by Nancy Kress
It wasn’t until the end that Ebenfield turned personal:
So, my Tessa, now you understand. If you understand, you must come to me, because that is what is right. First destruction of the soft and corrupt Old Order, then the rightful ascension of those meant to rule.
And just as you were first with the enemy Salah, now you will be with me. Everything goes full circle. Where are you? Give me a phone number and I will call you.
Richard
Give me a phone number.
So this was it—decision time. She stared a few seconds at the Arabic below his name: “Dogs first,” again. Then she typed back, “This is my cell-phone number. But I’m not going to turn it on until 3:00 P.M. today. We can talk then.”
To Maddox she typed, “Call you at noon. Be ready. Tessa.”
Outside, Tessa wrapped her head in the scarf she’d bought with pretty much the last of Ruzbihan’s money and walked back toward the side street where she’d left the Toyota. She approached cautiously, slipping into a backyard from an adjacent street, watching a while from behind a hedge. This lower-middle-class neighborhood was deserted in the day, kids at school and adults at work. So it wasn’t hard to spot the FBI agents.
They’d traced the hot car. They’d taken a chance that she might have bought a car in the same city she’d used her American Express card to buy the cell phone, and they’d come up lucky.
Carefully Tessa backed out of the hedge, out of the yard, out of the neighborhood. She walked to the highway, took a deep breath, and caught a ride with a man heading east. He leered at her and she told him her husband was a cop and she was leaving him because he turned violent at the slightest provocation. In fact, he’d already be in jail for assaulting someone if his buddies on the force hadn’t protected him. He’d accused her, Gina, of having an affair with the guy, which was ridiculous because she’d never been unfaithful, never, but her husband was so insanely jealous and vindictive she just had to get away. Although it was possible her husband would follow her. The driver stopped leering.
She left him at a truck stop in West Virginia, a small seedy place with minimal facilities. It was twenty minutes to noon. She called Maddox from a pay phone, using one of her prepaid phone cards.
“John, it’s Tessa. Did you get that long manifesto from Ebenfield?”
“Yes. Tessa—”
“Have you found him?”
“No. Where are you?”
“He’s going to call me at 3:00. I’ll call you after that, Bye.”
“Wait! Tessa, just a minute. I want to run some names by you again. You—”
“I can’t—”
“Just listen, for once! Do you know anything about any of these people? Hakeem bin Ahmed al-Fulani?”
“No.” Was he trying to keep her on the line long enough to trace the call? But he must know she wouldn’t fall for that.
“Aktar Erekat?”
“No.”
“Sometimes he uses the name Abd-Al Adil Erekat.”
Abd-Al Adil. The name of Ruzbihan’s son. But that wasn’t an uncommon name in Tunisia, and Erekat was not among Ruzbihan’s surnames.
“No.”
“Tessa—”
She hung up.
For the next few hours, she drank coffee quietly at a table in the truck stop, reading discarded newspapers, her chilly manner a clear warning to leave her alone. At two-thirty she started watching the truckers coming and going. She picked an older man, kindly looking, fairly slightly built, went over to his table, and asked him for a ride when he left.
“Sorry, no.” He kept shoveling in his hot roast-beef sandwich.
“Why not?”
“Don’t take women. Don’t want any trouble.”
“I won’t be any trouble. I just need to get to Tyler, Maryland or as close as I can!”
Now she had his attention. “Tyler? Where the dog plague is?”
“My mom’s in that town, caught in the quarantine. She’s got diabetes and high blood pressure and I don’t know what else. I know they won’t let me in but I need to get as close as I can, for when the quarantine is lifted!”
“Isn’t gonna be lifted. Not soon, anyway. Not now that they’re killing dogs and blowing up buildings.”
Tessa felt as if she’d been punched. “Killing dogs? Blowing up buildings?”
“Haven’t you seen no news, girlie?”
“No! What’s happening?”
“Just what I said. If you ask me, they shoulda killed those dogs before this. We could have ourselves some kind of bird flu, only with dogs. Can’t risk it. But protestors don’t see it that way—they want their precious little pets back. Hey, don’t look so—did your mom get bit?”
