The Green And The Gray

32

"I don't believe it," Jonah growled when Roger finished. "Why, that rotten, conniving, little—"

"Save it," Ron cut him off, his eyes steady on Roger's face. "But you didn't actually see Melantha up there?"

Roger shook his head. "I'm sorry. I wish I could be more helpful."

"What about Damian?" Stephanie asked, looking at the Greens. "Could he still be alive?"

"I don't see how," Laurel said. "He certainly wasn't aboard the transport. The Pastsingers could hardly have missed that."

"Wait a minute, though," Zenas said, frowning. "I was aboard the transport a couple of years ago, picking up a supply of herbs, and I remember spotting what looked like a door at the very back end behind the engine room. It didn't look like it had been opened in years."

"Extra cargo space?" Ron suggested.

"That's not what the Pastsingers say," Laurel said, frowning now as well. "They describe the transport as having three passenger compartments with attached supply rooms, a power room, an engine room, a control compartment, an exit hatchway area, and several connecting hallways that doubled as the air-purifying system. Nothing about anything behind the engine room."

"That's what I remember, too," Zenas agreed hesitantly. "Of course, what I thought was a door could have just been some sort of trim or decoration."

"I don't know," Ron rumbled, scratching at his cheek. "It's starting to sound an awful lot like someone had a private room back there."

"But how could the Pastsingers hide something like that?" Stephanie put in. "I thought they were usually very accurate."

"Yes, but only about things they've actually experienced or have learned from other Pastsingers,"

Zenas pointed out. "If none of them ever used the door, it might not show up in their descriptions."

"What we need is a contemporary witness," Fierenzo said. "Someone from the original 1928 arrival.

If there is a room back there, that's the group that would have used it."

"I don't know," Laurel said doubtfully. "Most of that group are solidly on Aleksander's side."

"Does it have to be a Green?" Roger asked as an idea suddenly occurred to him.

Zenas snapped his fingers. "Of course. Velovsky!"

"Who?" Fierenzo asked.

"He was a clerk who bumped into them on Ellis Island when they first arrived," Roger told him. "He helped them get settled and has been sort of an honorary Green ever since. And he told us he's been aboard the transport several times."

"You think he'll talk to us?" Fierenzo asked.

"He talked to Caroline and me once," Roger said, pulling out his phone. "I think I can get him to do it again."

"Wait a minute—don't call yet," Ron said quickly. "Torvald might have his line tapped."

"Torvald knows about Velovsky?" Fierenzo asked.

"Everyone knows about Velovsky," Stephanie assured him. "He helped us a little, too, when we first arrived."

"And his place is where Halfdan's men picked you up Saturday morning, Roger," Ron said. "They had the apartment staked out on the chance Aleksander or Cyril would send you to talk to him."

"I was listening to the whole thing on the tel net while they were figuring out how and where to grab you," Jonah added. He looked pointedly down at his brother. "So was Jordan, obviously," he added, nudging the other with his foot. "He was the one who chased Ingvar off you with Bergan's car."

"Really," Roger said, focusing on the boy. "Were you that worried about what Halfdan might do to us?"

"I was more afraid that if Halfdan had you he'd take you to Cyril," Jordan muttered, looking halfway between embarrassed and defiant. "I thought Cyril might be able to make you tell him where Melantha was." He threw Roger a furtive look, then dropped his eyes. "I didn't know you'd already lost her."

There was a moment of awkward silence. "The part that worries me most is that Torvald and Halfdan are cooperating again," Stephanie spoke up. "The question of what to do with Melantha caused a huge split between them, with Halfdan pulling a lot of people to his side with the claim that he and Cyril could work out a peace plan. If he's now thrown in with Torvald, that may mean he's given up on peace."

"I don't think he's given up completely," Roger said. "But he is close."

"How bad exactly would that be?" Fierenzo asked. "If all the Grays decided to go to war, could they take the Greens?"

"With only sixty Warriors on our side standing against them?" Zenas said grimly. "Cyril says it would be close, but personally I don't think we'd have a chance."

"Which brings us back to Damian," Fierenzo said thoughtfully. "You say your Pastsingers remember everything they personally saw. Any chance of finding one who remembers seeing him dead before you came here?"

Zenas and Laurel looked at each other. "We could ask around," Zenas said. "But mentioning his name would tip off Aleksander that we've been talking to Roger. Is it worth that kind of risk?"

