MINDBAND

by Pamela Sargent

 

 

Pamela Sargent won the Locus and Nebula Awards for her novelette “Danny Goes to Mars” (Asimov’s, October 1992). She has also been a finalist for the Hugo, Sidewise, and Theodore Sturgeon Awards. Her recent short story collection, Thumbprints (Golden Gryphon, 2004), is still available from the publisher in a unique boxed special edition with Pam’s own thumbprint. Her novel Farseed (Tor, 2007), a sequel to Earthseed (reissued by Tor in 2007), was named a Best Book for the Teen Age by the New York Public Library in 2008; Tor will publish a third volume, Seed Seeker, in 2010. The author’s last story for us, “After I Stopped Screaming,” appeared in our October/November 2006 issue. She returns to our pages with a complex tale that investigates the dark border where paranoia meets reality.

 

Chris stood on the porch of the Westview Bed and Breakfast. Across the street, in front of a white Victorian house, a sign on a patch of lawn read “MindData Associates.” An unusually large satellite dish hung from one of the house’s gables. The location of the enterprise was as understated as its website, which had revealed nothing more than its name, its Westview address, a phone number, a fax number, an e-mail address, and two vague paragraphs about communications technology and unspecified future projects. The only name featured on the site was that of a Matthew Bigelow Elmendorf, who bore the titles of President and Founder. She had phoned a few times and left voice mails and a couple of messages with a man who identified himself only as “Bob.” No one had ever returned her calls.

 

It had taken her several weeks to confirm what she had already suspected, that somewhere in the Pentagon’s budget there was a line for MindData Associates, an exceedingly modest expenditure by Defense Department standards but a sizable chunk of change for any small or even medium-sized business. Finding out that much had been almost accidental, and the data entry clerk who had passed on that nugget of information had left the Defense Finance and Accounting Service only a week later to retire to Florida. The clerk had mentioned her hopes of early retirement in passing, but Chris had verified the story anyway, calling the clerk at her cellphone number to learn that she was moving to Sarasota.

 

What she had also found out from the clerk, under the guise of doing a human interest story about local Federal employees, was that it was nearly impossible to track down Defense Department expenditures for some of the programs it funded, thanks to obsolete computers, incompatible systems, turf battles between different groups, and either indifference or discouragement from the top. It was impossible to audit most of the expenditures, and had been for some time. There was no way for her to find out from anybody she had talked to in the DFAS whether MindData Associates was a politician’s pet project, a sophisticated high priority research effort, a top secret operation, or a possibly fraudulent enterprise that had stolen millions of taxpayer dollars. The tracks of MindData Associates were already thoroughly obscured by a dysfunctional bureaucracy.

 

A month after she had abandoned the story, Jack Belzer, the station manager, had let it be known to the news department that he wanted Chris to take some time off; all her efforts to conceal her ever more obvious jumpiness and disorientation apparently hadn’t fooled him. By then the flashbacks were at the point where they would come upon her without warning, making her fear that one might hit while she was in the middle of a broadcast. The more she recalled of the night the Dunn Bridge had collapsed, the more convinced she was that MindData Associates was somehow connected to the incident.

 

She was on the bridge again, trapped in the crowd. “Some doofus screwed this project up big time,” several voices called out near her. “Hope somebody can turn off that transponder.” The surface under her feet suddenly buckled and gave way. She stumbled backward and found herself sitting in one of the large wicker chairs on the porch.

 

“Are you all right?”

 

The gray-haired man with the uncertain smile, another guest at the inn, had come outside. “Are you all right?” he repeated.

 

“I’m fine,” she managed to say. “Really.”

 

He sat down in the chair next to hers. “You sure?” She nodded. “Because you looked awfully unsteady there.”

 

“I’m okay.”

 

“If you don’t mind my saying so, maybe you didn’t have enough to eat for breakfast,” he said. “Couldn’t help noticing that you hardly ate anything.”

 

“I usually don’t have much for breakfast.” She tried to smile. “Have to keep my weight down for my job.”

 

“Your job?”

 

“I’m a TV news anchor at a station out in Indiana.”

 

“Sounds interesting.”

 

“It’s not as glamorous as some people think.” She glanced at him warily; he gazed back at her and offered her a half-smile. A retired guy, he had mentioned briefly in the dining room during breakfast while introducing himself, just passing through Westview; she didn’t have to worry about what she might inadvertently reveal to him.

 

“I used to work for a station here, though,” she continued, “over in Hannaford.”

 

“I never watched the news much,” the man said. “Not that I’m criticizing your profession or anything.” He shook his head. “I just never had the time, what with running my own business.”

 

“Then maybe you don’t know what happened in Hannaford four years ago.” She hesitated. She had been able to put that out of her mind after leaving this region, and then during the past year bits and pieces had started to come back to her—the crowds surging through the parking lot, the soldiers standing on the bridge.

 

“A crowd of people in Hannaford rioted one night, took over a mall, and then stormed a bridge,” she continued. “The city had to call out the National Guard, and then the bridge, with all of those people still on it, collapsed.”

 

“I remember now,” he said. “That was a big story.”

 

“I covered it,” she said. She was about to say that she had been on the bridge, that she was one of the survivors who had been pulled out of the river, but thought better of revealing that much. “They found out afterward that the bridge had some structural problems, but it should have stayed up for years, it was all those people stamping their feet in unison that made the bridge collapse. Resonance vibrations or whatever—that’s what caused it.”

 

“I know,” he said. “I studied engineering in college. All those people, just going nuts for no reason. They never did find out why, did they.”

 

“No, and none of the survivors could recall much afterward. Mass hysteria, that was the conclusion, which of course explains almost nothing.” Over a thousand people had died, including those who had been fished out of the river below the bridge only to die later, and the fewer than four hundred other survivors, according to the follow-up stories she had seen, apparently had memories as blank as her own. She wondered if other survivors were beginning to have flashbacks like hers, how many might still be in the area. Many of them had moved out of the region even before she had, ahead of the flood of anticipated lawsuits and criminal charges that had never been brought, perhaps because several police officers, National Guard members, and extremely well-connected citizens had also been among the survivors and the dead.

 

“It’s coming back to me now,” the man said; she started. “That was a really big story,” he added. “Even somebody like me couldn’t escape it, it was all over the newspapers and TV, and now it’s like everybody’s just forgotten about it.”

 

The front door of the MindData Associates building opened; two men in rumpled tweed jackets came outside and hurried down the steps to the sidewalk. She gazed up at the dish, noticing now that it wasn’t open to the sky or angled to receive satellite signals, but instead seemed aimed at the bed and breakfast and the buildings near it.

 

Chris stood up. “If you’ll excuse me.” She cleared her throat. “Better get my walk in now, feels like it’s going to be a warm day.” She left the porch and moved toward the street, following the men.

 

* * * *

 

“That’s where it happened,” Darlene said, pointing at the pylons that jutted out from the river. “That’s where all those people brought down that old bridge. Just totally collapsed from all their stomping around.”

 

Ceci leaned against the railing and peered down at the bluish-brown water below the walkway of the newly completed Dunn Bridge, which had been opened to traffic just three months earlier; the pylons were all that remained of the old bridge. The Mall Riot and Bridge Collapse—Ceci’s mental headline for the story Darlene was telling her—had been the first story told to her by her coworkers during her first day on the job. Before she had moved to Westview and found work in the nearby city of Hannaford, that story had been only vaguely recalled yet chilling televised images of a river of people streaming onto a bridge, followed by shots of the crowd stamping their feet and singing until the bridge gave way, rippling and then becoming a deep curve as the structure slowly fell apart. The people trapped on the bridge had looked like thrown-away dolls as they dropped into the river; Ceci had found out later that over a thousand people had died and fewer than four hundred had survived. At least that was what she remembered hearing when the story of the Hannaford riot had merited national and even international news coverage, before that story was displaced by other more recent and newsworthy tales of disaster on a large scale. The outside world had moved on, but people in Hannaford still clung to their brief moment of notoriety.

 

“My sister Kendra was on the bridge that night,” Darlene continued. Ceci was aware of that, too, because Darlene made sure that anybody new to the office quickly found out about her personal connection to Hannaford’s biggest story ever. “And she’s never been the same since.”

 

Ceci said, “Hmm,” in what she hoped was a sympathetic tone. The only reason she had agreed to take this stroll with her officemate during their afternoon break was that she knew some in the office thought her a bit snooty, a little too standoffish. “Sooner or later, Darlene’ll want you to take the walk,” Ceci’s coworkers had told her during her first week. “She’ll take you through the parking lot and down to the bridge and tell you all about how her sister was in the middle of the riot and could have been interviewed on Good Morning America and 60 Minutes and maybe even by Oprah but by then she just couldn’t get it together and she hasn’t been the same ever since.” The Hannaford riot was the most important event in Darlene’s life, even if only by proxy.

 

“She’s never been the same,” Darlene repeated. “She’s, like, how can I put it? Haunted. She’s, like, totally haunted and screwed up.”

 

“Does your sister still live around here?” Ceci asked.

 

“Oh, no, she moved away a few months afterward. She couldn’t have stayed around here, what with all those reminders. Almost none of them stayed around here, they say, the survivors, the ones who weren’t completely disabled, I mean, like, you can understand why they didn’t.” Darlene waved a hand at the pylons. “You know, Kendra never could remember anything much about what happened except this feeling that all these other voices, all these other thoughts, were kind of like rushing inside her and through her, that she wasn’t, like, really herself or just herself, but was turning into part of something else and being pushed around by something else, and after that it was like her brain had burned out.”

 

Ceci nodded, tuning the other woman out. Already she wanted to head back to her work station and close out everything around her. That was one of the side benefits of her monotonous job, she supposed, that its repetitiveness and simple routines could, for a time, numb her to the world around her and allow her to tune it out.

 

* * * *

 

Ceci was still trying to remember where she had left her cellphone as she drove home to Westview. Her last call had been from her sister Reine, who had told her that their mother seemed to be feeling a bit better, had eaten most of the lunch Reine had brought home for her, and had even pulled herself together long enough to stack some dishes in the dishwasher.

 

Then she knew where her cellphone had to be. Steve, her supervisor, had suddenly appeared at her work station; Ceci had cut Reine off and then dropped the phone into the open top drawer of her desk. Steve didn’t approve of any personal calls at work, even if people kept them short, even if you made up the lost time by shaving a few minutes off a break or a lunch hour and used a cell so as not to tie up the office lines. It was Steve’s fault that she had tossed the phone into the drawer instead of stuffing it into her purse, as she usually did, but she could blame her sister, too, for calling with the momentous news that their mother had felt well enough to eat lunch and stack the dirty dishes.

 

Her desk was locked; no one could grab her phone. But she felt completely disconnected, abruptly cut off from the world instead of tuning it out by choice.

 

Resentment welled within her. That tightening of her stomach and flaming of her face was becoming too familiar.

 

The music came to her just as she drove past the bed and breakfast. She did not recognize the tune at first, then knew it for an old Beatles song, “Eleanor Rigby.” The sound was so sharp and clear that she might have been listening through her iPod. She could almost believe that the music was right inside her head, centered right behind her eyes.

 

The music suddenly broke off.

 

A gray-haired man standing on the porch of the bed and breakfast was staring in her direction. She looked back at the street as her car turned the corner.

 

* * * *

 

The street was empty of traffic, except for a gray hatchback making a left turn. Marc thrust his hands inside his pockets. “Eleanor Rigby,” he thought. That had been one of Nora’s favorite songs. That had to be why he had imagined hearing it just now, why the tune had suddenly been inside his head, sounding a lot clearer than the song ever had on Nora’s old LP.

 

He had intended to drive into Hannaford to dine in a restaurant highly recommended by his pocket travel guidebook, but he had lost his appetite. He had never been prone to delusions, but he was hearing things now.

 

Nora had done this to him. It had been a mistake, thinking that he could put their breakup behind him by taking a road trip around the country, by getting as far away as possible from anything that might remind him of her.

 

It was all coming back to him again. I dread coming home, she had told him, never knowing what I’m going to find, never knowing if you’re going to harangue me or else be sitting around depressed. He had retired early, congratulating himself that he could easily afford to do it, that he’d sold the business at just the right moment and could spend more time with Nora, and that had been just about the time that she had decided she didn’t really want to leave her job after all, that she even sometimes enjoyed the pressure and the hassles and the extra hours and feeling that the people she was training and advising and getting placed in new jobs really needed her.

 

I can’t be everything to you, she had said. What she meant was that she didn’t want to be anything to him now. Maybe she was paying him back for all the times he had been away on business, late coming home, or had cancelled their plans for the evening or weekend at the last minute. It had taken retirement for him to realize that he had put so much of himself into his business that there had been nothing left over for the rest of his life, no hobbies, few friends, little knowledge of anything else except the business. At least there were no children to be caught up in his divorce; much as he had hoped for them once, he could be grateful for that now.

