Myself, she kept in the background. I grew into a skinny, feral girl, with wild hair and dressed in whatever rags we could scrounge from our patients. She always told some great lie about who and what I was, if families were far enough away to have not heard the story of the demon child who had walked with the dead. So I became her pet demon, I suppose. She would pack a smear of white, pasty clay from a pot across my mouth, so I must have looked quite a fright to people.
We also cared for the dead, preparing the bodies. The fashion there was to bury the dead as they had come into the world, naked, curled in a ball as babies grow in their mothers. I would take their clothes, such as they had. We would chant and sing nonsense songs that sounded very sincere, I am sure, and I would do a dance. There would be more burning of those infernal bundles of stinking herbs, and after the burial, when the body had been placed in the earth, with flowers and whatever meager possessions and keepsakes as the living were willing to part with and stones piled on top of them, we feasted, sharing whatever the families had to spare. Murta would tell lies about how the dead were happy, surrounded by ancestors, thanks to her and me, and that they and would be watching over them, protecting and caring for them while they were living, and would meet them again in the land of the dead when their times came. She was a terrific liar. It kept us fed.
As I grew into womanhood, Murta encouraged me to act more strangely around the families, to hang back outside the camp and only come when she called to me. She braided my hair, and smeared mud into it, so it was always filthy. She tried scarring me with a vicious little flake of stone that had an edge like a razor, but the hurts always healed, so she gave up on that. She kept me ugly, telling me I was not ugly enough to be a witch, and that I needed to be uglier or I would have trouble with the men. She tied bones to my hair, and hung a gruesome necklace of leathery pig ears around my neck whenever we visited a family. She kept me safe, at least, or tried to.
It was not all acting, our mysteries. I was a strange child, this was clear even to me, and living with Murta only made me stranger. I was beset by dreams, dreams which would sometimes come upon me while awake, and leave me mazed and thick when I awoke to my surroundings. I fell occasionally, and still do, you should be aware, although much less frequently than I did as a child. Seizures, you would call them. Sometimes I would soil myself, shaming Murta if I did it when we were in the presence of others. The dreams though, were both the best and the worst part of my life then. Vivid as life, more vivid, more real, while they lasted. Transportive dreams, I would be swept away by them for what seemed like hours, but was sometimes only a short while according to Murta. Once myself again, I could remember only bits of them, brief flashes of dreamtime memory which I lost, like trying to hold water in your fingers.
But Murta was old, old when I met her, and by the time I was grown she was ancient. We had stopped traveling together, and I had taken up her work, visiting the sick when called upon, helping women with babies and birthing, and bringing food back to her little cave. She and I had migrated over the years, several times, so we were now in more of a hilly country, which made the walking difficult for her. But many families lived among the hills, and kept goats there, and some sheep, so we had ready access to food. She and I would talk in the evenings, and she told me how she had become a witch, her story being much like mine. Her Murta, for Murta was more of a title than a name I suppose, and I had never known her by any other name—for names among those people were secret things, known only to very close family and never shared idly—her Murta had taken her from her family for much the same reasons as I had been taken. She was not as…strange…as I was, she said, having merely smashed her brother in the head with a rock, causing him to fall into a sickness and never speak right again. He deserved it, she would say darkly, muttering and chuckling to herself whenever the subject came up, though she never said why.
Murta died, late in one winter. I came back to our camp from a visit to a family where a boy had been lamed by a fall (he survived, having just badly broken his foot) and our fire had gone out, even though I had left her plenty of wood. I found her sitting with her back propped against a stone, wrapped in a blanket, her hand thrust inside of her worn leather pouch, which she had never shared with me. Snow had begun to settle on her, so she must have been gone since that morning.
Inside her pouch I found her old finger bones she sometimes used for divination, like dice, you know? Small things…a few bits of string, a leather thimble and fishbone needle, some scraping stones, and a bright blue bead, slightly misshapen but with a straight hole right down the middle. I had never seen such a thing before. It spoke to me of a warmer place, where people could make such things. Where and how she had come by it I never knew, since she was notorious for keeping me in the dark, cackling with laughter at my questions but refusing all attempts to wheedle answers from her.