"It might be," Fierenzo said. "Because I don't buy this Damian story for a minute."

"Why not?" Ron asked, frowning.

"Same reason I don't believe they've got Melantha stashed up there," Fierenzo said. "It's too far from the probable battle zone."

"But if Damian isn't there, why mention him in the first place?" Jordan asked.

"It could be that Aleksander's trying to goad you into attacking them," Fierenzo told him "Either because he figures his Warriors will have better odds in a forest setting, or because he wants to pull Gray resources out of the city in preparation for an attack here. Or Damian could be his idea of a Quaker cannon."

"A what?" Jordan asked.

"Something that seems to be a weapon but isn't," Stephanie told him. "Like painting telephone poles to look like artillery and setting them up where the enemy can see them."

"Well, if he hoping for a major attack, he's out of luck," Roger said. "It didn't sound like Halfdan or Torvald was going for it, either."

"Don't be so sure," Ron warned. "Halfdan usually argues against any idea that isn't his, but often changes his mind once he's had a chance to think it over."

"And Torvald would probably pretend to dismiss it whether he believed you or not," Jonah added.

"Odds are, the minute you left he starting running numbers on how many men he'd need to hit the place."

Jordan frowned up at his brother. "But if it's a trap...?"

"Then they could be in trouble," Jonah conceded. He looked at his father. "Or rather, we could be in trouble. There's a good chance Halfdan would pull a lot of us off sentry duty for any raid. That's you and me, among others."

"How fast could they organize a force if they decide to go that way?" Fierenzo asked.

"Well, they'd have to start by redoing the picket line," Ron told him, his forehead creased in thought.

"That should give us at least a few hours' warning."

Fierenzo nodded and turned to Roger. "You said Nikolos talked about taking you to the main house.

Did you ever actually see this house, either up close or at a distance?"

Roger shook his head. "No."

"But you could find the drive again, right?"

"Yes, assuming they don't pull out the sign," Roger said. "If they do, I'm not sure. There were a lot of similar ones leading off that road."

"Any idea where Nikolos lives when he's in the city?"

Roger snorted. "A tree in Morningside Park. What his official street address is, I don't know."

"I think he's unlisted," Jordan said. "I tried looking him up in the phone book once, just to see where he was."

"Yeah." Fierenzo rubbed at his nose. "See, here's the problem. Once you file an unlawful restraint charge against Nikolos, I can make some calls and get the sheriff or state police to go in and take a look. But if the Greens can hide Caroline somewhere on the grounds, and you can't prove you were even there, they're not going to be very enthusiastic about any searches."

Roger grimaced. "In other words, Caroline's there until they decide to let her go."

"I didn't say that," Fierenzo said thoughtfully. "I said we couldn't get the state cops interested. I didn't say we couldn't go up there and take a look ourselves."

"Are you crazy?" Jordan blurted. "They'll grab you!"

"Not necessarily," Fierenzo said. "If they think I'm just the unlucky Joe Cop who got stuck with a delusional citizen and his ridiculous story, they may try to bluff their way through it. Especially if they think that'll be the end of it."

"But they already know you're involved in the case," Roger pointed out.

"Which is why I'm the one you'd come to with your story," Fierenzo said.

"They'll also know you've had a run-in with a pair of Greens," Jonah added.

"Not necessarily," Fierenzo said. "If they're as isolated as Roger thinks, they may not get regular news from the city. And even if this particular rumor's made it up there, there's no way for them to know you've spilled the whole story. Trust me, I can make it work."

"Sounds risky," Jonah said doubtfully.

"Well, if you don't like that part, you're going to hate this one," Fierenzo warned, turning to the Greens. "How close would you have to get to Melantha to tell if she's there?"

"It's not like that," Laurel said, shaking her head. "If she doesn't talk to us, we wouldn't know she was even there."

"Really," Fierenzo said, suddenly thoughtful. "And it works that way with all of you?"

"Yes," Zenas said, frowning. "Why?"

"Because aside from checking up on Caroline, it would be awfully nice if we could find out for sure whether or not Melantha's there." Fierenzo lifted his eyebrows at Zenas and Laurel. "Either of you feel like taking a drive upstate tomorrow?"

"You can't take them with you," Jordan objected. "What if someone recognizes them?"

