Lee Hoffman and Robert E. Toomey, Jr.

 

LOST IN THE MARIGOLDS

 

 

“Don’t be myzled by the cultural imperative,” the image on the vidphone said as the colors flowed and the face turned into polychromatic knotty pine.

 

“What the hell are you talking about?” Murdock asked. He felt desperate. His head ached. He massaged his temples and leaned against the desk. “I just want to know if the deal’s gone through,” he said. “Now, please. Have we got the bulkhead rights or not?”

 

“Hard-boiled haddock is up two points,” his partner said with a thin green grin. The image split; two faces grinned at him.

 

And the line went dead for the third time that afternoon.

 

Murdock considered smashing the phone with his fist, then thought better of it. The damn things were expensive as hell.

 

He looked down from the blank screen. His monogrammed marble egg lay atilt in the white bone china eggcup on the dark blue desk blotter. The egg was rose-colored, veined with gray and black. The very sight of it comforted him.

 

He brushed his fingertips across it, closed his hand around it, rubbed his thumb against the cool smooth surface. He held it and gazed at the ornate initials.

 

His.

 

His marble egg, his mahogany-topped desk, his lushly carpeted office paneled in polished brown silitex, his aquarium, his deluxe model 5472 vidphone.

 

Scowling at the phone, he punched 0 for operator.

 

A girl’s face appeared on the screen. She was young, red-haired, efficient. “Your call, sir?” she said briskly.

 

“I’ve been disconnected.” He worried the monogrammed marble egg as he answered.

 

“I’m sorry, sir.”

 

“This is the third time this’s happened in the last two hours. I’m paying plenty for service and I expect—”

 

“Did you dial directly, sir?”

 

“Yes, I did.”

 

“What is your number, please?”

 

“MOrris 54692.”

 

“And what number are you trying to reach, please?”

 

“I haven’t been trying to reach him. I’ve been reaching him and getting disconnected.”

 

“His number, sir?”

 

“DEsmond 69969, Punta Gorda, Florida. That’s on the West Coast. Area B813.”

 

“Thank you, sir. One moment, please.”

 

Murdock clutched the marble egg. He stared at the ONE MOMENT, PLEASE sign on the screen and tried to ease back into the depths of his chair. His back was beginning to ache. His eyes watered. The operator appeared on the screen again, slightly blurred.

 

“Sir, service has been temporarily disrupted in Area B813. Shall I call you when we regain contact?”

 

“Disrupted? By what?”

 

“Hyperactive sunspots, sir.”

 

“Let me speak to your superior,” Murdock said. “This call is of the utmost importance to me.”

 

“Certainly, sir. One moment and I’ll connect you.”

 

This time, instead of the ONE MOMENT, PLEASE sign, a beautiful girl with a dazzling smile came on the screen.

 

“I am a recording,” she announced happily. Then her tone became sterner. “You have dialed a wrong number. Please disconnect and dial again.” She smiled the dazzling smile. “I am a recording,” she repeated. Then, with a trace of disappointment, “You have dialed a wrong number. Please disconnect and dial again.”

 

She smiled dazzlingly and Murdock hung up.

 

The operator he reached this time was a brunette. When he’d finished his story, she connected him with a motherly middle-aged supervisor who heard it through again. Her superior was an owlish woman who listened with an intent expression of disinterest.

 

The marble egg warmed to the heat of his grip. His fist felt clammy. He waited as the supervisor made connections with her immediate superior. The screen blinked twice, dimmed, then revealed a dour-faced executive with a black carnation pinned to his lapel.

 

Murdock fixed his attention on the flower as he launched adroitly into his story. He’d reduced the telling time to ninety-four seconds, including dramatic pauses.

 

“I’m afraid there’s nothing we can do, sir,” the man said.

 

“I can’t stress the importance of this call too highly,” Murdock said.

 

“I appreciate your plight, sir. However, sunspot activity is beyond the control of The Phone Company. I sincerely regret any inconvenience this interference may have caused you, but you must understand that we can take no responsibility for the interruption of service due to natural causes.” The man inserted a dramatic pause of his own. “I’m certain you understand.”

 

“Yes, but do you understand that I’ll be ruined if I can’t get in touch with my partner?”

 

The man gave him a long look of sympathetic skepticism. “We will endeavor to connect you as soon as possible, sir,” he said with a wilting smile. “However, if you will refer to your contract with our organization you will find that The Phone Company cannot take any responsibility for, or be adjudged liable for—”

 

“Paragraph seven,” the executive said.

 

Murdock gave up. “How soon can you put me through to him?” he asked.

 

“As soon as possible, sir. Sunspot activity, as you are no doubt aware yourself, cannot be controlled. However, if you will give me the name and number of the party you are trying to reach . . .”

 

“His name?”

 

The egg slid from Murdock’s grip. He snatched at it. Still juggling, he faced the vidphone again.

 

The executive said, “As soon as we regain service, sir. If you’ll give me the name of the party you are trying to reach and his contract number . . .”

 

Murdock scowled. He couldn’t remember his partner’s name. All the years they’d been together, and now he couldn’t remember. ... He dropped the egg.

 

“Sir?” the phone asked with concern. “Is there something wrong?”

 

“I’ll call back,” Murdock mumbled as he reached for the disconnect button.

 

Blood rushed to his head as he bent to pick up the monogrammed marble egg.

 

* * * *

 

Frowning at his reflection in the dark face of the phone, Murdock considered the situation.

 

He’d been away from home only once, twelve years ago. He remembered that trip vividly—starkly. A strange place—a strange bed—strange people. None of the warm, familiar comforts of home.

 

He looked around the office he’d built into his lovely multilevel house. All the fine particular things. The plush red sofa vibrant against the pea-green patterns of the rug. The mellow glow of the armadillo lamp—Irving had been such a good pet; too good to give up just because he’d died. Tammy had been a good pet, too. He smiled at the stuffed tabby standing on the mantle of the electronic fireplace. So had Wallace, the parakeet that perched in eternal silence on the edge of the aquarium, one glass eye alert to his every move, the other fixed on the three Siamese fighting fish who, at the moment, seemed to be engaged in a mutual nonaggression.

 

Home.

 

And he had to leave them again. Leave Savannah and go to Punta Gorda himself. Get this mess straightened out with—hell, he still couldn’t remember his partner’s name. Well, it’d come to him.

 

Had to see the man, find out what was wrong. Those goddamn bulkhead rights had to be cleared before his option on that stretch of Charlotte Harbor ran out. Already the dredges and draglines were contracted to start filling.

 

Penalty clauses.

 

Forfeiture.

 

Every cent he had tied up in the project.

 

Dammit. Move fast, his partner had said. Act quickly or somebody else would grab the ball and run with it. Half the Harbor was already filled. Not much left to be developed. Get everything ready to move the instant the bulkhead rights were approved. Sure. He’d done it: put up all his capital, signed papers, made commitments. And now the option was about to expire. The deadline was less than forty-eight hours away.

 

There was no way out of it, around it, over it or under it. He’d have to go to Punta Gorda himself. And he’d have to fly. He shuddered at the thought.

 

Still clutching the marble egg, he got to his feet. He stood there.

 

“Jean!” he called.

 

“What?” His wife’s voice came thin from the distance, softened by the acoustic ceiling.

 

“Where are you?”

 

“In here, dear.” She sounded very far away.

 

He walked to the door. “In where?”

 

“The living room. I’m polishing the bronzed baby shoes.”

 

Stepping into the hall, he closed the office door behind him. The house was very quiet. He walked down the hall and into the

 

. . . kitchen.

 

“Jean?”

 

“Yes, dear?”

 

“Where are you?”

 

“In the living room, Shelly.” This time she sounded closer.

 

He walked through the door and across the hall to the

 

. . . downstairs bathroom.

 

“Jean!”

 

“What is it, dear?”

 

He started to say that he couldn’t find the living room, but that was ridiculous. He was upset. He’d taken a wrong turn. He’d been living in this house for fifteen years.

 

He opened the medicine chest and took out a bottle of blue pills. Vitamin C. Good for the nerves. He swallowed three, then remembered it was calcium that was good for the nerves. He added three bonemeal tablets to the C he’d swallowed.

 

“Shelly?” his wife called.

 

“I’ll be right there.”

 

“All right.”

 

He walked down the hall and turned left. That felt wrong. He kept turning in a one-hundred-eighty-degree arc, then he turned right. It felt right. The living room was there, just where it always had been.

 

Upset, he told himself. Damn whatsisname. Needed to increase his calcium intake. Maybe take more lecithin, too.

 

“Jean,” he said.

