The Burning Road

by Ann Benson

“I said, do not be afraid.”

  The e-mail. This must be the person who had sent her the e-mail. “Oh, my God.” Janie and the young woman locked eyes, and after a few moments, she slowly lowered the knife and set it down on the counter. She kept one hand on the hilt, and stared at the young stranger with the unspoken message: Don’t do anything stupid.

  The girl released a long-held and relieved-sounding breath. She displayed her empty hands and said, “I’m unarmed. Not even a nail file.”

  It still did not explain her presence. “Keep talking,” Janie said.

  “I will,” she said. “Just—relax. Please. My name is Kristina Warger.” She stepped forward tentatively and extended her hand. “I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.”

  Janie wasn’t quite ready to put her hand out to this unknown person, so she stepped back and pulled her robe tighter around herself.

  Warger. Very clever.

  “Wargirl,” she said.

  Kristina smiled softly. “That would be me.”

  “What are you doing in my kitchen?”

  As if she was surprised by Janie’s question, Kristina gestured toward the plate and mug and said, in complete innocence, “I was making your breakfast. I thought you’d be hungry.” Then she tilted her head in the direction of the living room. “And I thought I would clean up a little. But I was just about to wake you up because there are things I don’t know where to put, and the pancakes were going to get—”

  “Stop. Just stop.” An image of waking up to find this stranger standing over her flooded Janie’s forebrain. It was no comfort that Kristina Warger seemed so—young. “I need to know how you got in here,” she said.

  “I tried the door. It was unlocked.”

  Unlocked? Janie thought. That was impossible. Tom was too careful to have left it unlocked.

  She paused for a moment, her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “Did Tom send you?” she asked.

  “Tom who?”

  She’d awakened with almost ravenous hunger, but Janie was so stunned by the morning’s events that she could only pick at the pancakes, tasty though they were. Tom’s note, with its seductive ambiguity, was momentarily set aside in the question and answer session that followed her initial encounter with Kristina Warger.

  “Camp Meir,” Kristina finally told her. “That’s why I’m here. You struck a nerve with your inquiries. It required a—response.”

  “But—did someone send you, or is this your own thing …?”

  “Oh, I was sent.” She sipped her own coffee, then smiled.

  “By whom?”

  “Do you really want to know?”

  “Of course!”

  “Well, I’m sorry—I can’t reveal who sent me just yet. I’m going to need to find out a few things first. From you.”

  Janie glared angrily at her bold and presumptuous visitor. So audacious, she thought. But so much like Betsy! “If you know about my inquiries into the camp, then you must be keeping a pretty close eye on me already.”

  “Not really. You found us, actually. You accepted a cookie from the Web site. We just tracked it.”

  “I’m sure lots of people visit that site.”

  “You’re the only one without a kid.”

  Janie took a moment to let the sting of that remark dissipate, then said, “Oh, come on—I’m sure other people without a good reason have stumbled onto it.”

  “Stumbled, peeked, and left. You hung out on a couple of sites for quite a while. Printed one, even.”

  Janie felt her blood pressure rising. “So you’ve been looking at my computer activities—I’m going to assume then that you know an awful lot about me already.”

  “Some. What can be learned in that way. Computers do have their limits, you know. I’m still interested in knowing how you discovered Camp Meir in the first place.”

  “Discovered it? I didn’t discover it. I was told about it. I just checked into it because I’m doing some work for a boy who once went there.”

  There was a quick flash of recognition on Kristina’s face, and for a moment Janie expected to hear her speak the name Abraham Prives. But she was disappointed. Kristina simply said, “You printed the one with the boy in a wheelchair. We know from your resume—”

  “Wait a minute—you keep saying ‘we’—who is we?”

  Kristina Warger was apparently unaccustomed to interruptions, and seemed not to like them. “In a minute,” she said in a perturbed tone of voice. “I don’t want to lose my train of thought. As I was saying, we know from your resume and from other work of yours we’ve reviewed that you’re a very bright woman. You’re also a thorough and observant scientist. Your work in neurosurgery was nothing short of brilliant. By the way, we all think it’s a shame about your relicensing problem.”

  Janie stared in disbelief as the young woman continued her detailed recitation. “And your research work on the soil in London—well, what can I say, it was just magnificent. So impressive.”

  “I haven’t published that work yet.”

  For a moment, Kristina seemed not to know what to say. “Well, anyway, I’ve seen it. I didn’t realize it hadn’t been published.”

  “It’s on the hard drive of my computer. The one that was stolen. And on my computer at work. My attorney also has a print copy.”

  “Well, it’s not important how—”

  “Oh, yes it is. To me, anyway.”

  Kristina forced a smile and went on, apparently unfazed by Janie’s continued challenges. “It’s not important how we know the quality of your work. But we do. So naturally we assumed, when you looked at Camp Meir on the Net, that you put two and two together and came up with fifty-three. Or some other cardinal number.”

  “You could say that.”

  Janie took a long hard look at the young woman in front of her. She could not help but dwell for a moment on the realization that in about a month, her own daughter Betsy would have turned twenty had she not contracted DR SAM.