 

He went down the steps to the sidewalk and headed toward the town’s only eatery, a place just down the street, “Dan’s Cozy Corner,” a small shack with the wide windows and small sliding doors of an ice cream shop on one side of the front entrance. He could use a cup of coffee; he could use any distraction that would keep him from having to go back to the bed and breakfast and sit in his room or in the downstairs common area brooding about Nora and the years of shared life that had somehow slipped away from both of them.

 

* * * *

 

The gray-haired man walked past the other five tables and sat down at the one in the back corner. Reine had not seen him in here before, but had noticed him walking along the sidewalk in front of the bed and breakfast that morning. She guessed that he was yet another consultant brought in by MindData Associates, even though he didn’t look it in his trench coat and well-tailored slacks. Most of the younger consultants looked scruffier, with the pale faces and vacant stares of people who spent most of their time indoors staring at computer monitors, while the older ones were usually hard-looking and slightly overweight men. Summers brought tourists who wanted to be near the hiking trails or spend a few days at the lake, while winters brought the cross-country skiers, but the other two seasons belonged mostly to MindData Associates here in Westview, and a good thing, too. Without their employees and consultants, Dan Howell had often told her, and their continuing appetite for hearty breakfasts, hamburgers, hot dogs, fries, sandwiches, orders to go, and ice cream, his place might have gone out of business ages ago.

 

Reine came out from behind the counter. “What’ll it be?” she asked as she approached the man, flashing him her automatic smile.

 

He looked up from the menu. There was a lost look in his eyes, a sadness that made her think of that song that had popped into her head a short while ago. All the lonely people, she thought; she knew “Eleanor Rigby” because her mother used to sing it to herself back in the days when she had not been so lonely, before she and her daughters had ended up in Westview.

 

“A Danburger with cheese,” he replied, “and a cup of coffee, black.” He frowned. “Menu says you close at six.”

 

“That’s all right,” Reine said. “Dan’ll stay here long enough to cook your burger, and I’ll give you plenty of time to eat it before closing up. And if you want dessert, we can stay open until you eat your ice cream, unless you’d rather take a cone with you.” Ceci would be home soon; Reine would let her handle their mother by herself that evening.

 

The stranger wrinkled his brows and offered her an uncertain look.

 

“This used to be a Dairy Queen,” she continued, “but Dan bought back the ice cream machines after he gave up the franchise, so we can give you a tasty dessert.”

 

“I’ll see how I feel after I have the burger.”

 

She went back to the counter and called out the order to Dan in the kitchen, brought the man his cup of coffee, then returned to the counter to go over the day’s receipts. It struck her then that she had been working here for less than a year, and yet it was often an effort to recall any part of her earlier life ever since she had settled so readily into this one.

 

Even worse, she had dragged her sister into the life she had now.

 

The gray-haired man was still staring into space. She had expected him to take out a paperback or a newspaper to read, or to start distracting himself with a cellphone, as the solitary customers who came into the Cozy Corner usually did.

 

“One Danburger coming up.” Dan Howell pushed through the swinging door of the kitchen and set the burger, open-faced on a toasted bun with melted shredded cheddar cheese, sliced red onion, lettuce, and tomato, in front of her. “When I’m finished in the kitchen, mind locking up?”

 

“Of course not.” She was closing the place for him three or four nights a week now. Dan had grown to trust her, and she didn’t mind the extra responsibility, which kept her away from the house and Ceci’s resentful silences and their mother’s ever-present grief for a few more moments.

 

Dan disappeared into the kitchen. Reine brought her lone customer his food. “There you go,” she said.

 

“Thanks.” He put the burger together, ignoring the ketchup bottle on the table, and bit into it. “Pretty good,” he mumbled.

 

“Best burger in town,” Reine said. “It’s also the only burger in town unless McDonald’s or Burger King decides to move in.”

 

An unhappy look crossed the man’s face. Stranger that he was, she found herself feeling sorry for him; he looked as lonely and lost as her mother usually did. “I wouldn’t think there’d be that many customers for you, even without the competition.”

 

“Oh, you’d be surprised. I haven’t been here that long, but Dan told me that when this was still a Dairy Queen, he was barely scraping by. The only thing keeping him going was that his wife had a job in Hannaford and his son helped out whenever he was home from college. Then this new company moved in down the street and the bed and breakfast opened, and suddenly business really picked up. After that, when the interstate put in that exit two miles up the road, he decided to chuck the franchise and turn this place into the Cozy Corner. I started working for him after I moved here last year.”

 

She was running on, but felt that he wanted to listen to her, that he welcomed the conversation. “Want me to freshen your coffee?” she asked.

 

“Any rule against my buying you a cup?”

 

“If I have coffee now,” she said, “I won’t be able to sleep, and I have to be here early tomorrow for the breakfast crowd. And right now, I’d better finish tallying up the receipts.”

 

She returned to the counter, a bit surprised at the lack of alarm she felt. The man was a stranger, and she had no reason to trust him just because he looked respectable and well-dressed, but somehow she sensed that she had nothing to fear from him.

 

He said, “You don’t have to be afraid of me, you know,” and then his eyes widened, as if he had surprised himself by saying that to her.

 

She said, “I know.”

 

Catherine sat in her darkened living room, unable to will herself even to move. She should force herself to go to the kitchen and take the clean dishes out of the dishwasher. Ceci would be home soon; it would help if her daughter saw her doing something, even if it was just putting the dishes away.

 

“Eleanor Rigby,” she thought, wondering why she had heard that particular melody so clearly before. She used to sing that song when Jon was still alive, back when she was not one of all those lonely people, when she had still had her husband and her home and two reasonably contented daughters and more than enough reasons to get up in the morning and do the work of a day. She had not thought about that song since losing Jon. To have to hear it again inside herself seemed an unbearable cruelty.

 

The back door creaked open, then closed. “Mom?”

 

“Cecilia?” she replied.

 

“Where are you?” her daughter asked.

 

“In here,” Catherine managed to say; even saying that much was an effort. There were more sounds out in the kitchen, and then the stomping of feet.

 

Ceci appeared in front of her. She had her father’s reddish-brown hair. She folded her arms and thrust out her chin, the way Jon used to do. “Have you been sitting in here all day?”

 

Now the demands would begin. You’ve got to pull yourself together, you can’t go on like this, I can’t stand seeing you like this.

 

“I know I can’t go on like this,” Catherine said. “Got to pull myself together.”

 

Ceci sat down across from her. “I’m glad to hear you admit it.”

 

Catherine had not meant to say that. The words did not seem to belong to her. “It isn’t fair,” she continued, “having you and your sister stuck in this town worrying about me.” Those words didn’t seem to belong to her, either. “You should get out of here, both of you, just pack up and leave while you can still have your own lives.”

 

“We can’t do that until we’re sure you’ll be all right.”

 

Catherine began to hum, then realized what tune she was humming. Ceci jumped to her feet.

 

“Mom,” Ceci said, “why are you humming that particular song?”

 

She was about to say why the melody had been on her mind, but held back. The admission would only be yet another reason for her daughter to think she was beyond hope. Hearing old songs—pretty soon, she would be making a confession about the voices, the ones she sometimes heard whispering to her that Jon was waiting for her, that all she had to do to be reunited with him was to take some pills and tie a plastic bag around her head and lie down and never get up again.

 

“I don’t know,” Catherine replied.

 

“Mom—” Ceci began.

 

Catherine suddenly saw herself through her daughter’s eyes, a middle-aged woman with uncombed hair cascading over her shoulders, sitting there in the dark in her flip-flops and bathrobe, a mound of ashes and cigarette butts in the ashtray next to her because she couldn’t be bothered even to empty the ashtray. Ceci had to come home every day wondering if she would find her mother dead from an overdose, maniacally cleaning the house, still in bed, or the house engulfed in flames because she had been careless with a cigarette.

 

“Think I’d better put away the dishes.” Catherine slowly stood up. Her daughter looked up at her with eyes widened by surprise. “Then I’m going to get dressed. Then maybe we can decide what to do about supper before Reine gets home.”

 

* * * *

 

Marc climbed the short staircase to the long front porch of the bed and breakfast. He had stayed at the Cozy Corner for almost an hour, even allowing the waitress to talk him into having a chocolate dip ice cream cone. It had been surprisingly comforting to sit with her, and she had apparently wanted to talk.

 

Her name was Reine Alcott and she lived with her mother and her sister Ceci in Westview in a house that had once belonged to her grandmother. Her mother had moved there from a Philadelphia suburb after Reine’s father had been killed by a stray bullet on a city street during a drive-by shooting. It had taken three weeks for the police to find the killer, a seventeen-year-old kid who had been aiming at somebody in a rival gang, and almost a year more for the beginning of a trial that had ended with the kid sentenced to a twenty-year stretch.

 

Reine’s mother had moved as soon as the trial was over. By then she had been in bad enough psychological shape that Reine had not wanted her to live in Westview alone, so she had left art school to look after her and been fortunate enough to find work at the Cozy Corner a week after arriving here. Ceci, who had graduated from college last May, had moved in with them afterward and now worked in the financial office of a hospital in Hannaford. Reine worried about her mother, but at least she and Ceci had enough resources to look after her. Her job had its demands, but Dan was an easygoing boss and often allowed her to take time off to work on the paintings she still planned to exhibit someday. She spoke of the problems in her life with an easy manner and a lack of self-pity that had impressed him.

 

It occurred to him that he had not had such a long, almost intimate, discussion with another person in years. He had even told Reine Alcott a little about himself, that he had been in the business of installing central heating and air conditioning systems before selling his company and was getting a divorce after almost thirty years of marriage. “We grew apart,” he had explained, “so it’s probably for the best,” but Reine had tilted her head and gazed at him sympathetically.

 

He opened the front door and stepped inside. The strikingly pretty blond TV reporter he had met that morning sat on the sofa at the far end of the room, leafing through a magazine. The only other guest, a young man with short brown hair and wire-rimmed glasses, sat in an armchair in one corner, pecking away at a laptop. Marc had also seen him for the first time at breakfast, when he had appeared in the dining room just long enough to fill his travel mug with coffee and grab a muffin before heading out the door. Near the staircase, Brad Malinowsky, who owned and ran the inn with his wife Liane, stood behind the desk where guests checked in, writing in a ledger.

 

Brad looked up. “Good evening, Mr. Zechman.”

 

“I’ve been here for two days now,” Marc said, appreciating the younger man’s courtesy. “Think you could start calling me Marc.”

 

The young man in the corner suddenly snapped his laptop shut, slipped it under his arm, and headed for the staircase. The blond woman lifted her head and gazed after him. Her lips were pressed into a thin line; she looked angry.

 

Liane Malinowsky came into the room, carrying a cup and a plate with a sandwich. She was a slightly overweight woman with long black hair pinned up on her head. “There you go, Ms. Szekely,” she said as she handed the cup and plate to the blond woman. “Think you’ll like the tea.”

 

“Thanks, and please call me Chris.” The blond woman set the plate on the coffee table in front of her, then sipped from the cup. “How much do I owe you?”

 

“Not a cent. Our fault for not letting you know the Cozy Corner closes at six.”

 

Marc slipped out of his coat, draped it over a chair, then sat down in an armchair facing the sofa, close enough for the blond woman to talk to him if she felt like it but not so close that she would think he was flirting. His impending divorce had revealed to him that he no longer knew how to behave around women who were not either business colleagues or the wives of men he knew.

 

“This is good tea,” the blond woman said.

 

“If you’re still here this coming weekend, you can have more at our Sunday brunch and afternoon tea,” Liane said. “All the food, except for the imported tea biscuits, is homemade or from local farms. Just make sure you get down by nine, because we fill up pretty fast. Get folks coming in after church and then more people in the afternoon for the tea, and Dan’s Cozy Corner’s closed on Sundays.”

 

“I was wondering—” the blond woman began before falling silent.

 

Liane tilted her head. “Yes?”

 

“That business across the street, MindData Associates. What exactly do they do?”

 

Liane smiled. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

 

The blond woman uncrossed her long jeans-clad legs. “You mean you don’t know?”

 

“It’s got something to do with communications technology. That’s all anybody ever said whenever I asked. They’ve been there for almost four years now, moved in when Brad and I opened this place, and frankly they’re the difference between barely breaking even and making a profit. We almost always have one or two folks staying here who are connected with them, and sometimes a group, but we don’t see much of them. They get up and they head over there for the day and we usually don’t see them again until they come back and go to sleep.”

 

“You never got curious?”

 

Liane had seemed about ready to sit down on the sofa; now she backed away. “They pretty much keep to themselves. Once in a while, the owner drops in for the brunch or the tea with a couple of people. Anyway, we kind of have the feeling that whatever they’re doing, that’s their business. They’ve got some kind of government connection, and the only reason I know that is that some of our guests arrive here with government ID or credit cards. And as long as they keep giving us their business, that’s about all I care to know.”