 

She set the bronzed baby shoes down on the pre-Colombian coffee table and turned to him with a pale lavender cloth in her hand.

 

“Yes, dear, what is it?”

 

“I’ve got to go out of town.”

 

She stared at him.

 

“To Punta Gorda. Trouble over the bulkhead rights in Charlotte Harbor. It has to be settled today and every time I get—get—” He still couldn’t remember. He sighed, then said, “Every time I get whatsisname on the phone he just gabbles jabberwocky at me.”

 

“Who?”

 

“You know. My partner.”

 

“Oh.” She nodded.

 

“That damn phone company.” He sighed again. “I can’t get a clear channel to Punta Gorda. Sunspots, they say.”

 

“Oh, the children are outside playing. Those sunspots are very bad for them, aren’t they? Shouldn’t I call them in?”

 

“I don’t think the sunspots will hurt them,” Murdock mumbled. “But you’d better call them in anyway. I have to leave immediately.”

 

“You mean right now? This minute?”

 

“Just about. On the next available flight to Fort Myers. I want to say good-bye to the kids. I’ve never left them . . . alone . . . before this.” He squared his sagging shoulders and added, “Call the airport, will you, while I pack. Assuming you can get through.”

 

She rose. The sight of her standing there, still as slim and lithe as she’d been the day he married her, filled him with a sudden sense of pride.

 

She was long-legged and small-breasted. Tousled blond hair cut fashionably short framed a face that was a little too emphatic to be called quite beautiful. She wore a loose ultramarine and green print housecoat and rope-soled shoes with no stockings. As she came toward him, she stuffed the pale lavender cloth into her pocket.

 

She looked up at him. “How long will you be gone, dear?”

 

“I don’t know. Not long, I hope. There’s something strange going on and I don’t like it. My option will expire tomorrow midnight if I don’t have the go-ahead from the land planning commission signed and in my banker’s hands. If this deal falls through for any reason, we’ve had it. I’ve got to go.”

 

She kissed him lightly on the cheek. “Everything will be all right.”

 

He looked deep into her wide dark brown eyes. “Would you tell me something, dear?”

 

“Of course.”

 

“And not think I’m joking?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“What’s my partner’s name?”

 

“Shelly!”

 

“No, that’s my name. What’s his name?”

 

She didn’t say anything.

 

“Jean?”

 

“I’m thinking,” she said. “You know, I can’t seem to remember. It’s right here on the tip of my tongue. See?” She stuck her tongue out at him.

 

“I don’t see it,” he said.

 

She pulled in the tongue and tasted it, then frowned. “It was there.” Shrugging, she shook her head. “I’ll call the airport.”

 

He kissed her again and went to pack.

 

* * * *

 

“Ten forty-five,” Jean said as Murdock came into the living room. “You’ve got almost an hour to get there.”

 

“Seats?” he asked as he set down his overnight bag.

 

“There were some cancellations. You have a reservation.”

 

“Good.”

 

He looked toward the children. Leslie was five now. His sister, Tracy, was four. Good, dutiful, obedient children, but more concerned at the moment with something Leslie held hidden in cupped hands than with their father’s impending departure. For an instant Murdock felt disappointment. He told himself they were both too young to understand.

 

Doctor Kirk’s Bluebook on Successful Child-Rearing in Our Modern Society said that a father must never let his own troubles interfere with his appreciation and attention to the concerns of his children.

 

Murdock grinned at his son and said, “Whatcha got there, champ?”

 

The boy eyed his father.

 

Tracy returned the grin. “It’s magic.”

 

“Let’s see.”

 

Peeling his thumbs apart, Leslie spread his hands open. The object nestled into his palm was small and shiny. A faceted shape made of some bright silvery metal.

 

As Murdock started to take it, he realized there was already something in his hand. His monogrammed marble egg. He put it down on the pre-Colombian coffee table, carefully so it wouldn’t roll off, then reached for the silvery object.

 

His fingers touched a surface as soothingly smooth as the polished stone they’d just relinquished. They closed tight on it. “What is it?” he repeated.

 

“Has it got germs on it?” Jean asked.

 

“It’s a pentadodecahedron,” Leslie said.

 

Dutifully, Tracy added, “It’s magic.”

 

Murdock stroked one facet of the curious object. “A what?”

 

“Pentadodecahedron,” Leslie repeated.

 

Tracy said, “We found it in the marigolds. The Easter Bunny laid it.”

 

Jean nodded as if her worst suspicions had been substantiated. “It has germs on it.”

 

“It’s got pictures on it,” Tracy said.

 

Murdock opened his hand and looked. She was right. Each of its five-sided facets showed a small figure of some kind.

 

“There’s a lion and a goat,” his daughter told him. “And some fishes and some children and—and all kinds of stuff.”

 

He nodded agreement. The side he was looking at showed a pair of children facing each other. The figures seemed vaguely familiar. He couldn’t place them.

 

“Shake it,” Leslie said.

 

Murdock shook it. He heard a series of small but distinct musical notes like the clear tones of fine crystal struck lightly with something made of steel. Soothing.

 

“That’s nice,” Jean said. “What is it, dear?”

 

“Be damned if I know.”

 

“A pentadodecahedron,” Leslie offered patiently.

 

Jean looked at her offspring. “Where did you get it?”

 

Tracy repeated, “We found it in the marigolds.”

 

“Looking for Mister Moto,” Leslie said.

 

Mister Moto was the snow-white, blue-eyed, stone-deaf tomcat that had been adopted into the Murdock household a few months ago, after Irving died.

 

“Did you find him?” Murdock asked, hefting the object. It was very light. Too light for the size of it. It chimed in his hand.

 

“We called and called, but he never came,” Tracy said.

 

Leslie shot his sister a scowl of disgust. “Nope. Can I have my pentadodecahedron back now?”

 

“It has germs on it,” Jean told him. “You don’t know where it’s been.”

 

“Yes, we do,” Tracy said.

 

“Where?”

 

“In the marigolds,” she sighed.

 

“Does this mean I can’t have it back?” Leslie said.

 

“We can look for more,” Tracy suggested. “Maybe the Easter Bunny laid a lot of them.”

 

“Listen, children,” Murdock said. “I’ve got to go on a short trip. I want you two to behave yourselves while I’m gone.”

 

“Can we go, too?” Tracy asked.

 

Leslie just glowered at his father.

 

The pentadodecahedron chimed again as Murdock turned his arm to look at his watch. “We better get moving.”

 

Jean instantly looked harried. “I’ve got to fix my face.”

 

“I’ll get the car out. Come on, kids.”

 

He picked up the suitcase. It had his initials on it in gold leaf that was still as bright as the day it was bought. The matched luggage had been a wedding gift. For an instant he wondered who’d given it to them. And why. The thought passed.

 

Tracy mumbled, “I wanna hunt Easter Bunnies.”

 

* * * *

 

Jean backed the car out of the driveway, swung it in a wide arc and stepped on the gas. It jolted forward. Murdock tested his seat belt for the third time since he’d strapped in. It felt secure. He checked the kids, saw that they were all right, then stared at the road ahead.

 

“Jean,” he said suddenly, “our car was blue. Wasn’t it?”

 

“Isn’t it?” she said. She gripped the steering wheel hard with both hands and set their course by sighting down the hood ornament, a chromed scorpion with unfurled wings.

 

“No, it’s green,” he told her. “Look at it.”

 

“You’re right.” She pondered the problem and came up with an answer that satisfied her. “It must be the sunspots.”

 

“How in God’s name could sunspots change the color of a car?”

 

“Sunspots do all sorts of things, don’t they?”

 

He wasn’t sure. “Maybe. Watch out!” he shouted as Jean ran a red light with practiced ease.

 

“I wish you wouldn’t scream in my ear like that,” she said, more hurt than indignant. “It’s very distracting. Don’t you want to make your flight?”

 

Murdock didn’t reply. Jean slammed on the brakes.

 

Murdock lurched forward. The safety belt cut painfully into his bulging middle. It held. As he rocked back, he saw that the light over this intersection was green.

 

“What the hell?”

 

“Look, Mommy!” Leslie called from the back. “A parade!”

 

“Yes, dear,” Jean said.

 

“I want some ice cream!” Tracy wailed.

 

Murdock stared up the cross street. A pair of perfectly matched piebald horses proceeded at a stately pace, towing a gilded float behind them. On the float a huge papier-mâché boll weevil basked in a blanket of pink and white camellias. It rolled slowly past, followed by men on horseback and men pedaling high-wheeled velocipedes and ten-speed English racing bikes with red, white and blue streamers whipping in the wind.

