DOWN IN THE DREAMTIME
Edward Bryant
Cordelia Chaisson had dreamed about the murder less frequently during the month past. It surprised her she still thought of it even that much; after all, she had seen far worse. Work consumed her; the job with Global Fun amp; Games sufficiently exhausted her days; laboring on the AIDS/WCV benefit to be held in May at Xavier Desmond's Jokertown Funhouse took up much of the nights. Most evenings she went to sleep long after the eleven o'clock news. Five in the morning came all too early. There was little time for diversion.
But there were still the occasional bad nights of dreaming: -Coming up out of the Fourteenth Street station, heels clicking smartly on the dirty concrete, traffic muttering down from above. Hearing the voice a few steps up at street level saying, "Just give us the purse, bitch!" Hesitating, then going ahead anyway. Fearing, but-
She heard the second voice, the Aussie accent: "G'day, mates. Some problem here?"
Cordelia emerged from the stairwell into the sweltering night. She saw the instant tableau of two unshaven white punks backing a middle-aged woman into the space between the short row of phone carrels and the plywood butt of a shuttered newsstand. The woman had tight hold of both a yapping black poodle and her handbag.
Sun-burnt and rangy, the man Cordelia assumed was an Aussie faced down the two youths. He wore a sand-colored outfit that looked like a rougher, more authentic version of a Banana Republic ensemble. There was a bright, well-caredfor knife in one hand.
"A problem, sonny?" he repeated.
"No, no problem, dick-head," said one of the punks. He pulled out a short-barreled pistol from his jacket and shot the Aussie in the face.
It simply happened too quickly for Cordelia to react. As the man fell to the sidewalk, the assailants ran. The woman with the poodle screamed, momentarily harmonizing with the cries of the dog.
Cordelia ran to the man and knelt beside him. She felt for the pulse in his neck. Almost imperceptible. It was probably too late for CPR. She averted her gaze from the blood pooling beneath the man's head. The hot metallic smell of blood nauseated her. A siren wailed up the scale less than a block away.
"I've still got my purse!" the woman cried.
The man's face twitched. He died. "Shit," said Cordelia softly, helplessly. There wasn't a damned thing she could do.
Some kind of trouble now, Cordelia thought, as a darksuited man she didn't recognize waved her into one of GF amp;G's executive offices. Deep shit, maybe. The two women standing by the desk examined a stack of printouts. Red-haired and tough, Polly Rettig was marketing chief for the GF amp;G satellite service. She was Cordelia's immediate boss. The other woman was Luz Alcala, vice president for programming and Rettig's boss. Neither Rettig nor Alcala smiled as they usually did. The man in black stepped back by the door and stood there with his arms folded. Security? Cordelia speculated. "Good morning, Cordelia," Rettig said. "Please have a seat. We'll be with you in just a moment." She turned her attention back to Alcala and pointed out something on the sheet in her hand.
Luz Alcala slowly nodded. "Either we buy it first, or we're dead in the water. Maybe hire someone good-"
"Don't even think it," said Rettig, frowning slightly. "It might become necessary," Alcala said. "He's dangerous." Cordelia tried to keep the bewildered look off her face. "He's also too powerful." Folding her hands, Rettig turned toward Cordelia. "Tell me what you know about Australia."
"I've seen everything Peter Weir ever directed," Cordelia said, momentarily hesitating. What was going on here? "You've never been there?"
"New York is the farthest I've ever been from home." Home was Atelier Parish, Louisiana. Home was a place she'd rather not think about. In most respects it didn't exist.
Rettig was looking at Alcala. "What do you think?"
"I think yes." The older woman picked up a thick envelope and handed it across the desk to Cordelia. "Open it, please." She found a passport, a sheaf of airline tickets, an American Express card, and a hefty folder of traveler's checks. "You'll need to sign those." Alcala indicated the checks and the credit card.
Cordelia looked silently up from the smiling image affixed to the first page of the passport. "Nice photo," she said. "I. don't remember applying."
"There was little time," said Polly Rettig apologetically. "We took liberties."
"The point is," said Alcala, "you're leaving this afternoon for the other side of the world."
Cordelia felt stunned, then recognized the excitement growing. "All the way to Australia?"
"Commercial flight," said Alcala. "Brief stops for fuel in L.A., Honolulu, and Auckland. In Sydney you'll catch an Ansett flight to Melbourne and another plane up to Alice Springs. Then you'll rent a Land-Rover and drive to Madhi Gap. You're going to have a full day," she added dryly.
A thousand things crowded into Cordelia's mind. "But what about my job here? And I can't just abandon the benefit-I want to go to New Jersey this weekend to check out Buddy Holley."
"He can wait till you're back. The whole benefit can wait," said Rettig firmly. "PR is fine, but the JADL and the Manhattan AIDS Project don't pay your salary. This is Global Fun amp; Games business."
"But-"
"It is important." Voice smoothly modulated, Alcala made it sound like a pronouncement.
"But what is it?" She felt as if she were listening to Auntie Alice on Radio Wonderland. "What's all this about?" Alcala seemed to be picking her words carefully. "You've seen the PR flacking GF amp;G's plan to inaugurate a worldwide entertainment service via satellite."
Cordelia nodded. " I thought that was years down the road."
"It was. The. only thing holding back the plan was the investment capital."
"We've got the money," Rettig said. "We have the help of allied investors. Now we need the satellite time and the ground stations to pipe our programming down to the earth."
"Unfortunately," said Alcala, "we have sudden competition for securing the services of the commercial facility in the telecommunications complex in Madhi Gap. A man named Leo Barnett."
"The TV evangelist?" Alcala nodded.
"The ace-baiting, intolerant, psychotic, species-chauvinist son of a bitch," said Rettig with sudden passion. "That TV evangelist. Fire-breather, some call him."
"And you're sending me to Madhi Gap?" said Cordelia excitedly. Incredible, she thought. It was too good to be true. "Thank you! Thank you very much. I'll do a terrific job."
Rettig and Alcala glanced at each other. "Hold on," said Alcala. "You're going along to assist, but you're not going to be negotiating."
It was too good to be true. Shit, she thought. "Meet Mr. Carlucci," said Alcala.
"Marry," said a nasal voice from behind Cordelia. "Mr. Carlucci," Alcala repeated.
Cordelia turned and took another, closer look at the man she had dismissed as some kind of hired help. Medium height, compact build, styled black hair. Carlucci smiled. He looked like a thug. An amiable one, but still a thug. His suit didn't look as if it had come off the rack. Now that she looked more closely, the coat looked expensively tailored to a T
Carlucci extended his hand. "It's Marty," he said. "We got to spend a day and a night on a plane, we might as well be friendly about it, you know?"