Second Chance (40 page)

"Would it be?" she said. "Possible, I mean. How many different tracks can there be? I think it's incredible that there can actually be two, let alone more."

"Why not?"

"How many times can reality break apart and reform itself, Woody? How many tracks can the universe hold?"

"If it's infinite, an infinity of them, I guess."

"But you don't know."

"Jesus, who does? What's your point, Tracy?"

She couldn't tell him. Not yet. "Nothing. No point. Meta-physical pedantry, that's all." She went over to the silent sound system, and hit play again, too weary to choose another disc. "I'm going to get a bath."

In the tub, she thought about what she had not told Woody, let her mind lay immersed in fear as her body lay in the warm, soft water. She was afraid that once she went back to the past, to that same apartment on a fall night twenty-odd years before, that she would not be able to return, that the cycle would stop, that the life she loved and knew so vividly had been only a visit, a gift of grace from some unimaginable god who now realized that he had made a mistake, and saw a chance to set things right again.

For Keith's existence
was
wrong. Some huge cosmic error had saved his life along with Tracy's. Thousands of people had died because of that mistake, and their friends' lives had been ruined. And now Keith was planning . . . what? A still worse offense? A disaster on a massive scale?

She closed her eyes and let herself slide down into the water, until it covered her chin, her mouth, her eyes, until her head was under, and she thought that if she had ceased to draw breath on that night long ago, how many other dead people would be alive today?

And then she thought about her children, and let her face break the surface of the water, and breathed again.

Her children.

She got out of the tub, dried herself, put on a robe, and walked into Peter's room. He was asleep, his arm around a stuffed rabbit. He held it every night, though he thought he was too old for stuffed animals, and compromised by refusing to acknowledge it or admit to its existence, even to his mother. Still, there it was in his arms.

Isn't that funny
, she thought.
He loves you, but you're not supposed to exist. Isn't that funny. And sad.

What would happen to you, little boy? What would happen, not if Mommy went away, but if she never was your mommy? Where would you go?

Heaven? Limbo? Someplace where dream children live? And could I be there with you?

Please?

She sat on the floor next to his bed for a long time, just watching him breathe, watching him be. She finally fell asleep, her head against the wall, and Woody had to wake her up so that she could go to bed.

Chapter 37

September 25, 1993
:

. . . and O'Hare International waits below. Already the virus is spreading through the world. I could stop now, but I feel the need to hurry it along. After so many years of struggle, what I sought has finally come, and I feel happier than I have in such a long time.

Again I am in coach class. I want to be among people, to reach as many as possible. A nun is sitting next to me, one of those new-style nuns with the
shortish
skirt and part of her hair showing. She's very friendly, and is going to some nun convention in Chicago—I don't know why that sounds so silly—nun convention, with maybe a man popping out of a cake naked except for a priest's collar.

That may be the first bit of levity I've ever written in my book of the mind. There was never any reason for it before. In any event, the nun will take some extra guests to her convention—millions of them on her breath. And, like a good Christian, she will share. She will multiply her loaves and fishes.

I've been sharing. In Los Angeles I shared over and over again. I picked up a little girl's Ninja Turtle doll that she had dropped, gave it to her, got my face close to hers, told her to hang on to her friends, that friends were very important, and her mother and father smiled and thanked me, because I'm dressed so well and look so good, and am so kind and polite and forthright, looking everyone in the face, with the touch of mint and death on my breath.

Now Chicago. Then New York.

Then, after all this time, home.

~*~

When Pete Sullivan didn't show up for work at Goncourt Laboratories Thursday morning, Al Freeman asked the other men if they had seen him. They said they hadn't, not at all during the break, and assumed that he had gone camping again. When Al called Pete's apartment, there was no answer, so he called Leonard
Brambaugh
, the man who owned the building.
Brambaugh
said that he hadn't seen Pete either.

The orders were to call in if you were sick or couldn't come to work, and the fact that Pete hadn't done so made Al Freeman nervous. Pete had admitted that he'd been pretty depressed by Sally's death. Supposing he'd done something stupid?

"Leonard," said Freeman, "do me a favor. Go up to Pete's apartment and make sure everything's okay."

"Hell, Al, he's not here—his
car
ain't here."

"Well, check anyway, all right?"

Brambaugh
muttered an obscenity, said he'd check and call back, and hung up. Ten minutes later he called for Freeman. "He's gone."

"What, did he leave a note?"

"No, he's
gone
. Gee-ay-
dubya
-en. Packed and scattered.
Nuthin
' left but the furniture. Won't see that boy again. Damn good thing he paid in advance."

Freeman slammed down the phone and went to Ted Horst's office. "Pete Sullivan's gone," he said. "Run out."

"Sure he wasn't grabbed?"

"No. His stuff's gone too. He left. Without a word to anybody."

Horst sat back in his chair. "God
damn
. All right, let's get down to it. Have 'em run a full inventory. Talk to the security guys who checked him out last Monday. I'll fax his picture to our friends, get them
lookin
' for his car,
lookin
' for him at airports, train stations,
alla
that. What was he
workin
' on last?"

Freeman tried to swallow, but it stuck in his throat, and he coughed. “The woman. He was taking samples from the woman who died."

Horst went pale. "Jesus. Who with?"

"Billy
Magruder
."