 

Small girls in filmy lawn intertwined complicated dance steps among the riders, strewing flower petals and cotton bolls. Dogs in ruffled clown collars and tasseled nightcaps staggered along on their hind legs, yipping and snapping at the petals and bolls as they blew past their noses.

 

The sound of a brass band preceded its actual appearance. The oompahs converged on the spot and overwhelmed completely the tiny string ensemble that paced along behind with an air of indefinable sadness and regret. Short-skirted girls with bright red boots and rouged batons high-stepped by to the cheers of the people lining the street.

 

“I want some ice cream!” Tracy wailed.

 

“There’s the ice cream man!” shouted Leslie.

 

“The children would like some ice cream, dear,” Jean said.

 

Murdock said nothing.

 

Leslie leaned excitedly over the back of the seat and pointed. “There he is! See? See him? Right there!”

 

A man in white pushing a small cart with tinkling bells suspended on strings.

 

“I’m afraid that’s not really ice cream,” Jean said.

 

Murdock scowled at the large red letters across the side of the cart: FRENCH FRIED POTATOES.

 

“I want some ice cream!” Tracy wailed.

 

The parade line gapped. The vender shoved his pushcart across the street. Leslie mumbled a word his mother didn’t approve of. Murdock heard it and nodded.

 

The next section of the parade arrived.

 

Two identical men in identical blue uniforms with gold shoulder-braid were supporting between them the ends of a gigantic billowing banner that read

 

THE GREAT SAVANNAH TO ATLANTA

CROSS-COUNTRY LOVE-PAGEANT AND

COTTON FESTIVAL EXTRAVAGANZA

 

in onyx open lettering.

 

Behind them came a small tidy man with a large sign saying

 

STAMP OUT THE DEWEY

 

in publicity Gothic.

 

Behind him a girl of about ten with mauve ribbons in her long dark hair carried another sign of the same size and lettering style.

 

DECIMAL IN GEORGIA

 

She was followed by a grim buxom matron whose sign said

 

LIBRARIES AND SCHOOLS

 

From the distance came a curious wail quite unlike a fire engine or an air raid warning siren. Black smoke hovered over an approaching segment of the parade. Brilliant white puffs of steam rose to engage the dark cloud in combat.

 

Another brass band strode past, each man cradling his instrument in silent respect to the heartbeat measures throbbing from the big bass drum. None of them were in step.

 

“We’re going to miss my plane!” Murdock said.

 

Jean patted him on the arm. “Don’t worry, dear. We’ll make it all right.”

 

“Ice cream!” Tracy howled.

 

“Me too!” Leslie added with small hope of success.

 

In unison: “ICE CREAM!”

 

“Shut up!” Murdock snarled.

 

Immediately he felt guilty. He reached into his pocket for the monogrammed marble egg. It wasn’t there. His fingers twitched.

 

“Calm down, Shelly,” Jean said. “You’re just a bundle of nerves.” 

 

“I am not!”

 

She gave him a significant look.

 

“Ummm,” he said and slumped in the seat as far as the safety belt would let him, which wasn’t very.

 

“There’s calcium in the glove compartment,” Jean said.

 

He stretched out an arm and snapped open the compartment door. A flashlight rolled out and fell between his feet with a clunk. Ignoring it, he fished for the emergency bottle of calcium.

 

“Did you remember to pack your kelp tablets?” Jean asked.

 

“Ummm,” he said.

 

He found the bottle and took three pills.

 

The eerie wailing resolved itself into an approximation of a melody. The clouds of smoke loomed closer. They spewed from the chimney of a brass-plated boiler. Ranks of gleaming gilt tubes tootled the puffs of steam.

 

At the keyboard of the calliope, a burly man in a clown suit pounded out a ponderous waltz. The calliope rolled past, drawn by two white horses in red harness.

 

The following float was pulled by a pink-and-white candy-striped jeep driven by a pretty young girl in a skimpy bikini. There was nothing to the float itself but a flatbed on bogie wheels, decorated with black crepe. It bore like a wearisome burden the weight of a small gray whale with sawdust leaking out of a vent in its side.

 

The whale was not alone. A pair of stalwart men in yellow nor’westers kept it company. Both wore jet-black beards, lush and untrimmed. One brandished a harpoon toward Murdock as the float came even with the car, and shouted, “You oughta seen the one that got away!”

 

His companion gave Murdock the peace sign.

 

Nothing followed the float for a good five hundred feet.

 

A cop appeared in the opening. He gestured at Jean with one International Day-glo Orange-gloved hand.

 

She stepped on the gas.

 

Murdock checked his seat belt.

 

“Ice cream?” Tracy said.

 

* * * *

 

Murdock realized he’d been holding his breath. He sighed. They were on the edge of a vast expanse of grass, dotted with gray aged buildings of an undefined nature and scarred with sharp straight strips of rotting concrete. Then he saw the terminal building, topped with its green fishbowl, posing proudly at the head of one blacktop strip.

 

Chatham Field at last, Murdock thought.

 

“Here we are, dear,” Jean said. “And in plenty of time, too.”

 

He didn’t answer her.

 

Was it Chatham Field, he wondered, or was it Travis Field? They’d changed the name some time ago, after it had ceased to be a military base. Which had it been; what was it now? Had they changed the name again? He’d heard a rumor that it was now McGee Field. He wished he’d looked at the sign by the gate as they drove in. Well, it didn’t matter, did it?

 

Jean surveyed the herringbone patterned parking places, chose one between two other cars, and swung the steering wheel sharply. The car whipped around. Its front bumper slammed against the rear chrome of a large black limousine. Satisfied, she backed and filled, deftly jockeying the car into its slot by ear.

 

It wasn’t until the whine of the electric engine had died away that Murdock opened his eyes and unfastened the safety belt.

 

He said his good-byes before he got out. Clutching his overnight bag, he walked around the car. He paused to lean in the open window and give Jean a peck on the lips. Then he pulled his head out and stepped back. He looked at the car.

 

“Green?” he said.

 

“Sunspots,” she replied.

 

* * * *

 

As he entered the terminal building, he sighted the sign above the National counter.

 

NATIONAL

 

in blue letters against a backlighted white background. The light was a fluorescent flicker. He strode toward it.

 

Two people were in line ahead of him. A middle-aged man with a shining bald spot, wearing a black leather jacket, and a young sailor with three slanted parallel blue stripes on his white jumper.

 

“Why can’t I go to Boston?” the middle-aged man was asking.

 

“Because there are no flights scheduled to make that run,” the girl at the counter said, her voice a study in patience.

 

“Why? There’s always been flights to Boston from here before. I make this trip twice a month for business reasons. I know there’s a regular Wednesday flight to Boston.”

 

Murdock didn’t want to hear it, but the voices were loud and rising. He couldn’t shut them out.

 

“All air traffic to Boston has been curtailed,” the girl said. “However, you may fly to Los Angeles if you wish.”

 

“Why the hell would I want to fly to Los Angeles?” The man’s bald spot was beginning to flush.

 

“It’s very nice there this time of the year,” the girl said. “Or so they claim.”

 

The sailor turned to face Murdock. “You know what the Marine Corps symbol looks like?” he said.

 

“I’m familiar with it,” Murdock admitted.

 

“It’s a sea gull on an eightball with an anchor up its ass screaming ‘Go, Navy.’ I just spent five months on an LST with those mothers. All they did was sit around and fondle their guns.”

 

“Rifles,” Murdock muttered.

 

“What?”

 

“Nothing. I was in the Army myself.”

 

“The Army.”

 

“National Guard, actually.”

 

The sailor looked disgusted. He turned away.

 

“. . . goddamn airline!” the middle-aged man said. He strobed off, his bald spot flickering under the sign light.

 

The sailor stepped up, leaned over the counter and kissed the girl soundly. She looked surprised but not at all displeased.

 

“Worth waiting in line for,” the Seabee said. He glanced at Murdock and his lips twisted. He moved on down the line to the mob at the TWA counter.

 

The girl in the National uniform gave Murdock a long unfocused look, then her warm smile became a professional one.

 

“Yes, sir?”

 

“My name is Murdock,” Murdock said, checking his watch. “I have a reservation on the next flight to Fort Myers.”

 

“The ten forty-five. That’s Flight 666 to Jacksonville, Tampa, Fort Myers and Miami,” the girl said. She picked up a clipboard and scanned the top sheet on it. “Murdock?”

 

“That’s right.”

 

“Would you spell that, please?”

 

He spelled it.

 

“Em as in ‘mildew’?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Well, I’m sorry, your name isn’t here, Mr. Murdock.”