"As generations of kidnappers and mob enforcers have learned, it's hard to recognize someone when they're hidden in your trunk," Fierenzo said dryly. "Neither of you is claustrophobic, I trust?"

"No," Zenas said hesitantly. "But there could be a problem if Aleksander or Cyril happens to be visiting. If either of them suspected I was hiding nearby, he could call me by name and possibly force me to reveal myself."

"Really?" Roger asked, frowning. "That's not what Aleksander said."

"You saw Aleksander?" Jordan cut in.

"Don't worry, it was last night, when there wasn't anything we could tell him," Roger said. "But he told us a Persuader couldn't actually order people to do anything."

"Interesting," Zenas murmured. "What exactly did he say?"

Roger closed his eyes for a moment, trying to visualize the scene. "He said a Persuader doesn't order people to do anything," he said, opening his eyes again. "That all he does is try to talk the other person into his point of view. He said the other person still has the power to make up his own mind."

"Is that wrong?" Fierenzo asked.

"Not entirely," Zenas said, slowly. "But it's not quite as benign as he makes it sound. A Persuader does have a certain degree of power, particularly if he can call to a person by name."

"Could he force Melantha to come to him?" Jordan asked anxiously.

"They seem able to do it with humans," Fierenzo muttered. "The super in Roger's building opened up their apartment without any fuss at all."

"Different situation," Zenas said. "Normally, humans have no idea what they're up against, and therefore don't have any chance to resist. Melantha, on the other hand, would know exactly what he was trying." He looked at Roger. "Especially if, as you say, she'd already resisted a Persuader's order once. She knows now what to listen for, and how to fight it."

"She's always had a mind of her own," Laurel said, smiling at Jordan. "Otherwise she wouldn't have set off to track down a Gray in the first place."

"It's still interesting that Aleksander spent Friday evening with Roger and Caroline," Fierenzo mused. "You'd think it would have been more worthwhile to at least try to smoke Melantha out."

"Are you suggesting Aleksander has her, not Nikolos?" Stephanie asked.

"Or he and Nikolos might be in collusion," Fierenzo told her. "Or Damian really is alive and well in the Catskills and Aleksander had a leisurely dinner because he doesn't really care whether they find Melantha or not." He shrugged. "Or it could be I'm misreading the clues entirely. But no matter which way you slice it, we still need to check out that hideaway."

"I agree," Zenas said. "Which of us do you want, Detective Fierenzo?"

"Whichever one's less likely to be missed," Fierenzo said. "I doubt even Nikolos would have the chutzpah to search a cop's car, but that might change if he gets a tip that one of Melantha's family is suddenly and suspiciously AWOL."

"That would be me, then," Laurel said in a voice that allowed for no argument. "Zenas has his job to do, but I make a couple of shopping trips each month that take me out of range of anyone else.

Tomorrow can be one of them."

"Will they believe you'd go shopping with your daughter still missing?" Roger asked.

Laurel smiled wanly. "My husband and I still have to eat."

"Don't worry, she can pull it off," Zenas said, clearly not thrilled with the idea but just as clearly recognizing that it had to be done. "You two just take care of her. I mean good care of her."

"We will," Fierenzo promised.

"Is there anything we can do to help?" Jonah asked.

"Nothing I can think of," Fierenzo said. "On second thought, yes, there is. You can lend Roger one of those hand phone things in case we get in trouble and need to let someone know what's going on.

How far will they reach?"

"Several miles," Jonah said. "Though without a booster setup in place, the Catskills may be a little of a stretch. We call them tels, by the way, not phone things." He looked down at his brother. "Come on, Jordan. On your feet, and let's see your hand."

Jordan made a face, but obediently stood up and held his left hand out to his brother. "You did want the private family line, as opposed to the general-purpose tel, right?" Jonah added, picking at the heel of Jordan's hand with thumb and forefinger.

"Unless you think Torvald would come charging to our rescue if we called," Fierenzo said dryly.

"How come you have a spare, anyway?"

"Blame it on another of my old school-cutting buddies," Jonah said. "He wanted us to be able to chat while we were skylarking around Queens without the rest of the community listening in. He was a whiz at tech stuff, and he figured out a way to build a tel that worked on a different frequency couple from the rest of them."

