"How is it that you can find so many, when I've never found one before they've woken up?"
"Maybe you don't know where to look."
Mary gave her a cold glare. "If you're going to toy with me, then we have nothing more to talk about." Then she turned her back on Jill and wove through the evenly spaced grid of hibernating children.
"It's the amulet," Jill finally admitted. "It glows when something devastating is about to happen. Something like a fatal accident…"
Mary turned to Jill, glancing at the blue-gemmed pendant she wore around her neck. It looked like cheap costume jewelry-but Mary was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. Certainly accidents, and untimely deaths, must set off ripples-not only in the living world, but through all levels of creation. It was possible that an object could resonate with such events-but how could Jill know specifically which accidents would result in a child falling short of the light, and into Everlost?
When the truth struck Mary, it struck deeply, as only the truth could.
"You stop them from reaching the light!" Mary said, with a 210gasp. "You know when and where the accidents will happen-then you wait for them to cross, and you stand in their way!" She looked at the kids on the floor, now caught in an invisible cocoon of transition. "These children weren't coming to Everlost-you guided them here!"
She only had to look at Jackin' Jill to know it was true.
Now things truly began to heave and buckle within Mary's soul-a shifting of purpose and design that went down to the core of her being. Finally Mary said:
"What a wonderful thing you've done here!"
Jill, who never seemed fazed by anything, was startled by that.
"Wonderful?" said Jill. "I wouldn't call it wonderful, but it does make me very useful to Pugsy."
As Mary looked over at the sleeping Interlights, waiting to be born into eternity, she realized that this was only a beginning, and what seemed so overwhelming just a few moments ago, now seemed like a tiny drop in a giant bucket.
"But don't you see," said Mary. "It is wonderful." Mary spread her arms out wide, and spun in a slow circle, feeling as if she was at the center of a gloriously expanding universe. "Look at all these children, Jill! You've saved them all!"
Everything changed for Mary after discovering Jackin' Jill's mysterious ability to keep children from the light. In the right hands, it was a power that was more awe-inspiring than any in Everlost. Mary could not help but feel that it
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was some kind of divine will that had brought this power to her. Now she saw everything as if refracted through the multifaceted blue topaz in the center of Jill's amulet. The future was sparkling and bright, and as her dreams sailed higher and higher, her sights became more firmly fixed on the western horizon.
She shared all this with Speedo, but he seemed more likely to shove his head in the earth rather than see Mary's big picture.
"If Chicago's not enough for you, we could go south to New Orleans, or north to Canada," Speedo said, pacing the Starboard Promenade. As the ship was moored and grounded-at least temporarily, Speedo had little to occupy his time beyond worrying. "We could even go back to New York."
"You're missing the point!" Mary said, with the most patient exasperation she could muster. "We must challenge the unknown, and the west is Everlost's greatest mystery."
"This isn't like you," Speedo whined. "Stability- routine-that's the Mary Hightower I know."
"I will find a peaceful routine for every child in my care," she assured him, "but to build a better Everlost, I must be willing to sacrifice my own routine for the sake of others."
"Build a better Everlost? Everlost is already here-you can't build what's already here."
Mary thought about Jill's incubator, and smiled. "I beg to differ."
Speedo just threw up his hands. It was no use-true, he was the closest Mary had to a confidant, but his thinking was numbingly limited in scope. She longed for someone she could share her revelations with-someone who could not only understand, but see the same vast horizon that she now saw. The future-her future-in fact the entire future of Everlost was spread out before her like a frontier. It wasn't merely her hope to subdue it-she had come to realize it was her destiny. Why else would Jill have come to her? Why else would she have such an urge to move beyond the bounds of the known afterworld?
"With Jill's help, and my guidance, we will save all the children we can, both here and in the west," Mary told Speedo. "And in so doing we will unite Everlost."
"There might not even be a 'west,'" he pointed out.
"Yes, I've heard the stories too," Mary said with a dramatic wave. "A giant cliff that falls off into nowhere. An ocean that pours off the edge of the earth. A wall of fire through which nothing can pass."