 

“Let me see the list.”

 

She held the clipboard to her chest and he stopped reaching.

 

“Our passenger lists are confidential,” she said.

 

“But my name has to be there. My wife called less than an hour ago. There were cancellations. She made a reservation for me. In the name of Murdock.”

 

The girl took a step back and looked at the list again. She shook her head. “It’s really not here, sir. There isn’t a single cancellation on Flight 666. Every one of the seats is booked as far as Jacksonville. However, if you’d like to pick up the flight there . . .”

 

“How can I get there?”

 

She consulted another list, shook her head again. “I’m afraid Flight 666 is the only one that could get you there in time.”

 

“Another airline?”

 

“Unfortunately no one else has a flight out of here in time.”

 

A line was queueing up behind him. He could feel their aura of impatience. He reached into his pocket for the monogrammed marble egg. It still wasn’t there. Searching aimlessly, he found a handkerchief and settled for dabbing at his forehead with that.

 

“When’s the next scheduled flight to Fort Myers after Flight 666?” he asked.

 

“Flight 666 tomorrow at ten forty-five.” She gave him a bright relieved smile. “Shall I reserve a seat for you?”

 

“I’ve got to get there today.”

 

The girl looked terribly sincere. “I’m really sorry, sir, but there’s been some difficulty between here and Florida.”

 

“Hyperactive sunspots?”

 

“Peripheral crosswinds. So there just aren’t any other flights besides 666 right now. Not from here, anyway.”

 

His hand started for the empty pocket again. He stopped it as he remembered, passed it the handkerchief to keep it occupied.

 

Sighing, he said, “I’ll wait. Maybe someone will cancel before the plane takes off.”

 

“It’s goddamned unlikely anyone’ll cancel after the plane takes off,” said a weary voice behind him.

 

He ignored it. “This is of tremendous importance to me, miss,” he said. “You have to understand that.”

 

“I do, sir.”

 

“Do you?”

 

“Oh, yes, sir.”

 

“Oh, for Christ’s sake,” said the voice behind him.

 

“I have your name, Mr. Mandrake,” the girl said. “If somebody cancels or fails to show, I’ll have you paged.”

 

“Murdock,” he mumbled.

 

His shoulders sagged. He walked slowly away from the counter.

 

* * * *

 

The vending machine dribbled out birch beers that were flat and iceless and it refused to give him his change. He gave it a few halfhearted kicks and it contritely fell over. It lay on its back disgorging shaved ice and gurgling to itself.

 

A man wearing gray gabardine coveralls with

 

VENDO

 

stenciled over his left breast and

 

HI! I’M JACKIE!

 

over the right rushed up. He looked mad.

 

“You know anything about this, buddy?” he asked Murdock.

 

“No, sir.” Murdock wished the incriminating cup he was holding were elsewhere. He wished he were elsewhere. Home.

 

“You didn’t see it happen?”

 

“No, sir.”

 

“I’m going to get to the bottom of this,” the serviceman said grimly. “Five times in one week is too often to be coincidence.” He gave Murdock a flinty stare. “I have the power to make a citizen’s arrest, you know.”

 

Murdock didn’t know. But he nodded. He began to edge away, concealing the cup with his body.

 

“The criminal always returns,” the man pronounced. “When he does, I’ll be here. Waiting!” Murdock nodded again.

 

A sharp sound cut the air, jabbing at his nervous system. The public address speaker rattled something resembling his name in conjunction with Flight hiss-sizzle-hiss. He made it to the plane door just as it was closing. More than half the seats were empty. The hostess flashed an enameled smile at him and told him to sit wherever he wanted. He slid into the nearest seat and discovered he was over the wing. He couldn’t see the ground. Suddenly he wanted very badly to see the ground.

 

He got up and took another seat aft of the wing. He gazed at battered cracking whitetop, thinking of the marble egg he’d put down on the coffee table and never picked up again. It was the fault of that damned pentadodecahedron. It had distracted him from more important things. He wondered vaguely what it was. Not that it mattered. He fastened his seat belt.

 

It seemed forever before the plane finally came to life and taxied across the field.

 

It reached the end of the runway, made a full turn and sat there, shuddering and grunting and not getting anywhere. The engines whined. The pitch rose. The intensity rose. The shuddering increased. The plane trembled and lurched. Then it began to roll. It picked up speed. Too fast, he thought. The ramp was too short. They’d crash into those blank gray buildings at the end of it.

 

He shut his eyes.

 

When he opened them again, he discovered the ground was far below. Too far. Getting farther away every moment. The plane lifted at a quick sharp angle.

 

He struggled to pull himself together. His angle of vision widened as the plane lifted. He could see the city, the muddy red river along its edge, the grassy expanse of Hutchinson Island lying across from it. The red river became a ribbon winding through the flat gray-green of the marshes and the brighter green of the pine-covered islands. Small streams threaded through the green to join it. They twisted and writhed, cutting the land into small sharp-edged shards.

 

Fascinating.

 

It looked just like a map; just like that Coast and Geodetic Survey map he’d had when he was a kid. Where was it now?

 

At home.

 

Ahead, he could see the vast gray sea, discolored where the red river dumped its burden of mud. He realized that the long thin strip of land splitting the river near its mouth was Cockspur Island. The five-sided structure on the prow of the island must be Fort Pulaski. It was a National Monument of some kind. Something to do with Robert E. Lee, he thought. He should take the kids out there to see it sometime. He really should. Doctor Kirk’s book advised taking youngsters on educational and culturally inspiring field trips at frequent intervals.

 

And then there was nothing under the plane but sea.

 

No ground at all. Nothing visible through the window but the wing and the water and the white ice-crystal clouds glimmering in a stark blue sky. No ground at all. At that realization, he felt the pit of his stomach flinch. He wanted the ground. He wanted his home.

 

He discovered a tugging. His hand was digging under the seat belt and into his pocket, looking for . . .

 

His fingers touched a smooth, cool, comforting surface. Elated, they closed on it. He hadn’t left the egg after all. He’d simply overlooked it when he’d hunted before. That only proved how bad his nerves were getting. More calcium tablets. That was what he needed.

 

The shape of the surface was wrong. Frowning, he brought the object out of his pocket. It chimed at him. He held it up and stared at the shining silvery facets of the thing.

 

The figures of two children seemed to stare back.

 

* * * *

 

Landing in Jacksonville made his stomach queasy. Landing in Tampa was just as bad. But at least it was the last stop before Fort Myers. The plane lifted off again on the last leg of his trip.

 

He worried about the pentadodecahedron as he watched land skim by below. They weren’t traveling as fast now as before, and they were lower. He could see a lot of detail in the landscape. Neatly trimmed lawns, precisely planted groves of fruit trees. Swimming pools shaped like oblongs, like ovals, like kidneys, like half moons and quarter moons and full moons. A pool in every backyard. And most of the backyards butted against canals.

 

Money, he thought. Loads of money down there. Fortunes had been made already. And lost. Dammit, what had happened to . . . to . . . Jesus, he still couldn’t remember the bastard’s name.

 

Beyond the vast fields of houses in bloom, he could see the rolling green of the Gulf. Thin spindly oil rigs latticed out of it a short distance offshore. A lean white yacht cut across it, catching his eye with its trim speed. It threaded between markers and anchored fishing boats, heading for a small bay.

 

He recognized the curious shape of the bay and the twin rivers feeding into it. Charlotte Harbor, almost exactly the way it was on the maps back in his office. The town on its edge must be Punta Gorda.

 

Why the hell didn’t the planes land here? It was absurd that he should have to go on to Fort Myers and then backtrack.

 

Absurd.

 

Something was going on in the Harbor. Barges like huge houseboats were anchored along the shallows between Pine Island and the mainland. Lengths of huge tubing on floats trailed across the water like surfaced eels. Plumes of pale mud gushed from their mouths, laying layers of sand along the shore. Dredges building dry land at the edge of the sea. Not far from the water draglines were cutting deep gashes into the earth. Ditches that were embryonic canals. A land project in its early stages. Pushing back the sea.

 

His land project.

 

It was his project; he was certain of it. He’d studied the maps too often. He knew the lines and contours of them too well. He couldn’t be mistaken. That was the land and water-right he’d optioned. That was the land he was going to build as soon as the bulkhead rights were cleared.

 

But someone was at work there already.

 

He squinted to read the huge letters painted across the side of one of the dredges.

 

EMERGENCE DEVELOPMENT, INC.

 

It was even the company he’d contracted to do his work. But it was too soon. The bulkhead rights weren’t cleared yet. As far as he knew.