She had sometimes talked about the Warm Lands, far away down the river. Down many rivers, for many days. She indicated she’d come that way at one point, but then launched into tales of stone cities so grandiose they seemed clearly lies, like all the lies she so reveled in telling. She had been a nasty old woman, but she had saved me as a child, so I never stayed angry with her for long.
I could not dig a grave, the ground being too hard with the cold, so I built such a cairn for her as I could, piling stones over her until I was sure no animal would molest her body. Once she was buried, I was alone for the first time in my life. It was exhilarating and terrifying at once. My memories may be broken into a million drifting shards, but this one stays clear. I breathed the crisp winter air, sniffing deeply. The wind was out of the south, carrying with it a rich, loamy scent of land uncovered by snow. The cusp of spring. The next morning I packed what meager stuff we owned into her leather bag, and set out, walking into the wind.
Chapter Seven
The Uber dropped her off outside the San Francisco office of the FBI with time to spare. A long drive up from Mountain View. It had been, she thought, glancing at her phone, only five hours since the shooting at Frontiers. She was approaching the front desk when a young man in a dark gray suit, box cut, stepped towards her. “Ms. Powell?” he asked, offering her his badge. “I’m Special Agent Chomsky.”
“I’m Jessica Powell,” she said. “Chomsky? Any relation to…” she trailed off at his blank stare. He frowned at her.
Then he broke into a broad smile. “Second cousins. On my Mom’s side,” he said, guiding her towards a bank of elevators. “I get that a lot, from the intelligentsia. Most folks just ask me if I’m Polish.”
The elevator took them to the 18th floor, opening onto a broad entry area with floor to ceiling glass windows and a view of the Bay. “Wow,” she said. “That’s a view.”
“Never gets old,” Chomsky said. “This way, please. They’re waiting for you down the hall.” He led her to a conference room. Knocked. Opened the door at a muffled word from within. “Here you go.”
She entered. Inside was a gray conference table, a whiteboard, and a projector. A woman was erasing the board, and a broad man with a mustache stood and extended his hand. “Ms. Powell, glad you found us okay. I’m Agent Roberts, we spoke on the phone. This is Agent Garcia.” He gestured to a chair. “Please, sit, make yourself comfortable.” He sat back down, sighing as he did. “Ah, much better.” He was jowly, with a broad, friendly face. His eyes were brown and small and twinkled when he smiled.
Agent Garcia finished wiping the white board and sat down, opening a black laptop. “I’m just here to take notes,” she said. “I’m not here.” She smiled, quick and formal, then turned her attention to her laptop and typed a soft clacking. She had a trace of an accent, Spanish, Jessica thought.
Roberts regarded her. “So, did you want anything? Water, coffee? A muffin? I think we might have some muffins left over.” He seemed ready to spring up and fetch something for her if she asked for it. He was almost laughable, like a big friendly puppy. Eager to please.
She
shook her head. “I’m good, thanks. Just curious why you needed to speak to me. It’s been a long day and I need to get some work done. I’m also a little nervous. I never talked to any FBI people before.”
He sat back and regarded her, smiling. “We appreciate that, we do.” He paused, seemed to think for a moment, then began again. “So, we’re part of the Bureau that does odd jobs, weird stuff. Not your ordinary investigations, put it that way. Sort of like, well, did you ever see X-Files? Maybe you’re too young?”
“I remember X-Files, sure. For real?” she asked, raising her eyebrows.
Garcia spoke, still typing. “I’m Mulder, he’s Sculley.” She didn’t look up.
Roberts slapped his thigh and laughed, a bray of a laugh. Like a donkey. He had big, yellowish teeth. “Exactly. I’m the credulous one,” he said, glancing at Garcia. “I want to believe.” Then he took a breath and pressed his hands together, leaning forward. “Some official business first.”
