Conspiracies

She shook her head. "I can't tell you how relieved I am? I was so afraid? Like maybe we'd find her dead of a heart attack or a stroke or something?"

His mind raced, stumbling along as it tried to decide which way to go. Not there? Impossible. He'd seen her ... dead ... mutilated ... her head twisted around ...

"You're sure you had the right room?"

"Of course? Eight-twelve? I was there? I searched the room myself? Olive's suitcase? And her clothes? They're all there in the drawers? But no Olive? Isn't that strange?"

"Yeah," Jack said. "Real strange."

"It makes you wonder? You know, about the End Days? When the faithful are taken away in the Rapture? Could this be the start? And Olive is one of the first to be taken?"

How do I—how does anyone—answer that? Jack wondered.

Evelyn smiled and patted his arm. "Rapture or not, the show goes on? I have to run? I'm introducing Professor Mazuko's panel on Japanese UFOs? See you later?"

"Sure," Jack said, still feeling dazed. "Later."

He wandered up to the common area and dropped into a chair. Olive's corpse ... gone. How had it been spirited out through a hotel full of people?

Spirited out ... swell choice of words.

And without leaving a trace of the murder.

This left him and the killers as the only ones who knew that Olive Farina was dead.

Or was she dead? Did he know that?

Jack was having a SESOUP moment here—he'd witnessed something but didn't have a shred of physical evidence to prove it.

Had to stop that kind of thinking. Olive was dead. No question about that. But who sliced her up? The two men in black he'd run into? Or someone else?

All of which made Jack intensely uneasy. This was supposed to be a quiet job, a safe job. No rough stuff.

But the condition of Olive's corpse had said loud and clear that someone was playing very rough.

Of course there was always the possibility that Olive's murder had nothing to do with Melanie's disappearance.

Yeah, right. I should be so lucky.

Olive gone without a trace ... just like Melanie. Did that mean Melanie was hidden away somewhere with no lips, no eyes, and a broken neck?

A logical conclusion, seeing as Jack, like everybody else except the killers, would be thinking of Olive as simply missing—or taken by the Rapture, if you were into that—if he hadn't broken into her room. He was glad he hadn't told Lew about Olive. He'd jump to the same conclusion, and that might just kill the poor guy.

He looked around at the SESOUP folk streaming into one of the conference rooms. Maybe these people weren't as crazy as they seemed. And maybe he could learn something useful at one of these panels.

As he followed the crowd he spied a flyer taped to the wall. He stepped closer to read it.

CALL FOR RESEARCH PARTICIPANTS

If one of your parents is an alien

OR

If one of your siblings or one of your children is the

product of an alien sexual encounter

PLEASE CALL IMMEDIATELY!

Then again, he thought, maybe SESOUPers are even crazier than they seem.

Even though Jack had been sure at times during his childhood that his older brother was part alien, he resisted copying down the phone number.

He filed inside and found a seat near the rear of the room. He fought an urge to shout out: "All those who believe in telekinesis, raise my hand!" Instead, he listened to Evelyn introduce Professor Hideki Mazuko of the University of Tokyo—what department, she didn't say—and was startled to learn that the man didn't speak any English. He did, however, speak French. So did Evelyn, and she would provide a running translation of Dr. Mazuko's address.

As a lantern-jawed middle-aged Asian in a gray suit, white shirt, red- and blue-striped tie advanced to the dais amid polite applause, Jack groaned and looked around for a way out. He realized he couldn't make it without stumbling over a lot of SESOUPers, so he grudgingly settled in and promised himself a trip to the bar immediately afterward.

Dr. Mazuko began speaking in French, saying a few words, then stopping for Evelyn to repeat it in English. Jack had always assumed water torture required water; here was proof that he was wrong.

After his interminable stop-and-go preamble, Professor Mazuko asked that the lights be turned down so he could show slides of recent photos of UFOs over Tokyo.

A progression of images of blurry blobs of light flashed on the screen, with the audience oohing and aahing at each one. Jack wondered why, if UFOs were supposed to be such a secret, they were always lit up like the Fuji blimp?

When one particularly strange-looking glowing object appeared, the woman on Jack's right began to clap and others joined her.

"Incredible!" she said in a voice hushed with awe.

Jack wholeheartedly agreed: Incredible was just the word for it. Even eight-year-old Vicky would see that it was a kite. Or pie in the sky—literally.

Like Abe had said the other day ... believing is seeing. Yes, sir.

"Shit, shit, shit!" Suddenly someone was shouting. "That does it! Turn on the lights! Turn on the goddamn lights!"

Jack thought the voice sounded familiar, and when the lights came up, he spotted James Zaleski striding toward the front of the room.

"What's the matter with you people!" he shouted. "These are the goddamn phoniest looking photos I've ever seen!"

Jack heard groans around him and muttered variations on the theme of "Oh, no, Jimmy's on a tear again."

Obviously this wasn't the first time he'd made a stink at a UFO panel.

"Dammit," Zaleski yelled, "you've got to be more discriminating! You've got to be critical! We know they're here, but are we so desperate for proof we'll accept anything, even these poorly doctored fakes, as real? We demand the truth from the government, but how are we ever going to be taken seriously if we don't demand honesty within our own ranks? We come off like a bunch of gullible cranks!"

Members of the audience had started rising to their feet during his impassioned plea and now they were shouting at him to be quiet and return to his seat and let Professor Mazuko finish.

Jack remembered Gia taking him and Vicky to the revival of 1776 when it had played at the Roundabout. This reminded him of the booming opening number when the entire cast rose and sang "Sit Down, John!" to John Adams.

Jack used the uproar to cover his exit. On the way out he saw Miles Kenway standing ramrod straight against the rear wall, staring at him. Jack felt like a school kid caught playing hooky. He matched Kenway stare for stare.

How do I get to talk to Kenway? he wondered as he reached the common area. At least he and Zaleski were still around. If someone was knocking off the top people in SESOUP, they hadn't reached the men yet. But was it just a matter of time before they did?

Just then two dowdy, silver-haired members of Professor Mazuko's audience emerged from the room, in heated discussion.

"You don't believe that, do you?" said the one wearing the MK-Ultra Stole My Brain! T-shirt.

Her friend nodded vigorously. "Of course I do."

"No," said the first, as they wandered away. "You can't really believe that."

I believe I'll have a beer, Jack thought.

He headed for the bar.

17

"He is our enemy, I tell you." Mauricio's voice grew louder with each word. "Just look at what he has done to the Farina woman! That man is out to destroy us!"

"Hush, please. You do not know that."

They stood in the bathroom of Roma's suite where Olive's mutilated corpse lay stretched out in the tub. They had partially covered it with ice to keep it from stinking.