"It's not on any of the radio bands we already use, is it?" Roger asked, staring in fascination as Jonah got a grip on what looked like a sheer film on Jordan's hand and began pulling it carefully off.

"It doesn't work the way your radios do," Jonah assured him. "We basically take a pair of normal radio frequencies, but instead of modulating them, we run a harmonic coupling between them. There are only a half-dozen frequency pairs that are convenient to use, and he picked the one as far away from the usual band as possible so that there wouldn't be any chance of interference between them."

"What happened to the one your friend had?" Fierenzo asked. "He doesn't still have it, does he?"

Jonah shook his head. "He gave it to me when he thought his parents were closing in on us and told me to get rid of them."

"We assume he didn't want to get caught with the evidence," Ron added.

"Right," Jonah said, grinning tightly. "For all his private defiance against authority, he tended to panic over the possibility of getting into real trouble."

"Why didn't you toss them like he told you?" Fierenzo asked.

Jonah shrugged. "I liked having them, so I took a chance and hid them away instead. No one ever came down on me, so I guess the whole thing was a false alarm. Anyway, when we started getting to know Melantha's family, I dug them out of storage and gave one to Jordan so I could keep in touch with him while he was in Green territory."

"Too bad you didn't give one to Melantha," Roger murmured.

"Actually, we did discuss that possibility at one point," Zenas said. "We decided it would be better for Jonah and Jordan to be able to keep in touch. Jordan and Melantha were already pretty adept at keeping their time together private, and we didn't want Melantha getting caught with a Gray tel." His lips compressed briefly. "Though I wish now we'd done it that way."

"We also didn't know whether you could take a tel inside a tree without damaging it," Jonah pointed out. He had the film nearly pulled away from his brother's hand now, with only the fingertips still attached.

"That really looks weird," Roger commented. "Like a snake shedding his skin."

"Or Peter Pan trying to get his shadow back on," Fierenzo said. "How hard is it to work?"

"Not very," Jonah assured him. "I can run him through the manual in five minutes." With one final tug, he pulled the last fingertip free. Holding the tel dangling in front of him, he turned and squatted down beside Roger's chair. "Let's have your left hand."

Gingerly, Roger held it out. Jonah draped the tel into position on top of it, smoothing and prodding at it to get the various sections lined up along the fingers. "Just relax," he advised. "It won't hurt."

He began pressing the tel onto the skin of Roger's palm. "One other thing that might or might not mean anything," Roger said. "The day after Cyril tried his Persuasion trick on Caroline, she found out she could sense Green communications. It was only at close range, and she couldn't understand what was being said, but she could definitely tell when one Green was talking to another."

"Interesting," Zenas said. "I've never heard of anything like that before."

"Not even with Velovsky?" Fierenzo asked.

"If it happened, I've never heard anything about it," Zenas said.

"Me, neither," Laurel seconded.

"Maybe it seemed so natural he never thought to comment on it," Roger suggested as Jonah finished with his palm and started massaging the tel into his fingers. "He told us he'd had a telepathic crash course in all things Green from Leader Elymas. Maybe sensing your communication was part of the same package."

"I remember the Pastsingers talking about that contact," Laurel said. "I don't think anything like it had ever been tried before, not even with the Others back on our old world. I sometimes wonder if the strain of that was what killed Elymas so young."

"I sometimes wonder how things might have been different if he'd lived," Zenas added. "We wouldn't have this power struggle between Cyril and Aleksander, for one thing."

"On the other hand, he might already have ordered Melantha to wipe us out," Jonah said grimly.

"Melantha wouldn't have done that," Jordan insisted. "No matter who told her to."

"Well, it's a moot point now," Jonah said, giving Roger's forefinger one final smoothing. "How does that feel?"

"Weird," Roger said, wiggling his fingers experimentally. The tel didn't exactly impede his movements, but it was impossible to forget the thing was plastered to his skin. "It's like wearing half a glove."

"You'll get used to it." Jonah looked over at Fierenzo. "So what are we supposed to do while you, Roger, and Laurel head north and look for Melantha?"

"Basically, you get on with your lives," Fierenzo told him. "You act as natural as you can and wait for us to come back."

"Even Jonah and me?" Jordan asked. "Halfdan's still looking for us, you know. There've been calls about us at least once an hour since you took us off that roof."

"And they've been getting testier, too," Jonah added. "I don't think we want to be found just yet."