He took out a worn leather billfold from his breast pocket and showed it to her. “I am Special Agent John Roberts. I am interviewing Jessica Powell of Richmond, Virginia, pursuant to ongoing classified investigations. She has agreed to meet with us voluntarily and answer questions.” He turned to her. “Everything you say is being recorded. You’re not a subject of our investigation, but are being questioned as a witness to events we want to know more about. That said, I need to inform you that lying to the FBI is a serious crime. You are welcome, at any time, to stop this interview, and we will stop asking questions. All clear?”
She nodded, her lips felt very dry.
He smiled. “Kind of need you to answer in the affirmative or negative for this.” He jerked his head towards Garcia.
“Oh, yes, yes I agree,” she said. She licked her lips.
“Good.” He paused, smiled. “We’re not hunting ghosts or UFOs, although we have looked into some weird stuff from time to time. But sometimes cases show up where two”—he held up two fingers—“plus two doesn’t equal four.” He waggled his hand. “So they ask us to look, knowing we enjoy a good puzzle now and again. Most of them are busts, crackpots, crazy people. Or just regular old joes who got things mixed up. We sort most out, given time.” He smiled at her.
“Okay,” she said. “What does this have to do with me? I haven’t seen a UFO lately.” She smiled.
He spread his hands. “So, a while ago, the FBI got some fancy new computer systems. On loan from another agency, you see. Cool stuff. Does many things.” He frowned, choosing his words. “We have lots of files, see. Lots of old, paper-based files. Most of them are just junk, nobody will ever need what’s in them, except for historians, academics, you know. Legacy stuff, for the future.” He took a sip of coffee from a white mug with the word “NO” on it in giant letters. “So what the smart boys and girls back in Virginia decided was to digitize all of our old files, make them searchable, run some analysis. Took years. Years and years.” He took another sip. “But they finished it a while back. Put everything online, all the way back. Hoover years. Back to Eliot Ness.” He smiled at her.
“The Untouchables,” she said. “I saw the movie. Look, this is all fascinating, but is there something I can help you with?”
“Yes, there is, we think. Today, you were present at the Frontiers tech conference down in Mountain View, correct?”
“Yes, there was a shooting. I was there, just feet away from it.” She flipped through her mental notes about it in preparation to discuss it.
He shook his head. “Yes, regrettable. But that’s not why we want to talk to you. Local cops will handle that, unless it needs Bureau attention. Not my beat, you see.”
She shook her head. “Then why…” she trailed off. “Oh.”
He nodded. “So, they saw you talking with a woman of some…interest to us.” He looked at her. “A Ms. Samara?”
“Yes, we met this morning. At the conference. Right before the shooting,” she said. “Like, right before it. Minutes.” Her heart was drumming inside her chest, she could feel it. Ba bump, ba bump, ba bump. She shook her head. “And then, as I was walking to Starbucks, to write my story about the shooting, she pulled up in her car and invited me for coffee.”
He smiled at her. His smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, she noticed. “And you went with her? A stranger?”
“Yes, I did,” she said, bristling a little. “I’m a reporter, new in town, and she seemed super connected to the tech scene here. I thought she might be worth talking to.”
He nodded. “So, no secrets here. And, this is where it gets weird. Garcia and I, we have lots of cases. Tons. So much work.” He licked his lips. “The conference was being monitored. Lots of tech industry bigwigs, some vague chatter about protests. Always some malcontents out there, wanting to lash out.”
He paused for a long while, thinking.
“And…” she ventured after a few seconds, surprising herself.
He glanced at her, then smiled. “And, it recognized her face. The moment she stepped out of that Mercedes in the parking lot, we flagged her. Popped up on my laptop this morning.”
“Okay, so she’s wanted,” she said. “I had coffee with her. You must have found us, since you called me when I was with her.”
Garcia looked up. Roberts glanced at her, shook his head. Garcia typed some more.
“Well, you didn’t mention that on the phone.” His voice took on an ever-so-slight accusatory tone, she thought.
