The Edge of Ruin

by Melinda Snodgrass

  Sam walked into the kitchen carrying her dirty plate. “Your band is here,” she said.

  Pamela watched Richard struggle with himself, and decide to let it go.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  Angela came wandering in with an air so casual that it made it clear there was nothing at all casual about her arrival. She set her plate on the counter. “May we listen? I’ve actually never heard you play.”

  An expression of acute discomfort swept across her brother’s face. “I’d really rather you didn’t. When you have an audience it isn’t a rehearsal any longer.”

  Dagmar entered the kitchen. “My husband is the same way,” she said to the room at large. “He practices six hours a day locked away in a converted greenhouse out behind the main house.”

  “So your children never see either of you?” Angela said in tones of sweet inquiry.

  Pamela looked at Richard with his back against the center island, and the three women surrounding him. She wanted to scream with vexation at the foolishness of her sex. Richard slipped between Angela and Dagmar, heading for the door. It looked more like flight than an exit.

  The female charm bracelet followed.

  As they crossed the dining room Pamela heard a thunk followed by the cry of vibrating strings as a cello case bumped into a wall, shaking the instrument inside.

  There were three strangers in the living room. A tall, dark-haired man with a half smile and a crooked bow tie was inspecting the art. A young woman with waist-length blond hair had her violin case hugged to her chest and kept turning in circles, surveying the room with a look of childlike wonder. An older man with crew-cut gray hair and pants that rode too high on his waist was drawn to the collection of canopic jars on an inlaid table. He looked up at their entrance and said, “Could you bring some of these by the school sometime? My world history class has only seen my slides from the Cairo museum.”

  “Sure,” Richard said. “I’ll give you my secretary’s number and we’ll get it arranged.”

  “Oh, Richard, there are so many beautiful things,” said the blonde in a breathy little-girl voice.

  Maybe the woman couldn’t help it. Maybe her voice really sounded like that, but Pamela had always suspected the baby dolls of putting on an act. Pamela also watched the interaction between her brother and the blonde, trying to judge if she was another one of his victims. Pamela had watched so many women, many of them her friends, make fools of themselves over Richard. This time it didn’t seem to be the case.

  The tall man with the bow tie turned to Richard. “There’s art in here worthy of anything in the Uffizi.”

  Richard nodded his head in acknowledgment, and stammered into far too detailed an explanation. “It’s not really mine. I mean, I live here, and it might ultimately be mine … well, at least for my lifetime, but I’m … we’re hoping the real owner comes back … I’m just sort of a caretaker …” He stuttered to a halt.

  Grenier, wandering through with his splayfooted fat man’s walk, reached out and patted Richard on the cheek as he passed. “Too much information, little man.” Pamela watched as Richard yanked his head away.

  Weber, Syd, and her father joined them, and introductions were made. The tall art lover turned out to be Lee Titlebaum, a law professor at UNM. He fell into easy conversation with her father. Syd, Weber, and the high school history teacher, Bob Figge, found a common interest in fishing. Susanna Monroe chattered brightly with Dagmar, Sam, and Angela. Richard threaded his way between chairs and music stands, retreating to the piano. He began sorting through music.

  Pamela drifted from conversation to conversation. Among the social chitchat were nuggets of disturbing information. Truancy at the high school was running at forty percent. At the law school it was, oddly, the professors who were missing. The mall where Susanna worked was an echoing cavern filled with Muzak and no customers.

  The conversations began to hiccup to an end. The three string players picked up their cases and moved to their chairs. Outside the wide window, the wind whistled through the boulders and tossed fine grit against the glass.

  There were sharp snaps as clasps were opened, and the hollow thrum as the violin, viola, and cello were pulled from the dark-lined interiors. Richard struck an A. There came a mewing as bows were drawn across strings, and tuning pegs adjusted. The scrape of bows on strings set a counterpoint to the wind’s melancholy cry. Sliding onto the bench, Richard opened up the sheet music and then worked his hands, flexing and stretching his fingers. He closed his eyes and nodded slowly for a few seconds. Pamela wondered if he was mentally playing the first few opening bars. The mewing stopped.