 

What the hell had his partner been up to? What was going on? Had somebody jumped his claim, gotten away his option? Was that why whosis had gabbled about hard-boiled haddock? Afraid to face him and own up to it?

 

He gripped the chiming pentadodecahedron, his thumb rubbing frantically at one facet. Wait until he got hold of . . .

 

Whatshisname.

 

Unless he was leaping to conclusions.

 

The seat belt sign flashed on. The plane circled on. The field at Fort Myers was smaller than the one at Savannah, but then it had never served as a military base. It lay at the edge of town, alongside a broad straight stretch of highway. The plane circled wide. It cut back and swung in low and fast. Much too fast. Murdock gripped the arms of the seat. The plane touched down smoothly and taxied toward the small terminal building. Stopped.

 

Passengers scrambled to their feet. They filled the aisles. Murdock found himself jammed in between two of them, a tall blond girl with one blue eye and one green eye, and a chubby Roman Catholic priest with a broken arm in a black clerical sling.

 

They moved along past the hostess who handed each an orange, out the door and down the escaladder into the hot bright Florida sunshine. That day the opening market value on the sunshine had been 20.69 and rising.

 

The air smelled of half-burnt jet fuel, scorched paving and salt marshes. Murdock crossed the concrete to the terminal building. Inside, the scent was the cool canned slightly musty odor of recycling air. He felt the thin film of sweat on his forehead chill as he walked past a blower. He rubbed at his face and wiped the hand off on a trouser leg as he hurried over to the long bank of vidphones.

 

The red lights were burning; they were all in use.

 

He stood there staring at the pleasingly patterned Translucetic booths and wished somebody would get the hell off the phone and give him a chance at it.

 

An unshaven old man with a patch over one eye and grappa on his breath stopped in front of him and asked Murdock if he could for the love of God spare a quarter for a cup of coffee.

 

“I gave at the office,” Murdock muttered.

 

“Please,” the old man whined.

 

“Here. Take this.” Murdock shoved the orange into the man’s open hand. “I need all my change for the phone.”

 

“An orange! I’m overwhelmed,” the old man said. He walked away grumbling to himself.

 

Finally one of the red booth lights blinked green and a door opened. A white-haired woman in a lavender and cerise sarong waddled out. Her mirror-lensed sunglasses turned toward Murdock. He saw himself reflected in them, tiny twin images bulging in their fishbowl convexities.

 

She stood firm, blocking the door. With an anxious grunt he shoved past her bosom and into the booth. He jerked the door shut behind him. A dim light and a noisy fan cut on.

 

Facing the blank screen, he thumbed a coin into the slot and punched 0.

 

She was the first genuinely ugly vidphone operator he’d ever seen. For a moment he just stared at her in astonishment.

 

“Your call, sir?” she said.

 

At least her voice was pleasant. It reassured him.

 

“Punta Gorda,” he told her. “Area Code B813, person-to-person to . . . make that station-to-station to DEsmond 69969, collect from Mr. Murdock.”

 

“I’m sorry, sir. Area Code B813 is temporarily out of service.”

 

She smiled. Strong teeth.

 

Like a mule, he thought. He almost asked her if she knew when service would be resumed. But, of course, she wouldn’t. He felt certain of that.

 

Instead, he said, “All right. I’d like to put through a person-to-person call to Savannah, Georgia. Area Code J912, to Mrs. . .” He hesitated. It was right there. It was . . . “to Jean Murdock. Collect.”

 

“I’m sorry, sir. Only calls originating within Area Code D813, Fort Myers, can be serviced at this time.”

 

“Sunspots?”

 

“I don’t know the reason, sir.”

 

“And I suppose you don’t know when service will be restored either, do you?”

 

“No, I’m afraid not.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

“You’re most welcome, sir.”

 

She flashed her teeth at him again. The screen went blank. In her case it was a mercy.

 

He bounced the chiming pentadodecahedron in his hand.

 

Someone started banging on the Translucetic side of the booth.

 

“Hey, you through in there already or what?”

 

Bang! Bang! Bang bang bang bang!

 

He opened the door. It was the priest with the broken arm.

 

“Bless you, my son,” the priest said. He shouldered Murdock roughly out of the way as he went in and slammed the door behind him.

 

* * * *

 

A fold-down screen closed the Hertz-Avis booth. A sign tacked to it said

 

OUT

 

Underneath it was a smaller sign:

 

WE LOVE YOU, PLEASE WAIT

WILL BE BACK AT

 

There was a clock dial under the sign. The hands of the clock were missing and someone had drawn a leering face on it in heavy red Magic Marker ink.

 

Murdock looked around, then walked over to the airline ticket counter. A young man with long hair sat on a high stool behind it. He wore a blue blazer and a bored expression. He was looking off into the distance as Murdock approached.

 

“Excuse me,” Murdock said.

 

No response.

 

“I said, ‘excuse me.’“

 

The young man’s eyes focused on him. “Yes? May I help you?”

 

“Would you happen to know when the car rental people will be getting back?”

 

“No, I wouldn’t.”

 

“I have to get to Punta Gorda,” Murdock said. “I have to get there today.”

 

“So what would you like me to do?”

 

“Tell me how.”

 

The young man’s eyes unfocused again. He absently stroked the winged insignia on his breast pocket.

 

“I’ve never been to Punta Gorda. We don’t fly there, you know.”

 

“I don’t care. I’ve got to get there.”

 

“It’s north of here,” the young man offered.

 

“Is there a bus? A train? An intercity taxi service? Dog sled?”

 

‘Taxi.” The young man sounded hopeful. “There’s an air taxi service. The Gatorland Flying Service. It’s that hangar over yonder. The one with the orange windsock on it.”

 

“Thanks.”

 

“Be sure to tell them Jerry Fisk sent you.”

 

“I will.”

 

“Promise?”

 

“Jesus!” Murdock said.

 

“Jerry. Jerry Fisk.”

 

* * * *

 

“Jerry Fisk sent me,” Murdock said. The corrugated metal walls of the hangar caught his voice, held it in thin dusty reverberations. “I want to charter a plane to Punta Gorda.”

 

The woman facing him looked like somebody’s idea of a composite mother-image. In spite of the heat, a pale gray sweater was draped shawllike over her shoulders. Her skirt was calf-length. Her shoes were Red Cross. She peered over the rims of her glasses at him and smiled. She took his arm.

 

“Come into the office,” she said.

 

He followed her into a cobwebbed cubicle jammed with two desks, three filing cabinets, an indeterminate number of straight-backed chairs. Papers and charts littered the desks. Some were yellowed with age, curling at the edges. One wall was taken up by a huge framed etching of the Titanic going down.

 

She pushed him gently into a chair and seated herself on a corner of the nearest desk.

 

“You’re in luck,” she said, striking a wooden match on the sole of her shoe. She used it to relight a half-smoked cigarillo. “One of our best pilots is free at this very moment.”

 

“I’d like to leave immediately,” Murdock said.

 

She clenched the cigarillo in her teeth and brushed papers off the desk as she hunted through them. “It’s here somewhere. Ah, here we go.”

 

She shoved a printed form at Murdock. He took it. It was printed upside down. No, he was holding it upside down. Upset, he told himself. Too nervous. He turned the form over.

 

“Would you sign it, please?” she asked.

 

“What is it?”

 

“Just a standard waiver-of-liability form. It releases our firm from responsibility for any injuries incurred as a direct result of our unsolicited services to you.”

 

“Injuries?” He looked up. Behind her head, the rearmost section of the Titanic was under water. Smoke billowed from its upper decks.

 

“It’s a standard form. Standard form #699. See.” She poked her fingertip at a small line of type at the bottom of the sheet. It read

 

STANDARD FORM PRINTING, INC.

 

Handing him a cryptostylus, she told him, “You sign right there, beside the X.”

 

Murdock stared at the paper. He raised his head and glanced around the office. One panel of a partition was broken. Through it he could see the dimness of the hangar. Chains swung from an overhead hoist. A wing section that looked like balsa wood and canvas was stowed in the rafters.

 

He frowned. There was something terribly familiar about it all. It should have been in black and white. It was right out of an old Jimmy Cagney movie from the Late Show Antiques Festival. Or was it Cary Grant? Richard Arlen? He wasn’t sure.

 

The woman tapped her fingertip on the form to get his attention. “Would you?”

 

He signed. His hand trembled.

 

“If you’ll just wait one little moment, I’ll call the pilot.” She smiled sweetly. “He’s my son, you know.”

 

“I want to see the plane,” Murdock said.

 

“You will, sir,” she assured him. “You will. Hey, Dallas, you lazy shiftless no-count, get your ass in here, we gotta customer!”