 

“Can’t say I blame you for that,” Marc said, offering Liane a smile.

 

The innkeeper smiled back at him, looking a little more relaxed.

 

“I suppose . . .” the blond woman began. She had seemed about to ask something else.

 

“Better get back to cleaning up the kitchen.” Liane hurried from the room, followed by her husband.

 

Chris Szekely picked up the plate and nibbled at the sandwich, turning away from Marc as if to signal that she was uninterested in more conversation. He got up and walked toward the stairs.

 

* * * *

 

Reine was dancing, spinning around on tiptoes. The chandeliers above her flickered out and were replaced by a network of tree limbs. Ceci and their mother were dancing, too, arms outstretched as they twirled. Dan was to her right, standing under a tree, talking to the man who had come into the Cozy Corner that evening; a blond woman stood near them. She heard the sound of flutes and piccolos in the distance. She danced toward the trees, still spinning, as joy welled up inside her.

 

“Are you picking this up?” Dan asked her.

 

“Yes,” she replied, “and it’s wonderful, I feel so happy.”

 

“Then I think we’d better shut it down now.” That was Ceci, who was suddenly standing next to her. The music stopped.

 

Reine was awake. She lay there, holding on to the fading vision, which felt more like the memory of an actual incident. Her dreams didn’t usually feel so real, so much like part of her life that she had to lie in bed for a while before she realized that she had been dreaming instead of remembering the past. She curled up around her happiness and closed her eyes, refusing to look at the digital clock on her night table, not wanting to know exactly how much time she had left to sleep before she had to get up again.

 

* * * *

 

Catherine danced, twirling around on her toes, and looked up to see a canopy of tree branches. Reine and Ceci were also dancing, arms outstretched as they turned. Jon was there, standing under one of the trees with Dan, the man who had hired Reine to work in his café, and a blond woman she did not know. She heard the sound of wind instruments and danced in the direction of the trees, content to dance forever.

 

“Jon,” she said, reaching out to him. He smiled at her as she clasped his hands.

 

“Are you picking this up?” Dan asked her.

 

“Yes,” she answered.

 

“Then we’d better shut it down now.” That was Ceci, who was suddenly standing next to her. She could no longer hear any music.

 

She woke up. Jon had been there, under the trees; he was still alive. She clung to that certainty until she was alert enough to remember the truth, and longed to lose herself in her dream again. The man in the dream had been someone else, not Jon, someone taller with much grayer hair.

 

No, he was alive, she told herself, with her again in some way that she did not understand. She did not have to mourn him now.

 

* * * *

 

Marc got up feeling alert. He had awakened only once during the night, in the middle of a dream that he could now recall only in pieces. He had been in a wooded area, and the waitress from the place he had eaten at was there, along with the owner of the place and the blond anchorwoman, Chris Szekely. Someone else had been there, too, a woman he did not know. That was all that he could remember of his dream now, but thinking about it cheered him. He wondered why.

 

He went to the window and gazed across the street at the large white house with the big satellite dish. Lately he had been waking several times during the night, imagining that he was home again before reorienting himself; last night had been an exception. Maybe he still needed to catch up on his sleep. He had thought of checking out and leaving Westview that morning, but staying on for another day or two, maybe even into next week, might make him feel more rested.

 

* * * *

 

Reine approached the table, ready to take the order, when she heard Ted say, “. . . some home repairs, and maybe on Sunday I can get in nine holes at Hannaford Muni.”

 

“Then you’ll be getting more done this weekend than I will,” Bob said as Reine stood there with her pad and pencil. “Just hope I can catch up on sleep.”

 

Ted said, “And I still think moving the group away from here’s a bad idea.”

 

“Matt thinks it might be time to find a new site,” Bob replied, “and once he makes up his mind, it’s not easy to talk him out of it.” That was how she knew them, as Ted and Bob, no last names, even though they were regular customers. Ted was going bald, while Bob had thick wiry dark brown hair, but they both wore tweed jackets and had the same stocky build. They always paid in cash, as did the other employees of MindData Associates, although Dan accepted credit and debit cards. During all the times the two had eaten at the Cozy Corner, Reine had never heard either of them mention any wives or children, friends or family, hobbies or interests. All she knew about them was that they lived in a suburb of Hannaford about a twenty-minute drive away and that they worked at MindData Associates.

 

“You’re telling me,” Ted said, “but we don’t need more space, and how much more isolated can we get?”

 

“You don’t have to convince me. Talk to Matt. It’s not even that he really wants to move, he’s just wondering if we might have to. Look, maybe it’ll work out, depending on how this next phase goes.”

 

Reine’s fingers tightened around her pencil. Today had started off so well, what with her mother actually giving her and Ceci a hug before they left for work. If MindData Associates was thinking of moving its offices out of Westview, Dan’s Cozy Corner would really take a hit.

 

She forced herself to smile as the two men looked up. “What’ll it be?” she asked.

 

“The usual,” Ted said.

 

“Same for me,” Bob added. “The usual.”

 

“You got it.” The usual was coffee, orange juice, scrambled eggs, and toast for Ted and coffee, grapefruit juice, a Western omelet, and home fries for Bob, unless it was lunchtime, when the usual became a turkey club and cole slaw with coffee for Ted and a Danburger with cheese, no onion, fries, and a Coke for Bob. She wrote down their order and turned as another customer entered the café, a tall slim blond woman, a stranger; she sat down at a table near the door.

 

Dan came out of the kitchen. “Usual breakfast for Ted and Bob,” Reine said under her breath as she headed toward the woman.

 

“One of these days, maybe they’ll surprise me.” Dan glanced toward the new customer; his brows went up. “You look familiar, miss.”

 

The blond woman lifted her head. Reine glanced from her to Dan.

 

“I know I’ve seen you before.” Dan leaned against the counter. “Of course—you used to do the Action News, didn’t you? Chris Szekely. On WKLY.”

 

The woman sat up straight; her eyes widened. “That was a while ago,” she said. An uneasy smile flickered across her face.

 

“Not that long ago. Hair’s different, but your face looks the same, and I couldn’t forget you, not after the stories you did about that mall riot and the Dunn Bridge collapse.”

 

Ted stared at them. Bob had turned around in his seat.

 

“Well,” the woman said after a long pause, “I guess I should be glad somebody remembers me.”

 

“I’ll bet a lot of folks still remember you around here,” Dan said. “That whole business was just about the biggest deal ever in Hannaford.”

 

Reine knew what he was talking about; Dan had related the whole story to her not long after hiring her, as she had only a vague recollection of news broadcasts and items about the incident. Even her mother, reclusive as she had become, was aware of the riot and bridge collapse that had given Hannaford, for a brief time, national notoriety. People around here seemed to take an odd pride in the story, as if its drama and significance had somehow lent them more importance than they would have had otherwise.

 

The woman leaned forward. Reine noticed that her hands were balled into fists. “Yes, it was a big story.” Her voice was so low that Reine could barely make out her words. “I’ll have a cup of coffee, please.”

 

“Just coffee?” Dan asked.

 

The woman nodded.

 

“Cream and sugar?” Reine asked.

 

The woman shook her head. “Black.”

 

Dan retreated to the kitchen. Reine grabbed three mugs from under the counter and went to the coffee machine. She poured one cup, brought it to the woman, then filled and carried the other two mugs to Bob and Ted.

 

Reine heard the door creak open. She turned and saw her mother close the door, move toward an empty table, and sit down.

 

For a moment, Reine was too shocked to stir. That was the first surprise, that her mother had actually pulled herself together and left the house. The second was that she had combed her hair and pinned it up and looked reasonably well-groomed in her short red jacket and black slacks.

 

Reine went to her. “What can I get you?” she said almost automatically.

 

Her mother looked up, her lips curved in a gentle smile. “Oh, just a diet ginger ale.” She shook her head. “Think I’ve had enough coffee already.”

 

Reine leaned toward her. “Are you sure you’re all right?” she whispered.

 

“I’m fine,” her mother replied. “I’m all right, really, just felt like taking a walk.” Her eyes narrowed; she stared past Reine and tilted her head, as if listening to something.

 

Reine straightened. The blond woman was staring at her mother. The woman set her cup down, stood up, and walked toward them.

 

* * * *

 

Chris was picking up more whispers, words and thoughts that didn’t seem to belong to her. She had heard them last night, after getting out of her car, even though there had been no one else in the small parking lot with her. The whispers had been more insistent that morning, as her vivid memory of a dream of dancing in a forest grove had faded. Nothing to worry about, she had told herself, nothing like the intermittent whispers that occasionally evoked memories of that night on the collapsing bridge.

 

“I won’t ever forget him,” Chris murmured as she headed toward the waitress and the older woman, “but it’s past, and now, finally, I can think about him and remember him without wanting to die.” Those words were not her own.

 

The waitress took her arm as Chris sat down. “You’re shaking,” the young woman said.

 

Chris saw that her hands were trembling. She managed to slip from the younger woman’s grasp. “It’s all right, dear,” Chris heard herself say, “I’m feeling better, really I am. I’ve been mourning Jon much too long.” He would have wanted her to go on, she realized, and now she was recalling the time he had said that to her, only a few months before his death. “Don’t want you turning into my mother,” he had told her, “sitting around in black, talking about my dad watching over us from above.” They had laughed then, because the thought of either of them dying had seemed so distant.

 

“Don’t want you turning into my mother,” Chris continued, “sitting around dressed in black and talking about Dad watching over us from above.”

 

“Are you all right?”

 

Chris forced herself to look up. The waitress was backing away. The older woman’s eyes widened. “Are you all right?” the woman repeated.

 

She did not trust herself to speak. Someone else was whispering to her now. “. . . tell Matt about . . .” But that voice was coming from outside of her. Chris leaned back, willing herself to be calm, and knew that she was inside herself again.

 

“It was very sudden, wasn’t it,” Chris murmured. “Your husband’s death, I mean.”

 

The two men who had been sitting in the back were talking to the waitress. “But what about your breakfasts?” the waitress asked as one of the men thrust several bills into her hand.

 

“It’s okay,” one of the men replied. “Guess we’re not that hungry after all.” They hurried outside.

 

The older woman was standing next to her now. “Maybe you need some air, too,” she murmured to Chris. “Mind taking a walk with me?”

 

* * * *

 

Reine stood in the doorway of the Cozy Corner. “It’s all right,” Catherine called out to her. “I’ll be back in just a bit.” She leaned toward the other woman. “She’s my daughter,” she explained.

 

“Yes,” the blond woman whispered, “I know.”

 

Catherine said, “So you picked that up, too.” The woman began to cross the street; Catherine kept at her side. “A couple of weeks ago,” she went on, “I would have just assumed I was imagining this, that I was going crazy. You were saying just what I was thinking before.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“It was almost like I was listening to myself. And you knew my husband was—that he—” She paused. “It’s just a coincidence, has to be.” Reine looked much like her; someone in town might have mentioned that Catherine was a widow.

 

The other woman gazed at the building occupied by MindData Associates. The two tweed-jacketed customers who had rushed out of the Cozy Corner stood in front of the white Victorian with the big satellite dish, looking in Catherine’s direction.

 

“Excuse me,” the balder of the two men called out, “but I was just going to say—”

 

The blond woman narrowed her eyes. “We remember you, too,” the other man interrupted. “From the news, I mean, when you were doing those follow-up stories about the bridge collapse. We lost one of our own people there, a young researcher.”

 

“I know.” A mixture of emotions flickered across the blond woman’s face; Catherine saw fear in her eyes and then the glint of anger.

 

“Huge story,” the balding man said.

 

“Yes,” the blond woman said in a low voice. “It was just the kind of story that might have been my big break. Unfortunately just the opposite happened. WKLY started worrying that I might be suffering from something like post-traumatic stress disorder, that maybe I’d break down during a broadcast. The business manager was probably wondering how much their insurer was going to have to shell out to my therapist, not that therapy ever did me much good. And of course there was the possibility of a lawsuit or charges of some sort sooner or later, and my contract was running out anyway. So I got canned.”

 

“Sorry to hear it,” the balding man said.

 

“Oh, I found other work eventually, after I left the area.”

 

“Well, I’m glad to hear that.”

 

The blond woman’s lips were pressed together; Catherine could see the rage inside her.

 

“Better get going,” the younger man said to his companion. The two bounded up the front steps to the porch of the Victorian and disappeared through the front door.

 

“Are you all right?” Catherine asked. The other woman, still gazing after the men, did not reply. “Guess I should introduce myself—I’m Catherine Alcott.”

 

The blond woman turned toward her. “Chris Szekely.” Now she seemed distracted. “It’s a coincidence, what I said. I’m okay now. Ever since the bridge—” She looked down.

