Alex touched a control and froze her again. "That's it," he said. "That's it ?" "That is the sum of the transmission." "What's she talking about?" "I don't know. I've no idea." He took a deep breath. "I'm wondering if we're looking at a woman in the last stages of a breakdown." She had looked thoroughly spooked. "Maybe she's been writing too much horror," I said. "It's possible." "And you've never met her?" "No." " Who's all dead?" "Don't know." "Maybe a bunch of fictitious characters." I got coffee for both of us. "You might want to recommend she see somebody." "It's been in the folder for several days." "That's because we told Belle not to disturb us." He ran the artwork from her books. Etude in Black , which featured a young woman playing a stringed instrument in a spotlight while glowing eyes watched her from a dark curtain. Love You to Death , with a vulpine creature kneeling in sorrow at a grave site. Nightwalk , portraying a satanic figure in the clouds over a moonlit city. And three others with similar motifs: Wish You Were Here , Dying to Know You , and Midnight and Roses . "What do you think?" "Alex, she sounds like a lunatic." "She's in trouble, Chase." "You want my advice? Don't get involved."
We couldn't send or receive a message while we were in hyperspace. We could have interrupted the jump, but there was really no point in that. So we waited until we arrived back at Rimway. Thirty seconds after we saw the stars again, he sat down and told Belle to record. "Ms. Greene," he said. "I just received your message." He stopped and looked in my direction. "Chase, how far out are we?" "About a day," I said. "Day and a half." He turned back to his message. "We've been away. I'll be in my office by the weekend. Meantime, if you want to talk to me, I'm within radio range now. Skydeck can put you through." He sat quietly for several moments, then told Belle to send it and looked up at me. "What's wrong, Chase?" "Nothing."
"Come on. Talk to me." "I think you should be more careful about getting involved in other people's problems. You're an antiquities dealer, not a psychologist." "If she's in trouble, I wouldn't want to walk away from her." "If she's in trouble she can call the police."
TWO
We don't fear death because we lose tomorrow, but because we lose yesterday, with its sweet poignancy, its memories of growing children, of friends and lovers, of all that we have known. Nobody else has really been there in the way we have. And when the lights go out for us, for you or me, the lights go out in that world, too.
- Wish You Were Here
They're all dead.
We cruised toward Rimway. With its big moon, it constituted a glittering double star in the sparse sky near the galactic rim. Vicki Greene didn't respond, didn't send a message, didn't say anything. The hours dragged on, and the double star grew into a pair of spheres. But Alex couldn't put it out of his mind. When we got closer, where the delay in signal exchange wouldn't be so great, he placed a call to her but was informed the code was inoperative. Temporarily out of service. Ordinarily he'd have dismissed the whole thing at that point as the work of a crank, but since it was Greene, he couldn't let go. Maybe it was that she was an icon, the biggest name in supernatural fiction. Not that he ever read any of it, but he liked meeting celebrities as much as the next guy. So, a day and a half after we'd tried to communicate with her, we docked at Skydeck and headed directly for Karl's Dellacondan Restaurant. It was traditionally our first stop after a flight. It doesn't matter how good the shipboard food is, and we get good stuff on board the Belle-Marie , it's always a pleasure to make for a real dining room, spread out, and eat from a fresh menu. We were just walking into the place when he brought her up again. "She must be okay," he said, "or she'd have gotten back to me right away." He was genuinely worried. More than the meet-the-deranged-celebrity thing. I'd known him for four years by then, and I still couldn't figure out how his mind worked. I'd have been interested to know what Selotta might have been able to tell me about him. It was unsettling to realize she'd only spent a few days with the guy and knew him far better than I ever would. Maybe that's the real reason people resent the Mutes so much. "She probably sobered up," I said. He looked at me with an expression that told me we both knew she hadn't been drinking. So I let it go, and the host led us to a corner table. We sat down beside a window. Brilliant splotches of light were spread across the globe. In the north, lightning glimmered. "Have you ever read any of her novels?" he asked. "No," I said. "Never had time." "Make time. She's good." "When did you read them?" "I read Dying to Know You on the way in." He took a moment to examine the menu. "Great stuff," he added. "You mean the food?" "I'm talking about Greene. I was surprised how good she is."
"I like fiction that's a little more realistic." He went into his paternal mode. "You need to open your mind to new experiences, Chase." "I guess. You'd really like to meet her, wouldn't you?" "Yes," he said. "I would." "You get in trouble," I told him, "you're on your own."
I was glad to see Ben Colbee again. Ben had twice proposed to me. All the signs were there. I saw passion in his eyes, watched him light up whenever I walked into a room. And I think I was in love with him, too. At least, I'd never felt about anybody else the way I felt about him. Ben was a good guy, sensitive, smart, good-looking, and he knew how to make me laugh. That's the big thing. Make me laugh. He was a musician. He played cornerstone with the Full Boat, which-he thought-was moving up and would shortly make him famous. That did eventually happen, but it's another story. Anyhow, Ben was waiting as I knew he would be when the shuttle got in. He offered to take Alex home, too, but Alex knows when he's an encumbrance, so he said no thanks, you guys go ahead, and threw his bags into a taxi and took off. We did some smooches, and Ben asked me how the flight had been and told me about the Full Boat's latest gig at the Sundown. Then, somewhere in there, he looked at me funny. "What's wrong, Chase?" "Nothing, Ben. Just a crank message we got on the way home." He asked me about it so I told him. I didn't mention who it was from, though. "This guy was a complete stranger?" he asked. "It was from a woman. And yes, she was nobody we knew." "Not one of your customers, right? Somebody you maybe forgot about?" "No, Ben. Not somebody we forgot about." He rolled his eyes. "Crazy people everywhere. I wouldn't worry about it." We left Andiquar behind and headed out over the western hills. And, to make a long story short, I wasn't very receptive to his advances, not at all what he'd expected when I'd been gone almost three weeks. Hell, not what I'd expected. And I don't think it had anything to do with Alex and the crazy woman. I'm not sure what it was. I had a feeling we were approaching another one of those moments when Ben was going to pour out his heart to me. I'd been gone a long time, and he'd missed me, and-well, you know. And as much as I liked him, loved him, whatever, I wanted to head it off. So I explained I wasn't much in the mood. Tired. Long trip. He deflated and said okay, he'd see me the next day. If that was all right. "You know," he added, "you're gone a lot." "I know." "I mean, Chase, you're gone all the time." "I'm sorry, Ben. I can't help that. It's my job." He took me into his arms. It was a bear hug, delicious because he meant it, disconcerting because I didn't want it to go any further. He hung on to me, squeezed tight, his cheek against mine. "It's not the only job in the world, you know. There are others." "Ben, I like this job. I mean, I really like it." "I know. But we don't get to see each other for weeks at a time. Is that really what you want?" He released me, and I stepped back and looked into those puppy-dog brown eyes. All right, I know how this sounds. But the truth is my heart picked up, and I was damned if I knew what I wanted.