 

* * * *

 

The pilot looked like Cary Grant in full flying togs. A battered horsehide jacket, field boots and riding breeches. No leather helmet and goggles, though. No white silk scarf either. For a moment Murdock questioned the man’s competence. How could he fly without a white silk scarf?

 

“Name’s Dallas,” Cary Grant said. His smile was almost as deep as the cleft in his chin. He offered his hand. Murdock shook it. The grip was firm, dry and confident. Murdock felt better.

 

“Ready to go?” Dallas asked. He gestured toward a plane in the hangar’s shadow.

 

At least it wasn’t one of those Ford Tri-motors from the movies, Murdock thought. In fact, it wasn’t any kind of plane he recognized. He said, “What model plane is that anyway?”

 

“Ain’t a model.” Dallas paused to chuckle at his own joke. “It’s a real ‘un.”

 

When Murdock failed to join him in his hilarity, he added, “It’s a Piper Yamacraw. Them plane-makers run out’n Indian nations to name ‘em after ‘bout five, six years ago. Now they callin’ the new models after little tribes an’ things. Yamacraws was parta the Creek Nation. None of ‘em left nomore.”

 

“Killed off by settlers?” Murdock asked.

 

“Naw. Same thing happened to them as happened to the Hawaiians. They kept intermarryin’ till there wasn’t any fullbloods left. Wiped themselves out the painless way.” Dallas scowled at Murdock ominously. “Same as is gonna happen to us all one of these days. Watch your step gettin’ in.”

 

The cabin of the small, twin-engined plane was remarkably like the interior of an automobile. The controls looked much the same. That seemed wrong to Murdock. He felt there should have been a lot more dials and meters and things. Panels of them in front of the pilot and above his head. To every side of him. Or maybe nothing but a joystick. He wasn’t sure how it should be set up, but this wasn’t the way.

 

He settled himself deep into the copilot’s seat and reached automatically around for the ends of the seat belt. He found them and fastened it, pulling it as tight as he could. The buckle snapped into lock.

 

“You ready?” Dallas asked, climbing in on the other side.

 

“Yes,” Murdock gasped thinly.

 

“Wait!” It was the woman from the office. She came running out to the plane waving something. “Idiot,” she hollered fondly. “You’re always forgetting.” She flung the thing around Dallas’s neck. It was a white silk scarf.

 

Suddenly Murdock felt a lot better. He gave a relieved sigh. The seat belt snapped.

 

He felt a lot worse.

 

“Thanks, Mom,” Dallas said.

 

“And for Christ’s sake,” she told him. “You watch out for them goddamn peripheral crosswinds.”

 

“Don’t you worry none, Mom.” He gave her a small peck of a kiss in the middle of her tired careworn forehead. She backed away. Dallas turned to Murdock. “You just set back an’ take it easy. We’ll be there in two shakes of a gator’s tail.”

 

“My seat belt broke,” Murdock said.

 

The pilot nodded. “That’ll be five dollars extra.”

 

* * * *

 

Murdock mumbled half-remembered prayers all the way to Punta Gorda. He kept himself braced against the control panel and the floorboards, not relaxing until Dallas said, “We’re down.”

 

They were rolling toward a candy-striped red and white hangar. Rolling too fast, Murdock thought. They’d never be able to stop in time!

 

But they did.

 

Dallas jumped out, walked around and opened Murdock’s door. The afternoon sun reflected off the tasseled white silk scarf, giving the pilot’s handsome face a radiant ethereal glow.

 

“Okay, Mr. Murdock?” he asked.

 

“Okay,” Murdock echoed, stumbling to the ground.

 

The ground. He realized it was okay. He was here. Safe, sound, and in one piece. He felt a rush of fondness for the smiling, competent pilot who’d managed this miracle.

 

“Punta Gorda,” the pilot said. “Ain’t changed a bit since I was here last.”

 

“I’ve got to take care of some business,” Murdock said. “Can you wait for me?”

 

“Depends. How long you gonna be?”

 

“Only an hour or two, I hope.”

 

“I reckon I can hang around that long. Till five maybe. Gotta head back then. Mom hates it when I’m late for supper.”

 

“If I can’t get back by then, how can I get in touch with you?”

 

“You just call the airport at Fort Myers, Mr. Murdock. We’ll be havin’ supper right there in our own little hangar. You’d be downright amazed what Mom can cook up on that hot plate. If you need me, I’ll fly back down here after we eat.”

 

“Wait,” Murdock said. “I’ll be here.”

 

* * * *

 

A sign with the wreathed-dragon symbol of TPC hung from a post in front of the candy-striped hangar. Inside, Murdock found that the office was a lot like the one he’d just left back in Fort Myers. Except that this one wasn’t cobwebby. In fact, it looked like it had just been uncrated and set to cool. The public phone booth beside the door was empty.

 

“It ain’t workin’,” a twanging nasal whine informed him.

 

A redheaded kid with no eyebrows and a huge adam’s apple. He leaned against the frame of the office door.

 

“I’m not surprised,” Murdock said with a sigh. “I need a taxi.”

 

The kid shook his head. “They don’t come out this way.”

 

“How are people supposed to get to town from here?”

 

The kid shrugged. “We hardly ever see anybody. Me, I ride a bi-sickle. Gonna get a motor-sickle next year, though.” He twisted his hand in the air in front of him. “Vroom, vroom, vroom.”

 

“How far are we from the Loshun Mall?” Murdock asked.

 

“ ‘Bout two miles or so. More or less. Vroom. Maybe.”

 

“And I can’t get a taxi?”

 

“Looks like.”

 

“I can’t walk it.”

 

The kid stared at Murdock’s legs. His eyes narrowed. “Wanna rent my bike?”

 

Murdock considered it. The idea wasn’t very appealing. But it would be better than walking. It had been a long time since he had ridden one, though. Well, they said once you’d learned to swim or ride a bike you never completely lost the ability.

 

“How much?” he asked.

 

The unbrowed eyes narrowed further. The lips pursed. “How long?”

 

“Till five.”

 

“Ten bucks,” the kid said.

 

“I’ll walk.”

 

“Five bucks. I ain’t gonna go no lower. Take it or leave it.”

 

It would have been worth five. There was a lot more than that at stake. But a principle was at stake, too.

 

Murdock said, “Two fifty, and you’re robbing me blind at that.”

 

The kid held out his hand. “In advance, mister. I gotta have a deposit, too. Gotta be sure you’ll come back.”

 

Murdock stared at the hand. It was filthy. “You should try washing that once in a while,” he said.

 

“Hell, spit and crud’s the only things holding it together.”

 

Murdock doled out the two fifty.

 

“And twenty-five dollars deposit.”

 

“Come on.”

 

“Take it or leave it,” the kid said, stuffing the two fifty into his pocket.

 

Murdock peeled out two tens and a five. “I want a receipt for that.”

 

The kid shrugged again. “Watch third gear. Slips on hills.”

 

“A receipt,” Murdock insisted, not sure whether he should feel silly about it or not. But sure that he wanted the receipt. Business was business. He waited while the kid scrawled something illegible on a dirty scrap of paper with a burnt match.

 

The bicycle had a low narrow seat and high handlebars. A three-speed shift and a handbrake. He leaned it away from the wall of the hangar, got gingerly aboard, and pedaled off, wobbling badly.

 

The afternoon was getting warmer.

 

* * * *

 

Loshun Mall sprawled in the midst of a vast parking lot. It was a squat white concrete block structure with one single glass and plastic office tower rising upward from it like an obscenity finger. The tower was the pride of Punta Gorda. Originally it had been twenty-eight stories high. Then it had blown over. They built it up again, this time five stories less. It blew over again. Three rebuildings later, it was twelve stories high and hopeful. It rose directly from the center of the Mall building.

 

There were rows of racks for bicycles outside the Mall entrance. They were all full. Murdock leaned his bike against a wall and joined the teeming throng of shoppers that flowed through the open doorways.

 

It was like walking through a waterfall. A curtain of cold air boxing in a solid block of artificial atmosphere. The Mall was a frigid tropical paradise. Its high acoustic ceiling was speckled with colored lights. Plush plastic birds of every hue sang recorded songs as they hung suspended from almost invisible wires or perched in the Styraflex palms that lined the walks. Planters carved from mahogany-stained coquina were filled to overflowing with large-leafed machine-made foliage. Cast concrete benches nestled among them, lit by incandescent cressets, lined with exhausted shoppers.

 

The stores fronting into the Mall beckoned with open doors and brilliant window displays. Swords, sterling silver, lava lamps, patent medicines, shoes, puppies and boa constrictors, suits and dresses and garden implements, toys, guns, religious statuary.

