by Roland Smith
“I think so.”
We peered through the Voodoo window. People were lined up at the counter waiting for their pink cardboard box filled with doughnuts.
Kate was not among them.
“Maybe she already got her doughnuts and took them someplace else to eat.”
This was a dumb thing to say, but Coop didn’t get on me for it. He just grinned. “I doubt she went inside. Kate doesn’t seem like a doughnut person.”
I was pretty sure I had spent more time with Kate than he had, but he was probably right. Even if she was a doughnut person she couldn’t possibly be hungry after devouring a flaming steak and everything that had gone with it.
“Maybe we should call her,” I suggested.
Coop looked confused for a second, then said, “Oh, the phones. I’d forgotten all about the phones.”
I wasn’t surprised. Coop’s idea of high tech was a flashlight.
“Do you think Kate has her phone on?” he asked.
“Only one way to find out,” I said, thinking she had probably forgotten she had one, just like Coop had.
“Give her a call.”
I took my smartphone out of my pocket. “Remind me again why you’re anti–cell phone.”
Coop pointed at the line of doughnut seekers. “They all have their phones out. It looks like everyone in line is with somebody, but they’re not talking to whoever they’re with. They’re talking or texting people who they aren’t with, which is insulting to the person they are with. They aren’t living in the present. They aren’t even living in the presence of the person they’re with.”
Quintessential Coop. I was happy to see it. I had been wondering if his year away, or his brutal stint in the Deep, had changed him. Apparently he was no worse for wear. He has a lot of quirky behaviors, but he can explain all of them if you take the time to listen. Sometimes his explanations even make sense.
There were only three numbers saved on my cell phone. Coop’s, Kate’s, and Alex Dane’s. I was about to hit Kate’s icon when a hand reached out of nowhere and grabbed the phone from my hand.
“Compromised,” Alex Dane said.
I was too stunned to speak.
“Mr. Dane,” Coop managed to say, although I could see he was as surprised as I was.
“Better call me Alex. Dane is a bad word these days.”
“We were supposed to meet Kate here,” Coop said.
Alex took his pipe out of his mouth and tapped the ashes out on a lamppost. “I just saw her,” he said. “She’ll be along soon.”
“What do you mean by compromised?” I asked.
Alex threw my expensive smartphone into a trash can filled with pink doughnut boxes.
“Does that answer your question?”
“Not really,” I said. “I haven’t used the phone. Neither has Coop.”
“But Kate has. She sent me a text when she was in Chicago. Three minutes later I got a text from my brother saying that I was an idiot and that he knew where I was and where Kate was.”
“You said you thought the cell phones were secure,” I said.
“The key word is thought, which is not fact. You’ll need to toss your laptops as well. We’ll be operating completely off the grid from now on.”
I glanced at the trash can. Coop noticed, because Coop notices everything, and said, “It’s going to be a huge haul for a cold garbage picker tonight.”
In New York, both of us had spent time picking through Dumpsters and trash cans. Coop more than me.
He was right. Someone was going to score two cell phones and two laptops.
“I don’t see how the laptops can compromise us if we don’t use them for email or texting. What if we need to look something up on the Internet?”
Alex didn’t say anything for a few seconds, then shook his head. “We’re going old-school. Toss them. And be quick about it. We need to go. Follow me. But keep your distance. The Pod is in town.”
We threw them into the garbage can.
“Where are we going?” Coop asked.
“The library.”
I wasn’t surprised. It was probably where he felt safest, since he worked as a researcher at the New York Public Library for decades. It was probably also the first place the Pod would look for him, but before I could point this out, Coop asked about Kate.
“She’ll meet us at the library,” Alex answered.
He handed me his backpack, which felt twice as heavy as mine, and started down the sidewalk at a fast clip.
“He could have asked,” I said, slinging the pack over my shoulder.
Coop grinned. “He didn’t ask because he didn’t want to hear no. Don’t worry, I’ll take over his pack in a couple of blocks.”
We followed Alex with a half a block between us, bundled up, leaning against the snow.
Except for the slight limp from when his brother had shot him years earlier, Alex moved well for someone in his seventies. Gray coat, pants, muffler, sock cap, hair.
Follow the gray man.
granite and red brick three-story Multnomah County Library is on Southwest Tenth Avenue, taking up an entire city block.
We weren’t the only ones inside sheltering from the snow. The coffee shop on the main floor was jammed. I found a table at the back. Alex found another, three tables away from me. He was reading a newspaper, or acting like he was reading a newspaper. I was writing in my notebook, trying to catch up.
Coop was on the other side of the coffee shop. He had sat down alone, but within seconds a man joined him. The man talked. Coop listened.
Alex watched them from across the room, frowning. He didn’t understand that Coop has no control over the people who approach him. Alex got up from his table and sat down next to me. I guess we were no longer worried about being seen together. I put my notebook away.
“What does he think he’s doing?”
“It’s not his fault.”
“Who’s he talking to? What’s he saying?”
“If you look close, he’s not saying anything.”
