Chapter 5 — Impromptu Quartet

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*****

~ 1 ~ A month before the action of the atomic bomb transfer had played out, an imperious knock on Alberto’s office door had interrupted his interview with Dr. Sylvia Keane, who had been hired recently in the Department of Natural Sciences. Because he had, for privacy, taped a number of New University Review articles to his door’s glass window, it was necessary for him to open the door in order to identify the person who was trying to beat it down.

“Dean Montgomery! Pardon me, Esmeralda, I mean Provost Montgomery.” Since the day of her purloining the flask of Elixir which Bridget had left in his office as a dangerous taunt—claiming that Bridget had stolen it from her—Alberto had avoided Esmeralda except for business conversations. He had sent his assistant, Eddie Kiander, to interview her after she had been named Provost.

"Mr. Mendoza, I am bringing to you some important campus business which cannot wait. Sylvia, dear, I apologize for interrupting; I will return him to you in a few minutes.”

Had becoming Provost given her a new theater for her amusements? "Are you really Esmeralda?" Alberto had asked, once they had gained the privacy afforded by the noisy hallway.

“Alberto, because of our good relationship in the past, I’ve come to speak to you about your Knox Aviation story. You cannot comprehend what it is that you have gotten into, so I'm warning you: Drop it! Otherwise, the jaws of deception will very soon snap shut on you!” Esmeralda spun around and stalked away.

Alberto shook his head. Reverse aging has ruined you, Esmeralda! You’re an old woman in a young woman’s body. Were you paid to frighten me? Or is scaring me your new amusement?

"God! I hate administrative types like her! Don’t you, Alberto?"

“Esmeralda's new position has gone to her head, Sylvia. She was okay as Dean of Students.” Alberto returned to his chair, facing the door.

"I hadn’t known; I've always assumed that such people were born that way. Look, as I was saying: I'm not a whistleblower. I’ve come to you because of your reputation for having an excellent ability to dig out information.

“Alberto, since I first began working as an assistant professor here at the University, I've been studying the geology of the campus area. I’ve found that a good many geological studies of the area have been carried out, and they’ve furnished good material for my students—who are all wondering how safe they will be in the big earthquake.

"Recently, I’ve found this old US Corps of Engineers report from the 1940’s.” Sylvia waved it at him. “By reading between the lines, I’ve come to understand that the Natural Sciences buildings may have been built on a small perched alluvial deposit, deep enough to be subject to liquefaction in an extreme event. The managers of the Keep building project obviously understood this; I’ve found that all of their construction was done on solid material. The region of questionable construction lies roughly on the west side of the gully and south (downslope) of the Arch property. The original campus was—like the Keep—laid out to avoid this area, but the newer west wing of the Natural Sciences building may be over unstable ground. To my knowledge, the detailed studies were never done, which were necessary for determining the safety of building in the west wing’s location, and although the probability of this being a problem is only about ten percent, I’m worried, because my office and laboratory are in that wing."

"I see: You’re new, Sylvia, and you won't have any chance of getting tenure if you start out as whistleblower. But maybe we can work out a story for raising the question tangentially."

"That might work, Alberto. How about this for a subject: A few students have asked me, ‘What is the worst flood of the Campus Creek that could come down the gully in an extreme rainfall event? Would some of our dorms be flooded?’ The creek seems to flow approximately on the east edge of the area of concern."

“That’s a good approach, Sylvia. Then, ‘by student demand' we would publish a follow-up story on other geological issues, including your discovery that there may be a possible ‘earthquake pothole’ under the university’s west wing. …But an intriguing story needs a good illustration. Let’s go down to the Student Union cafeteria and talk some more there. My office used to be private, but now the telephone’s always ringing, and people often barge in. On my coffee breaks I’m usually left alone, and I’ll wear my reporter’s uniform so I can say, ‘I’m on my way to an interview and don’t have time to talk’.” Alberto had a hunch that he would encounter a good lead downstairs.

“I’m feeling a need for sweets and tea, myself.” Sylvia rose and stretched a little, brushing back her hair. “What is your uniform, Alberto?” He’d look good in his natural uniform.