 

“It’s all right,” Catherine said. “I understand. This is the first time I’ve left my house in—” She had to recall how long it had been and was suddenly dismayed at herself. “Months, except for maybe wandering into the yard once in a while or taking a walk around the block. If it weren’t for my daughters, I don’t know what would have happened to me.” She reached inside her purse, fumbled for her cigarettes, and slipped one from the almost empty pack.

 

Chris Szekely lifted her head; she looked calmer. Then she glanced toward the large white house. “I don’t suppose you can tell me anything about what they do. MindData Associates, I mean.”

 

Catherine lit her cigarette. “I’m afraid not,” she replied, “but you could ask Reine. My daughter, I mean, the waitress. But she never said much to me about them except that they’re regular customers.”

 

Chris Szekely offered her a wan smile. “Then there’s probably no point in asking her.” She paused. “Sorry about my little lapse.” Before Catherine could say anything more to her, the blond woman turned away and walked toward the bed and breakfast.

 

* * * *

 

Reine had talked Catherine into having lunch at the Cozy Corner. There had been only one other customer, a trucker who had pulled off the highway, so they ate their turkey sandwiches together after the trucker had paid his bill and left. They said little about the blond newswoman, with Reine briefly commenting on how creepy she had sounded and Catherine mentioning only that the woman was obviously still deeply affected by her past experiences.

 

“I was wondering,” Catherine said, and then paused.

 

“What is it?” Reine asked.

 

“That TV reporter—she asked me if I knew anything about MindData Associates.”

 

“So what did you tell her?”

 

“I didn’t tell her anything. I don’t know anything. I did say that maybe she should ask you.”

 

Reine finished the last piece of her sandwich. “I don’t know much about them, either.”

 

“They come in here all the time, you’ve said so. I thought you might have picked up some information.”

 

“You’re awfully curious about them all of a sudden.” Reine reached across the table and grabbed her hand. “Not that I mind. I’m glad to see you up and about and interested in things.” She sighed. “Actually, I know almost nothing about them except that they’re some kind of communications company.”

 

“Doesn’t that strike you as odd? I mean, you’ve been working here for a while now.”

 

Reine glanced toward the kitchen, where the proprietor had gone to prepare his own lunch. “Dan doesn’t know anything, either,” she said softly. “When I first started here, I asked him about MindData Associates and he said he didn’t have a clue and that it didn’t matter, what mattered was that they helped keep this place going. It’s pretty much what everyone in town seems to think . . . they don’t know, they don’t care, and it isn’t any of their business anyway. And I never got the feeling—” She paused, then continued in a whisper, “A couple of times, I’d ask one of them about what they did, just a casual question, but I never got a real answer, just a blank stare or some mumbo-jumbo about systems management or research and consulting on satellite technology or communications in general. I wasn’t about to push it.” She shrugged. “After all, they are good customers, their boss seems like a nice old guy, and their offices don’t look any different from what you’d expect.”

 

“You’ve been inside their building?”

 

“Sure. Sometimes they’ll order lunch, or sandwiches if a few of them are working late, and ask us to deliver the food. Bob’s got his desk in the front room, with a computer and a couple of file cabinets and what looks like a supply closet. Haven’t seen the other floors, but I wouldn’t imagine they’re anything unusual.”

 

Catherine sipped coffee. An unfamiliar sensation stirred inside her, cheering her and yet making her apprehensive at the same time. Curiosity, she realized. It had been a while since she had been curious about anything.

 

* * * *

 

Someone was following her. Chris turned as a car passed her, but saw no other vehicles on the road. She had been walking ever since leaving Dan’s Cozy Corner, trying to clear her mind. She had passed the bed and breakfast and then kept on going until she was well outside the town, surrounded by the open fields sprouting with new grass that separated Westview from the nearest Wal-Mart.

 

She was alone. There were no voices whispering inside her now, but someone had been following her. She was certain of it; she had sensed it.

 

She stopped and took a breath. No one was following her now; no one else was on the highway. Time to turn back, she thought. Judging by what she recalled about her drive to Westview, she would encounter more traffic before too long, vehicles heading toward the Wal-Mart, and there was no sidewalk or even much of a shoulder along the road.

 

A car appeared at the top of the small hill up ahead. She recognized the blue Toyota that had passed her before. She halted and watched the car as it approached, then saw that the driver was one of the two men who had bolted so abruptly from the Cozy Corner.

 

The car slowed as it neared her, then stopped. The balding man behind the wheel beckoned to her. She hesitated, then crossed the road and stood next to the driver’s side of the car.

 

The window rolled down. “Need a ride back?” the man asked.

 

Chris was silent.

 

“Name’s Ted. Thought you might like a ride.”

 

Chris said, “You were following me.”

 

“Not at all. This is the route I always take when I head home.”

 

Maybe it was, she thought. Maybe he was leaving work early today.

 

“Hey, believe me, I’m not some weird guy, just happened to be going this way. Anyway, I don’t mind giving you a lift back.” Ted looked up. “Looks like it might rain.”

 

She doubted that; the few grayish clouds overhead didn’t look like rain clouds to her. But maybe this was her chance to find out more about MindData Associates. “That’s very kind of you,” she said. “I’m staying at the Westview Bed and Breakfast.”

 

“Figured as much.”

 

“Thanks.” She walked around the front of the car and got in on the other side, sensing that she was safe, at least during the short ride back to town.

 

“What brought you to Westview, anyway?” he asked as she fastened her seat belt.

 

He already knew who she was, and that she had survived the madness of the bridge collapse; he would never believe that she had come here simply to relax. “I’m visiting a couple of old friends in Hannaford,” she said.

 

The car moved forward. “There isn’t any chance you might come back to one of the local stations, is there?”

 

“No. I’m doing all right where I am. Maybe someday I’ll get another big story.” She heard the bitter tone in her voice. “And what do you do?”

 

“Work for MindData Associates.”

 

“I guessed that much. What kind of work?”

 

“Systems manager.”

 

That told her little, but also made it impossible for her to ask more questions without seeming intrusive. “I wouldn’t have thought you’d have that much of a system to manage,” she said. “That building of yours doesn’t look like it could house that many employees.”

 

He glanced at her, then looked back at the road. “Even a small computer network has its quirks.”

 

The car climbed another slope and passed the abandoned brick schoolhouse that marked the edge of Westview. “This town’s been a good place for us,” Ted went on, “quiet, nice folks, no distractions.”

 

“Didn’t you used to have offices in Hannaford?” she asked.

 

“Yes, we did.” He glanced at her again. “I’m surprised you remember that.”

 

“Local businesses were one of the things I kept up with at WKLY.”

 

“Matt was thinking of moving out of Hannaford even before our lease ran out, and then the building here came on the market, so we moved and it’s worked out pretty well for us.”

 

“So your company owns the building?” she said. “You aren’t just renting space?”

 

“Matt figured that owning it made more sense for us.”

 

“Guess that means you plan to stay for a while.”

 

“I hope so. I mean, we’ve got nice offices and a quiet environment and at this point, we’re kind of important to the economy of this town. I’d hate to do anything that might set the people here back.”

 

Strange, she thought, that he would be that concerned about the welfare of Westview’s residents.

 

He pulled up in front of the inn. “Thanks for the ride,” she said.

 

“No problem.”

 

She got out of the car and walked toward the porch, hurried up the steps, then turned around. Ted drove down the street in the direction he had come; his car disappeared around a corner. She went inside and stood by one of the windows that looked out over the street.

 

“Feeling better today?” someone said behind her.

 

Chris turned to see Marc Zechman. “Yes,” she replied.

 

“Glad to hear it.” The man wore a trench coat, obviously on his way out. He nodded at her again, then opened the door and stepped outside.

 

She continued to wait by the window. As she was about to give up, she saw Ted’s blue Toyota coming back along the street. She watched it pull into the small parking lot next to the offices of MindData Associates.

 

He had been following her.

 

* * * *

 

Chris lay in her room, unable to sleep. She could follow Ted home, where he might be more willing to answer a few questions. She could nose around some more in the tiny town library, where she had perused various town records and called up past local news stories on one of the four public computers and learned only that the Victorian housing MindData Associates was owned by Matthew Bigelow Elmendorf and that he also lived in the building in an apartment on the top floor. He had left few tracks on the Internet; he had attended CalTech in the late 1950s but had no degree. He had given a less than revealing interview to a local weekly after moving to Westview, saying only that he and his associates worked in communications and consulted with various firms in other parts of the country. The photo published with that story was of an affable, rumpled-looking man with thick white hair and crinkles around his eyes. The interview had yielded quotes from Elmendorf about the untapped energy of human minds, the possibility of transmitting thoughts through what he called a “mental broadband,” and a hope that humankind might be able to transcend violence if people could communicate their deepest longings and hopes to one another. The interview made him sound like either a harmless crank or a charlatan. She had found no other news items about him or his company.

 

“Kind of a hermit,” the librarian had told her; Chris had not noticed that he was looking over her shoulder.

 

“Excuse me?” she had said.

 

“He’s kind of a recluse.” The librarian was a young round-faced man with broad shoulders who looked more like a football coach than a librarian. “Matthew Elmendorf, I mean. You almost never see him around town, and the only way you even know if he’s home is when the lights are on in his building at night.”

 

She got out of bed, pulled on her bathrobe, and left the room. The hallway’s dim light was enough for her to find her way down the stairs. There was no one in the common area. She went into the front room and leaned against the window.

 

Across the street, light shone from the windows on the second and third floor of the Victorian. Three in the morning, she thought; either Matthew Elmendorf was having trouble sleeping or someone at MindData Associates was working very late. She was tempted to get dressed, walk over, and demand to be admitted.

 

That might be dangerous, as would following any of the employees home after work. If MindData Associates had anything to do with the mall riot and the Dunn Bridge collapse in Hannaford, they would have reason to be concerned about anyone who might connect them with that incident. And she had no real proof of any involvement, only an occasional flashback that induced a strong, persistent sense that they were somehow involved in what had happened.

 

“Guess I’m not the only one staying here who has insomnia,” a voice said behind her.

 

She turned, barely able to see him in the darkness. “Mr. Zechman.”

 

“Please—call me Marc. I was reading until I got tired enough to turn in, and thought I heard something below, on the porch. I have a good view of the street from my room, saw that young kid, the other guest here, heading over to that big house.”

 

“MindData Associates,” Chris murmured.

 

“They’re working kind of late,” Marc Zechman said.

 

She suddenly had the feeling that the young man, Ted, and Matthew Elmendorf were sitting in one of the offices talking about her, maybe deciding what to do about her. She stepped back from the window as the room filled with light.

 

She looked around and saw that Marc, his hand still on the switch, had turned on the overhead light. “Turn it off,” she whispered.

 

“I only thought—”

 

“Turn it off !” She backed up, wanting to get as far away from the front windows as possible, thinking that somebody across the street might already have seen her outlined by the light.

 

The light went off. “Are you all right?” Marc said in the darkness.

 

She took a deep breath. “I’m fine,” she answered. “It’s just that—” For a moment she wanted to tell him about her suspicions. “I’d better go back to my room.” She headed for the stairs.

 

* * * *

 

Chris stood on the porch, looking across the street. The young man whom Marc Zechman had seen leaving the bed and breakfast in the middle of the night had checked out that morning, while Chris was still finishing her second cup of coffee. He had put his bags in his car after parking it in front of the inn, walked over to MindData Associates, disappeared inside their offices for a while, then returned to his car and driven away.

 

The waitress from the Cozy Corner hurried along the sidewalk, then crossed the street, carrying two large shopping bags by their handles. She went up the front steps of the white Victorian; the front door opened and she disappeared inside the house.

 

Chris left the porch and ran across the street to the building, hesitated for a moment in front of the door, then pushed it open.

 

The waitress stood in front of a desk with a couple of computer monitors and a keyboard. At the back of the hallway, a printer sat on top of an old table and two file cabinets stood on either side of a metal closet. Two armchairs with high backs and a loveseat were to Chris’s right, facing the desk. The curly haired man who had been with Ted the day before at the Cozy Corner was rummaging in a desk drawer. He looked up as Chris approached the desk.

 

“Any chance of my getting in to see Matthew Elmendorf ?” she asked.

 

The man said, “We were just about to begin a lunch hour meeting.” He waved at the two shopping bags on his desk.

 

“Then maybe I could make an appointment.”

 

“We’re kind of busy right now.” The man thrust several bills at the waitress. “Thanks, and keep the change,” he said.

 

The young woman nodded at him. “You’re welcome.” She glanced at Chris as she moved toward the door.

 

“I’m free this afternoon,” Chris said, “but if that’s not possible, I can always come back tomorrow.”

 

“I’m afraid we’re really tied up today and tomorrow.”

 

“Then maybe the day after that,” Chris said.