“No.”
“Then she’s probably all right. Oh, come on, girlie, your mom’ll be fine.”
“Please take me to Tyler! Or as close as you’re going!”
“I…oh, what the hell. You look like a nice enough girl. What you doing thumbing it, anyway? It’s dangerous.”
“I don’t have any money.” She tried to smile. “A little down on my luck.”
“Been there, done that. You hungry?”
His eyes on her were so kind that Tessa nodded, even though she wasn’t hungry. He ordered her the same thing he was having, without asking her first—clearly he was used to being in charge of women. She smiled tremulously and ate a few bites, dawdling to get the timing right. At 2:55 he said, “You gonna actually eat that or can we go?”
“I’ll eat.” A few more bites and she said, in a voice more girlish than her own, “Can you ask the waitress to put it in a doggie bag for me? And can I use the rest room a minute?”
“If you gotta go, you gotta,” he grumbled.
The ladies’ room was empty. Tessa took a deep breath and turned on her cell phone. The tiny screen displayed the icon that meant the phone was searching for a transmission tower.
…and searching…
…and searching.
NO COVERAGE AT THIS TIME.
Tessa stared at the phone. Numbly—stupidly—she shook it, which of course did nothing. Ebenfield was probably trying to contact her, and she was going to miss her one chance to talk to him.
She raced out of the ladies’ room and cried, “Let’s go now! Please! Now!”
The old trucker got slowly to his feet, shaking his head at the unpredictability of women.
Tessa sat tensely in the cab of the semi, staring at the cell phone display. No little tower appeared. Still too many mountains here
…and here….
…and here…
“Leaning forward like that ain’t gonna make us get there any faster,” the old trucker said. “Neither’s glaring at that there phone.”
“Do you know when we come back into an area of cell coverage?” Tessa asked. He glanced over at her and she realized she’d dropped the voice and diction of the distraught, not-too-bright woman rushing to her ailing mom in Tyler. Well, there was a reason Tessa had never worked undercover.
“Top of that peak ahead, might be your phone’ll work.”
“Thank you.” She continued to watch the display, but now she also watched the road signs and tried to measure the distance to the place he’d indicated. Fifteen minutes, twenty? How long would Richard Ebenfield try to call her before he decided she wasn’t going to answer?
The trucker said dryly, “Your mom really needs to talk to you, huh?”
“I told you she’s sick.”
“You told me a lot of things.”
When her cell phone finally chimed cheerily and the tower icon flashed on, Tessa said, “Please let me out here!”
“Here? Ain’t nothing here.”
“But I want to get out. Please!”
The old man sighed, pulled onto the shoulder, and said, “Miss, I think maybe you should take your medication more regular-like.”
“Thank you! I really appreciate the ride! I’ll call for someone to come get me!”
He sighed again and drov
e away. Tessa stood in the snow by the side of the road in front of a clump of bushes and stared at the cell phone. Call, Ebenfield, damn you. Call.
He didn’t. She’d missed the three o’clock appointment and he wasn’t going to keep trying. She had to get to a computer, had to email him what had happened… A car rounded the top of the steep rise in the road and she drew back into some bushes, out of sight. The last thing she wanted right now was the distraction of persuading some Good Samaritan that she didn’t need a ride out of the West Virginia mountains.
But the car slowed, then stopped. Tessa stared from behind her bushes. The cover they provided was incomplete but still the driver shouldn’t have been able to see her from the road…The door opened and a man stepped out.
“Tessa?”
The smell hit her then, brought on a sudden gust of winter wind, the sickly-sweet smell of living rot. The man wore a strange headgear over his face, a loose white square of cotton held in place with a ring of knotted cord. She realized suddenly that it was supposed to look like an Arab headdress worn backward, cut with eyeholes.
Then she saw the gun.
“Get in the car, my Tessa,” Ebenfield said. “No, you can’t escape. And there’s something I’ve waited such a long time to show you.”