Alberto smiled as he pinned on his press badge, slipped his camera strap behind his neck and slapped his Panama hat onto his head. “These, Sylvia. What’s yours?”

“Hiking boots, a broad-brimmed field hat that looks older than your Panama, and a leather belt with my geologist’s hammer hanging from it.”

“You’ll have to wear it when we do an official interview. What do you wear on a hot day in the desert, along with your ‘uniform’?”

“Not much.”

They stepped out into the hall, near the head of the stairs which they would descend to the Student Union. Alberto locked his office door and stood still, touching Sylvia’s arm as a signal for her to stop, too. “Sylvia, there’s a story I’ve been working on for a long time, involving someone in the Natural Sciences Department and people in the Keep. Have you ever been in the Keep?”

“I’ve been more interested in the geology outside the Keep, Alberto, and I’ve studied engineering reports, like I said. I’ve been inside only once, to the grand gallery. A pass is needed for entering the other parts, and I haven’t wanted to go to the trouble.”

“Do you know Dr. Kerrigan?”

Light from the skylight above them revealed a faint blush on her pleasing face. “He’s asked me out, but…”

“He’s a part of my story. That’s why I asked. I call it the Knox Aviation story.” No response to the name “Knox” appeared in her face. Alberto—aware of Sylvia Keane’s passion for ferreting out secrets, which was similar to his own—suspected that she was considering the risks and benefits to her career, of an affair with Het Kerrigan. He asked, “Do you know Esther Rosen?”

“Not personally, but I know she’s one of those administrative spooks, like Esmeralda Montgomery, who knows about everyone’s business while no one knows hers.”

So, you’ve been sizing up the competition. “Esther is in my Knox Aviation story, too, Sylvia. She and Het work together in a secret laboratory in a Knox Aviation hangar at the Ontario airfield. It’s hard to believe all the mystery and intrigue there are in this story. Dr. Steuben is involved—and I wonder if his illness has something to do with it. The War and Peace Conference was part of it…”

“That Russian woman on the Politburo! What’s her name? What a disgrace she is to the feminist cause!”

Alberto hid his smile. He knew that he had a new ally in the Natural Sciences Department. Sylvia’s office was near to Het’s; she needed only to know what to look for.

“Praskovya Shtcherbatov is her name, Sylvia. She used to be known as ‘Stalin’s surgeon’. And Wanda Stuart seems to be a friend of hers; I saw them gossiping together at the War and Peace Conference like they’d known each other forever.”

“What? Dr. Steuben’s ‘secretary’?”

“Wanda Stuart makes a lot more money than you do, Sylvia.”

“Is she, too, involved in what you’re investigating for your story?”

“You could say that. Sylvia, have you seen that strikingly beautiful, tall African woman around campus? Sometimes she’s with a white friend who also has eye-catching looks and dresses in a similar unusual style.”

“Are those two also campus spooks?”

“Sylvia, I think the family of either one of them could buy the entire campus. I’ve named my story for the young white woman, Rhoda Knox. Her mother is from a big Mexico City family that’s descended from Spanish royalty and Aztec gods. And Rhoda’s some kind of aeronautics wizard. Militaries of both East and West want to buy the magic aircraft that she makes. And I’ve got a reliable report through a colleague of Dr. Kerrigan, that the Black woman is a genuine witchdoctor.”

“Alberto! That’s all crazy! You’re pulling my leg!”

“You’re right; it does sound crazy, doesn’t it? Sylvia, would you like to hear the whole story, from the beginning? I still don’t know what it’s all about, but I think if I find out what Dr. Kerrigan and Miss Rosen are working on in Ontario, I can make a lot more sense of these things. Whatever they’re working on, they used to work on it in the bowels of the Keep—which isn’t just a research institute for honest scholars and scientists.”

Sylvia pursed her lips, descending the stairs into the noisy activity of the Student Union. “Does this Rhoda Knox have some kind of relationship with Dr. Kerrigan?” Occasionally, she had heard someone speak Rhoda’s name in a way which indicated that she was a person of interest. …Who had she overheard using the name?

Sylvia listened for at least an hour to Alberto talking about the Knox Aviation story.