  “I’m heading home,” Weber said. He reached up and touched his ear self-consciously. “It would be wasted on me. I’ve got a tin ear.”

  Grenier settled into a recliner and folded his hands on his belly. Sam took the love seat, and Angela sat down on the couch. By their attitudes each seemed to be claiming the entire piece of furniture. Dagmar looked from one to the other as if debating where was the safer roost.

  The judge looked back from the hallway leading to the bedrooms. “I’m going to pick up some reports I was reading last night. I’ll be in the office if you need me.” It was a rebuke and a goad, and it had no effect on the COO.

  Dagmar just looked at him impassively and said, “All right.” She finally picked a seat—on the couch at the far end from Angela.

  “Do you mind?” Richard asked the members of his quartet with a nod toward the ad hoc audience.

  His tone made it clear what he wanted them to say, but nobody wanted to seem rude. They all nodded and said it was fine if folks listened. Richard’s lips thinned to a narrow line, and Pamela took pleasure in his displeasure. She sat down on an ottoman. She should probably go and help her father. But her eyelids felt weighted, and her mind seemed too full to accept any more input. Maybe Richard was right to call for a brain break.

  “Are we ready?” the law professor asked.

  Pamela’s eyes snapped back open just in time to see Richard nod slowly.

  TWENTY-ONE

  RICHARD

  Six measures was all it took. Six measures and the tension in my chest uncoiled. We were playing Mendelssohn’s Piano Trio no. 2, opus 66. Susanna had been asked to fill in for a touring chamber music company, and they were going to perform this piece. Since this might be her professional break, Lee agreed to sit out and critique her performance. I thought she was playing wonderfully, drawing sounds of melting sweetness from her violin.

  For myself I loved the stretch and play of the muscles across the backs of my hands, the rise and fall of my foot on the pedals. I’ve always felt incredibly strong when I play. Especially when we get to an allegro or scherzo movement. Feeling the muscles in my forearms bunch and jump as I attacked the keys with speed and power made me feel like I was creating a vortex of sound. There was nothing but the music, the notes on the page, and matching breaths with my fellow musicians. I completely forgot the listeners.

  Until my father walked back through the living room carrying a report. We were at a particularly wonderful section in the final movement. I wanted him to hear it, embrace it, realize that I hadn’t just wasted the time, money, and education. You didn’t have to be a professional musician for music to have value.

  I threw myself into the run, trying to coax perfect sound from the piano. I looked over at my father, but he didn’t look up from the report, just walked into the foyer. The elevator dinged as it arrived; it was in a discordant key from the trio. My fingers tangled, and suddenly I was three beats behind. I lifted my hands, counted, and jumped back in with Susanna and Bob.

  We were approaching the resolution. It felt as if the passion of the music had entered my chest and gone shivering throughout my entire body. I realized it was exactly what I felt when I drew the sword, and the music swept away all thought. I was possessed by it, swept along, lost to the world.

  Then the phone shrilled, harsh and metallic, cutting across th
e floating music, breaking my trance and bringing back the world. I try not to throw tantrums, but this time I just couldn’t help it. I brought my hands crashing down on the keyboard in a jangling, dissonant chord. The strings faltered into silence. Angela darted to pick up the receiver.

  “Hello? Hello?” she said, but the phone kept ringing.

  “There,” Sam said and pointed at a phone on the bookcase.

  It was the first time I’d really noticed it, and apparently it was a different line because no other phone in the penthouse was ringing. A faint sound reached me from the bedroom side of the penthouse. Correct that, a phone was ringing and it sounded like it was in Kenntnis’s … my bedroom. I was closest to the living room phone, so I answered, primed to bust somebody’s chops because I hated to be interrupted when I was playing. Add to that it was eight o’clock at night, definitely way past business hours.

  “Oort.” Irritation had thrown me back into old habits, answering as if I were at APD headquarters.

  “Will you accept a collect call from Dr. Edward—”

  I was startled to hear an actual operator, but I’d been trained well by my parents. “No,” I said quickly.