She rushed him, prepared to kick. But then something happened, something she had only read about. A wave of nausea and disorientation hit her, so strong that the mountains wavered in her sight. She fell backward onto the snowy ground.
When she came to, she lay in the open trunk of his car. Her ankles and wrist were bound and on her feet she wore only socks. In the small enclosed space, the smell of decaying flesh was so strong that Tessa gagged. Ebenfield suddenly loomed above her. He used the sonic-wave gun again and a second wave of nausea and blackness took her, but not before she saw the terrible abomination that was his face.
» 53
Ed Dormund sat in his living room, watching TV. A pleasurable glow wrapped him, composed of accomplishment over the successful bombing, anticipation of what might happen next, and an entire six-pack of beer. On CNN, Janet Belville intoned, “pressure from both sides—to destroy all dogs in Tyler, Maryland as a way of combating and containing the epidemic, or to continue with the present policy of capturing and holding both infected and uninfected dogs. Since there have been no new dog attacks reported since yesterday, according to FEMA spokespersons, it may that the president will wait for—”
Ed snorted. That wimpy president wasn’t ever going to make a decision, just like FEMA didn’t make the right decision and return the dogs after the bombing. So Ed and the others were going to make those decisions for them. After all, this was still a free country!
He drained the last beer as Cora emerged from her crafts room. “Ed! You left rings on the coffee table again! Couldn’t you at least—”
“Don’t start,” Ed snarled. All at once his pleasant, interested mood vanished. She ruined it, just like she always did, ruining everything, wrecking his life.
“Look at this place!” Cora shrilled. “Chips all over the rug, if you think I’m going to clean it up you got another think coming! Get up off your lazy ass and vacuum up that rug!”
Ed stood, intending to…what? Wooziness took him and he grabbed at something to stay upright. His fingers closed on the lamp on the end table beside the couch. It and he crashed to the floor.
Cora laughed bitterly. “Look at you! Can’t even stand up!” She stomped off into the kitchen and slammed the door.
Could he stand? All at once it was an interesting question, almost as interesting as what the White House was going to try to do about the dogs. Carefully Ed pulled himself to his feet and swayed, triumphant.
He heard barking.
Jake! Ed staggered to the window and there they were, all three of them, Petey and Rex and Jake. At the sight of Ed they bared their impressive teeth and snarled, but Ed wasn’t fooled. Good ol’ Jake! Ed knew the dogs loved him even though they temporarily had this disease. That wasn’t their fault. Ed knew how it was when you caught a disease. Hadn’t he had pneumonia once?
Tears filled his eyes, the easy tears of the very drunk. The dogs were probably hungry, that’s why they came home. He could get them dog food from the kitchen, pour it out the window under the sink. Yeah, food…
Cora reappeared, dragging the vacuum cleaner. “So it’s me cleaning up after you again, you worthless, drunken piece of garbage, you never do anything around here.”
At the sight of Cora’s smirk, Ed ignited. All the weepy love he’d felt for Jake and Rex and Petey turned in a single instant to white-burning hatred of Cora, this bitch who ruined everything, who never let him enjoy anything, who was always at him and at him and at him and never left him alone—
He could be alone.
It wasn’t a thought but a force, inevitable as thunder after lightening. You couldn’t stop thunder from coming, and Ed didn’t try. All you could do with a force of nature was go with it. He lurched across the room and grabbed Cora.
She shrieked and struggled, but Ed didn’t even slow. He outweighed her by fifty pounds and anyway, this was thunder here. In less than thirty seconds he’d dragged her through the kitchen to the garage door. He pushed her forward and she stumbled down the two shallow steps to the garage. Ed hit the automatic garage door opener, then slammed and locked the kitchen door.
Cora screamed. Jake and Petey and Rex, as they’d done their entire lives, responded to the sound of the garage door and raced around the house. Cora screamed again, a different sound, horrible! Ed resisted the urge to cover his ears. Instead he stumbled to the phone and dialed 911.
“My wife! My wife! The dogs—”
“What is it, sir? Calm down, can you tell me your name and address?”
