Time Scout

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Kit Carson was waiting in the crowd when the Porta Romae opened. Neither Malcolm nor Margo put in appearances. He started to grow seriously alarmed when the Time Tours guides who emerged wouldn't look at him. The whole contingent of tourists, guides, and baggage handlers waiting in the Commons climbed the ramp and vanished through the portal and still there was no sign of his granddaughter or the man he'd trusted with her safety. Then, just as the portal began to shrink toward closure, Malcolm shot through. One look at his face sent Kit's viscera into a tailspin.

The normally unflappable time guide burst past Kit like a damned soul pursued by gleeful demons. He didn't even glance in Kit's direction. Kit shut his eyes, convinced of the worst Then he risked another look just as the gate shrank closed. Margo had come through. He started breathing again. But she hung back on the platform, looking defiant and sullen and scared all at the same time. She, too, watched Malcolm's stormy retreat down the Commons. Then she saw Kit standing in the crowd below.

She lifted her chin and descended the ramp

"Want to tell me what's going on?" he asked, falling into step.

"No," she said icily. "I don't."

With that, she, too, stormed off. Kit allowed his footsteps to slow to a halt. Just what had transpired between those two? Given Margo's temper, he was afraid of the answer. But he had to know. Kit highsigned one of the returning Time Tours guides.

"What gives?"

The woman gave him a guarded look. -Uh ... Hi, Kit. I think, maybe Malcolm ought to be the one to explain." She hurried away before he could ask another question.

Kit muttered under his breath and called Malcolm's number. The answering machine picked up. He swore and headed for the Down Time, but Malcolm hadn't put in an appearance. Then Robert Li, the station's antiquarian, skidded into the bar. He announced to the room at large, "You ain't gonna believe it! Malcolm Moore just wiped up the mat with Sven Bailey. I mean put him on the ground out cold. What's going on? I've never seen an expression like that on Malcolm's face."

Conversation exploded around Robert LI while Kit beat a hasty retreat. He headed straight for the gym and found Sven in his office, holding an ice pack to his head and groaning.

"Whadda you want?" Sven muttered

"I heard Malcolm knocked you out."

"You don't have to rub it in."

"Did he say anything?"

Sven peeled a swollen eyelid. "No. All he said was, `Let's spar.' Next thing I know, Ann Mulhaney's bending over me and someone's yelling to call Rachel. Only thing I saw after I woke up was his back on the way out the door. What's eating him, anyway?"

"I was hoping you could tell me," Kit said grimly.

"Huh. Two weeks alone with Margo is my guess. She'd drive any man to violence."

"Great. You're some help, you know that, Sven?"

The weapons trainer just grunted and held the ice pack against his skull. Kit headed for home. Margo wasn't at the apartment. Clearly she'd been there: damp towels and dirty clothes littered the bathroom. Wet footprints crossed the carpet into the living room. But she had departed for destinations unknown well before Kit's arrival. He called Malcolms again. In the middle of the fifth ring, the connection went dead.

Kit stared at the receiver. "What the hell?"

Someone is going to give me some answers. And it had better be soon. But when he pounded on Malcolm's door, a breakable object of unknown origin crashed against the panel and shattered noisily.

"Go 'way!" He sounded drunk. The last time Kit had known Malcolm Moore to get drunk was the night the owner of Time Ho! had fired everyone in his employ, then quietly committed suicide rather than face his creditors.

"Malcolm! It's Kit! Let me in!"

"Go the hell away!"

He considered breaking down the door. Instead, he leaned on the buzzer until the noise drove the younger man to distraction. Malcolm finally snatched open the door. His hair was dishevelled and his eyes were bloodshot He looked like he hadn't slept in a week He gripped a whiskey bottle by the neck like he contemplated breaking it over Kit's head

"You are drunk."

"An' I'm gonna be drunker. I'm in no mood for a visit."

He slammed the door. Kit caught it before it could close all the way.

"Dammit, Malcolm, talk to me. What the hell happened down time?"