“Well, we shouldn’t be talking, or listening, to strangers. We need to keep a low profile.”
Alex stared at me in silence for an uncomfortable amount of time.
“What?”
“You don’t look much different than you did when you were in the Deep.”
I shrugged, not mentioning that he looked exactly the same as he had when I’d met him in the Deep. “I don’t think they know what I look like.”
“Ever been arrested?”
“No.”
“Are you on any social networks?”
“A couple.”
“Ever posted a selfie?”
“No. I think selfies are stupid.”
“Have you ever been tagged in a post?”
“Yeah.”
“Is your photo in your school’s yearbook?”
“Yeah.”
“Then they know what you look like. Do you realize that when you were in New York you were videotaped from the moment you stepped off the train until you went to the airport in New Jersey? It would take some time to find that first glimpse, but once they find your face, they can find it again and again.”
“The Pod can do that?”
“If the government can do it, the Pod probably can too. It would be difficult while they’re on the run, but I wouldn’t put it past them. I think they’re capable of just about anything.” Alex pointed a finger up at the ceiling. “We’re being videotaped right now, which is not to say that the Pod is watching us, but the digital recording stream flows continuously, whether anyone is watching or not. They can stop the stream and dip in for a closer look anytime they like.”
I looked up at the ceiling feeling pretty stupid.
“Don’t feel bad,” Alex said. “They know what I look like too. I should have Tasered the Rottweiler and shot the mush room man.”
Back when we were in the Deep, one of Lod’s Guards had sicced his dog on us. Alex had shot the dog and Tasered the ma
n.
“Lod must have known you were still alive before we met you,” I said.
“Let’s just call him Larry,” Alex said. “He’s no longer Lord of the Deep. When we were kids he was Larry, and I still think of him that way. But to get back to your question. He didn’t know I’d been watching him all these years until our confrontation with the Guard in the Deep. I’m sure he’s as mad about that as he is about Kate going above.”
I looked out the window. It was almost dark. I wondered how late the library was open. People were getting up and putting on their winter coats. But not everyone.
Coop had a new guest at his table. A young guy with long hair and a stack of books.
Alex glanced at his watch, then looked at the entrance to the coffee shop.
No new people were coming in.
“Are you worried about Kate?”
“A little,” Alex said gruffly.
He always had a little growl in his voice, but this was different, dismissive, like he didn’t want to talk about Kate.
I wasn’t about to let him off the hook. “What’s she doing?”
He stared at me for a moment, then said, “She’s following Bella and Bill.”
It took me a couple of seconds to wrap my mind around this.
“How do you know that?”
“Because I told her to follow them.”
“You were at the station?”
“I was there before you were. I flew into Portland yesterday.”
“From where?”
“New York. I told you I had to take care of some things before I could leave.”
“I didn’t see you at the station.”
“That’s kind of the point. Was the shrimp good?”
“Yeah. Wait, where were you sitting?”
“Dark corner about five tables away from you. I thought Kate was going to jump out of her skin when her steak came to the table.”
That was funny, but I didn’t laugh. In fact, I stopped myself from even smiling.
“I have some questions,” I said.
“I’m sure you do. I probably don’t have the answers.”
I ignored this.
“Do you think it’s a good idea for Kate to be following the people who are trying to find her?”
“They certainly aren’t expecting her to be following them, so that’s on her side. And she’s a trained Shadow. Probably the best the Pod ever had.”
Except at the restaurant, I thought. When she missed Alex sitting five tables away.
“Why follow them at all?”
“Because in order for me to figure out why they’ve surfaced I need to know something about their setup above.”
“Why don’t you call the FBI and let them take care of it?”
“For the same reason I didn’t call the police when Larry murdered my nephew and niece, shot me in the leg, and kidnapped Kate. Just because I left the Deep doesn’t mean I disagree with Larry’s political philosophy. I’ve softened my beliefs a little over the years, but I’m still with him in a lot of ways. And don’t forget, as twisted as he can get, Larry is still my brother. I don’t want to see him executed.”
“Even though Larry and the Originals tried to release sarin gas into New York City and blow up the followers he left behind?”
“But it didn’t work,” Alex said.
“Only because we got the information to the FBI before they pulled it off.”
Alex leaned forward across the table. “Which I told you to do. The FBI didn’t know that Larry was still alive, or that the group had been thriving for decades in the Deep.”
“They know now,” I said.
“But they don’t know my brother. Even if they were to catch him, which is unlikely, his plans, whatever they are, would be carried on without him. Larry has contingency plan upon contingency plan, dozens of them. It’s how he thinks. He might have stayed in the Deep for another year, or more, if Coop hadn’t shown up.”
“Are you saying this is all Coop’s fault?”
Alex shook his gray head. “No more than it’s my fault for making contact with Kate and giving her books to read to broaden her thinking. No more than it’s your fault for going into the Deep to find Coop. All I’m saying is that Larry is the most methodical and patient human on the planet. Think about it. He stayed in the Deep for decades, creating a multimillion-dollar business without anyone knowing that the owner was a dead man. He kept the Pod together, relatively happy, and completely unknown above for more than twice as long as you’ve been alive. The sarin gas and the explosives had been in place for decades. I helped Larry set them.”