  This one’s not much older than that. Janie closed her eyes for a moment and tried to imagine Betsy sitting at a stranger’s kitchen table after having made herself quite comfortable without invitation; it was not a vision that came together neatly. Betsy had been a spirited child, but she’d never had the chance to discover her own power. She could not have done this.

  And where did this young woman, a creature of such tender years, come up with her audacity? Living through the Outbreaks had made some young people daring, even hard—weird cults had grown up among groups of adolescent DR SAM survivors. But was this girl hard?

  No. Daring, yes, tough, maybe. But Janie didn’t get hardness. There seemed even to be a bit of vulnerability there, some approval-seeking.

  “Now, maybe you’d better explain this we.”

  For a moment, Kristina Warger looked confused. “Um, we …?” she said.

  “Yeah, we. You just said we know this and we know that and we assumed the other thing. I asked you who we are.”

  “Uh …”

  “Don’t you remember?”

  Janie saw Kristina’s eyes move back and forth rapidly as she searched her memory. It was as if, during Janie’s momentary silence, the girl had drifted off somewhere.

  Then the light of recall flashed on her face. “Oh! Yes. We.” Recovered from her short lapse, she drew in a breath, as if preparing for a diatribe. But her explanation was short and so mechanically delivered that it appeared to her attentive listener to have been very carefully crafted, and then memorized.

  “We are an agency comprised of concerned citizen volunteers, and we investigate cases of what we think might be illegal genetic manipulation.”

  Simple enough, Janie thought. “A government agency?”

  Kristina seemed almost offended by that question. “Oh, no,” she said quickly. “Private. Completely independent. Volunteers, like I said.”

  “How are you funded?”

  The girl waited for a moment before speaking, as if deciding what she ought to say. There
seemed to be no script for this particular inquiry. “We have our ways” was what she put forth, quite tentatively. “But that shouldn’t concern you, at least not for the moment.”

  “Well, it does, whether you think it should or not, just like I’m concerned about how you’ve seen my London paper. But more concerned about why you’re here in the first place. It can’t be to compliment me on my scientific acumen. And I don’t believe anyone from Camp Meir sent you.”

  “Not exactly, no.”

  “Then there’s got to be something you want from me.”

  “Oh, there is.”

  “And that would be?”

  “We want you to do something for us.”

  What a surprise. “Which is?”

  “A little investigation.”

  “I’m not an investigator—but there are plenty of people out there who are. Why don’t you contact one of them?”

  “Because we don’t trust any of them.”

  “And you trust me?”

  “Yes. You’ve been—recommended.”

  “If you don’t mind my asking, by whom?”

  “Right now, I don’t think it would be good for me to reveal that.”

  She was playing cat and mouse with a kid. Could anything be more ridiculous? “Oh, for God’s sake, this is—”

  Kristina overrode Janie’s protests with a forceful elaboration. “We have some people flagged in our own database as possible victims of genetic manipulation.” As Janie stopped speaking, Kristina lowered her voice. “You’ve stumbled across some of them. And you have the skills to help us figure out what’s going on.”

  “But I’m not a geneticist.”

  “That’s all right. I know a lot about genetics. And we have people who can help you deal with the information you get inside—”

  “By inside, I presume you mean inside Big Dattie.”

  Kristina nodded. And then she took a small, folded piece of paper from one of her pockets. She unfolded it methodically and glanced at what was written before continuing. “Abraham Prives,” she said. “Your instincts on him were perfect. So we felt it was a good idea to look into you. And when we looked deeper, we liked what we saw.”

  Janie gestured in the direction of the living room. “You could have been a little gentler.”

  “How have we been ungentle?”

  “Last night—the break-in.”

  Her response was measured and very serious. “That wasn’t us. That’s why I’m here this morning. We didn’t think it was wise to wait any longer.”

  At first Janie refused to believe that Kristina and her group had had nothing to do with the break-in, but the girl was insistent. And despite her initial shock and anger, Janie found herself being drawn in, almost against her will, certainly against all common sense.

  “Then who could it have been?”

  “That’s what we don’t know, and precisely what we want to find out. It’s just too much of a coincidence that you should be looking into it, and then the computer you used to do that snooping was the only thing in your house to be stolen,” Kristina said. Then she leaned forward, and with a look of intense concentration on her face, she stared into Janie’s eyes.

  It seemed almost a challenge.

  It was. “We know you have the skills, the motivation, the tenacity to do this,” Kristina said, “to find out who’s trying to protect Camp Meir and why. But I should warn you—there may be some danger in it. If you decide you want to help us, and we hope you do, you should probably put your affairs in order.”

  It seemed a little extreme. “Will someone try to hurt me?” Janie asked.

  “Probably not physically. But you should make hard copies of everything, and get all your most precious possessions to a safe place. Just in case.”

  “When do I need to let you know?”

  “As soon as possible.”

  “How can I get in touch with you?”

  “We’ll be in touch with you.”

  And with that promise, Kristina left. She got into a tiny little car that she’d left parked in the driveway overnight, and drove off.

  From her kitchen door, Janie watched the car pull away and wondered where she was going.