"What if one of those things is true? What if they're all true?"
"Didn't you tell me the Hindenburg made regular trips to Roswell, New Mexico, before it came into your possession-doesn't that prove there is something west of the Mississippi?"
"That's according to the finder who sold it to me-but finders can't be trusted-I know because I was one. He would have said anything to unload this thing!"
Mary sighed. "Let's not put the cart before the horse, shall we? Chicago first, and then we'll see where providence leads us from there. And of course we must not forget the threat of the Chocolate Ogre."
"Nick? He's probably forgotten all about you by now." Mary bristled at that. "I'm sure he hasn't! And I would prefer that you not call him by his living name. He is the Chocolate Ogre now."
"He was never an ogre, and you know it."
"After what he did, he deserves to be demonized."
Speedo backed down, not up for the battle. "Whatever you say."
Mary studied him closely. "After all this time, are you regretting the choice you made to stay with me?"
"Of course not," Speedo said. "It's just that sometimes… sometimes you scare me." In her book Order Now, Question Later, Mary Hightower has this to say about her enemies:
"In Everlost, just as in the living world, there are those who put their own selfish desires ahead of that which is clearly and obviously right. In these cases I have always found such enemies of virtue will eventually destroy themselves if left to their own devices. Although occasionally some assistance might be required."
CHAPTER 19 Eminence Green
Had there been any outside observers-biographers to mark the afterlife of Megan Mary McGill, better known as Mary Hightower-they would have marveled at how thoroughly she infiltrated Pugsy Capone's rule. How brilliantly, how slyly it was done! Mary, however, would never call herself sly, or even cunning. Ascendant, she would call herself. The way cream rises to the top. The way the wise are naturally elevated above the masses. Mary was the eminence gris-the shadow power-behind Pugsy's very short-lived "golden era," and while Pugsy had always been very good at tooling people to his own purposes, he himself was not the sharpest tool in the shed. So he never knew that his power was slowly being usurped.
"Your organization needs structure," Mary told him in confidence.
"It works fine the way it is," Pugsy insisted.
"Oh, yes, it does," Mary admitted, but she pointed out how very afraid of him his own subjects were. It was something Pugsy took great pride in, in fact. And so Mary proposed a little test. She asked Pugsy to call in one of his loyal subjects, and order him to perform a simple but time-consuming task. Curious as to where this was going, Pugsy called in a kid whose name he did not remember, and told him to do a head count of the hundred or so Afterlights living in the administration building, and then create a graph, plotting how each of them had died.
"I want it before sunset," Pugsy demanded. "Or else!"
The boy obediently ran off, took the entire day, and returned just as the day settled into twilight. He presented Pugsy with a list and a competent graph, and he cowered until Pugsy nodded his acceptance.
Then Mary asked the same of one of her own childr
en-a boy known as Bedhair-to graph the demise of all ninety-three in her care. The boy took only two hours, and he returned with a list, and not just one graph, but three: a coordinate graph, a bar graph, and a pie chart.
"You cheated!" Pugsy insisted. "He already knew the answers."
"Do you really believe that?" Mary asked in a calm and condescending way. "My children obey my requests because they want to, not because they fear what will happen if they fail. Consequently, they perform their tasks better."
It didn't occur to Pugsy that Mary never actually denied that Bedhair already knew the answers.
Mary also discovered that Pugsy did not personally attend to the transitioning Interlights that Jill continued to bring to the agricultural building. He found it beneath him, and left their assimilation to his flunkies. This provided Mary with a great opportunity.
She marked her personal calendar with the date that every sleeping Interlight would awaken, and made sure she was there to greet them when they did.
"Welcome to Everlost," she would tell the confused, and often frightened, children. "My name is Miss Mary, and you are among friends." Then she would present each of them with a volume of Tipsfor Taps, her definitive book for new arrivals to Everlost-each book painstakingly handwritten by her children on paper scavenged from Pugsy's troves. Grateful for her kindness, these new children would imprint on her like ducklings, ensuring their allegiance, while Pugsy became little more than a distant figure in their minds, a footnote in their world at best.
