Extraordinary Rendition

38

COLD FOG. THE OLD wood of the rambling house never lost the chill of Maine. The wood-the sea-washed shingles and the broad planks on the outside porches and floors throughout the house-always had the same pine scent as the trees on the island’s rocky soil. Foghorns regularly sounded from the points of the island, the recurring resonance of warning and reassurance. Byron had seen only two other houses on the island with lights on as he and Christina had sat, three hours earlier, inside the stripped-down passenger compartment of the old ferry on one of the three passages it made each week in the winter from the mainland.

“My God, Carlos,” Christina said. “Why do you ever leave this place?”

“I’ve been coming here since I was nine. In the summers the island is hot in the day, cool every night. The sky was always clear. High Maine weather. Those were usually the only times each year when we spent fourteen continuous days and nights together. My father’s father was still alive then. A poetry-quoting Boston lawyer who, of course, loved to sail. Sailing was an addiction of upper-class Bostonians with summer houses on the coast of Maine. As much of an addiction of that class as the gin martinis. I loved him, and loved sailing. I spent more time with him than with my mom and dad. Out on the sea. Sunlight and sea spray. Even twelve miles out you can still smell the pines.”

She embraced him. She wore a sweatshirt with a hood; on the front of the sweatshirt was the word “Bowdoin.” She said, “It’s wonderful how our paths have crossed. When I was in college we used to drive out to Mere Point and light fires on the boulders, cook, smell the ocean, and look out at the small islands that had only pine trees. The same ocean and the same smells you had.”

He kissed her lips. They tasted of salt from the chilly air on the ferry and the short walk from the dock to the house. They had carried their bags on red children’s wagons. The house was a half mile from the wooden dock.

The only other person they saw in the three days they spent in the house was Eben Cain, the caretaker of Byron’s house and several others for more than forty years. He was one of the two hundred year-round residents of the island, probably the last member of the last generation of a family that had been here since the 1700s. Eben kept the furnaces running year-round because Byron, although he rarely came to the island, usually visited on a day’s notice, and Byron’s sons also came unexpectedly and intermittently. Eben-a thin, compact man with that terse Maine accent-hadn’t seen Byron with his sons since they were young teenagers. Eben made sure there was enough oil in the furnace, hot water in the tank, and wood near the fireplaces.

The nighttime fog dissolved just after dawn each morning, as each gloriously clear day began. They woke early. They hiked in the afternoons. The only snow on the island was lodged on the sides of the immense boulders shielded all day from the sun. From the heights and shore of the island they saw the glittering of the frigid sea. In the distance, the small, uninhabited, pine-covered islands were surrounded with brilliant light. The trees seemed to be on fire, but never burned.

At night they read. There were old books on the shelves that Byron had first seen there in the late fifties and early sixties, in the last years of his grandfather’s life-novels and short stories by once-famous and now almost forgotten writers like John O’Hara and James Gould Cozzens. The Cape Cod Lighter. Morning, Noon, and Night. Advise and Consent. His grandfather was a meticulous lover of books. Each book had its original dust jacket, on thick paper. The pages were all swollen by the sea air.

Christina studied on a table near the fireplace while Byron read. A small lamp shedding soft light glowed on her gorgeous face. Although he tried to resist, Byron often glanced up at her as she studied. From time to time she caught his eye and smiled a wistful but seductive smile, as if she were saying: Not now, later, I’ll give you the ride of your life.

The kitchen had not changed since the 1950s. Big white refrigerator, linoleum floor, black stove. There was no dishwasher. Byron rinsed the supper dishes and placed them in a rack next to the sink. Christina was cleaning the table with a sponge.

He said, as he dried his hands on a towel, “Who are you?”

Christina reacted as though Byron was teasing her. Then the moment lasted too long. “What?”

“The only Christina Rosario who ever graduated from Bowdoin died eighteen years ago.”

“What are you saying, Carlos?”

“And your apartment on Riverside Drive is leased to a company known as Alpha Sources. Tell me why your father the engineering professor didn’t leave a single engineering book in his apartment. And why there’s no record of anyone named Rosario who ever taught engineering or anything else at Columbia.”

“Carlos, I don’t know why you’re saying this. It’s wrong. Someone is lying to you.”

“You’re lying to me.” His voice was vehement. “You’re a liar, a fraud.”

“Carlos, please.”

“Who is this animal you pal around with? The one with the suit and the mustache?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“And who is that blonde girlfriend of yours?”

“Please, Byron.”

“Tell me the truth.”

“Carlos, I’m Christina Rosario. I’m a law student at Columbia. I’m your lover. I admire you. I love you.”

“I have pictures of you with a man who is a torturer. I have pictures of you with a woman who works with the same fucking torturer. She’s a fraud, like you.”

“What’s the matter with you? Please tell me.”

“I have the video from your computer. You know the one. The one with your friend beating and drowning Ali Hussein.”

Suddenly she placed her hands over her face. She turned from him. He heard her cry.

At first light she put her soft luggage and backpack in one of the red wagons and pulled it behind her as she made her way to the dock. The ferry was scheduled to leave at nine. The door to the small, unheated waiting room was always unlocked.

During her two-hour wait in the cold room, she composed on her BlackBerry a long text message to Byron. Carlos, she started, I want you to know this. I hope when you read what follows you can understand that I became involved in the work I’ve done because I love this country and want to protect it. I had no idea how crazily it would unravel. Or how dangerous it’s all become. And I had no idea how much I would love you. Don’t look for me. I’ll transform myself again. I’ve done this before. I’ll become someone else.

She created the message as if in a trance. When she finished, she saw for the first time that the old station room was now flooded with morning light. The wooden planks of the walls and floors glowed; they seemed to radiate slightly with heat.

She gripped the BlackBerry, hesitating to press the Send button. She found the only bathroom. Still clutching the BlackBerry, she sat on the toilet, which was clean but had rust-colored stains on the porcelain. She looked at the sleek object in her hand as if it were a bomb; she was afraid of it.

Minutes later, just as she pressed Send, she saw the heavy, unwieldy lobster boat ease gradually into the dock’s wooden pilings, which had been worn smooth by countless dockings over the years. Surprised, she recognized two of the men standing on the cluttered deck of the boat. When she had last seen them in New York a week earlier, they had looked subdued and weary in the lousy midwinter weather. Today in the brisk morning, they looked bright, athletic, and vigorous.

“We got your message,” Tom Nashatka called out. “We came out to get you. The ferry was cancelled.”