 

An insurance company display showed a beautifully ornate casket with a sign above it saying:

 

YOU’RE GOING TO DIE SOMEDAY!

DON’T MAKE IT HARD ON YOUR LOVED ONES!

PASS AWAY HAPPILY—CHAT

A WHILE WITH OUR FRIENDLY

HELPFUL STAFF.

 

Murdock finally found the directory. Loshun Tower wasn’t listed. Evidently it couldn’t be reached from this particular passageway. He backtracked to the outside and tried a different entrance. It, too, failed to get him to the Tower.

 

Outside again, he surveyed the parking lot and wondered just how one got from here to the office building. A boy of about ten bounced by on a pogo stick. A poodle in sunglasses led a woman in sunglasses past on the end of a leash. The dog stopped and watered a plastic palm. A policeman ambled slowly along, swinging his stunstick. Murdock walked toward him.

 

“Excuse me, officer.”

 

The cop halted and turned on him. “Don’t come too close, mister.”

 

“I just want directions.”

 

“Stand back a little there. Okay, what’s the problem?”

 

“I’m looking for the entrance to Loshun Tower.”

 

“That way,” the cop said, pointing with the stunstick. “Back off now.”

 

Murdock backed, restraining the impulse to cut and run.

 

In the cool that leaked through the air curtain, a man in a long white robe with a deep cowl marched back and forth, his sandals slapping softly on the maroon indoor-outdoor carpeting. He shouldered a sign that said:

 

LISTEN, CHILDREN!

 

He confronted Murdock.

 

Murdock tried to edge past him.

 

The man’s impossibly thick black beard bristled out from the shadow that half-hid his face. As he sidestepped to block Murdock’s way, he said, “The spawning rivers are running dry! Prepare yourself, for the days of wrath are at hand!”

 

Murdock tried to go around. The man moved with him, holding out a folded slip of pink paper. Murdock took it. The robed figure didn’t move.

 

“Get out of my way or I’ll call a cop,” Murdock said.

 

“I am a cop,” Blackbeard intoned. “I only do this during my off-duty time.” He jutted his beard at Murdock again and added, “Prepare yourself, for the days of wrath are at hand! The spawning rivers are running dry!”

 

“Do you mind?” Murdock said.

 

“You got any ID?” Blackbeard asked.

 

“What?”

 

“Identification. You got any or not?”

 

“I’m really in a hurry,” Murdock said.

 

The man waggled his sign. “You see what this is?”

 

Murdock looked. The sign was heavy-duty posterboard. The pole that held it up was an extra-long riot stunstick. He reached into his pocket and took out his wallet.

 

“Citizen card?” the cop said.

 

Murdock handed it over. The cop examined it carefully, comparing the picture on it with the actuality.

 

“It’s not really a very good likeness,” Murdock apologized.

 

“What are you doing this far from Savannah?”

 

“I have a business here. My office is in Loshun Tower. I’m in land development.”

 

The cop handed the citizen card back.

 

“Keep your nose clean,” he said. “We’ll be watching you. We don’t like trouble here. Punta Gorda is a nice peaceful little town and we aim to keep it that way, mister. No nuts or freaks allowed. Step out of line and you’ve had it.” He raised his voice again. “The spawning rivers are running dry! Prepare yourself, for the day of wrath is at hand.”

 

Murdock put his wallet away and went into the chill of the Mall. This time he managed to locate a bank of elevators and beside them, the Tower directory. The sight of his company’s name there in simple white block letters against a velvety background cheered him.

 

An elevator opened its doors.

 

He went in and it sighed, sealed and hummed. He reached out to push the tenth-floor button and noticed that he was still holding the folded pink slip the cop had given him. He opened it as the elevator rose, and looked at it. Bold black type, slightly out of alignment, explained:

 

Beyond all doubt, the evidence points to 1914 as the year when the kingdom of God went into operation, and that event is causing things to happen here on Earth.

 

That was it except for a small union label in the corner of the sheet. He let the paper flutter to the floor and the elevator stopped.

 

The doors opened and he stepped out into a corridor filled with beautiful, tanned girls in short skirts. They were all tall and blond and wore flat-heeled shoes. He paused to appreciate the dazzling array of flexing calves, then struck out for Suite 1066. Two left turns and an acre of sunkissed flesh later he found it. The door was lettered in Greco Adornado Bold:

 

AMALGAMATED BEACHFRONT, INC.

DON’T JUST STAND THERE

COME ON IN!

 

He went on in.

 

The office was cool. White walls. A pale blue carpet. Matching furniture. The receptionist was a tall, leggy blond in a brief sky-blue bikini and flat-heeled shoes. She sat in front of a glass-topped desk. There was nothing on it but an empty ashtray and a morocco-bound copy of the Koran. To her left was a full-length vidscreen.

 

She flashed Murdock a smile of intense relief.

 

“Oh, Shelly, you’re here! We were beginning to think you weren’t going to make it. The papers arrived over an hour ago.”

 

“You know me?”

 

He’d never seen her before.

 

She tilted her pretty head. “Know you? Shel-lee!”

 

The last half of her greeting penetrated. “Papers?”

 

“The ones you were waiting for, hon. Clearing the bulkhead rights. Have you been smoking, love?” Her face showed sudden concern. “Are you feeling all right?”

 

“Fine,” he mumbled. “Ummmm. Wh—where’s my partner? He here?”

 

“Who?”

 

“That was my next question.”

 

“Are you sure you’re all right?” She rose to come around the desk and face him, looking up. Gently she pressed a cool palm against his warm forehead. “Let me smell your breath.”

 

Backstepping, he took out his bottle of C and gulped down a couple. He held the bottle toward her. “Would you like some vitamins?”

 

“Not during business hours, hon.” Her brow furrowed. “Mr. Hardy’s been calling here every ten minutes. He’s absolutely frantic.”

 

“Hardy? My partner?”

 

“Your attorney.” She studied him with a faint trace of interest.

 

“My attorney,” he repeated, wondering if he shouldn’t have taken calcium instead of C. Or possibly he should take it now to complement the C.

 

She said, “He says those papers have to be signed and at the bank before three. We’ve got a messenger girl standing by on roller skates.”

 

He sighed.

 

She gave him a sympathetic smile. “It’s the pressure, isn’t it, hon? You’ve been working too hard. You just come along and sign those papers and I’ll take care of everything else.”

 

Her cool gentle hand slipped into his and tugged at him. She led. He followed numbly. Across the waiting room, past a coffee table littered with colorful Chamber of Commerce brochures, to a door of frosted glass. She pushed the door open and led him into the office.

 

It was as big as the waiting room, and even more deeply carpeted. He felt like he was walking on whipped cream.

 

The Translucetic desk was vast and kidney-shaped. It was the color of chlorinated water. The walls were textured, done in four attractive pastel shades: pink, blue, beige and oyster white. A number of tastefully framed Primachrome architect’s renderings of Amalgamated Beachfront property developments were hung in various places.

 

She guided him around the desk and into the welcoming upholstery of the Patent Comfy-Chair.

 

“Sit down and relax,” she said. “Would you like a drink?”

 

“No.”

 

“Of water?”

 

“No.”

 

He looked at the papers on the desk in front of him. He didn’t know what was going on, but he knew what had to be done.

 

“Where’s a pen?” he asked.

 

She put a cryptostylus into his hand.

 

The computer-pen made small scratchy sounds as he scrawled his signature across the paper. He lifted the corner of the sheet, signed the first carbon, then the second, third, fourth, fifth. He kept signing and lost count.

 

When he reached bottom, the girl took the pen from his cramped hand. She gathered up the sheaf of papers and said, “I’ll give these to Noel. She’ll rush them right over to Mr. Hardy.”

 

“Fine,” Murdock said with a nod.

 

“Shall I call Mr. Hardy for you?”

 

“Please.”

 

She started toward the door, then turned and said over her beautiful tanned shoulder, “Take it easy, Shelly. You only live once.”

 

* * * *

 

Murdock’s hands felt empty. They were empty. His fingers twitched for something to do. He fished the pentadodecahedron out of his pocket. It chimed as he fondled it.

 

He leaned back in the chair and looked around. On his desk—his desk?—was a large green blotter. On the blotter was a small Kalliroscope on a walnut stand equipped with a one-watt heating source. Inside the sealed glass and metal box a smoky living liquid swirled and danced, sensitive to the slightest thermal gradient. He stared at it for a moment, then lifted his eyes.