From Pugsy's point of view, high atop his regal Ferris wheel, nothing had really changed. His subjects still feared him and obeyed his every whim. But now it was merely because Mary allowed it. Only when Mary made it clear that her ambitions stretched beyond Chicago, did he begin to worry about her intentions.
"Tell me what you know about the west," she asked Pugsy one day. "Not what you've heard, but what you know."
"There is no west," he answered curtly. "Everlost ends at the Mississippi River."
"Have you been there?"
"What's it to you?"
"I just assumed that a leader of your stature would want to see it with his own eyes."
Pugsy took the flattery at face value and said, "I did. Once. There's a wind that blows from the other side. A crazy wind. I ordered a dozen Afterlights, one after the other, to cross the Centennial Bridge, but the wind wouldn't let them, and each one of them sunk right through the bridge, into the river."
The thought that he'd order so many Afterlights to their doom didn't sit well with Mary, but she tried not to show it. "Perhaps if you found a bridge that had crossed into Everlost…"
"There are no Everlost bridges that cross the Mississippi, because there's no Everlost there to cross into, so stop asking stupid questions." He eyed her with suspicion, and Mary realized she had pushed too far.
"Perhaps my next book should be a collaboration," Mary suggested. "I'm sure there are other things you know that I don't."
"And it'll stay that way," said Pugsy, closing the door to further conversation. But, as they say, when God closes a door he opens a window, and in Mary's mind, it was a window facing west.
Jackin' Jill took a close interest in the gradual shift of power. Pugsy was far too busy luxuriating in extravagance to notice it, and although Jill could have sown the seeds of his suspicion, she didn't. Pugsy's life before Mary's arrival had been one of decadent excess, but Mary's superior administrative abilities had made life better for all the Afterlights of Chicago-especially Pugsy. Even the leather armchair that served as his throne was gone, replaced by a gold embroidered settee that a pharaoh might have once used. It was a gift presented to him by Mary as a show of her loyalty to their partnership. Mary had traded the finest baubles of her own collection for the settee, and yet she had given it away to Pugsy, claiming his armchair for herself. Jill found this very impressive, because she knew exactly what Mary was doing. Pugsy's comfort was worth any cost, because the more comfortable he was, the less he'd be looking in Mary's direction. Jill dreamed that the next partnership would be between her and Mary-that together they would become the most powerful force in Everlost.
On this particular day, Jill carried two fresh sleeping Interlights to the incubator, both thrown over her shoulder like a hunter's kills. The incubator wasn't kept under tight guard anymore. Mary had declared that all Afterlights should be able to see this glorious place, as if it were a hospital nursery. After depositing the sleeping Interlights, Jill went to tell Mary that the incubator was now brimming with almost a hundred and seventy hibernating souls. She found Mary in the Hindenburg's Starboard Promenade, talking to another Afterlight-but not just any Afterlight. This one was a handsome skinjacker. A skinjacker by the name of Milos.
Jill tried to hide her shock, but couldn't. She had left Milos and his two miserable cohorts at the hands of an angry mob, and had assumed the mob had sent them on a long, slow trip to the center of the earth. She should have realized that Milos would have found a way out of it. He was so smooth-too smooth. Even now he looked at Jill with the suave hint of a gloat, and a grin that hid what must have been hatred, for how could he not hate her after what she had done to him? "Jill!" said Mary. "I'm glad you're here." She was either oblivious or pretending to be. She was smooth too.
"He's a liar!" Jill blurted out. "Don't listen to a word Milos says. If you have any sense you'll get him off your ship right now!"
Mary showed no signs of heeding her. "What an odd thing to say-I thought you two were friends. At least that's what Milos said."
Jill looked to Milos. The grin never left his face. "We parted under… uncertain circumstances," he said. "But Jill, I must say, I am surprised by your… how do you say it? 'Unprovoked hostility'."