Malcolm glared at him, then dropped his gaze. All the fight leached out of him. "Ask Margo. Your granddaughter is a lunatic. An impulsive, dangerous lunatic. Worse than you, damn your eyes. And a goddamned, bloody liar-little bitch just turned seventeen, goddammit, not nineteen. Now get out and let me get soused."

Seventeen? Margo was only seventeen' Kit saw several shades of red. I'll kill her, I swear to God, I'll teach that girl if it's the last thing I ever do not to lie to people who trust her.

Malcolm was in the act of slamming the door when Kit caught it in one hand. "I, uh, owe you some money."

Malcolm's bitter laughter shocked Kit speechless. "Keep it I sure as hell didn't earn it."

The door slammed shut.

Kit stared at the reverberating panel. All right... He stalked down to the Commons on a hunt for his errant granddaughter. He found her at Goldie Morran's, exchanging her down-time currency for modern scrip. Goldie glanced up and smiled. The smile froze in place. Margo swung around and lost color.

Kit was out of patience. He backed Margo into a corner so she couldn't bolt and run. "just what the hell happened down time, young lady?"

"Nothing! I did fine! It's not my fault Malcolms an overbearing, overprotective, chauvinistic..."

She ranted on at length.

Kit finally figured it out.

"You left the tour?" he asked quietly, hardly able to believe his ears.

"Yes, I did! And I did fine! I'm in one piece, aren't I? I'm sick of being coddled, roped in, restricted, dammit, I proved I can handle myself this trip! I want a real scouting job!"

Kit couldn't believe it. She'd actually abandoned the tour, run off on her own ... No wonder Malcolm was downstairs getting drunk. Kit was tempted to put Margo straight over his knee and wallop her backside until she couldn't sit. But the fire in her glare told him it wouldn't do any good.

"That's it," he said coldly. "You are clearly too reckless for your own good. I'd thought you were capable of learning something. I was wrong. Worse, you lied to me. Eighteen hell." Margo lost color. "Pack your things. You're going home."

"The hell I am! You're just an overprotective, lonely old man too scared to let me try my wings! I'm ready and you're not letting me prove it!"

They locked glares.

Goldie intervened quietly. "If I might suggest it, why don't you two go somewhere separately to cool off and think this over? Kit, clearly no harm was done. She's made it back just fine. Margo, why don't you come back later and we'll finish this transaction. You might think about the scare you've given everyone. Now, may I help you, sir? Yes, I can certainly exchange that for you ... ."

Kit stalked out, leaving Margo to make her own way back to the apartment. He was so angry he couldn't think straight. Of all the bone-headed, childish, idiotic ... He didn't care what Goldie said, Margo was clearly not ready to scout. Goldie had never set foot across a single down-time gate. She had no concept of the dangers that could threaten even an ordinary little tour, particularly when one of the pig-headed tourists abandoned her guides and struck out on her own without knowing so much as half-a-dozen words of the language ... .

He stormed into the Down Time and snapped out an order for a triple. He knocked it back, then ordered another. Gotta calm doom before I face her again. Goldie'd been right about that much, at least. He couldn't talk to her in this frame of mind He had to recapture his composure, marshall his arguments, decide to approach the very serious problem her rebelliousness had raised.

But...

Whatever possessed the brainless little fool to do it?

"Worse than you," Malcolm had said

Kit winced and downed another triple Great. That was just great. All he needed to make his life complete was a seventeen-year-old female carbon copy of himself bent on raising hell everywhere she turned her ambitious little gaze.

He was tempted to haul her kicking and screaming to Primary and toss her bodily through it. But that wouldn't do any good She'd just come back Or go to another station and try it from there. He had to find a way to reason with her, convince her to keep training, that she wasn't ready despite marginal success in surviving Rome.

The problem was, Kit had no idea how to go about it.

Everything he did or said only made matters worse.

So he delayed the inevitable and ordered another triple. just one more for fortitude. Then he'd face her. Lonely old man, she'd called him. Well, that much was true: He was lonely and he was afraid of losing her. But that wasn't the reason he was holding her back. Surely he could find a way to convince her of that?