"Get him."

In less than a minute
Magruder
was sitting in Ted Horst's office, Horst and Freeman standing over him. "Billy," Horst said, "was Pete Sullivan ever in that cell with that subject alone? Ever, but especially last Monday?"

Magruder
shook his head. "No sir."

"Listen to me now, Billy. No lies. I know we've always said how important proper procedures are, and that you can get your ass fired for not
followin
' them. But if you didn't, you better say so right now, because there are things a
helluva
lot worse than
tellin
' me you broke the rules, get it?"

"No sir. Pete and me were in there together. All the time. He's
never
been alone in there. And neither have I."

"Did he do anything strange in there this week?"

"Like what?"

"Like
anything
!
Goddam
it,
anything
struck you as weird!”

“Well, well no. He . . . he forgot the blood tube Monday, but . . . we went and got it."

"We? Both of you got out of the lock and got it? At the same time?"

"Well, sure. According to procedure. We're not supposed to be alone in there, we know that."

"And you weren't? You didn't go out and get it, then leave it in the lock for him while you got dressed?"

"Hell no, Ted! I know
better'n
that."

"All right . . . all right. Al, get that inventory started right now." Freeman disappeared through the door. "Billy, help Al. But you remember now, you
better've
told me the truth. There are worse things than
breakin
' the rules. Lots worse."

Billy
Magruder
nodded, stood up, and followed Al Freeman down the hall, thinking bullshit. There's nothing stupider than admitting you broke the rules, and there's nothing worse than getting fired for it.

Nothing.

Chapter 38

By late afternoon, when the Goncourt inventory was completed and nothing was found missing, Keith's plane was landing at Kennedy International. He would have gone directly to the International Arrivals Building, but was too tired, and instead took a cab to the J.F.K. Plaza near the airport, got a room, and slept for several hours.

When he awoke, he took a swim in the pool, had a late dinner, and sat in the bar until midnight, observing the women. He toyed with the idea of picking one up for the night, but decided he was too tired. Then he went back to his room and slept until dawn.

He checked out, took a cab back to International Arrivals, and spent several hours at different gates. He went through the metal detectors, smiling each time, knowing that they would never beep at what he carried, a weapon far more deadly than guns or bombs.

He began to feel tired again at noon, so he bought a
Times
, paid the admission to the third level observation deck, and sat reading. In the music section he saw a small announcement that the forthcoming week-long appearance of Woody Robinson and his quintet at Fat Tuesday's had been postponed due to "a minor accident," and that Kenny Barron's group would appear in Robinson's place.

Keith smiled, stood up, and walked to the windows, looking out at the planes rising and falling.

~*~

September 27, 1993
:

Good for Woody. I always knew he was strong-willed. He had to be to go through all those years of musical changes and keep his vision intact.

He's very similar to me when it comes to single-mindedness. We both had goals, and we never lost our concentration, never stopped seeking the final prize. His music may still live, though. Maybe those who survive will retain enough technology to play it. There will be far fewer people, so their needs won't be as great. Electricity will survive, I'm sure. They'll keep some things. But it will take thousands of years before the earth sinks to the state of dreadful waste it's in now.

Good old Woody. He's no threat anymore. I should call him. Congratulate him.

Tell him what I've done, and let him congratulate me. That's the one thing that bothers me—people won't know. To save the world and not have them know.

Maybe there's some way to tell them. I'll have to think about that. At least I can tell Woody.

It's ten in the morning in California. He'll be up by now.

~*~

Keith left the third level and began walking in the direction of the gates, looking for an isolated bank of pay phones. As he walked down a less than busy corridor, he became aware of someone following him. To make sure, he stopped at a candy machine and bought a pack of gum.

The man stopped too. Keith saw his reflection in the machine's glass. Medium height, wearing a denim jacket zipped halfway up. Sunglasses, blond hair cut short, no facial hair.

Typical little Nazi.

The lab.

All right, he'd make it easy.

Keith kept walking down the corridor until he came to a men's room. He walked inside, saw that it was empty, put down his bag, and stood at the urinal. But instead of his penis he held a small penknife that the airport security people always assumed posed no threat. In most peoples' hands it didn't. But most people were not Pan.

In the reflective chrome collar above the urinal, Keith saw a bent and curved version of the man come into the rest room, his white teeth smiling. His hand became hidden in the folds of his denim jacket, and when it came out Keith saw the gleam of a pistol.

The man came up behind him and started to say something, but Keith didn't wait for the words. He whirled around, plucked the pistol from the man's right hand as easily as picking a ripe apple, and pressed the point of the penknife into the hollow directly above the man's sternum.

It sank in easily, and Keith smiled at the look of surprise and pain on the man's face. Then he flicked out the knife and stepped back. The man stood there, unsure how to breathe with two mouths. His hands waved feebly in the air, and he began to look around him, as if for help.

"Instant tracheotomy," said Keith. He pushed the man backwards so that his back hit a booth door and he went down in a sitting position, his sunglasses clattering to the floor. "Don't try to talk. You'll bleed too much. Just nod. Answer my questions and maybe you'll live. Are you from the lab?"

The man, blue eyes wide with shock, nodded.

"They're looking for me?"

The man's hands fumbled at his throat. He looked at his fingers. When he saw they were red, he began to make mewling noises.