Then she worked late into the night in the Natural Science Department’s library, reading scientific articles by Het Kerrigan and Het’s colleague, G.K. Scott, who was one of Alberto’s sources. She was fascinated by the Aviation Week article on the Greased Lightning. And she discovered that Esther Rosen had read some of the same articles, as had Arlo Ferguson, whom she had heard described as Dr. Steuben’s gay hitman in Natural Science’s office politics.

~ 2 ~ “Perhaps, Eugene, we will find that Herbert has returned by now to California. He is a very complicated man, and I think that big arms sale which the Mexican army upset may have changed his plans, so that suddenly he had other things to do. Retimer told me that Herbert did not know about the arms sale.” Gabrielle, massaging Eugene’s shoulders, was naked with him in her bedroom in the Stucco Place. Eugene lay on his belly while Gabrielle straddled his back. She had replaced all of the pictures of herself which disclosed her true age and her association with the Nazis; those had been for Esther. Eugene was in some ways so wonderfully naive, he was putty in her hands.

They had returned late on the previous day from Quinceañera Beach, where she had told him that everything had returned to normal. Then she had taken him directly to her place in order to keep him on her leash. On the flight, while letting Eugene hold her hand and even caress her breasts, she was ignoring him most of the time while mind-speaking with the Comrade. She was thankful that their seating on the small aircraft piloted by Retimer was too restricted for lovemaking. While carrying on her simultaneous mind and of body conversations, she was attentive to the Strands of Herbert’s Living Memory of Makers’ matters, which were flowing into her mind. By the time the plane had landed, she had acquired a full grasp of the things which she needed to do in order to secure the vesting of the Friend in the Soma. And she had learned that Herbert had discovered the Design of the Friend’s perfume, which would afflict her as a member of the Circle. “You have newly acquired this knowledge,” the Comrade told her, “as a result of a secret Pact made by the late Gesalec and me with an ancient Clan Maker, giving us sufficient means to detect false actions by the Clan in the preparation of the Soma. You have taken Gesalec’s place in the Pact.”

Do you mean that my role is to game the Ethical Force in Herbert’s recast Design of the Soma?

“Exactly, just as Herbert has done so handily.”

Using drink and sex, Gabrielle had soon sent Eugene into a deep sleep. Then she hurried from the Stucco Palace to the Keep through a torrential rain which was creating rivers on the road. By reading Herbert’s journal at Quinceañera Beach, Gabrielle had learned his plan for preparing for the vestment of the Friend, and so she had informed Esther, during their telephone conversation, of the things which she must do. Although Esther had said that she might need Eugene’s assistance, Gabrielle thought it was likely to be a one-person job for a skilled Maker. She went straight to Herbert’s Workshop in the Keep, and found that Esther had done the job! Not only was the Soma present; it was ready! Gabrielle called Mortimer, and they made their plans for the next day. Esther had not contacted Mortimer Kane for assistance with the return of the Wheeled Workshop, and she was not to be found. But that did not matter now.

“I don’t see her, Eugene,” said Gabrielle, after looking around in the Student Union.

“It was only a hunch that Evelyn would be here. Often she is… Look: There’s Isabel Tavares.”

Gabrielle glanced at Eugene, thinking that Evelyn would have been perfect. “Is Miss Tavares that young woman sitting by herself, looking out the window?”

“Yes. I hardly know her though, Gabrielle, but I’ve heard that she’s in bed—one way or the other—with Rhoda Knox.”

Fool! You have no idea. But we do have her parents waiting—Oscar and Flavia. With the right touch, Miss Tavares will fall.

“Eugene, you shouldn’t listen to rumors.”

Gabrielle was looking intently at Isabel. In spite of what her father Oscar, thinks, she might well be their sorceress. But I have little time, and she must come willingly, like Eugene.

“Wait here, Eugene.”

“Okay. You talk to her. She has always made me feel funny.

“Isabel Tavares, may I speak with you?”

Isabel looked up slowly from her coffee. She had been lost in thought, her mind circling around her heart’s singleminded focus: Diego. After their recent flying adventure had ended in the delivery of the Messerschmidt Device to Thersa—who had flown it into that perfectly cylindrical cloud and then had swum out naked to be picked up by the Greased Lightning—Isabel had been wondering exactly what was going on in the War Thing. That events were moving toward a climax was the only thing of which she was certain. Rhoda and Ricardo had told her little more than that which was revealed by their actions. She had sensed that their apparent satisfaction with the most recent event was merely delight in the move—whatever it had accomplished—not having failed.