 

“I’m afraid that wouldn’t work, either.”

 

“How about three days from now?”

 

“On Saturday? We usually take the weekends off, unless—”

 

“Oh, I wouldn’t take up much time, and I understand Mr. Elmendorf lives in this house, and since I’m staying just across the street—”

 

The waitress left, closing the door behind her. “Ms. Szekely,” the man said in a lower voice, “I think you’d better leave now.”

 

“I’m willing to wait until after your meeting’s over.”

 

He frowned. “We’re really tied up. You can’t wait here. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to get ready for our meeting.”

 

She stood there, wondering what he would do if she refused to budge.

 

“If you don’t mind—” He glared at her, as if daring her to provoke him. “If you want to talk to Matt for some news story, we really don’t need any publicity at the moment.”

 

“Maybe you do,” she said. “I haven’t even been able to find out exactly what your firm does, and nobody I’ve spoken to seems to know, either.”

 

“I think you’d better go.” He paused. “I’ll tell Matt you were here.”

 

She had the feeling that she had pushed him far enough. “Maybe I’ll come back later, then.” She moved toward the door, went outside, then heard footsteps behind her and the metallic snap of a door being bolted from the inside.

 

* * * *

 

Chris wandered over to the library, where the librarian assured her that there was little more information about Matthew Bigelow Elmendorf and MindData Associates than what she had already seen. She searched for more items online, but found nothing that she had not already read. She walked back to the bed and breakfast to find Liane Malinowsky sitting in the front room with Catherine Alcott.

 

“We’ll be over by six on Friday,” Catherine was saying as she stood up. “Thanks for arranging this on such short notice, and now I’d better go home and tell Ceci what I’m planning.”

 

“I thought you wanted it to be a surprise,” Liane said.

 

“It’ll be a surprise when I tell her. That’s enough of a surprise without springing it on her at the last minute. She’ll appreciate having some advance warning.” Catherine looked up at Chris. “I’m arranging a small dinner party for my daughter’s birthday.”

 

“The waitress?” Chris asked.

 

“No, my other daughter, Cecilia. I thought it would be nice to have a birthday dinner for her here, just Ceci and Reine and me.”

 

“Oh, by the way,” Liane said, turning to Chris, “there was a phone call for you about a half hour ago.” Chris frowned; anybody calling from Indiana would have called her on her cellphone. “Matt Elmendorf, from across the street,” Liane continued. “Didn’t say what he wanted, just asked if you could call him back and left me a number.” She got up, fished around inside the pocket of her long sweater, and handed Chris a small piece of paper.

 

The number was not the MindData Associates number she had called in the past. “Thanks,” Chris said. “I’ll call from my room.” She hurried toward the stairs and then up to her room. Her hands trembled slightly as she unlocked the door; she slammed it shut and leaned against it.

 

Now that she would actually get to speak to the mysterious Matt Elmendorf, she wondered what she could possibly say to him. You had something to do with that riot, it keeps coming to me during flashbacks. If I’m thinking that, other survivors might be wondering about it, too, so maybe you’d like to tell me what’s going on.

 

She might only be endangering herself if she voiced her suspicions. If she was going to confront him, then she should bring someone along to back her up, somebody like Joel Hickel from the Hannaford newspaper if he was still around, a large man who could look intimidating. In any case, she could prove nothing; Matt Elmendorf wouldn’t even have to worry about trying to silence her because nobody would believe her.

 

She went to the bed, sat down, rummaged in her pocketbook for her cellphone, then thumbed his number. There were two short tinny rings and then a soft click.

 

“Hello,” a tenor voice said.

 

“This is Chris Szekely. Am I speaking to Matthew Elmendorf ?”

 

“Indeed you are.”

 

“The proprietor of the Westview Bed and Breakfast told me you called.”

 

“Yes. One of my associates said you dropped by earlier. Perhaps you could tell me what you wanted to speak to me about.”

 

Chris said, “I think you know.”

 

“I don’t care for guessing games, Ms. Szekely. Enlighten me.”

 

“Four years ago, a mob suddenly went on a rampage at a mall in Hannaford and then swarmed outside and took over the old Dunn Bridge. They had to call out the National Guard. I covered that story for WKLY.”

 

She heard him sigh. “We lost one of our people when the bridge collapsed. Elwood Bannister—nice young fellow, not the type you’d ever think would run amok like that, but a mob is a funny thing. People do things in a crowd they’d never think of doing by themselves or in a smaller group.”

 

“You lost two of your people,” Chris said.

 

“I beg your pardon?”

 

“An electronics engineer, Simcha Olmer. You lost him, too. I remember because I was part of the mob, I was covering the story and then—” For a moment, she could not breathe. Her face burned; her heart throbbed painfully against her chest. “Afterward, I had to know who had died and who the other survivors were, see if I could find some kind of thread that might connect us, if there—” She swallowed hard and took a deep, shuddering breath. “Simcha Olmer was one of your people. He committed suicide a week after the bridge collapse, I checked the autopsy report. I’d become kind of obsessed with that riot and what had happened by then, by what could have caused such a thing. Kept looking for anything that might be connected to it, and I couldn’t escape the feeling that MindData Associates had something to do with the whole thing. I was picking that up on the bridge—” Chris took another deep breath. “Other people’s thoughts were leaking into mine and then there was this feeling that we weren’t separate at all, that we were just one mind, and now it’s happening to me again, hearing whispers inside my head, picking up all these bits and pieces that aren’t my own thoughts.”

 

Matthew Elmendorf was silent for a while. “I assume you’ve consulted a therapist.”

 

“Oh, yes, but I never mentioned anything about picking up other people’s thoughts and feelings during the riot because I couldn’t really remember much of what had happened afterward, and I didn’t want him to think I was completely crazy, but now—it’s almost as if it’s all coming back to me, everything I forgot before.”

 

She had said too much, babbled on for too long. She waited for him to say something to her.

 

“Simcha Olmer was a depressive,” he said at last. “Things hit him a lot harder than they did other people. I often wish I’d paid more attention to that, urged him more strongly to seek help.” He paused. “But that has nothing to do with your problem.”

 

“If I’m having these kinds of reactions, these memories, maybe other people are, too, other survivors. I might be the first person to have come here looking for some kind of connection to what happened, but I doubt I’ll be the last.”

 

“Ms. Szekely, this isn’t the sort of discussion that we should be having over the phone. Perhaps you should stop by our offices. If you have the time, maybe you could come over right now.”

 

“Very well.” Chris was suddenly wary. “I’ll be sure to let the innkeepers know where I’m going.”

 

“I’ll expect you in, oh, about ten minutes.”

 

* * * *

 

As she crossed the street, Chris kept wanting to turn back. It would soon be evening and, judging by the empty parking spaces near the MindData building, most if not all of the company’s employees had already left. Now that Matthew Elmendorf had agreed to a meeting, she worried that she might be putting herself in danger. If his company were connected with what had happened in Hannaford, he would have every reason to get rid of anyone who might uncover such a connection.

 

Absurd, she told herself as she climbed the front steps. If Elmendorf had any such end in mind, he would not have called and left a message with Liane Malinowsky, or invited her over for a chat knowing that Liane and her husband would be aware of where she was going.

 

She tried the knob, then pushed the door open. Matthew Elmendorf, whose unruly white hair was even longer than it had been in the photo she had seen, sat in one of the armchairs. He was a small man, smaller than she had expected, and the expression on his face was almost kindly.

 

“Come in,” he said, smiling.

 

She closed the door and walked toward him. “Please sit down,” he continued. “You still resemble your photograph, the one I used to see on the side of a few buses in Hannaford, in those ads for your television station. I can’t say that I ever watched your news program, even though, in different ways, we’re both in the same line of work.”

 

“We are?” Chris said.

 

“Communications. If I were to sum up what MindData Associates is about in one word, that would be the word I’d use, communications. Now what was it that you wanted to discuss?”

 

She sat down and gripped the chair’s armrests. “I don’t know if you can understand what it’s like, knowing that you were part of a mob that went completely batshit crazy like that. I told my therapist something else must have made us act that way, and he kept saying that that was just a way for me to keep from owning what had happened.”

 

He gazed at her with the kind of warm, sympathetic look that she had never glimpsed on Dr. Perrin’s face. “Did you offer your therapist any ideas about what that something else might be?”

 

“No. What would be the point? Especially since a lot of the time, I wasn’t really sure what I thought, whether—” She took a breath. “For a while, I couldn’t remember anything much, just bits and pieces. Even now I can’t recall a lot of what happened that night.”

 

“Seems to me you’d be better off forgetting it entirely. Amnesia can be the mind’s way of protecting itself.”

 

The back of her neck ached with tension. “I have to ask you this. Has anyone else who survived the riot come here looking for you?”

 

His smile faded. “Are you thinking that if someone had, this would somehow verify your suspicions?”

 

“I just want to know.”

 

“Ms. Szekely, take my advice. Leave Westview and try to put your unfortunate experience behind you.”

 

“I know that MindData Associates got some funding from the Defense Department.”

 

He frowned. “I didn’t know that television news personalities actually did much real investigation.”

 

She leaned back in her chair. She wasn’t picking up anything from him, not even the faint almost inaudible whispers she had been picking up around other people ever since coming to Westview. Instead, she felt a stuffiness in her ears and head, the kind of sensation that usually meant she was coming down with a cold. “This was funding from a couple of years back,” she said. “I couldn’t find a line for you in the most recent figures. Of course that might just mean I wasn’t looking in the right place.”

 

“That we’ve had some government contracts is a matter of public record.”

 

“Technically I suppose that’s true, even if it means taking ages for anybody to find a trace of those records.”

 

“Go home, Ms. Szekely—it would be better for you and for the people of Westview.”

 

“I didn’t realize you were all that concerned about the people here.”

 

“One can’t help taking an interest in one’s community, even when one prefers to spend much of one’s time alone doing one’s work. We’ve contributed our share to the local economy, there’s even talk of a new business or two opening up here soon. It’s been gratifying to know that we’ve been of some help in keeping the town going.”

 

She said, “I suppose you think that makes up for what happened in Hannaford.”

 

“You have no evidence that we had anything to do with that.”

 

“Somebody else will start wondering, another survivor. Maybe they’ll start poking around and asking questions about why one of your people committed suicide and another was on the bridge that night. I can’t be the only one remembering, having flashbacks and weird feelings, thinking I’m picking up other people’s thoughts.” She shook her head. “It’s funny. Ever since I came back here, every once in a while, it’s been like I can hear what somebody else is thinking. Yesterday I was sitting in that restaurant, the Cozy Corner, and then I was looking at this woman who had come in and knowing that she had lost her husband and was still mourning for him and—” She sighed. “And for just a second, it was like I was looking at myself through her eyes.”

 

Matthew Elmendorf leaned forward and peered at her with a wide-eyed look of surprise and curiosity.

 

“You think I imagined it,” she continued, “but other survivors will start having the same suspicions. Maybe somebody else is already wondering about what happened and maybe the only reason they haven’t done anything about it is that they don’t want people to think they’re crazy, that it’s better just to forget. But somebody’ll do something eventually, start blogging about the riot or trying to contact other survivors, and if there are enough of us and we ask enough questions, maybe we can find out the truth.”

 

He stood up. “Good night, Ms. Szekely.”

 

She got to her feet. “I may head into Hannaford tomorrow. Maybe I can find out more there.”

 

“Good night.”

 

She turned and moved toward the door, forcing herself not to look back at him.

 

* * * *

 

Her threat to drive into Hannaford and snoop around had been an empty one. She managed to get as far as the highway that looped through the eastern suburbs before turning back, and even getting that close to the city had made her palms sweat so much that they kept slipping from the steering wheel.

 

Her eyes felt gritty and she still ached with fatigue, even though she had not made it out of bed until almost noon. Maybe she should take Matt Elmendorf’s advice, she thought as she drove toward Westview. There was nothing more she could do here; there was nothing to link MindData Associates to the Hannaford riot except the possibly coincidental deaths of two of its employees and scraps of her possibly mistaken memories. Maybe it would be easier simply to accept that she was suffering from a mental disorder than to keep thinking that some unknown force was responsible for all of those deaths.

 

She came to the exit, slowed down on the ramp, and continued into Westview, passing the convenience store and the Cozy Corner. As she approached the bed and breakfast, the front door opened and two people stepped out to the porch. She recognized Catherine Alcott, and the white-haired man with her was Matthew Elmendorf.

 

* * * *

 

Brad Malinowsky had become extremely solicitous of the old man as soon as he’d entered the inn, hurrying up to him, offering him a chair, asking if there was anything else he could do.

 

“He hardly ever comes over here,” Liane Malinowsky whispered to Catherine as they entered the sitting room.

 

“Who?” Catherine asked absently.

 

“Matthew Elmendorf, the man who runs MindData Associates.”