  Then she sat down at the kitchen table to collect her thoughts. The note from Bruce, written by Tom, was still there. She picked it up and stared at it, hoping it would speak to her. But it remained stoically silent and confounding.

  It wasn’t their customary call time, but she badly needed a fix. She was relieved to find Bruce still in his office in London.

  “You won’t believe what’s happened in the last twenty-four hours.”

  Bruce listened, without interrupting, while she related the whole thing over the phone. From the excited tone in her rendition, it was plain that she expected him to share her fascination with the whole thing. But his reaction was far from encouraging.

  “I know you’re not going to appreciate this,” he said quietly, “but I don’t like the sound of this at all. Twice in two days you’ve had strangers in your house. Someone is ‘looking into’ you. Janie—I’m worried about you—this is bizarre stuff, and I guess I would expect you to be a little more hesitant. It sounds like you’re ready to jump right in. Maybe you should hold off—maybe you should just get a visa to anywhere you can and get the hell out of there. Quit your job and just leave. Go anywhere.”

  “Bruce, what are you saying? I can’t just leave—I mean, I would love to quit my job, but the rest of my life … I couldn’t just walk out.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because—because I have responsibilities, that’s why.”

  “What could be so important that you’d allow yourself to be put in danger?”

  The dignity of having something meaningful to do flashed into her brain. The adrenaline of doing it. Abraham Prives. And maybe a lot of other little boys.

  But she didn’t say any of those things aloud. “First of all, I don’t know that I’m really in any danger.”

  “A man is dead, and your house was broken into. A charming stranger shows up—who happens to be about the same age as your departed child, which of course will pull on your heartstrings—and tries to convince you to do something that reeks of illegality. That’s danger.”

  “I’ll be all right, I can take care of myself—”

  “And what about us? If you get into trouble, if you have problems, those things happen to both of us. We may never be able to work it all out so we can be together … is that what you want?”

  She thought her concern for their eventual reunion was a given, something he knew she would always pursue. How could he think it wasn’t important to her? It chafed at her that he’d even brought it up.

  “No, of course not,” she said after a pause. “But what about my responsibility to myself? I think this might be something I want to do. It feels—important.”

  “I know. You hate your job. I understand that. But you know it’s just temporary, until things get back to normal.”

  “Which is not likely to happen anytime soon.”

  “Janie, please, don’t do this.”

  “Bruce—please don’t ask me not to. It’s going to stick in my craw. It already is.”

  She heard him sigh. She was almost glad she couldn’t see him.

  “Did Tom leave you the note I asked him to?”

  “He did.”

  “Well, I meant it. I love you, and I just want what’s best for both of us.”

  After they disconnected, she crumpled up the note and tossed it in the recycling bin. It was time to settle some affairs.

  Her first call was to the Hebrew Book Depository. Myra Ross was only too happy to hear from her. “I’ll keep my schedule clear,” the curator said. “Call me as soon as you have the journal back.” Then she added, in an excited tone of voice, “This is wonderful. Just wonderful. I’ll look forward to hearing from you.”

  She expended precious gas on a drive to Tom’s office, after calling to be sure he would be ther
e. She took with her a pouch of personal items, mostly from her jewelry box: the engagement ring that her now-deceased husband had given her, some inexpensive but very precious pieces of jewelry that her mother had left behind when she too fell to DR SAM. Her grandmother’s silver service. A small paper envelope full of Betsy’s baby teeth and a lock of the little girl’s golden hair. Another data disk, this one with digital copies of her entire photo album and home video collection, which chronicled her life before things went bad.

  “I’m gonna need a bigger safe if you keep bringing things in here,” Tom told her when she arrived. “Maybe you should just move in.”

  “Hey, if I thought I could fit in that safe, I might consider it. Listen, Tom, is my will up-to-date?”

  “Of course. We did it three months ago.”

  “Oh. Right. I forgot.”

  Concern crept onto Tom’s face. “Well, you have had a lot on your mind lately, but you’re not usually forgetful, especially about things like that, so I guess I have to say I’m wondering …”

  His comment made her think of Kristina Warger, with her temporary memory lapse.

  Maybe it was something contagious.

  “And you have copies of my insurance policies?”

  His expression darkened even further. “Is there something I should know that you’re not telling me? You talked yesterday about needing to tell me some things. I have time right now.”

  She looked at him for a brief moment, and wondered if she should tell him about her morning encounter. She’d trusted him with everything; why not this? “No,” she finally said, though it made her feel sad somehow to utter the word. “It turned out to be nothing. It was just fatigue. My imagination gets out of hand sometimes.” She smiled. “You know that. It’s just that the other night scared me. I don’t want to lose the things that are important to me. Sometimes I think they’re all I’m going to have when I get older. If I get older.”

  “Are you being just a bit alarmist, maybe?”

  “No,” she said firmly. “I don’t think so.”

  Janie left her car parked near Tom’s office and took a cab. The fare was expensive, but seemed almost trivial in view of her sudden sense that everything in her life, including the journal, was exposed and up for grabs. She was very happy when the cab pulled up right outside the door of the book depository, leaving her only a few steps to traverse with her precious cargo.