“This is quite enough, Maria,” she told the nurse. “Why don’t you go next door and lie down yourself? I’ll call if I need you for anything. I wish to go through this, and if I need some help some of the people at the Lodge will come in to help me. Just leave the door to the hall open.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m sure.”
The nun wasn’t happy with the idea of leaving her alone, although in truth she was exhausted, but she also knew the value Angelique placed on being as self-sufficient as possible. And, as she said, the Lodge staff would be at her beck and call. “Call out if you need me for anything,” Maria told her, and then left.
Angelique was well experienced with her disability and quite self confident about it, far more so than she was about meeting and dealing with these strange people and this strange new life and power. A thermos with a long, stiff, curved straw was at one side of her chair, allowing her to sip whatever she had instructed be placed in it—in this case some ice tea—and to the other side was a small holder with a number of devices that could be grabbed by her with her teeth. The chair’s sophisticated microprocessor could by voice command raise or lower any part of it or the easel. She had other devices, not currently attached, that allowed her to do far more on her own than most people would believe possible.
Still, she had lied when she’d said she no longer had those kinds of fantasies. Indeed, it was just such urges that had caused her to put off taking final vows and truly committing herself to a new life.
She had lied, too, about no longer being attracted to men. She was, and she found them fascinating because they were different from the nearly all-female society in which she’d been raised. MacDonald, now—though she’d seen him little enough—she found attractive and handsome. He was the only one who didn’t dress up, nor quake in his boots at her every word. He’d even ducked out on the big meeting! She hoped he wasn’t a rotten character underneath. It would be nice to have a male friend who wasn’t fifty or sixty and didn’t ever wear a clerical collar.
She put such things out of her mind and began sifting through the stack of papers. MacDonald and the others had, of course, gone through much of this before, but they would have been less sure than she was as to what was or was not important.
It was laborious work, particularly with her handicap, but she had long conditioned herself to patience. Many of the papers had notes in cryptic words and abbreviations, mostly from Sir Robert to himself. Others were reminders of non-routine obligations and appointments, various ideas for expanding or changing things in the Institute—Sir Robert even seemed concerned about the color of the drapes in the library— and lots of other such mundane items. All of it seemed quite routine.
After a while she began to get the strong feeling that someone was watching her. It was a somewhat unnerving feeling, and she periodically glanced furtively up to see the open door to the hall and the equally open interconnect to her own suite, from which Sister Maria’s snores were quite evident. She also heard voices dimly down the hall, but there was no one anywhere near. And still the sensation persisted, as if someone were almost behind her, peering over her shoulder. The drapes had been closed and the lights off in the room when they’d entered, but she had turned on a strong lamp on a table beside the desk. Now, though, it seemed as if the dark shadows at the opposite side of the room harbored something or someone.
She knew she was being foolish, that the room and the events and the long trip had simply gotten to her, but still it persisted. Finally she could stand it no longer; taking a deep breath she said, quickly and sharply, “Demicercle droite!” The chair immediately pivoted around one hundred eighty degrees to the right.
For a moment she saw nothing. Then, for a second, she thought she saw movement in the shadows: a dark, manlike shape that seemed to move, then shimmer, a greater black against the darkness of the corner, and it was gone. “Avancer!” she commanded. “Lentement!” The chair crept slowly forward to the corner.
She did not fear that whatever it was was still present. Just as she had sensed its presence, so had she felt its leaving. Still, she had to take a look, if only to reassure herself. The corner was empty save for an old coat rack that contained only an umbrella and a well-worn sweater. There was room for a man and more here, but there was no exit of any kind, no place that such a man could go without coming first into the light.
She turned around once more and went back to the desk area, but she was too shaken to continue. She knew it would be foolish to tell someone. Nerves, they’d say. The coat rack was mistaken for a phantom. No way to prove otherwise, although she knew that someone had been there.
She decided that she didn’t want to be in the room any more, but she certainly wasn’t sleepy. She needed to get outside in the sun, and to talk to somebody—anybody. Well, she thought to herself, if I am to be queen of this place, then perhaps I should learn to act the part.
She commanded the chair forward, guiding it through the doorway to the hall, and then went down it a ways until she saw a security man standing there at his post. He watched her come, and approached when he sensed she wanted something. “Ma’am?”
“Pardon, if you please—will you remove the contents from this tray and replace it in the room back there?”
He reached over and, with her help, removed the tray/copy holder, took off the papers, and placed the tray in a compartment on the back of the chair. “I’ll see to it, Ma’am,” he assured her. “Anything else I can do to help?”
“Oui—yes,” she responded, catching herself. She was nervous, and whenever she was nervous she thought only in French. “Will you please use your radio or whatever and see if Monsieur MacDonald is available to talk to me?”
“I think I know where he is right now. Where do you want me to send him?”
“I will wait by the entrance there, where I can look out into the sunlight.”
4. THE OCEAN OF MEMORY
Gregory MacDonald was surprised at the summons and even more surprised to find her waiting alone. He had assumed that the nurse, at least, would always be present.
“Mademoiselle, Greg MacDonald at your service,” he said lightly, not really knowing how to react to her.
She smiled. “Please—not Mademoiselle. I’m already a little tired of all the formalities which I’m not used to having, and I am not even certain of my family name any more. Everyone has always called me Angie and I would be pleased if you would do so.”
His eyebrows shot up. “Very well—Angie. Most people just call me ‘MacDonald’ or, sometimes, ‘Mac,’ but I always insist that lovely ladies who inherit the company I work for call me Greg. Fair enough?”
She laughed a little at that. “May we go outside? I need to feel a little of the sun and breathe the air here. I have never been to a tropical place before.”
“You’re the boss, but I warn you to go slow. If you’re not acclimated to this sort of place you could find it physically very hard on you.”
She commanded the chair forward and to the doors, which were electrically opened for her. He followed, wondering just what all this was about. It was humid, and the temperature was in the eighties, as usual. That was one reason he had always liked Celsius, where it was only thirty. It was just as hot, but somehow it sounded cooler.