 

Catherine was suddenly curious. Liane seemed about to say something else when the old man stood up. “Hello, Ms. Malinowsky,” he said to Liane, then turned to Catherine. “Pardon me, ma’am, but I don’t believe we’ve met.”

 

She was touched by his old-fashioned courtesy. “Catherine Alcott,” she said, extending her arm.

 

“Matt Elmendorf,” the old man responded as he clasped her hand.

 

“Catherine lives in that big gray house just behind our parking lot,” Liane said.

 

“You probably haven’t seen me before,” Catherine said, “because I’ve been kind of—well, keeping to myself.” The man offered her a smile. “But I think you know my daughter Reine.”

 

“Yes, of course,” Matthew Elmendorf said. He glanced at Brad. “I came over because I’ll be bringing in a larger number of consultants at the beginning of next month. I might need all of your rooms.”

 

Brad nodded. “I’ll have to double-check our reservations, but I’m pretty sure we can accommodate you.”

 

“My colleagues have often told me how much they appreciated your place, how comfortable they were here, how much nicer it was than staying in a hotel. They’ll be here throughout the first week, starting on Monday.”

 

Brad went to the desk by the staircase and opened up his laptop. “If you need us to arrange for a reception, or special dinner,” Liane said, “we can do that, too. We’re putting on a small dinner party for Catherine tomorrow evening, a birthday celebration for her daughter, but we can handle a larger group, and we can serve beer and wine on the premises.”

 

Matthew Elmendorf smiled. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

 

“As I suspected,” Brad said from the desk, “we’ll be able to accommodate your group next month.”

 

“Then I’ll come over this weekend and make the final arrangements.” The old man got to his feet. “I’d better get back to work.”

 

“And I’d better head home,” Catherine said as she stood up and followed Matthew Elmendorf to the door; he held it open for her. “Nice to meet you at last,” she murmured as she stepped outside. “We both apparently have one thing in common, namely being hermits, except that I’ve been even more reclusive than you.”

 

“I’m actually not that solitary, Ms. Alcott,” he said in his gentle voice. “There are my coworkers, and the consultants we bring in, and an occasional business trip. It’s just that I don’t have much of a life apart from my work.”

 

They lingered by the door. She had met him only a few moments ago, but was already feeling that she could talk to him. “At least you have an excuse,” she said. “I just retreated into myself, I didn’t even see what it was doing to my daughters. Ceci has a job in Hannaford that she only took so that she could help Reine look after me, and Reine should be spending more time on her paintings.”

 

“Her paintings?”

 

“She was finishing her master’s in fine arts when her father died.” Catherine’s voice caught. “When he was killed.” She shuddered. “A stray bullet from a kid’s gun, he didn’t even mean to do it, Jon just happened to be—”

 

“I understand,” Elmendorf said, and she felt that he did.

 

She swallowed hard, remembering again, then took a deep breath. “And now, after all this time mourning him, I feel—I don’t know how to explain it. One day I woke up and I felt like staying alive after all. It isn’t that I’ve stopped grieving, I don’t know that I ever will stop missing Jon, but I was able to get out of bed and feel like doing something instead of just lying there, as if something had been switched on in my brain. And I knew what I had to do, pull myself together and get ready to look after myself so that my daughters could stop worrying about me and live their own lives.”

 

Catherine fell silent and was suddenly embarrassed. “I understand,” Matthew Elmendorf said. “I’ve had my own losses. It can take a while to get past them.”

 

“It’s strange. Not only did I get up feeling better, but my daughters seemed happier, too. Ceci actually looked happy about going to her job for once.”

 

“Hope she enjoys her party.”

 

“Please feel free to stop by for a drink here tomorrow,” Catherine said impulsively. “My girls and I probably can’t finish all the wine by ourselves.” The man was the head of what was apparently a thriving business; there might eventually be an opening there for Ceci or Reine, something better than the jobs they had now.

 

A red Subaru came down the street, then slowed; Catherine saw that Chris Szekely was behind the wheel. “Poor thing,” Matthew Elmendorf said as the car entered the inn’s parking lot. “That incident, the Hannaford riot,” he continued. “You’ve heard the story, I’m sure.”

 

Catherine nodded.

 

He shook his head. “She still hasn’t gotten over it, I’m afraid. Maybe she never will. Seems to have made her a bit—unbalanced. She’ll probably keep looking for someone to blame, some sort of explanation for what happened, instead of simply accepting that it was most likely a kind of mass hysteria.”

 

Catherine glanced to her left. Chris Szekely was out of her car; she crossed the grass and came to the walkway that led to the porch, then looked up. “What are you doing here?” she called out. She was staring at Matthew Elmendorf. Catherine wondered why she sounded so beliigerent, so angry.

 

The old man frowned. “I don’t know that it’s any of your business.”

 

The blond woman seemed bewildered. She came up the steps and stopped in front of Catherine, searched her face, then rushed past her into the inn, slamming the door behind her.

 

“As I was saying,” Matthew Elmendorf murmured. He touched his head, as if tipping an invisible hat, and went down the steps.

 

* * * *

 

She should welcome the silence, the feeling of being enveloped by an invisible cocoon, of being completely inside herself. But when she had been standing in front of Catherine Alcott, waiting and expecting to overhear the whisper of her thoughts, the silence had been oppressive, too thick and heavy around her, making it hard even to hear her own inner voice.

 

The silence was a threat.

 

Chris lay on her bed, wondering if she was coming down with flu, telling herself yet again that she should pack and leave the next morning. Matthew Elmendorf had sounded both concerned and vaguely menacing while advising her to leave Westview. There was nothing more for her to accomplish here.

 

At last she sat up and slipped her feet into her shoes. The Cozy Corner would be closed by now, but there were places to eat along the highway. She would look for a promising restaurant, something that wasn’t either a greasy spoon or too expensive, and plan her trip home while she dined. If she got enough sleep and an early start, maybe she could just drive straight through and make it back to her apartment by Saturday.

 

Chris went to the mirror over the dresser, ran her fingers through her hair, then left the room. As she came down the stairs, she heard the sound of voices in the sitting room.

 

“...shot in the arm for us,” Brad Malinowsky was saying. “Things are usually slow for us right up until Memorial Day.”

 

“Saw him outside earlier today, while I was taking my early morning walk.” That was Marc Zechman’s voice, although it sounded muffled, as though she had cotton stuffed in her ears. “He was standing on the sidewalk while some young guy was hanging out of an upstairs window fiddling with that satellite dish. What I don’t understand is why it’s aimed toward your place instead of up at the sky.”

 

“One of their guys told me about that,” Brad said as Chris entered the room. “They shut it down to make repairs, said it’s easier to fix the machine when it’s pointed this way.”

 

“And you believe that.” Chris suddenly realized that she had said it aloud.

 

Brad, who sat in a corner chair with his laptop on his knees, looked up. “I have no reason not to believe it.”

 

Marc Zechman, wearing his trench coat, stood up. “I’d better be going. Thanks for the recommendation.” He glanced at Chris, looked down at the carpet, then lifted his head. “By the way, have you eaten dinner yet?”

 

Chris shook her head. “No, I haven’t.”

 

“Then maybe you wouldn’t mind being my guest.” His arms hung awkwardly at his sides. “I wouldn’t mind having some company.”

 

“I recommended a place called Arlo’s,” Brad said. “Good food, reasonable prices, a halfway decent wine list, popular with the locals, and it’s only a fifteen-minute drive from here.”

 

Chris hesitated. Marc Zechman shifted his weight from one foot to the other; he looked extremely embarrassed, as if he had not asked anyone to dinner for some time.

 

“Fine,” she replied.

 

* * * *

 

When they reached the highway, Chris’s spirits lifted. By the time they were seated at Arlo’s, which turned out to be a small, crowded restaurant with a menu that featured steak, chicken, and pasta dishes, her head was clearer and she was sure that she wasn’t coming down with a cold. By the time she had finished her dinner and had allowed Marc to talk her into sharing half of his strawberry shortcake, she knew that he was getting divorced and had been traveling around the country for almost two months. He had said little about his wife and his business, much more about the cities and towns he had stopped in during his extended road trip. He was thinking of settling in a new place, perhaps in one of the towns he had explored.

 

“Didn’t think there’d be that much to Westview,” Marc said as the waitress brought them two cups of coffee. “Figured I’d stop here for a couple of days and check out Hannaford, but now I’m thinking of staying on for a while, and I still haven’t made it into Hannaford. I’ve just been wandering around town and talking to people.”

 

“Really?” Chris said. “And what have they been telling you?”

 

“A lot of the younger people have moved away, which isn’t surprising, I guess. The ones that are still here have jobs in Hannaford for the most part. The owner of Et Cetera, that collectibles place near the library, told me that, a few years ago, he was wondering how long he could keep going, and now, between his Internet business and the customers at his shop, he’s actually been doing all right. The guy at Memory Lane, the antiques store, told me the same thing, Westview was dying, and then things started picking up, not long after MindData Associates moved in.”

 

Chris set down her coffee cup. “Probably just a coincidence,” she said.

 

“Maybe not. The town librarian told me that he thinks the consultants they bring in might have helped turn things around. They come here, patronize the local businesses, mention them to other people when they get home, and pretty soon more people from out of town are ordering things online from Et Cetera or from Books and More or stopping here when they’re on vacation. That’s his theory, anyway.”

 

Marc was still expounding on the librarian’s theory as they left the restaurant and got into his car. Another bit of evidence supporting his suppositions was the apparent success of the Westview Bed and Breakfast, given that people brought in by MindData Associates filled rooms during the off-season that might otherwise have remained empty. Then there was Dan’s Cozy Corner, where the waitress had admitted to him that MindData Associates provided a good share of the eatery’s profits. Now there was talk of a couple of new businesses opening up in a town some had been ready to give up on just a few years ago.

 

“Compared to some of the places I’ve been through lately,” Marc continued, “Westview isn’t a bad place. As I said, I wouldn’t mind staying on for a while, maybe finding something I could do.”

 

“Like what?” she asked.

 

“Maybe starting a new business, or investing in one here. The thing is, I’ve been missing my old routines. Retirement isn’t what it’s cracked up to be. A lot of the time, it’s just sitting around with too much time on your hands.”

 

They were approaching Westview. Except for the bright lights of the service station and convenience store, and the dimmer streetlights that lined the sidewalks, the rest of the town was dark. Chris said, “I’m thinking of checking out and heading home tomorrow.”

 

“Back to Indiana?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Never been to Indiana,” he said. “Maybe it’s time I saw it.”

 

Was he hinting at following her back? The car slowed as they neared the inn’s parking lot. The lights were still on at the MindData Associates building on both the first and second floors, and she saw the silhouette of a man in one of the third floor windows.

 

Because of Matthew Elmendorf people had died, and not easily, trapped in anguish and despair, falling from the bridge, crushed by boulders of asphalt and steel girders and the bodies of other people. “You’re one of the lucky ones,” a doctor had told her. She still could not recall much about the medical people who had fished her out of the water and taped her fractured ribs, or the short stay in the hospital before they sent her home, but there had been nightmares after that, dreams of people falling around her as she dropped toward the black river below. She had always awakened, screaming, before she hit the water. Matthew Elmendorf owed her for that; he owed even more to all those people who had died around her.

 

“What?” The car had stopped. “What did you say?” Marc asked.

 

Chris groped blindly at the door on her side, pushed it open, and stumbled outside. Her legs nearly buckled under her as she leaned against the car.

 

“Are you all right?” A hand gripped her elbow. “Is there anything I can do?”

 

She took a breath. “It’s nothing.”

 

“You were saying something about being owed something, and then you—”

 

“I’m all right.”

 

“At least let me help you inside.”

 

She stood there while he locked his car, then allowed him to take her arm and lead her up the steps to the porch. As he opened the door, she turned to look at the lighted windows across the street.

 

* * * *

 

Marc ate his breakfast of bran flakes alone. Even Liane, who usually came into the dining room every few minutes to check the coffee pot, was in the kitchen, preparing for a dinner party the inn was arranging for somebody that evening.

 

He got up and went into the front room, then over to the window that faced the parking lot. Chris Szekely’s car was gone; maybe she had already checked out. He felt a pang of disappointment, then crossed to the front door and went outside.

 

The sky was clear, the air already warm; he wouldn’t need to go back to his room for his coat. He hurried down the steps to the sidewalk, ready for another day of aimless wandering and imagining that he might decide to settle here.

 

As he rounded the corner, he saw a woman sweeping the front steps of the large gray house next to the inn’s parking lot. Her brown hair was pulled back, revealing white streaks at the temples; her denim shirt and jeans hung loosely on her slender frame. A middle-aged woman, he thought, someone far more appropriate for him than Chris Szekely. Nora might have had streaks like that in her hair if she hadn’t insisted on having it tinted and highlighted.

