Julia remained quiet for an unnaturally long time. Finally, she answered, “An old college friend of mine tracked me down recently—through Dee. Let’s say her name’s Rebecca. She’s in some kind of trouble with the authorities and needs help getting out of the country.”
Cade whistled silently. “As bad as that? What kind of trouble are we talking about?”
“I didn’t ask. But you know what it’s like trying to get through the regular exits. Everywhere’s watched. They’ve got everything about you in the computers.”
“Have you decided to start a new line—people smuggling?” Cade asked. Even now he was unable to refrain from a mildly teasing note.
“She was a close friend, the kind you’d like to do something for.” Julia paused again, then drew a long breath as if committing herself finally. “Look, I was asking about Marie to see if there was a chance you might still be on speaking terms. If she is back in the country as those ISS people said, what might the possibility be of contacting her? Doesn’t that organization that they said she’s with have ways of getting people out—to Asia or somewhere maybe? They’re supposed to have a whole underground organization for moving contraband and people, right?”
Cade glanced at her in mock apprehension. “What are you trying to get me into here? Look, I sympathize with your friend. But even supposing I wanted to get involved, I don’t have any idea where Marie is now. I’ve only got those two spooks’ word that she’s even back from China.”
Julia, however, was evidently not ready to leave it there. “Come on, you’re the Mr. Fixit with connections everywhere, aren’t you?” she said. “I know how you work, Roland. Are you really telling me that with all the friends you and she made over the years, you couldn’t find a way of getting a message through to her if you really needed to?” She reached out and laid a hand on his knee. “Rebecca was a close friend. And it does sound as if she’s in a lot of trouble.”
Cade took his eyes off the road to look across the car for a second. Julia was serious, he could see. “So where is she right now?” he asked.
“In a hotel downtown. I guess one of those nondescript places where invisible people go. Dee didn’t give me any details.”
Cade shook his head. “That’s no good. You’d better bring her to the house while we figure something out. At least it’ll be more comfortable. Can you arrange it with Dee?”
Julia hesitated, as if giving him time to reconsider. “Does that mean we’re going to help her?” she asked.
Cade stared at the highway ahead, wondering what options he had let himself in for now. “Let’s see what she has to say first,” he replied.
* * *
After they got back home, Julia went out again and returned a couple of hours later with Rebecca. She was mousy haired and plain, a little on the plump side, not given to talk; or perhaps it was the strain of the last couple of days and whatever experiences had preceded them. Henry took her bags and showed her to one of the guest rooms. Later, she reappeared for a late supper of chicken pieces and fries in the kitchen. Cade and Julia joined her just for coffee, since they had eaten earlier. By then, Rebecca had pulled herself more together.
Her story was that she and another woman had coauthored a hard-hitting piece in an underground political newsletter that circulated in print and on the net, detailing dubious and in some cases flatly unlawful electoral machinations that had accompanied the installation of the current administration in Washington, which if proved would make it illicit, and not the result of a constitutionally correct, democratic process. The governor of California, William Jeye, had picked it up in a speech to the Constitutional Club of San Francisco, and the result had been consternation in the Western media, condemnation from the East, and public outcries everywhere. The other author had been arrested. Another woman, who lived on the next street to Rebecca in a house with the same number, was picked up by the ISS at the same time but released twenty-four hours later with an admission of mistaken identity. Rebecca had packed a bag and gone into hiding; she wouldn’t even say where in the country she had arrived from.