Yeah, right, just lake I convinced Sarah to stack by me.

Kit tightened his hand around the shot glass.

Why was it, he always managed to find a way to flub the most important relationships in his life?

He didn't have an answer to that, either.

Margo couldn't believe it She stood trembling in the corner of Goldie Morran's shop and fought desperately not to cry. After everything she'd been through, after everything she'd proven ... She'd even risked losing the gate ito ask a Time Tours guide to watch over Achilles until she could properly free him the next time the gate cycled. She'd handled every adversity and responsibility chance had thrown at her, doing better than she had any right to expect, but nobody was giving her so much as a moment to explain. They all just assumed the worst and dismissed her as a brainless, incapable fool. Worse, Malcolm had told Kit about her lie.

She straightened her back against a weight heavier than the whole Himalayan mountain range and forced her chin up. She might have been kicked out of training, but she wasn't quitting. Somehow, Margo would prove herself.

"Margo?"

She glanced around to find Goldie Morran watching her. The customers had all departed, their business transacted for the moment Goldie smiled, a sympathetic gesture from one woman to another.

"Don't take it so hard," the older woman said. "You've clearly proven your mettle. A week down time alone, you said?"

"Yes. In Rome."

Goldie nodded. "Why don't we finish that transaction Kit interrupted? I'd like to talk to you."

Margo fumbled in her belt pouch for the coins she'd brought back to exchange. She thought about selling the Circus gemstone, but decided to send it through with a Time Tours guide the next time Porta Romae cycled Achilles could sell it and use the money to support himself. She was proud of that plan and since ATF would only tax her for it if she tried to take it back through Primary, that was exactly what she intended to do. She might run away from her problems, but she didn't run from responsibility.

Goldie examined her coins and nodded. "Very nice. So ... you're ready to prove yourself." It wasn't a question.

"Damn right -I am," Margo muttered "I got along fine-and I don't even speak Latin!"

Goldie's eyes widened. "That is an accomplishment You should be very proud." Then she glanced at the doorway as though searching for eavesdroppers. "You want to know what I think?" The older woman's eyes were bright, merry.

"What?"

"I think you're a budding young scout in need of a place to go. And if you're interested, I think I know just the place you need."

Margo's pulse quickened. "Really?" Then she cleared her throat and attempted to assume an air of professionalism. "What did you have in mind?"

"I know of a gate that's in need of a good scout Someone bright and ambitious. Someone who isn't afraid of a challenge. Someone who'll take a few risks to make a lot of money."

Margo's pulse skipped another few beats. "Why are you telling me?"

Goldie Morran grimaced and gestured to herself. "I'm not a scout and besides, I'm too old. And frankly, I think you've got what it takes. After all, Kit Carson did train you: You've been taught by the best and as far as I'm concerned, you've demonstrated you have what it takes. You've got fire inside you, girl. Besides," Goldie winked, "I'd like to see a woman finally crack that men's club wide open. Interested?"

Margo glared at the doorway where Kit Carson had vanished.

"You bet I'm interested. When do we start?"

"Is now soon enough? Good First, we allay everyone's suspicions about what you're up to ... ."

By the time Kit was ready to face Margo with something approaching calm, the "night" had advanced fairly far. Two additional gates had cycled: Edo and Primary. He'd listened to the familiar announcements regarding gate departures while brooding over his bourbon and marshalling his arguments. Significantly, none of his friends even approached his table. Kit finally left the Down Time and brushed through a crowd of new arrivals gawking at the Commons. When he arrived at his apartment Kit drew a deep breath, then unlocked the door. He expected to find her sulking on the couch. He didn't.

Margo wasn't there at all. Her things were gone.

All he found was a scrawled note.

Sorry for all the trouble. It hasn't been fun. I won't be troubling you again. Margo.

Kit crumpled the note in his hand.

Then he sank down onto the couch and cried: