"Not the way you mean," Lisa told her, shaking her head. "I mean, he's a nice enough guy, but not for—you know. But I've got to find him. It's my fault he's in whatever trouble he's in; don't you see? If they've got him in jail or something..." She left the sentence unfinished.
"And if they have, then what? Break him out like they're always doing in the movies? You'll really get in trouble for something crazy like that."
Lisa's laugh was more like a painful cough. "More trouble than I'm already in?"
Sheelah grimaced and fell silent. Picking up her pencil again, Lisa returned her attention to the paper. Writing was much harder work for her than reading had ever been. Somehow, the letters never seemed to come out looking quite like those in the books, and many of the words wound up looking wrong, even though she usually couldn't tell why. She wished now she had spent more time on the writing lessons in Daryl's books instead of hurrying to get on to more reading. But it was too late to make up for her laziness now. Doggedly, she kept at it, trying to ignore the vision hovering before her eyes of fifty police righthands hurtling toward Dayspring.
But no one had burst into the room by the time she finally finished. "All right," she said, laying down the pencil with relief and folding the paper twice before handing it to Sheelah. "Give this to Gavra in the morning—not before, understand? If she asks you about it, you don't know anything. You've got to promise me that—I don't want you to lose all your points, too."
Sheelah took the paper gingerly, a dubious look on her face. "I still don't see what good a note will do."
"It'll tell her I'm all right but won't give her a chance to stop me," Lisa said. Teeking off the room lights, she went to the window and opened the curtains enough to peek out. "If I talked to her in person or used the phone, she'd have to call the police or get in trouble herself for not calling them."
"She won't have a chance to give you any advice, either," Sheelah pointed out. She signed loudly. "All right, I'll give her the note. Any righthands out there?"
"I don't see any." Opening the curtains wider, Lisa slid the window up and glanced back into the darkened room. "Don't forget, you don't know anything. Okay?"
"Yeah." The shadow that was Sheelah stepped forward and touched Lisa's arm. "Watch yourself, Lisa, and be careful."
"I will." Taking a deep breath, Lisa slipped out the window and dropped quickly toward the ground. Keeping low, with an eye out for searching righthands, she headed south.
Chapter 20
Dayspring Hive was a towering collection of uniformly dark windows as Tirrell pulled the car silently to the curb and gently opened his door. "Don't slam it," he cautioned Tonio as the righthand slid out his side of the vehicle. "Sounds carry pretty well at night."
The preteen nodded and swung the door to with a barely audible click. "You want me to wait out here and watch?" he whispered.
Tirrell shook his head. "There's no way you could cover the whole building by yourself. Let's try the battering-ram approach first and see if we can get to her before she knows we're here."
Still, the detective kept an eye skyward as they headed up the long walkway to the main entrance.
The outer door was unlocked. Opening it and stepping through, Tirrell found himself in a glassed-in vestibule whose inner door turned out to be locked. In the larger entrance hall beyond, a young adult was sitting at a small desk, a solitaire hand laid out in front of her. Looking up at the visitors, she leaned toward a small microphone. "May I help you?" she said pleasantly, her voice coming through an intercom grille in the vestibule ceiling.
Tirrell held his badge up to the glass. "Police," he said. "I want to see both your Director and your Girls' Senior right away."
Eyes bulging slightly, the woman nodded and groped at the far side of her desk. With a snick the inner door popped open a centimeter or two, and as Tirrell pulled it open, she reached for her phone.
They arrived almost simultaneously from opposite directions a few minutes later—the man in robe and slippers, the woman still dressed. Tirrell wondered why she'd still be up, decided to hold the question for later.
"Detective?" the man asked as he approached, as if there could be any doubt. "I'm Director Allan Gould. What seems to be the problem?"
"I'm Detective First Tirrell," Tirrell identified himself formally. "One of your kids broke into my office at the city building an hour ago and assaulted a police officer. We're here to pick her up."
"What?" Gould's jaw sagged.
"Who?" the woman asked.
Tirrell shifted his attention to her. "You're the Girls' Senior?"
"Yes; Gavra Norward. Whom are you accusing?"
"It's hardly a simple accusation—one of the officers who saw her enter the station has already tentatively identified her from her picture. Her name's Lisa Duncan."
Something flickered over Gavra's face, something that didn't look altogether surprised. "Are you absolutely sure it was Lisa?" she asked, her voice strangely tight.
"That's what we're here to find out," Tirrell said. "Would you take us to her room, please?"
Gavra held his eyes a fraction of a second, then turned to the young woman at the desk. "Has Lisa come in since you've been here?"
The other was already running a finger down a long list in front of her. "Not since the doors were locked at eight-thirty," she said, shaking her head.
"You knew she was out?" Tirrell asked, watching Gavra's face closely.
"I knew she'd missed the eight-thirty sign-in," the Senior replied without hesitation. "She's never missed lights-out before, though, so I had no reason to suspect she'd be late this time."
"Uh-huh." Or else had suspicions and carefully avoided any direct knowledge. "I'd like to check her room for myself, if you don't mind."
Gavra glanced past him at Tonio, opened her mouth as if to object to his presence on the girls' side, then abruptly turned and headed back the way she'd come without saying anything. Tirrell fell into step beside her, Tonio following close behind.
The twin towers started three floors above street level, rising above the hive's common areas, and Lisa's room was five more flights up the girls' tower itself. Tirrell pushed the pace, with the result that both he and Gavra were breathing a bit heavily by the time they started down the hallway. Tonio, of course, showed no strain at all from the trip.
Gavra led the way to one of the doors about halfway down the left-hand corridor. "This is it," she said in a soft voice which tried very hard to disguise its tension. "May I knock before you go barging in? Knocking is a hive privacy rule."
Tirrell hesitated, then nodded. "All right, but don't wait for an answer before opening the door."
Gavra grimaced, but turned back to the door without comment and rapped gently on the panel. Twisting the knob, she pushed the door open and stepped inside. "Lisa? Sheelah? It's Gavra," she announced quietly as Tirrell flicked on the light and took a long step past her into the room.
It was, unfortunately, an anticlimax. One of the two beds was clearly empty; in the other a tousle-haired girl, startled awake, was half sitting up with an arm thrown protectively over her eyes. "What—" she gasped.
"It's all right, Sheelah; it's Gavra and a police detective," the Senior said quickly.
"The police?" Still squinting, the girl lowered her arm and peered in Tirrell's direction. "Why is—oh!" She broke off, and her sheet suddenly jumped to chin level.