  And then I heard a young man’s voice in the background. “No, wait!”

  Another voice, deeper, more gruff, with an Aussie accent, said, “That’s it then, lad. That’s your phone call—”

  “Back off, flatfoot!” the younger voice shrilled.

  The operator’s voice, losing some of her soothing phone sex quality, asked, “Sir, do you wish me to terminate the call?”

  The fact there were cops, Australian cops, involved had me intrigued, so I said, “No, it’s okay, I’ll accept the charges.”

  There were a few clicks on the line; then the boyish voice said, “Thanks. Is this Lumina Enterprises?”

  “Yes. Who is this, please?”

  “Eddie Tanaka, Dr. Tanaka,” came the hurried addition. “I’m in Australia. I haven’t got a passport, or any money, and that bastard on the freighter took my ID—”

  For some reason I was finding this oddly amusing. “And now you’ve been arrested,” I interrupted.

  “Yeah, this is my one phone call, and I really need help, and—”

  “Okay, I can see where you have a problem, but why is it my … or rather Lumina’s problem?”

  “Because, dickhead!” I yanked the phone away from my ear at the bellow. “I work for fucking Lumina!” The shout became a roar. “I was given this number to memorize before I left for Indonesia. I was told to call it if I was ever in real trouble! Well, I’m in real fucking trouble! Everybody at my lab was killed except me, and I had to jump ship, and it took me four days to get to Australia in a goddamn Zodiac, and I’d run out of food, and then these dumb asses arrested me—like how many Japanese American terrorists have you ever heard of?” The fury and desperation were rising again. “And then I picked you for my one call instead of a lawyer, and so far you’ve been a real fucking disappointment, so get off your dead ass and get me some help!” Tanaka was once again shouting.

  There was silence, and I listened to desperate panting from the other end of the line, while my mind tried to process all that I’d heard. Only one thing was really sticking. Everybody at my lab was killed. Then, in an almost conversational tone, Tanaka added, “And by the way, who the hell are you?”

  “I’m the head of the Lumina,” I answered before I could think about it and carefully parse and pick my words.

  I was suddenly distracted by someone clapping. I looked over my shoulder. It was Grenier.

  Far away in Australia I heard my employee say, “Oh, shit. Um … whoops?”

  TWENTY-TWO

  “Why in the hell didn’t we know about this?” Richard demanded of Dagmar as they swept through the office doors.

  Pamela, trailing after them, watched her father’s head snap up at the profanity and the harsh rasp of her brother’s voice.

  “If everyone was killed there wouldn’t be anyone to report the events,” Dagmar offered.

  “And no one is fucking monitoring these outlying interests?” Richard countered, and he glared at Dagmar.

  “Richard!” The name cracked like a whip, and the judge came out of the big chair behind the desk. His face was dark with disapproval. A momentary and errant thought disturbed Pamela’s focus. She wondered why her father had always been so uptight about cursing.

  Amazingly Richard rolled over the rebuke. “We’ve had thirty-six scientists and technicians murdered in Indonesia.” The judge’s disapproval dissolved as he processed this information.

  “Obviously this is something we need to look at and make adjustments.” Dagmar’s head was erect, back stiff.

  “Do ya think?” Richard said. As her father emerged from one side of the desk, Richard swung in the other side and sat down. Pamela realized it was the first time Richard hadn’t approached the desk and chair with the air of a terrified dog circling a trap.

  “I want the dead recovered,” Richard continued.

  “That might not be easy,” Pamela said.

  “Tough,” Richard snapped. “We have relatives who’ve lost loved ones to violence. They’ll need the comfort of having the dead returned.”

  Dagmar nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  “Next question, was this wide-scale rioting and violence, and we had the bad luck to have it roll over us, or were we the target?” Dagmar looked baffled and shook her head. “Well, find out, and while we’re making that determination, let’s get warnings out to every other Lumina holding. Next we need to get Dr. Tanaka papers, and get him back to the States. I want to hear his report personally.”