“You didn’t ask. Besides…well, I should say, you called me the first time, and I declined, went to voicemail, remember?”
He nodded, face a mask, not giving anything away. His eyes were bright blue and stared at her from within their folds of skin.
“She was just leaving, which is why I didn’t take the call.” She finished, “Happy to tell you what we talked about.”
“Sure,” he said. “Let’s go there in a minute. But first, where did you go?”
She smiled. “You know where I went. You must have my call logs or tower data.”
“Assume we don’t, just tell us. Other folks can check such things.”
“Cantina Mexicana, East Palo Alto. I’m not sure of the address.”
“Never mind, and there, when you got there, what did you talk about.”
“We ordered coffee, Mexican coffee,” she said. “She, uh, speaks fluent Spanish.”
“Does she now?” He seemed surprised. Garcia typed a little faster, a flurry of keystrokes.
Clack clack clack. “Do you speak Spanish?”
“Terribly. Had years in school and can barely order off a menu,” she said, repeating the same joke she’d told Silver.
“So who did she speak to?” He asked.
“The staff, talked to them like she knew them, but when I asked the waitress after she left, she said she’d never seen her before. Maybe her mom, the owner, she may have seen her before,” she said. “Silver is one of those people, you know, who knows everybody, treats strangers like they’ve known them all their lives. Some people are like that.”
“Silver?” He glanced at Garcia, who gave a minuscule shrug.
“Her name,” Jessica said. “Well, at least, that seems to be her name. It’s what she told me.”
“Good to know. We don’t have a lot on her, you see.” He sat back, looking at her. “So, you had coffee, and talked about…”
“The tech scene mostly, the murder we’d just witnessed.” She met his eyes. “Something weird happened there. I…” She stopped, realizing she’d been about to confess her suspicions about Silver. And so what, she thought, you don’t owe her anything. She could be a terrorist, you know. “They tackled that guy, the shooter, the guys in the front row swarmed all over him.”
“Good for them,” Roberts said, eying her. He frowned. “What did Ms. Samara, Silver, what did she do?”
“Well, that’s the weird part. I was sitting facing the stage, and she was to my left, and the shooter, he must have come down the center aisle, right up to t
he stage. He shoots, twice, and then, he gets tackled. I get up to get the heck out of there, you know, exit stage left. She’s gone. Like, gone. I glimpsed at her heading out the side exit which must have set off the fire alarm, now that I think of it.” She said all this in a rush, surprised at the upwelling of memory it brought with it, recounting it like that.
“So she ran out ahead of you?” He asked.
“I mean, yes, she did, but man, I was moving fast. I was in Iraq. I react to stuff like that.” She realized she sounded ridiculous. “All I am saying is she moved fast.”
He frowned. “Do you think she had something to do with the shooting?” His fleshy forehead crinkled, and for the first time she realized he was old, must be pushing sixty.
“I don’t think so. She said she didn’t like guns when I asked her about them. And she didn’t want to stick around and talk to the cops.”
“Huh,” he said, a flat exhalation. Garcia typed. “Anything else you can recall which might be useful?”
“She mentioned that she loved the Mediterranean, oh, and had I ever been to Mosul. In Iraq, you know. When I mentioned I had been over there.” She thought. “Oh, and she brought up how the shooter might have been Antai.” She made finger quotes around the word.
Garcia had stopped typing. “Antai?” Roberts asked.
“I guess they are, like, against AI?” she said. “I first heard about them from her, so it could be a Valley thing.”
“Could be. Could be,” he said. He looked down at his hands. Noncommittal, she thought. Would not want to play poker with him. He looked up, the smile returning to his face. “What, in your opinion, would you say her age is?”
“Thirty, maybe thirty-five. Forty at the outside. She’s rich, dresses well, drives a hundred-thousand dollar car, has a purse that must cost a couple thousand dollars, and wears five hundred dollar sunglasses, if I had to guess.” She ticked these things off on her fingers.
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