-shaped black eyes, and three fingers on each hand standing in front of the building, smoking cigarettes. Apparently the San Francisco no-smoking-indoors-in-public-places ordinance applied even to beings from outer space.

  Not far from the entrance, Angie saw a table just like the one that had stood outside Tardis Hall the night before, with the same heavyset man with the stubby black Hitler-like mustache hawking free drawings for hundred-dollar prizes. Going over to get a brochure crossed her mind, but he was busy talking to several young men, and she was more interested in what was happening inside the convention.

  She and Connie headed past the smokers and paid their way into the center.

  The aliens they had seen outside were dull compared to the ones inside. Sorcerers, gnomes, and princesses made up the bulk of the fantasy side of the con, while the science fiction crowd saw fleets of Martians, Klingons, Han Solos, and Darth Mauls, at least a dozen Mr. Spocks, and an equal number of Datas, although Deep Space 9 and Next Generation captains vastly outnumbered Captain Kirk. She also saw at least twenty men in wildly colorful suits carrying miniature old-fashioned telephone booths.

  “Who are you?” she asked one of them.

  “Exactly! Yes, I am!” he cried. His hair was thick and curly—almost like Shirley Temple’s.

  She stared at him as if he truly were from another planet. “Wh-What?” she stammered.

  “Not what, who! Dr. Who, I should say!” He giggled. “I love doing that. Just like an Abbott and Costello routine. And you’re saying you don’t know me?”

  She rubbed her head. “I’m afraid not.”

  “I’m a time lord. When not on the BBC—and I’m afraid I was canceled after a run of over twenty years—I travel through time and space in my tardis.”

  “Your tardis? What’s a tardis?” Angie had thought Tardis Hall was named after someone—some wealthy Mr. Tardis. She had no idea it was something a British television time lord used.

  “This is a miniature version.” He held up the phone booth. “Although it looks like a simple old-fashioned phone box, when you go inside it turns into my spaceship.”

  “Uh … right.” Angie backed away. “Thank you.” She’d just found out a lot more than she ever wanted to know about British science fiction.

  Angie pulled Connie toward the National Association of Ufological Technology Scientists’ booth. “Hi,” she said to the serious young man behind the table. He was dressed like a collegeprep student—white shirt, red tie, no jacket, neatly trimmed reddish brown hair, and a plain, nondescript face. He didn’t fit in with this weird crowd at all. It was embarrassing to ask someone so normal-looking her question. “Excuse me. Can you tell me a bit about UFOs?” she asked.

  “Why, most certainly, ma’am, my pleasure.” He had a thick southern accent, and he kept giving her strange looks. “Say, didn’t I see you at Tardis Hall the other night?”

  Angie was surprised she was so recognizable. “Yes. I was there the night of the abduction.”

  His smile disappeared. “Oh, I know what night it was, that’s for sure. My name’s Elvis, by the way.”

  Angie and Connie both took a step backward.

  “Don’t worry,” he said with a long-suffering sigh. “I’m not crazy, my mama was.”

  Angie’s and Connie’s eyes met.

  “You asked about UFOs.” He picked up a large book from the display in front of him. “Here’s a book with photos of them taken all over the United States. It’s on special today. Only twenty-nine ninety-five. It’s usually ten dollars more.”

  She
glanced at the book he’d stuck in her hands. It was filled with pictures of small shiny objects in the sky. She put it back on the counter. “I don’t mean UFOs as such—I mean, what makes them interesting? What real, tangible things come to mind when you think about UFOs?”

  He pondered a moment. “Well, as far as what’s real, the first thing I think of is Roswell.”

  “Roswell?” Maybe she should have stopped and picked up a pamphlet from the guy outside the Moscone Center. “Why?”

  “Simple. It’s the only place in the United States where it’s well documented that an alien spaceship crashed.”

  “It’s a fact?” she asked. Was he putting her on? The man looked quite serious. And normal, despite his name. In fact, Elvis was the most normal-looking person she’d met connected with all this ufology. And what did that say about it? “Where is Roswell, by the way?” she asked.

  “Are you serious?” He acted as if he was wondering whether she was putting him on. “It’s in New Mexico. I thought everyone knew that. Here, take these books and brochures.” He pulled a paperback out of his briefcase and several from boxes on the floor, plus a number of pamphlets from the tabletop. “There’s no charge. Just read them. No one should be ignorant about what’s really important in the world.”

  “I agree,” Angie said as he loaded the books into her arms. She might not agree that Roswell was at that level of importance, but to him, obviously, it was. She was so stunned by the man’s reaction to her ignorance, it took her a moment to realize that the shaking she was feeling wasn’t the ground moving, but Connie yanking on her arm, trying to get her attention. “What is it?” she asked.

  “Look at the picture of the president of this group,” Connie whispered. “He’s a dream!”

  Angie peered at the flyer Connie was holding. Smiling up at her as president of NAUTS was her old boyfriend, Derrick Holton. Why hadn’t he told her he was president? Was there some reason for keeping it secret?

  After telling Connie his identity and watching her stunned reaction, Angie continued to wander around the convention floor, Connie in tow. She saw a sign reading Prometheus Group. Here was her chance to find out something about Algernon’s association. When she reached the booth, she saw two men and a woman in their late teens or early twenties. They were dressed more like skateboarders than people interested in science fiction or fantasy. She hoped none of them was Algernon.