“You what?” The few people remaining in the coffee shop turned to look at us.
“Keep your voice down. I was an Original before I became a librarian. If we got caught, Larry wanted to blow the compound and gas people up top. I was the only person he told about it. None of the other Originals knew about it. I helped him set it up because I was afraid he’d botch it. I knew more about explosives and gas. I defused it before I left New York. I would have defused it years ago, but I was afraid he would discover it and reset the gas and explosives in a way that I couldn’t sabotage it. By now the FBI knows that it wasn’t going to blow. Larry’s goal is to take down the United States government and corporations, by any means necessary, including the death of innocent people. He’d like to see this country go back to precolonial times. I wouldn’t mind that either, but not at the cost of millions of lives. That’s where his and my philosophy diverge. We split apart long before he murdered Kate’s parents and shot me.”
“He’s a maniac,” I said.
“Maybe,” Alex admitted. “But more pertinent to the current situation is that he is completely committed to his cause. The only way to stop him is to find out what he’s planning to do before he does it. If you go to the FBI now, they might catch Bella and Bill, who I guarantee will not give up Larry. They’re Originals. They’ll never rat him out. And even if they did, they don’t know what the ultimate plan is. The only person who knows that is Lawrence Oliver Dane.”
“I didn’t say I was going to the FBI,” I said. “I asked why you don’t go to the FBI.”
I’d thought a lot about Alex during the long trip across the country. I promised myself that if I ever saw him again I was going to thank him for saving us in the Deep. If it weren’t for Alex, Coop and I would be dead or stuck in a dark, dank room tending mushrooms forever.
“I’m not going to do anything you don’t want me to do,” I said. “You saved our lives in the Deep.”
Alex didn’t deny it.
Or say aw shucks.
Or that we would have been just fine if he hadn’t shown up and shot the dog and Tasered the mush room guard.
Instead, he shook his head and gave me a rare smile.
“The reason I hung around New York after you left was that I wanted to try to pick up Larry’s trail. I hoped you and Kate and Coop would be able to simply disappear until all this cooled down.”
“You didn’t find the trail.”
“Not even a whisper. Larry and the others vanished as if they had never been in the Deep or anywhere else.”
“Poof,” I said.
“Exactly. One of Larry’s magic tricks. His exit from the Deep, hurried and unexpected, was perfectly orchestrated. Not a trace until Kate told me about Bella and Bill.”
“Which is why you had Kate follow them.”
“Yes.”
“So we’re not running anymore?” I asked.
Alex said, and pointed at my notebook.
“Are you keeping a record of this?”
“Something to do,” I said. “Helps to keep me focused.”
Actually it had kept me from going out of my mind from dread and loneliness as I click-clack-clicked my way across the country on the train.
I looked over at Coop.
He was listening to his third complete stranger.
I smiled.
“What?” Alex asked.
“I remember something Coop told me when I was a kid. He said the word listen is an anagram of silent.”
A young guy came into the coffee shop and scanned the thinning crowd. I didn’t know how, but I knew he was looking for us.
Apparently, Alex thought so too.
“Too young to be an Original,” he said. “And I doubt he’s from the Deep, but you never know. The Pod’s being helped by people from above. They wouldn’t have been able to disappear otherwise.”
“We’ll know in a few seconds.”
The guy headed directly toward us. He stopped a couple of feet away from me.
“Are you Jack?”
I was about to tell him no, but then I remembered that I had told Kate that I had used the name Jack on the trains.
“Yeah, I’m Jack.”
The guy nodded. “I have something for you.” He took out a short stack of notebook paper from his coat pocket.
It was the same kind of paper I had in my pocket notebook.
“The girl told me you’d give me twenty bucks if I gave this to you.”
I reached down for my pack, but Alex beat me to it and gave him a twenty. The guy put the pile on the table, then hurried out of the coffee shop with his cash.
We looked down at the pile. Neither one of us picked it up.
“Is that from Kate?” Coop asked, suddenly appearing at our table.
“Yeah. She must have torn it out from the notebook I gave her.”
He sat down, grabbed the top sheet, read it, frowned, then passed it to Alex.
Alex swore.
He passed it to me.
They’re traveling in motor homes and trailers. Meeting others at Nehalem Bay State Park on the Oregon coast near Manzanita. Caught 6:00 p.m. bus to Cannon Beach north of Manzanita. Bus full. Bought ticket from kid who gave you this note. $100 plus $40. Not sure how, but I’ll be in touch if I can.
Kate
The note did not surprise me. I’d spent only a few hours with Kate in the Deep, but that was more than enough time to know that she was fearless. Alex had asked her to shadow Bella and Bill. And that’s exactly what she was doing.
“Why did she tear out the other sheets from the notebook?” I asked.
“Maybe as a precaution in case she gets caught,” Alex said. “Whatever she wrote down was probably incriminating.”