  Pamela stared at this stranger behind the desk. When had her brother become effective? Maybe his stint in the police hadn’t been all bad. It seemed to have given him a spine transplant.

  Their father joined the conversation. “It’s hard to quickly obtain a passport.”

  “We’re a big company. They expedite for corporations all the time,” Pamela offered. “And you’ve got contacts, Papa … Congressman Waters.”

  Richard was flipping a fountain pen between his fingers and frowning. “Tanaka’s in the hands of the police, and that’s never an easy situation to resolve. I’d like to have someone with legal training handle this. Pamela, I’d like you to go to Australia.”

  It was couched as a request, but it was really an order. To her. Pamela damped down the coiling resentment and tried to keep her tone level as she asked, “Why me? Why not Papa?”

  “Because you’re right, with Papa’s contacts we can get the papers arranged. We’ll send you on the Lumina jet. By the time you get him back to the States we can meet you at the airport with a passport.”

  “There’s just one small problem with this plan,” Dagmar said. “Our pilot’s in jail in Virginia,” she said in response to the various querying looks she got.

  Pamela looked back over at her brother, and saw that the sharp, commanding certainty had vanished, replaced by that lost vulnerability that always irritated her. Her mother used to get that look, too.

  “He is? What happened? I didn’t know. If I’d known I would have—”

  “Oh for pity’s sake, you can’t feel guilty over something you didn’t know about,” Pamela said, and the words came out sharp and pointed. Richard shot her a nasty look, banishing the fragile, haunted expression.

  “This must be the fellow who was flying the helicopter when we came to—” Their father broke off abruptly, and his mouth worked as if trying to expel a bite of something rotten.

  “Came to rescue me,” Richard said, his tone flat. “Why can’t you just say it, sir?”

  Well, the family melodramatics seem to be working overtime tonight, Pamela thought.

  “Why was he arrested?” Dagmar asked, breaking the pattern, and bringing them back to the topic.

  “Violating federal airspace. We were in the no-fly zone around D.C.,” the judge answered.

  “Is this going to be a hard rap to
beat?” Richard asked.

  Pamela shook her head. “I don’t think so. Once again we’ve got Papa. He’s a member of the federal bench.”

  “And you have the power that comes from being a very rich man,” Dagmar said to Richard.

  Pamela watched the weight of that statement fall onto her brother. For a moment Richard’s expression became distant and faraway. Pamela wondered what he was thinking. Whatever it was, he shook it off.

  “I know this isn’t exactly pertinent, but why do we only have one pilot?” Pamela asked.

  Richard shrugged and shook his head. He looked over to Dagmar, who said, “The plane was primarily for Mr. Kenntnis’s convenience. We could request to use it, but he preferred his employees flew commercial.” Dagmar shrugged. “It was one of his many quirks.”

  “All right. Papa, you’ll handle getting this gentleman …” Richard gave Dagmar an inquiring look.

  She supplied the name. “Brook Kanadjian.”

  “Brook out of jail. Meantime, we’ll wire money to Dr. Tanaka, and try to at least get him out of jail until Pamela can get there.”

  Dagmar nodded. “I’ll get on it, and I want to find out why we had a breakdown of communications.”

  The judge cleared his throat, a dry, precise sound. “I think I can accomplish this more easily if I’m in Washington instead of the wilds of New Mexico. As Pamela pointed out, I do have contacts.”

  Richard suddenly lifted his head, and Pamela watched a number of emotions go washing across his face. It all happened too fast for her to get a read of what he was thinking.

  “I think I ought to go with you.” It was the absolute last thing she had expected out of her brother. At their father’s expression Richard rushed on. “I mean, it doesn’t seem like the government is responding to this … this invasion at all. I know what’s going on, and I’ve got this.” The hilt came out of his coat pocket and was laid in the center of the desk. “I think I need to try to work with them.”

  Dagmar hustled forward, rested her hands on the granite surface of the desk, and leaned in on Richard. “With all due respect, sir, that is crazy. If they learn of the sword they might take it. Why would you take such a risk?”