Fierenzo made a face. "You may be right," he conceded. "How suspicious is he going to be that you're not answering the calls?"

"Not very," Jonah said. "I've gone silent before when people were mad at me, though not so much since I left school." He lifted his eyebrows. "Still, as long as Jordan and I are hiding out anyway, why don't we go to the Catskills with you?"

Fierenzo snorted. "What do you think I'm running, a bus service?"

"And they're hardly going to let a couple of Grays into their compound," Roger added.

"I didn't mean we'd go all the way in," Jonah said. "You could drop us off on a hill someplace where we could be ready as backup if you needed us."

"If anyone spots you and Laurel together, it'll be all over," Zenas warned.

"We shouldn't need backup anyway," Fierenzo seconded. "This is a soft probe, not a frontal assault."

"Though a little extra precaution might not hurt," Ron said. "And it would certainly keep them from running into Bergan."

"I suppose," Fierenzo said. "Well... okay."

"But Zenas's right about the risks," Ron continued, looking at Zenas. "Which means the boys don't go unless he and Laurel agree they should."

For a moment Zenas and Laurel gazed at each other in silence. Then, with a sigh, Zenas nodded. "All right," he said heavily. "They can go."

"Fine," Fierenzo said. "But I'm not driving through Manhattan with all of you sitting there for the whole world to see. Can you two take the Hudson Line train to Peekskill early tomorrow morning?"

"Why can't we just go tonight?" Jordan offered.

"Sure, that'll work," his older brother agreed. "We'll take the next train and park on one of the buildings until morning. Roger can call me on the tel when you get close and arrange for a pickup."

"Fine," Fierenzo said, levering himself to his feet. "Then I guess all that's left is to get Laurel set up with a convincing cover. Come on, you two; let's huddle."

He crossed the room to Zenas and Laurel and knelt down in front of them, talking in a low voice.

Roger found himself gazing at them, and at the two Grays sitting listening beside them, marveling at this unlikely alliance that Melantha and Jordan had somehow managed to create.

"Roger?"

He turned away from his musings. Jordan was standing beside him, his face solemn. "Yes?"

"I just wanted to thank you for taking care of Melantha," the boy said, the words coming out with difficulty.

"You're welcome," Roger said, feeling a surge of sympathy for the boy. Caught in a war and a decades-old hatred he didn't understand and couldn't fight...

He felt his jaw tighten. Yes, they could fight it. And they would. "We'll get her back, Jordan," he told the boy quietly. "Don't worry. We'll get her back."

"Jordan?" Jonah called from across the room.

Jordan's lips pressed together briefly as he held Roger's gaze. Then, with a silent nod, he turned and joined his brother. For a moment they spoke quietly with their parents, and then the two youths headed out.

Roger closed his eyes as the door closed with a thump behind them, a terrible ache stabbing suddenly at his heart. The Greens and the Grays—families both, wrapped together with all the love and unity and mutual appreciation that that implied.

And on the other side of the room sat Roger Whittier, alone, his wife imprisoned away from him somewhere in the woods. A wife who, over the past few months, he'd somehow forgotten how to appreciate. A wife he'd perhaps even forgotten how to love.

If this ended badly, he might never get the chance to fix that mistake.

There was a footstep at his side, a breath of moving air drifting across his cheek. He opened his eyes to find Fierenzo standing over him, gazing down with a mixture of concern and hard, cold assessment. "We're set," the detective told him. "We'll pick Laurel up tomorrow morning at a mall in Yonkers."

Roger looked over at the door in time to see the two Greens disappear out into the hall. The Grays, he noted with mild surprise, had already gone. "Where are we staying?" he asked.

"Here," Fierenzo said. "Ron and Stephanie rented this room, but under the circumstances they decided they'll just go home and let us have it."

"Okay," Roger said, suddenly too tired to argue or even discuss. "I never found out from Jonah how to use this tel."

"He gave me a quick rundown," Fierenzo assured him. "You looked like you needed a minute alone.

Don't worry—it's easier than setting a VCR. Where are you parked?"

"A garage on 44th near Broadway," Roger told him. "It's a twenty-four-hour place."

"Good," Fierenzo said. "I'll call down to the desk and see if I can get us a couple sets of toiletries, and after that we'd better hit the sack. Tomorrow's going to be a busy day."