"Whatever happened between you and Milos, I'm sure you're sensible and mature enough to put it behind you," Mary said. "Just as I've been able to admit how wrong I've been in my assessment of skinjackers, you should be able to resolve your differences. After all, we're all working for the greater good."
Jill was truly speechless, but she tried to salvage the moment. She turned to Milos. "Milos, I'm sorry, let's start fresh." She reached out to shake Milos's hand and he took it, clasping it a bit too hard, making it clear that bygones were not bygones, and that he would have his revenge. Jill squeezed his hand just as hard. Let him try to get back at her. Let him try!
"I really have missed you, Milos. How've you been?"
"Oh, Moose, Squirrel, and I have had some fine adventures, but now we're here. We must spend some time catching up."
Jill glanced to Mary. If she picked up the tension between Jill and Milos, she didn't care. Or perhaps the tension suited her needs.
"Now, then," said Mary, "I've been bringing Milos up to speed on your amulet, and how you've been using it to rescue children from the light. We now have four skinjackers instead of just one-isn't that splendid? It's been amazing all the things you've been able to accomplish all by yourself, Jill-think of how much more effective you'll be as a team!"
"I can only imagine," said Milos.
If Jill had a stomach, she would have been sick to it.
For Milos, finding Jackin' Jill was nothing compared to finding Mary Hightower. The fact that Jill was unable to ruin things for him was a good sign, and boded well for his future. If success was the best revenge, then his success with Mary would be sweet indeed-and a very bitter pill for Jackin' Jill, who had used him and discarded him.
Moose and Squirrel were still off paying tribute to Pugsy Capone, giving Milos time to follow Jill to the incubator, once his first audience with Mary was done. "I wanted to see your new scam with my own eyes," he told her the moment he knew they were alone. He looked out over the sleeping Interlights. "You've been busy."
"This is no scam," said Jill, practically spewing venom. "And whatever you think you're doing here, it's not going to happen. You'd better leave now if you know what's good for you."
Milos was not troubled in the least. Her th
reat was empty. He sauntered closer to her, then suddenly thrust his hand forward, grabbing the amulet, pulling it toward him. The chain didn't break, and instead it pulled Jill right to him, by the neck.
"Let go of me!" demanded Jill.
"I remember when I gave you this necklace," he said. "I traded a whole box of Twinkies for it. Do you know what those Twinkies were worth?"
"I said let go!"
This time Milos did, and Jill took a healthy step back from him.
"Does Mary know that your 'magical amulet' is nothing more than blue glass on a fake gold chain?"
Now Jill began to look scared. "Are you going to tell her?"
Milos chose to ignore the question. "What I want to know is how you do it. You obviously cannot see the future, so then how do you know when these deadly accidents will occur?"
Jill looked at him with fuming hatred. "Figure it out for yourself."
"Oh," said Milos, "but I already have."
The hatred in Jill's eyes peaked into desperation, and finally faded to defeat. "What do you want, Milos?"
Good, thought Milos. Now for the bargain. Few things were more rewarding than blackmailing a criminal. "I will keep your secret," Milos told her, "and in return, you will step back, and allow me to take first position among Mary's skinjackers."
"Mary chooses who she puts in charge."
"Mary will choose me," Milos said with confidence. "And when she does, you will support it, and accept my leadership." Then he smiled. "Just like old times."
"And if I don't?"
"Then I will tell Mary exactly how you find all these 'new arrivals.'"
Jill looked away, her lips pursing into an angry slit. "Fine. But don't expect me to follow your orders," she said, but Milos knew she would.
Milos left Jill to stew in her own afterglow, returning immediately to Mary, who wanted to brief him on the state of affairs in Chicago. At first she was guarded, but Milos could sense she needed someone to talk to-a new and sympathetic ear. And so he listened, and found everything she had to say fascinating. Perhaps she sensed that, because soon she opened up, sharing things beyond her dealings in Chicago. As stiff as she was, she seemed to relax just the slightest bit.
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