“Ed Dormund! 693 Asbury Street! My wife went into the garage to get into the car, she must of hit the garage door opener by mistake, the dogs came in—oh God!”
“The police will come immediately.” Horror in the young voice, and struggle to stay calm.
“Yes, yes, oh my God—” Ed heard his own horror, his own excitement. Yes. Just right.
Cora had stopped screaming.
Gently Ed lowered himself to the kitchen table. His moment was slipping away; he could feel it going. No matter. He could do this. He could do anything he wanted to. He just needed to get his story straight. The argument over the vacuuming. Cora mad. She says she’s going to her mother’s. Car in the garage, no danger, go right into her mother’s garage, mother would have been ready to open and close door after Cora called her on her cell. The way people were managing all over Tyler. Cora angry at Ed, didn’t stop even for her coat. But—
Ed staggered to his feet and unlocked the kitchen door. Before he could hesitate, he opened the door, hurled Cora’s purse into the garage, and slammed the door. The dogs, occupied, didn’t try to come in. He gagged at the sounds out there now.
But he could do this, he could—
Police sirens, coming closer.
Good ol’ Jake!
» 54
Tessa didn’t know how long she’d been locked in the reeking trunk, or how far they’d driven while she’d been unconscious. Finally the car stopped and the trunk opened. She managed to say, “Richard Ebenfield.”
“My Tessa.” He lifted her and she had to force herself to neither gag nor recoil. The skin on his face had rotted. Pieces had fallen off, leaving exposed, oozing purplish patches like those of leprosy. But this was not leprosy; his features were all intact and apparently only his face was affected since he didn’t seem in pain where her body unwillingly pressed against his. He staggered under her weight. This was not an athlete.
Somewhere nearby, dogs howled.
Snowy mountains and pine woods pressed close. Under the thick pines, the sunshine was muted. Ebenfield kicked open the door of a small wooden shed and dropped Tessa on a pile of very dirty straw. Lighting a Coleman lantern, he closed the door. The shed was windowless. Turds littered the c
orners. A rat scurried away from Tessa and disappeared down a hole.
She said, as evenly as she could manage, “The tracker was in one of my boots, wasn’t it. The boots I was given in London. The signal is encrypted and goes through satellite. The metal detectors at the airport didn’t pick up the tracker so it’s state-of-the-art, ceramics or plastic. And that sonic stunner you used on me is military-grade. Who are you and Abd Al-Adil working with, Ebenfield?”
“Ah, my Tessa, I knew you were as smart as you are beautiful. Salah chose wisely for me.”
“For you?"
“But of course. He was the precursor, the forerunner. John the Baptist, if you like.”
Which cast Ebenfield as Jesus Christ.
Tessa stifled her grimace of disgust. “Who are you working with?”
“Those the Lord has sent me as minions, as servants, as means to carry out the design of Heaven.”
She stared levelly at him. “You don’t believe that Biblical stuff. Not really. I can detect lying.”
He laughed, a horrible distortion of his scabrous face. “You’re right. I’ve grown past that. The Bible was useful to me once, but now my path has taken me beyond it. Religion, like government and economy, is nothing more than a way to keep the true men from claiming their rightful power.”
He was as loopy as tangled yarn. “And what’s your rightful place, Ebenfield?”
“You already know, my Tessa.”
“I don’t. Tell me.”
Ebenfield didn’t answer. Moving to the far wall of the filthy shed, he fumbled at something on the wall. Tessa took advantage of his turned back to strain at the rope that bound her wrists behind her. It didn’t give. All she succeeded in doing was sinking her body deeper into the stinking straw.
Sudden light flooded the shed.
Ebenfield had unfastened and lifted away a section of the wall, a solid piece of wood maybe five feet square that began at the dirt floor. Behind the opening was strong chain-link fencing, through which poured weak late-afternoon light filtered through pine boughs and air even colder than that in the shed. Behind the fence snarled and jumped three huge dogs. One black-and-tan Doberman. The other two of some all-black breed with snouts like pigs, heavily muscled legs, and long, saliva-flecked teeth. The dogs’ eyes were all filmed with milky white.