 

His throat seized up at the thought of Nora. He could still drive west, lose himself in yet another unfamiliar place, without trailing Chris Szekely like a stalker. Foolish to think that a fling with her would ease the pain of losing Nora.

 

The woman looked up. Her sharp-featured face seemed familiar; he must have seen her before, perhaps while he was taking one of his walks.

 

“Hello,” he said, realizing with embarrassment that he was staring.

 

She nodded at him. He was about to walk on when she said, “I think I’ve seen you before, even though I’m sure we haven’t met. Are you staying at the bed and breakfast?”

 

“Yes, I am.”

 

“Maybe that’s why.” She came down the steps, still clutching the broom. “I must have seen you in passing.” She pointed her chin at him. “It’s only recently that I’ve taken much of an interest in anything outside my home.” Her gray eyes held him, and then she looked away. “I’m Catherine Alcott.”

 

“Then I believe I’ve met your daughter Reine,” he said, “at the Cozy Corner.” He extended his hand. “Marc Zechman.”

 

She shook his hand lightly, then drew back. “Glad to meet you. How long have you been in Westview?” She lowered her eyes. “Listen to me, interrogating you right after meeting you.” Her face grew pink. “I’m still not quite used to talking to other people, except for my daughters.”

 

The feeling that he had met her before persisted. She continued, “But I feel as though I can talk to you. Weird, isn’t it?”

 

“I’ve been here for a few days,” he said. “I was thinking of leaving soon.” At the moment, he did not want to leave at all. “Reine told me a bit about herself, about her job and her sister and your—” He paused. “Your loss.”

 

“You mean my husband.” Her eyes filmed over. “It’s better for me now than it was. At least now I’m up to things like cleaning the house and walking around town and arranging a birthday dinner for my daughter.”

 

“For Reine?”

 

“No, Ceci, my other girl. Today’s her birthday, so I’ve arranged a birthday dinner for us at the bed and breakfast tonight. Maybe—” She glanced past him, then continued, “Please feel free to join us there for a drink if you like, sometime around six or so. I ordered some wine for the party, and Reine’s boss said he’d come by for a few moments, and I invited the man who owns that business across the street, MindData Associates, so if you’d like—”

 

“That’s very kind of you.”

 

“It might make it more like a party for Ceci. It’s been hard for her here, taking a job she doesn’t much care for and not having any social life to speak of. She hasn’t made any real friends at work from what I can tell and there aren’t many people her age in Westview. Maybe I can talk that troubled young blonde into joining us, too, if I run into her before then. She seems like somebody who could use a little kindness.”

 

“I think she might have checked out already,” Marc said.

 

“Are you sure? Reine saw her this morning, said she was acting kind of strange, pacing back and forth in the parking lot at MindData Associates with an upset look on her face. Reine was concerned enough to call me, said that she waved at her and said hello but got no response at all.”

 

“I had dinner with her last night,” Marc said. “She told me she was thinking of leaving today.” He thought of how Chris Szekely had almost collapsed getting out of his car, the way she had muttered something about what was owed to her. She hadn’t drunk that much wine at dinner, but maybe she was somebody with a low tolerance for alcohol.

 

“I spoke to her yesterday—” Catherine Alcott paused. “I think—” She was gazing past him. He turned as a red Subaru sped past them; he caught a glimpse of Chris Szekely’s blond hair as the car rounded the corner, passed the inn’s parking lot, and continued down the street.

 

Ted and Bob had come in for an early lunch. Reine had just served them their usual orders as the blond TV reporter pushed the front door open, slamming it into the wall with a bang.

 

The woman’s mouth twitched; she looked around the room, then turned toward Reine and her two customers. She had looked out of it that morning, so lost in her own misery that she had not even responded to Reine’s greeting. Now she was tense, her hands curled into fists, her face pale.

 

“What can I get you?” Reine asked.

 

The woman came toward her, then turned toward the men. Bob looked uneasy; Ted had his arm curled protectively around his plate.

 

“I finally went back there,” the woman said. “Didn’t know if I could face it again, but I drove there and stood on that new bridge and looked out at the river and the place where the old bridge used to be.”

 

The two men were silent. Reine backed toward the counter.

 

“You were working for him back then, weren’t you,” the woman continued. “Both of you, when your offices were still in Hannaford. I know you were, I’m sure of it, you had to be.” She was looking at Ted. “What did you think you were doing?”

 

Ted pushed back his chair and slowly got to his feet. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

 

“What did you think you were doing? Doesn’t it ever bother you?”

 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Ted repeated.

 

“You know damn well what I’m talking about. It started coming back to me today, what happened that night, what I was hearing inside my head. Something went wrong, somebody screwed up big time, that’s what I heard that night, along with all of those thoughts from everybody around me that I couldn’t shut off. Somebody better shut down that transponder. Somebody messed up. And I knew it was something your people, MindData Associates, had done.”

 

Ted said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

 

“You thought it was all over, that anybody who survived wouldn’t know enough to come after you, would be too traumatized to want to do anything but forget. We’d think it was mass hysteria, picking up other people’s thoughts like that. We’d blame ourselves for what happened, not you.” The woman swung around to face Reine. “Don’t trust them. It’ll come out eventually, it has to.”

 

Bob reached under his jacket and pulled out a cellphone; his thumb moved over the surface. “I know you’ve been through a bad time,” Ted said. Bob was whispering into his cellphone. “Wish there was something we could do to help.”

 

“Don’t trust them,” the woman said to Reine, and then she stumbled toward the door, yanked it open, and ran outside.

 

* * * *

 

Ceci’s coworkers had surprised her with a birthday cake and a card signed by everybody in her department. Then her supervisor Steve had surprised her again by telling her that she could leave a couple of hours early after she had mentioned that her mother was planning a party for her that evening.

 

“Nice of him,” her mother’s voice said into her ear. Ceci smiled, steering her car lefthandedly while clutching her cellphone with her right. She had worried that her mother might have lapsed into depression again, or even cancelled the birthday dinner, but she sounded quite cheerful as she chattered on about what she had planned for that night. There would be crabmeat and avocado salad to start, then grilled salmon for the main course, and Brad Malinowsky had helped her select the wines. She had also invited the man who ran the business across the street to stop by the inn just before dinner.

 

“It can’t hurt,” her mother went on. “He might be hiring in the future.”

 

“Are you thinking of me?”

 

“Actually, I was thinking more of your sister.”

 

“Because I don’t know if I’d want a job in Westview,” Ceci said. “I was thinking of looking for another position in Hannaford and maybe getting an apartment there.” This idea had come to her only that morning, but she had been toying with it ever since.

 

“Ah, the best of both worlds,” her mother said. “Far enough away to have your own life and close enough so that Reine and I could still see you fairly often.”

 

“That’s what I was thinking.”

 

“Oh, and I invited one of the guests at the inn to your party. Hope you don’t mind—he’s a retired businessman. Thought of asking the other guest, too, but—” She paused. “I hope you’re not driving, Cecilia. Did you at least pull over?”

 

“Um,” Ceci replied.

 

“Then I’m hanging up. You know it’s against the law.”

 

Her mother disconnected. Ceci dropped her cellphone in her lap. Maybe she wouldn’t look for another job just yet, now that her boss and coworkers were acting more congenial, but she would look for her own place. She had expected her mother to object to that, and instead she had sounded sympathetic.

 

Her good mood held until she was driving down the street toward her house. A blond woman stood on the front steps of the bed and breakfast, talking into a cellphone. For a moment, the back of Ceci’s neck prickled with apprehension, and then the feeling passed.

 

* * * *

 

Chris said, “I’m sure of it now. You’re responsible for what happened. While I was standing there, it all came back to me.”

 

“Baseless accusations,” Matt Elmendorf said. “You shouldn’t have called.”

 

“Then you shouldn’t have given me your private number.” Hand shaking, she nearly dropped her cellphone.

 

“I meant that you shouldn’t be talking to me. You should be consulting a therapist. You need help, Ms. Szekely.”

 

“I phoned an old friend while I was in Hannaford,” Chris said. “I think he’ll be very interested in finding out more about your operation, especially if anything happens to me.” She did not have to tell him that she had only been able to leave a voice mail for Joel Hickel, or that the newspaperman was someone she had known only slightly. Joel would probably be curious enough to call her back, and if he didn’t, she would keep trying until she got through. In the meantime, she wanted Matt Elmendorf to feel at least some of the fear that haunted her. Throw him off, she thought, get him nervous enough, and he might make a mistake that could lead to his exposure.

 

Matt Elmendorf said, “Go home.”

 

She disconnected and thrust the phone into her purse. He might already be plotting some way to get at her, but she would be gone before he even knew she had left town. Elmendorf did not know whom she had called in Hannaford, something else that might give him second thoughts about coming after her. Joel would call back, or she would finally get hold of him, and between them, they would figure out some way to get at the truth about MindData Associates.

 

She went inside. Brad Malinowsky stood at the check-in desk. “Excuse me,” she said. “I’ve decided to leave on Sunday—Sunday morning.”

 

He looked up from the register. “Staying for the brunch?”

 

“I don’t know.”

 

“Check-out time isn’t until eleven, so—”

 

“Maybe I will, then.” She would not tell him that she planned to leave early tomorrow morning. “But I’d like to settle up the bill now.”

 

“Sure.”

 

She rummaged in her purse for her wallet. “By the way,” Brad said, “we’re putting on a small birthday dinner tonight, and the woman who hired us asked me to invite you to have a glass of wine beforehand with the party. She invited our other guest, too, Mr. Zechman; she just called a few minutes ago to say she’d spoken to him already. Catherine Alcott—she’s the one who asked us to do the dinner.”

 

“That’s very kind of her,” Chris said, pulling a credit card from her wallet. She had no intention of taking Catherine Alcott up on her invitation. She would leave late tonight instead of early tomorrow, put as much distance as possible between her and Westview before anyone realized she was gone.

 

* * * *

 

“Can’t stay long,” Dan said to Reine as they neared the bed and breakfast, “but it was nice of your mother to ask me.”

 

“You gave me a job when I needed one,” Reine said. “It’s about time she invited you to something.”

 

They climbed the steps to the porch; the door was flung open. Ceci stood there, wearing a blue silk shirt and black skirt, her reddish hair piled on her head.

 

“Happy birthday,” Reine said, surprised to see her sister so dressed up.

 

“And a happy birthday from me,” Dan added.

 

“Come on in.” Ceci beckoned them inside and closed the door. Dan greeted Brad Malinowsky, who ushered him toward the dining room; Ceci and Reine followed. “At first I thought this dinner idea was really lame,” Ceci murmured to Reine, “but now I’m glad Mom decided to do it.”

 

“Me too.”

 

Their mother stood by the sideboard, sipping a glass of wine with Matthew Elmendorf. Reine moved toward them, ready to enjoy herself.

 

* * * *

 

Chris heard the voices from her room. She had almost finished packing and could now lie down and rest while waiting for everybody to leave and for the Malinowskys and Marc Zechman to go to bed. She would slip out of the inn after that. If she didn’t get a call from Joel Hickel before she left, she would try him again in the morning.

 

She stretched out on the bed, unable to make out what the people downstairs were saying. Occasionally a distinct word or a phrase floated to the top of the sea of cheerful murmuring:

 

“...so glad...”

 

“Hey!”

 

“...gonna...”

 

“...a while ago, since then I’ve just been . . .” That was Marc Zechman’s voice; he was telling somebody about his retirement and his travels.

 

The voices faded into a soothing hum. The pressure against her ears had returned, making her wish that she could go to sleep and never wake up.

 

“...seeing some of her art.” She recognized the voice of Catherine Alcott. “. . . did some freelance work in graphics...”

 

“...like to take a look at it sometime.” Chris tensed at the sound of Matthew Elmendorf’s voice. “. . . might need somebody . . . designer...”

 

She sat up, suddenly awake. Murderer, she thought. All those people downstairs didn’t know what he really was, but they wouldn’t want to know. He was simply the kindly old guy who had given their dying town a shot in the arm. They would not thank anybody for exposing what he had done. They would all rather keep on believing that their thoughts would always be surrounded by unbreachable walls.

 

She got up, pulled her cellphone from her purse, and punched in Joel’s number. “Joel Hickel is not available to take your call,” a metallic voice said. “Please leave a message after the tone.” She disconnected and set the phone down on the night table.

 

Someone was coming up the stairs. The footsteps stopped; there was a knock on her door. “Chris?” Marc Zechman asked.

 

She was silent.

 

“Chris? You’re welcome to join everybody downstairs for a drink.” He paused. “Maybe we could go out to dinner afterward.”

 

He knew she was here. She went to the door. “I’m not feeling too well,” she said through the door.

 

“Anything serious? What are your symptoms?”

 

“Oh, it’s nothing, really, just—” She paused. “I’m just tired. Guess I haven’t been getting enough sleep.”

 

“Maybe a glass of wine would help you sleep better.”

 

The waitress from the Cozy Corner would be downstairs. After the way Chris had acted at the café that day, the woman probably thought she was crazy. The woman’s mother had grounds to doubt her sanity, too, and Chris had no desire to be in the same room as Elmendorf.

 

Just thinking of him made her almost dizzy with anger. She had to hide up here, cowering in her room, because of him. Maybe he would leave if she came downstairs.

 

“All right,” she said. “Please, just give me a moment, will you? I’ll be down in just a bit.”

 

“Sure. That young woman whose birthday it is turned twenty-three today. Makes me feel old.”

 

“You and me both.”

 

* * * *

 

The key to her room was inside the side pocket of her slacks; Chris had left her purse upstairs. When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she was suddenly tempted to turn back. Matthew Elmendorf was seated at a table by the window, across from a pretty young woman with thick chestnut hair.

 

“Hello.” The tall lanky man with graying hair who had recognized her at the Cozy Corner stepped in front of her. “Dan Howell.” He thrust his right hand at her. She shook it and focused on the glass of wine he held in his left hand, trying to avoid a glance in Elmendorf’s direction.

 

Catherine Alcott came to her side, trailed by Marc Zechman. “I’m glad you decided to come,” she said. “You must be—I hope you’re feeling better. What would you like? I can offer you chardonnay, sauvignon blanc, or merlot.”

 

Brad Malinowsky was at the sideboard, arranging a platter of appetizers. The waitress from the Cozy Corner said something to him, then moved toward Elmendorf. The stuffiness in Chris’s ears was a throb.

 

“What would you like?” Catherine asked again; her voice was faint.

 

Elmendorf took a sip from a glass, set it down, and took what looked like a BlackBerry from his pocket. He pressed it with his thumbs, looking as though he was texting somebody, and her ears suddenly cleared.

 

“...keep away from her, she’s just climbing out of a really dark place, leave her alone or...”

 

“...still miss him, I’ll never...”

 

“...got something for you right over here...”

 

The voices were inside her head. Chris took a step backward.

 

“What are you gonna do now, go nuts like you did at my place?” Chris had said those words out loud, but the words did not belong to her. She turned to face the owner of the Cozy Corner. “Way to go, bitch, scaring off my best customers.” His lips did not move.

 

“What did you say?” The man shook his head at her. “You all right, lady?” he continued.

 

She wanted to cover her ears, even knowing that this would not mute the voices. Elmendorf seemed to be aiming his BlackBerry at her.

 

“Fuck me, baby, fuck me, I could take you right here on this floor.” That was Marc.

 

“Dan told me what you said in his place, crazy shit, we put everything into this place, and you want to scare off the guys keeping us afloat.” That was Brad Malinowsky.

 

Catherine Alcott handed her a glass. “I should never have invited you.” Catherine was smiling, but her eyes darted about nervously. “You better not screw up Ceci’s party.” Chris’s hand shook; the glass fell from her hand and shattered on the hard wood floor.

 

“Clumsy bitch.” That was Liane Malinowsky. “Don’t worry,” she continued in a voice outside Chris’s head. “I’ll take care of it.”

 

“Are you all right?” Catherine Alcott asked, and then: “You are going to mess up my daughter’s party, aren’t you.”

 

Chris stumbled toward Matthew Elmendorf. “You’re doing this to me,” she muttered.

 

The young woman sitting with him gaped at her. “Go ahead, mess it up for Mom just when she’s getting better.”

 

* * * *

 

“Stop it,” Chris said. “What are you trying to do to me?”

 

The voices rose, shrieking, their words washed away by a wave of rage and despair.

 

* * * *

 

“What are you trying to do to me?” Chris Szekely said. Catherine could barely hear what she was saying to Matthew Elmendorf. Everyone in the room was staring at the blond woman. Ceci looked frightened. Matt Elmendorf glanced up for a moment, then peered down at his hand-held device, as if checking for messages.

 

“My God,” Reine whispered to her.

 

This is my fault, Catherine thought. She had forgotten how to deal with other people, and now this woman, whose instability had been obvious right from the start, was wrecking her daughter’s evening.

 

* * * *

 

Chris gasped for air, feeling as though the wall of anger and hopelessness would crush her. “Just stop it. Stop it!”

 

A hand gripped her arm. Someone propelled her away from the table. Marc Zechman was saying something to her, but the shrieking drowned him out. She sensed the threat inside him; he was ready to throw her to the floor and force himself on her.

 

She struggled against him. “Let me go.” She managed to pull away. “Leave me alone!”

 

* * * *

 

“Leave me alone!” Chris’s pale face was mottled with red patches.

 

“I’m only trying to help,” Marc said.

 

“Get away from me.” She threw up her hands, then swung at him; he threw up his arms and caught the blow. “Get out of my head!”

 

* * * *

 

Chris stumbled toward Matt Elmendorf, then looked back. “You don’t know what he is, you don’t know what he’s done.” She turned back to the old man. “People are dead because of you.”

 

Elmendorf leaned back, still holding his BlackBerry. “Something went wrong, made a mistake, learned, that kind of thing won’t happen again. Girl must have been more sensitive to begin with, and now more exposure . . .” The voice cut through the shrieking and screaming, harsher and sharper than his usual gentle tone; he was inside her, impossible to escape. “She should have died with the rest of them, she would have been better off.”

 

* * * *

 

Chris suddenly dropped to her knees, then fell forward, curling up on the floor with her arms wrapped around herself.

 

* * * *

 

The shrieking abruptly broke off. Chris lay on the floor for a long time, unable to move.

 

“Stand back,” someone said in a muffled voice. She opened her eyes. Matthew Elmendorf stared down at her, his colleague Ted just behind him. “Give her room to breathe.”

 

Ted said, “Better get her something to drink.”

 

“I don’t want anything from you.” Her throat was sore; the words came out in a croak.

 

Matthew Elmendorf said, “She needs air.” He grabbed her right hand and pulled her to a sitting position; Ted gripped her left arm and helped her to her feet. “We’re going outside, Ms. Szekely,” he continued. “Some fresh air’ll do you good.” Catherine Alcott came up to them, a bewildered look on her face. “Go back to your party, “ Elmendorf said to her. “We’ll look out for her, see if there’s anything we can do, don’t want you worrying about this, just go and enjoy yourself.”

 

The two men, hanging on to her so tightly that it hurt, led her into the front room and then out to the porch. Ted let go of her; Elmendorf guided her to a chair.

 

“Feeling better?” he asked as she sat down. She shook off his hand. In the dim light, he looked as though he was smiling. “Good thing Ted was working late. Came right over when I called.”

 

“Got some Ambien in the office,” Ted said. “Might help you calm down and get some sleep.”

 

“I don’t want anything from you.” She stared across the street. The lights were still on at Elmendorf’s building, the big satellite dish still aimed at the bed and breakfast. “What did you do to me, anyway?”

 

“Nothing,” the old man said, “nothing at all. You’ve been under a lot of stress, Ms. Szekely. You should get a good night’s sleep and then drive home and get a long rest.”

 

Chris rested her head against the back of the chair. She was already having trouble recalling exactly what had happened that evening. Was it the café owner whose rage had nearly overwhelmed her, or Marc Zechman? No, there had been something else inside Marc, something obscene. It came to her now that she had picked up something from Elmendorf, too, something about herself, and then that thought faded, becoming as elusive as an early childhood memory.

 

“Go away,” Chris said, “just leave me alone.”

 

Matthew Elmendorf bowed slightly toward her, then started down the steps, followed by Ted. She would have to go back to her room and wait and leave later on, as she had intended. She closed her eyes, unable to move, feeling spent and empty.

 

* * * *

 

Chris had still not come back inside even after Dan Howell had left. Marc went to look for her and found her alone on the porch, asleep in one of the wicker chairs.

 

“Chris,” he said. She started up and threw one arm across her face. “Dan Howell left by the back door already, said he had to get home to his wife. Thought maybe—” He sat down in the chair next to hers. “I can take you to dinner if you like, or bring something back for you.”

 

“I’m not hungry.” Her voice was flat.

 

“Can I do anything for you?”

 

“Just leave me alone.”

 

“It’s getting cold. You’ll freeze out here.” He waited, then reached for her hand. She tensed, as if to pull away, then let him help her up. He guided her inside; she walked stiffly, arms hanging at her sides, her back straight. In the dining room, Catherine and her daughters sat at the table near the window; they glanced warily in his direction.

 

Chris said, “I can get upstairs by myself.”

 

“You sure?”

 

She nodded and left them. Marc waited at the bottom of the staircase, listening to the slow, steady thump of her footsteps as she climbed the steps.

 

* * * *

 

Marc drove to Arlo’s, intending to grab a quick bite before heading back to Westview, but the waitress was slow to take his order and the chef took nearly an hour to throw his sandwich together; he had finished two Scotches by the time the food arrived. There was another long wait over coffee for the bill. He got back to the inn to find the place in darkness, the party clearly over; Chris Szekely’s ravings and fit of hysteria had probably put the damper on the celebration. The only light still on was the one that illuminated the porch.

 

The headlights of another car came on as he pulled into the parking lot. The other vehicle shot past him; he was about to lean on his horn when he recognized Chris Szekely’s Subaru. She turned right and sped down the street.

 

He suddenly feared for her. He backed out of the parking lot and drove after her.

 

* * * *

 

He followed her to the ramp that led to the interstate. There was little traffic on the highway, only a Greyhound and a pickup truck between him and the Subaru. Occasionally her car disappeared behind a curve and he worried that he might lose her before he caught sight of her once more. Soon the road became straighter and he was able to keep her car in view. She passed one exit, then another.

 

More vehicles were on the highway now. A truck rumbled past him on the left and then cut in front of him. Marc slowed, cursing under his breath. By the time he was able to pass the truck, he could no longer see Chris’s car.

 

He had lost her. A bridge lay ahead of him, and beyond it the bright specks of light that marked the city of Hannaford. Marc kept driving.

 

* * * *

 

Chris parked her car in a nearly empty lot across from the ramp that led up to the bridge. An old warehouse had stood there when she was still living in Hannaford, but had since been torn down to make way for the parking lot.

 

She got out of the car and crossed the street. A car passed her as she walked up the right side of the ramp. She should have been on the other side, facing oncoming traffic; she was not easily visible and somebody might hit her from behind. She did not care.

 

The others were still inside her. She no longer remembered the words she had picked up from all of them at the inn, only the emotions. There was Catherine’s despair, pushed to the edges but waiting to drag her back into that dark pit of hopelessness. There was Reine’s resentment at the detour her life had taken, resentment so deeply repressed that she was only vaguely aware that it existed. Her sister’s bitterness and longing for her own life were at war with her duty to her mother, and then there was the café owner, whose anger at anything that threatened his business simmered just below the surface. The innkeepers were even more protective of their precarious business, although their fears were more buried. And there was Marc Zechman, with his mixed waves of lust and rage at the woman who had abandoned him.

 

Odd that she could sense their feelings and none of her own. Something had burned out inside her. Matthew Elmendorf had done that to her, attacked the threat to him and to everyone around him, all of those people hanging on to whatever lives they had, who sensed on some level how dependent they were on him, on his business. The people whose deaths he had caused would be only abstractions to them.

 

She came to a pedestrian walkway and kept going, feeling as though the rest of her was only loosely attached to her legs, then stopped to look out at the river. Bright bands of reflected lights from the bridge rippled across the black surface; upriver, the pylons of the old bridge were visible.

 

And she remembered.

 

She was on the old bridge again, surrounded by people. Some of them were singing; others were thinking of the dark waters below them. It would be so easy to climb over the railing, to leap into the water and join the current that was like the thoughts flowing through all of them. More voices rose in song; she reached for the hands of the people standing near her. She stamped her feet in unison with the others, knowing that if they kept it up, the bridge would soon collapse.

 

“Who’s going to control that crowd?” She was picking up those thoughts again, the same thoughts that had threaded through her on that other night. “It’ll be the ones whose minds can dominate the others. Man, did we screw up—got to shut down that transponder.” She was hearing Matthew Elmendorf’s thoughts; she was sure of that now. She could do nothing against him, nothing to make him pay for all the deaths he had brought about, but that no longer mattered. She was on the bridge, amid the crowd, ready to accept what she had escaped before. There would be no more bad dreams.

 

She threw back her head and laughed, then pulled herself up over the railing. She stood there, swaying slightly, feet braced against the railing, arms out, and glanced back as a car pulled up and screeched to a halt.

 

“Chris!” Marc Zechman was running around the front of the car toward her. He still wanted her, but it was too late. She turned away, threw her arms out, and fell into the river’s embrace.

 

Copyright © 2010 Pamela Sargent