Martha had told her, “You won’t know, my new daughter, what is going on in the War Thing and what, exactly, is your part, until you’ve played out your part.”

“Have you played out yours already, Martha?”

“Heavens, no! Isabel, I may still carry a mother’s worry for you and Rhoda when I’m on my death bed. Who knows when and how things will end?”

“I sense that even in the case of Rhoda and Ricardo, each doesn’t know exactly what the other is up to.”

“I’m sure that’s true. Rhoda says—and I believe her—that not even a god exists who’s certain of the future.”

“Martha, what about God? Doesn’t He know everything?”

“Ah, my dear little agnostic! Isabel, you can’t think of God like a he’s a creature.” Hugging Isabel, Martha had said, “If my foreseeing is worth anything, honey, then you will have the life you long for with Diego.”

Martha knew that I didn’t want to talk theology, Isabel was thinking, as a sweet-sounding woman’s voice asked, “May I speak with you?” Isabel felt her hair writhing in the direction of the voice. A Shade is seeking me, and it’s nearly time to meet Rhoda! She shook her head to disguise her hair’s motion, and looked up from her reverie. A beautiful, elegant woman was waiting expectantly for her reply.

As Isabel hesitated to respond, Gabrielle added confidentially, “I knew your father, Miss Tavares.”

“The suicide?” Isabel was shocked by the deadly cold in her own voice. She knew that the woman was evil itself. Her agnostic convictions evaporated. God help me!

Gabrielle glared at her. “My mistake.”

Gabrielle turned on her heel and walked away, knowing that the daughter of Oscar and Flavia would not fall prey to her within the scant time available.

Isabel’s heart beat rapidly as she watched the Shade disappear behind one of the Student Union’s pillars. Why did I come here to wait? I have to get to Rhoda’s. Who was that? …I’ll bet it was Gabrielle von Klopstock. Isabel reached down to feel her ankle dagger, and it leaped into her hand. Seeing no one looking her way, she sat up and dropped the dagger into her purse. Strength had flowed into her while she had been holding it, and her mind had cleared of its frightened haze.

She decided to wait for a minute, watching the pillar behind which Gabrielle lurked. Soon she saw Gabrielle step out from behind its cover and walk over to the table of couple who looked like young faculty members. After a few minutes of animated discussion, they got up and left with Gabrielle. Isabel watched them continuing to converse as they hiked up the path to the Keep. Feeling that Gabrielle was luring them to the fate which had been intended for her, Isabel was thinking that she should run after them to warn them—of what?—when she saw Eugene following them.

Gabrielle glanced over her shoulder at him and made a quick, odd hand gesture to him. He slowed and followed at a distance. Isabel raced from the Student Union to the parking lot, feeling that she must get to Rhoda’s place quickly.

~3 ~ Alberto and Sylvia had been taking another hour-long break together in the Student Union, when Gabrielle and Eugene entered.

Sylvia felt that Alberto truly was onto something, but that she, herself, would most likely understand it better than he did, as his scientific knowledge was mediocre. Yet some work was required for Sylvia to truly master Dr. Kerrigan’s theory and Dr. Scott’s mathematics. She did grasp as real physics, the fantastic drift of the meta time concept, so she put on hold her concern about a liquefaction event drawing her office and laboratory into ruin.

Sylvia had begun by asking Alberto more about Dr. Scott, and Alberto had just begun telling her about discovering Scott at an apartment fire in which Alberto was sure that Scott had had a hand.

Alberto had paused to sip his coffee, relishing the thought of his journalistic prowess in that event, when his eyes met those of Gabrielle. They were looking directly into his. He nodded to her an invitation to join them.

Quickly he said, “Sylvia, that woman coming our way is another part of my story, about which I haven’t yet told you. She works in the Keep’s headquarters, and I’ve talked to her only once or twice. She’s attractive, but she’s like Praskovya Shtcherbatov. I think she would have made a good Nazi.”

Sylvia glanced at Gabrielle. “She looks German.”

