"Sounds worse than Central Park after midnight in August."
Margaret Wiley ignored me and said, "It's very difficult for people like us-I mean my people-to part with even an acre of land."
Right." But for twenty-five large, we can talk. I said, "I found a musket ball once."
She looked at me as if I were a half-wit. She directed her attention toward Beth and prattled on a bit, then said, "Well, you don't need me to show you up to the top. There's a path right there. It's not going up, but be careful on the sea side. It drops steeply and there aren't many footholds." She added, "This bluff is actually the terminal moraine of the last ice age. The glacier ended right here."
In fact, the glacier stood before me now. I said, "Thank you for your time and patience, Mrs. Wiley."
She started to walk off, then looked at Beth and asked her, "Do you have any idea who could have done it?"
"No, ma'am."
"Did it relate to their work?"
"In a way. But nothing to do with germ warfare or anything dangerous."
Margaret Wiley didn't look convinced. She went back to her car, started it, and drove off in a cloud of dust. I called after her, "Eat my dust, Margaret. You old-"
"John!"
I brushed the dust off my clothes again. I said to Beth, "Do you know why Daughters of the American Revolution don't have group sex?"
"No, but I'm about to find out."
"You are. Daughters of the American Revolution don't have group sex because they don't want to have to write all those thank-you notes."
"Do these jokes come from an inexhaustible supply?"
"You know they do."
We both looked up at the bluff. I said, "Let's see that twenty-five-G view."
We found the small path, and I went first. The path led through some thick bushes, a lot of scrub oak, and a few bigger trees that looked like maples, but could have been banana trees, for all I knew.
Beth, dressed in a khaki poplin skirt and street shoes, wasn't having an easy time of it. I pulled her up over a few steep spots. She hiked her skirt up, or it rode up, and I was treated to a perfect pair of legs.
It was only about fifty feet to the top, the equivalent of a five-story walk-up, which I used to be able to do with enough energy left to kick down a door, wrestle a perp to the floor, slap the cuffs on, and drag him down to the street and into a PD. But that was then. This was now, and I felt shaky. Black spots danced before my eyes, and I had to stop and kneel down.
Beth asked, "Are you okay?"
"Yeah… Just a minute…" I took a bunch of breaths and then continued on.
We reached the top of the bluff. The growth here was much more stunted because of the wind and salt air. We looked out over the Long Island Sound, and truly it was an incredible panorama. Although the south slope of the bluff was only fifty feet from the base to the crest, the north slope down to the beach was about a hundred feet. It was, as Mrs. Wiley warned, very steep, and when we peered down over the edge, we could see sea grasses, erosion gullies, mud slides, and rock falls that swept down to a nice long beach that stretched east and west for miles.
The Sound was calm, and we saw a few sailboats and powerboats. A huge cargo ship was heading west toward New York or one of the Connecticut ports. About ten miles away, we could make out the Connecticut coast.
The bluff ran west for a mile or so and disappeared at a point of land jutting into the Sound. To the east, the bluff ran with the beach for several miles and ended at Horton Point, which was identifiable because of the lighthouse.
Behind us, the way we had come up, were the flat farmlands, and from up here, we could see the quiltwork of potatoes, grapevines, orchards, and corn. Quaint clapboard houses and white, not red, barns dotted the green fields. I said, "What a view."
"Magnificent," Beth agreed. She asked, "Worth twenty-five thousand?"
"That is the question." I looked at her. "What do you think?" In theory, no. But up here, yes."
"Well put." I saw a boulder in the tall grass and sat on it, staring out to sea.
Beth stood to my side, also staring out to sea. We were both sweaty, dirty, dusty, out of breath, and tired. "Time for cocktails," I said. "Let's head back."
Just a minute. Let's be Tom and Judy. Tell me what they wanted here, what they were seeking."
Okay…" I stood on the boulder and looked around. The sun was setting, and way off to the east the sky was purple. To the west, lt: was pink and overhead it was blue. Gulls sailed, whitecaps raced across the Sound, birds sang in the trees, a breeze blew out of the northeast, and there was a smell of autumn as well as salt. I said to Beth, "We've spent the day on Plum Island. We were in biocontainment all day, wearing lab clothes, surrounded by viruses. We shower out, race to the Spirochete or to the ferry, cross the Gut, get into our car, and come here. This is wide open, clean, and invigorating. This is life… We brought a bottle of wine and a blanket. We drink the wine, we make love, we lie on the blanket, and watch the stars come out. Maybe we go down to the beach and swim or surf cast under the stars and moon. We are a million miles from the laboratory. We go home, ready for another day in biocontainment."
Beth stayed silent for a while, then without replying, she moved to the edge of the bluff, then turned and walked to the only substantial tree on the crest, a ten-foot-tall, gnarled oak. She bent down, then straightened up, holding a coil of rope in her hand. "Look at this."
I joined her and looked at her find. The rope, made of green nylon about a half an inch thick, was knotted every three feet or so for handholds. One end was tied to the base of the tree. Beth said, "There's probably enough rope here to reach the beach."
I nodded. "That would certainly make the climb up and down easier."
"Yes." She knelt and looked down the slope. I did the same. We could see where the grass was worn from the climbs up and down the face of the bluff. It was, as I said, a steep slope, but not too difficult for anyone in decent shape, even without a rope.
I leaned farther over the edge and noticed that where the grass had eroded there were those reddish streaks of clay and iron in the soil. I noticed something else: about ten feet below, a sort of shelf or ledge appeared. Beth noticed it, too, and said, "I'm going to have a look."
She pulled at the rope, and satisfied that it was securely attached to the tree trunk, and the tree trunk was securely attached to the ground, she took the rope in both hands and walked backwards down the ten feet to the ledge, playing out the rope as she descended. She called up, "Come on down. This is interesting."
"Okay." I walked down the slope, holding the rope in one hand. I stood on the ledge beside Beth.
She said, "Look at that."
The ledge was about ten feet long and three feet deep at the widest. In the center of the ledge was a cave, but you could tell it was not natural. In fact, I could see shovel marks. Beth and I crouched down and peered into the opening. It was small, about three feet in diameter and only about four feet deep. There was nothing inside the excavation. I couldn't imagine what this was for, but I speculated, "You could stash a picnic lunch and a cooler of wine in there."
Beth added, "You could even put your legs in there and your body out on this ledge, and go to sleep."
"Or have sex."
"Why did I know you were going to say that?"
"Well, it's true." I stood. "They may have intended to make this bigger."
"For what?"
"I don't know." I turned toward the Sound and lowered myself into a sitting position, my feet dangling over the ledge. "This is nice. Have a seat."