reincarnation with Pia Klick.
Aware of the extreme flakiness of the question, I nevertheless asked,
“And the cat, Mungojerrie . . . he isn’t in league with these people
at Wyvern?”
“He escaped from them.”
Licking his chops to be sure that no precious biscuit crumbs adhered to
his lips or to the fur around his muzzle, Orson got off the dinette
chair and came to my side.
To Roosevelt, I said, “Earlier tonight, I heard the Wyvern project
described in apocalyptic terms . . . the end of the world.”
“The world as we know it.”
“You actually believe that?”
“It could play out that way, yes. But maybe when it all shakes down,
there’ll be more good changes than bad. The end of the world as we
know it isn’t necessarily the same as the end of the world.”
“Tell that to the dinosaurs after the comet impact.”
“I have my jumpy moments,” he admitted.
“If You’re frightened enough to go to the mooring to sleep every night
and if You really believe that what they were doing at Wyvern was so
dangerous, why don’t You get out of Moonlight Bay?
“I’ve considered it. But my businesses are here. My life’s here.
Besides, I wouldn’t be escaping. I’d only be buying a little time.
Ultimately, nowhere is safe.”
“That’s a bleak assessment.”
“I guess so.”
“Yet You don’t seem depressed.”
Carrying the cat, Roosevelt led us out of the main cabin and through
the aft stateroom. “I’ve always been able to handle whatever the world
threw at me, son, both the ups and the downs, as long as it was at
least interesting. I’ve had the blessing of a full and varied life,
and the only thing I really dread is boredom.” We stepped out of the
boat onto the afterdeck, into the clammy embrace of the fog. “Things
are liable to get downright hairy here in the jewel of the Central
Coast, but whichever way it goes, for damn sure it won’t be boring.”
Roosevelt had more in common with Bobby Halloway than I would have
thought.
“Well, sir . . . thank You for the advice. I guess.” I sat on the
coaming and swung off the boat to the dock a couple of feet below, and
Orson leaped down to my side.
The big blue heron had departed earlier. The fog eddied around me, the
black water purled under the boat slip, and all else was as still as a
dream of death.
I had taken only two steps toward the gangway when Roosevelt said,
“Son?”
I stopped and looked back.
“The safety of your friends really is at stake here. But your
happiness is on the line, too. Believe me, You don’t want to know more
about this. You’ve got enough problems . . . the way You have to
live.”
“I don’t have any problems,” I assured him. “Just different advantages
and disadvantages from most people.”
His skin was so black that he might have been a mirage in the fog, a
trick of shadow. The cat, which he held, was invisible but for his
eyes, which appeared to be disembodied, mysterious-bright green orbs
floating in midair. “Just different advantages do You really believe
that?” he asked.
“Yes, sir,” I said, although I wasn’t sure whether I believed it
because it was, in fact, the truth or because I had spent most of my
life convincing myself that it was true. A lot of the time, reality is
what You make it.
“I’ll tell You one more thing,” he said. “One more thing because it
might convince You to let this go and get on with life.”
I waited.
At last, with sorrow in his voice, he said, “The reason most of them
don’t want to harm You, the reason they’d rather try to control You by
killing your friends, the reason most of them revere You is because of
who your mother was.”
Fear, as death-white and cold as a Jerusalem cricket, crawled up the
small of my back, and for a moment my lungs constricted so that I
couldn’t draw a breath-although I didn’t know why Roosevelt’s enigmatic
statement should affect me so instantly and profoundly. Maybe I