“Follow my lead. I smell a source for my story. I can tell when people want to talk. Maybe she’s been slighted.”

Sylvia looked at Alberto with even greater interest.

Alberto stood up as Gabrielle arrived at their table.

“Mr. Alberto Mendoza, the college newsman? I believe we have once met. You were going to write a story about the Keep and the Institute for Ancient Art and Relics, were you not?”

“Thank you for remembering me, Miss Gabrielle… I don’t know your last name.”

“It’s von Klopstock. Please call me simply Gabrielle, if I may call you Alberto. Just now when I saw you, I remembered that Dr. Kane had told me to get back to you at my convenience about your story. I am embarrassed to say that I had forgotten until now.”

“I’m glad you haven’t forgotten me, Gabrielle. Please let me introduce Dr. Sylvia Keane, who’s a colleague and friend of mine. We’re working together on a story with which you might be able to help us.” Gabrielle took Sylvia’s hand and continued to hold it while sitting down with her, immediately beginning a long disarming chat. Alberto was left on the outside, wondering. Gabrielle concluded their conversation by saying, “I’ve wondered, myself, about the earthquake safety of the Keep.”

She turned to Alberto. “I am down here on the campus because the Institute is closed for a scheduled maintenance of the environmental system, and—more importantly—because Dr. Kane is on vacation. This is a chance for me to see the campus and meet people outside my professional work group. I’m so near, yet I’ve never come down here to enjoy the campus. If you like, Alberto, I can give you a grand tour of the Keep right now, relieving my guilty conscience for forgetting your story. Sylvia, you’re invited, too, of course.”

“I have the time right now, Gabrielle,” Sylvia answered eagerly.

“May I take photographs?”

“Certainly, Alberto, whatever you like. The Keep is not a secret military complex.” Gabrielle laughed. “I’m the highest-ranking member of the staff on duty. I’m German, but I really don’t like rules, and since Dr. Kane’s away, this cat will play. I’ll answer any question you’d like to ask—off the record, of course.”

Comrade, we are in luck! I have in my company the perfect other half of the Soma’s quartet. Their names are Alberto and Sylvia. If I cannot soon locate Dr. Kerrigan, I will seduce Eugene to make him my ballast for the Agent Calipers.

“Excellent. We have a sense of Het Kerrigan’s activity, and we are searching for him.”

Once the Friend is vested, we will have more time to locate him. Are Oscar and Flavia still in my temporal Niche, as I had left them with you?

“Yes; it has been only seconds for them. They will hardly miss you.”

I had intended to bring their daughter Isabel with Eugene, but now that we have Alberto and Sylvia, we can make better use of Eugene. Be ready to send your Powers to Alberto and Sylvia personally to beguile them into agreeing to my suggestions, to which they are already inclined. I will lead them to the Workshop, outside of which Oscar and Flavia are waiting to see the marvel which I have promised to show them—a “Commons’ Taxi for four”.

“We are ready.”

I will take their arms in less than a minute of my time, becoming the Bridge for your Powers. My next action, which will be somewhat later for me, will be my introduction of them to Oscar and Flavia, by which they will serve you as a Bridge to Oscar and Flavia. When we enter the Workshop, only the Powers who are completely personally present to the members of the quartet will be admitted by the Workshop’s Powers.

“How will we know what is the moment for the Friend to vest?”

Thanks to Esther Rosen’s work, Mortimer Kane has been able to move the Soma to the Chamber of Gathering, where the entire Circle is now gathering in the dark. We will emerge into the Soma’s presence from the Gate of Herbert’s Workshop. At the moment in which all four of the quartet touch the ripe Soma, as I will have them do, it will become visible in the Friend’s Province—in the way of things being visible to you gods. Then, the Friend must vest.

“The Friend is waiting in the wings with me. He is poised with the rest of Our Powers, assembled into the present time of Earth’s Province. He reports that Kane has done as you say and is waiting for you.”

Impress upon Kane the need for the members to remain silent, so as not to distract our select quartet before they touch the Soma.

~ 4 ~ “Eugene Hemming.” The woman had touched his shoulder from behind as he was following Gabrielle, Alberto and Sylvia into the Keep, where they had come to the section of the corridor between the entrance to the Workshop, and the locker room. At the sound of the voice, people who had been hurrying down the corridor in the same direction as Eugene, vanished. Eugene spun around, in bewilderment and growing fear.

“We have not been introduced, Eugene, although I imagine that Herbert Schooner has mentioned me. I am Giselle Miller, of the Miller Group whose offices are in this building.”

Eugene blurted, “I recognize you, Miss Müller. Uncle Georg once told me that you might be the Friend, the head of Arch Company and Hemming Chemical.” Eugene used her German name as Georg had spoken it.

The ring of genuine merriment in Giselle’s laughter dispelled Eugene’s bewilderment. Giselle took his arm. “Come with me, young man. I am neither the Friend nor the head of Arch.”

In the parking lot, he asked her where they were going. “To Santa Barbara. I will drive. Is it not a beautiful day, Eugene?”

“I don’t see any sign of the storm,” he said. Looking around, he was dazed by the bright sunlight.

“Oh, the storm was over a week ago.”

“Seven days?” Eugene was feeling not at all confused; he was beginning to feel himself. It seemed to him that a week had passed since Herbert had called him to Quinceañera Beach—a very long, confusing week, but it was over.

“Yes; seven days. Minnie, your mother, is waiting in Santa Barbara. I must speak to both of you about an important business matter—the restoring of full ownership of Hemming Chemical to the true Hemming family. She will be very much comforted by seeing you, Eugene. She has had a difficult time, but she is recovering.”

“Was Mother sick?”

“No; we have had to confine her to quarters in order to spare her from the fray that you, too, have been spared by following me.”

“But you marched me out, Miss Miller.”

“You have come willingly, Eugene.”

~ 5 ~ Gabrielle conducted Oscar and Flavia, Alberto and Sylvia through the Workshop’s Antechamber and toward the Gate to the Chamber of Assembly in which the entire Circle of the Friend was assembled in silence and darkness. The only illumination was on the Soma, which was waiting for the vestment of Sunderer, the self-proclaimed Friend of Men.

It was necessary for Gabrielle to get all four of them to touch the Soma, in order for the vestment to succeed.

The light was dim in the broad corridor through which the five of them were walking, Flavia next to Oscar and Sylvia next to Alberto, the couples holding hands while Gabrielle walked between them. “The machine which you will see burrows into the earth, eating the earth like an earthworm and extracting valuable minerals while leaving the geological substratum intact. Its use will end strip mining and mine disasters. I understand that it makes itself invisible to the geological substratum—which may or may not make sense to you.” It made some sense to Sylvia, who sensed that the secretary herself did not understand. The idea that the “earthworm” might “cloak” geologically had come to her from having read Het’s papers.

“Since everybody else is away, I came down here earlier today to see and touch this thing for myself. It has been set up in a big assembly room to be shown to extraction industry executives next week. My hand touching the side of this ‘ground worm’ felt a pleasant tingling.”

The Gate to the Chamber of Assembly opened directly in front of the Soma. The corridor by which they had come was the way by which the Soma had been brought to the Chamber of Assembly, and the way by which the animated Soma would pass to the Workshop’s Back Gate and out into the Commons. After touching the opening button for the Gate, Gabrielle quickly grasped Alberto’s hand and Oscar’s. While the Gate was rolling up, Gabrielle said. “When you stand back to take it all in, you can see that it looks like a giant metallic earthworm on its exhibit platform. Touch it first, to experience a fascinating sensation. Gabrielle continued to hold the men’s hands as the five of them walked forward. On the platform, the Soma’s side was at chest height and bulged beyond the edge of the platform on which it rested. After Gabrielle had released the mens’ hands, Alberto touched it first, exclaiming, “Oh! It feels good!” Encouraged, the others followed suit. Gabrielle quickly turned back through the Gate and touched the button to close it, and ran back through the corridor as the Gate was closing. She heard the quartet’s expressions of astonished delight transformed into screams of horror, which were cut off abruptly by the completion of the Gate’s closing.

Gabrielle caught her breath. Eugene! I must have Eugene.

Stepping into the corridor to grab Eugene for “ballast” in the Agent Calipers, she found that he was not there.