 

A big wall-mounted vidphone blanked back at him from across the room. To one side of it was a dark cork board framed with diffraction foil. A dart board. He remembered how fond he’d been of darts when he was a kid. Hadn’t thought about that for a long time.

 

It was an odd dart board. Divided into twelve segments, with no bull’s eye or numbers for scoring. Nothing but a silhouette figure in each of the segments. The figures were strangely familiar. He puzzled as to where he might have seen them before and what they were. Fish, crab, bull, a woman holding a balance. Very familiar.

 

He saw the darts lying half-hidden under some Chamber of Commerce brochures to the left of the Kalliroscope on the desk. They were old-fashioned wooden-bodied darts fletched with real feathers. He hefted one, appreciating its weight and balance. He threw it.

 

The dart thanged into a picture of two figures standing back to back. Children, from the look of them. Yes. He remembered where he’d seen them before.

 

He picked the pentadodecahedron up off the desk and turned it in his hands. The fish, the crab, the bull. They were the same all right. Some small differences in detail, but not enough to disguise them. All the figures were the same except for the children, if that was what they actually were. There was only one child on the pentadodecahedron. He thought there’d been two.

 

Or had there been? He wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure about much anymore. Less and less every moment.

 

But at least the bulkhead papers were signed and on their way. The business was proceeding properly again. The pressure was off. He wasn’t staring financial ruin in the face anymore. He could stop and think. His nerves would unstring themselves and hopefully he could get back to life as usual.

 

The pentadodecahedron was just some toy his children had found among the marigolds. There were more important matters to be considered. He leaned back in the chair to consider them and the intercom buzzed.

 

“What?” he said.

 

“Mr. Hardy on channel two, sir.”

 

Not hon anymore. Sir.

 

He said, “Thanks.”

 

The intercom clicked at him. He punched 2 and as the screen across the room lit up he told himself that at last he’d get some answers to his questions. Then he could get himself home again where he belonged.

 

The man who appeared on the screen was so pale that Murdock wondered if the chromatint was out of adjustment. Nobody in Florida could really be that washed-out looking. The Chamber of Commerce would never allow it.

 

“For Christ’s sake, Murdock,” the man said. “Where in hell have you been? If you hadn’t got here when you did, the whole deal would have been blown. I own a piece of this project, too, remember!”

 

Murdock decided that whoever this Hardy was, he wasn’t going to be pushed around by him like that.

 

“I got here, didn’t I? What’s going on out in the harbor? Somebody’s already begun filling. Is somebody trying to grab our deal? We’ve got the rights. We’ve got the option. Or have we?”

 

“What are you raving about?” Hardy snapped. He was wearing a vested suit. A bright red handkerchief poked out of the breast pocket. He fiddled with a corner of it as he spoke. “You’re the one who set up this early-bird deal. It was your idea to order the work started as soon as we were certain the bulkhead rights would be cleared.”

 

“I did? Who handled it? My partner?”

 

“ Who partner? What partner? What the hell good am I to you as a lawyer if you don’t let me in on these things?” He frowned suddenly. “Who drew up the partnership agreement? What is this, Murdock, the axe? You trying to shove me out the door?”

 

He pulled out the red handkerchief and swabbed at his pale face with it.

 

This is ridiculous, Murdock thought. Calcium was called for. He found the small bottle of pills and flipped up the cap with his thumb. Not many left. He took three.

 

“What’s that?” Hardy asked him suspiciously.

 

“Calcium.”

 

The lawyer looked dubious. “Murdock, if you’re trying to screw me . . .”

 

“Wait a minute,” Murdock said. “Just wait a minute.”

 

Hardy paused and took a deep breath.

 

Murdock clutched the chiming pentadodecahedron. Its surface was so smooth, so like that of the monogrammed marble egg that he’d left at home. He wondered if he could have the pentadodecahedron monogrammed, too. His fingers played along its shining surfaces.

 

“Wait a minute,” he said again. “Let’s both calm down and talk this thing over reasonably. We’ve gotten our wires crossed somewhere.”

 

“Have we?” Hardy said, still dubious. “Okay, go ahead. Explain.”

 

“No, you explain. Wait. We can take turns asking each other questions. You go first.” He stared at his toy. He could have sworn there’d been two children on it.

 

“What’s this about your partner?” Hardy said.

 

“That’s what I was going to ask you.”

 

“I don’t know what kind of a stupid game you’re . . .”

 

The screen went dead.

 

Murdock looked at it without surprise. He activated the intercom.

 

“The phone just went dead,” he said. “Will you call TPC and . . . hello? Are you there? Is this thing working?”

 

No answer.

 

He went to the door and opened it. The outer office was empty. He crossed the room and jerked open the hall door. A flash of blue. Long tanned legs. It was his secretary. He thought it was her, but they all looked so damned much alike. She was getting into an elevator. He waved at her and ran down the corridor.

 

“Hey!” he yelled, wishing he knew what her name was. “Hey, wait!”

 

She waved back. “Hey, hon!”

 

And the elevator doors closed.

 

He pushed the button for the other elevator. It arrived quickly, full of Xeroxed blond, leggy, tanned young girls talking and giggling among themselves. He squeezed in and pressed L. The cab went up. Slowly, stopping at every floor.

 

At last it was empty. No more girls. His feelings on that were mixed; he wasn’t sure whether he should be happy or not. He jabbed at the L again and noticed below it a switch labeled

 

MANUAL OVERRIDE

 

He threw the switch and the elevator began to descend.

 

It went nonstop to the lobby and he let go of the switch. The doors slid back and showed him the plastic jungle of the Mall. He stepped out and glanced around, looking for his secretary. He saw people, legs, sunburnt arms, blondes (have more fun because there are more blondes than anybody else), a teleview camera crew, a bronzed man wearing nothing but a loincloth and a grim expression while a small monkey chittered on his muscular shoulder, and where was his secretary? She was the one in the blue bikini, but he couldn’t see her. He rushed across the lobby toward the Mall entrance. Maybe he could catch up with her in the parking lot.

 

He dashed through the air-curtain and collided with the blackbearded white-robed cop.

 

LISTEN, CHILDREN!

 

Big black letters swooping wildly overhead as the two of them tottered together . . . then they went over in a confused heap. There was a sound of snapping elastic . . . the black beard of the prophet was torn away ... it flopped onto the concrete like a small limp animal. Murdock hazily expected it to scurry off to its burrow or whatever.

 

“You’re under arrest!” the cop shouted, writhing under Murdock’s weight. “Now get the hell off me before I charge you with attempted rape!”

 

* * * *

 

Murdock finally managed to convince the police that he was a respectable businessman who sought nothing more from his life than to bring increased happiness and prosperity to beautiful peaceful Punta Gorda. Once they came to accept this, they began to listen more sympathetically to his story. His status changed subtly from that of a suspect to that of a citizen. By the time he’d told it all, they were shaking their heads in sympathy.

 

Two things were now obvious to them. Murdock meant only good toward their city and he’d lost someone. His partner or his secretary; possibly both. The sergeant had no doubts as to what had happened to those two. It happened all the time in romantic, sun-drenched, moon-washed Florida. There was a simple, realistic and officially approved solution: pass it along to another department.

 

He sent Murdock upstairs to the Bureau of Missing Persons.

 

The office of the BMP was a whitewashed cinder-block cubicle filled with papers. File cabinets overflowed with them. Wire baskets spilled them onto the floor. A gigantic desk threatened to crumble under their weight. There were boxes and piles and shelves of them. Papers. If there was an order to them, Murdock couldn’t see it.

 

In the midst of the stacks sat a small harassed clerkish-looking man with a black, pencil-thin mustache on his upper lip. It wiggled like a starved caterpillar when he spoke.

 

“Yeah?”

 

“I was sent up here by the desk sergeant,” Murdock said. “He told me you could help me.”

 

“I can’t. Who’s missing?”

 

“My partner.”

 

“No shit? Yours too? It’s an epidemic. Bristol—that’s my partner—he’s gone. We’ve been trying to locate him for a week and a half now. The clerk stood up and made a sweeping gesture at the desk. A small pile of papers and photographs were swept to the floor. “You see this mess? Just look at it! Day after day thousands of missing person reports come into Florida. They’re filed from every state in the Union. Even this one. It seems like people are always running away, dropping out of sight. Have you noticed that?”

 

“Yes,” Murdock started. “I . . .”

 

“And you know where they end up?”

 

“No,” Murdock said. “I . . .”

 

“Half the time, they don’t. I have all these photographs and all these damn forms, descriptive forms, mind you, and they’re all catalogued and numbered and lettered and stamped and you know what’s wrong with them?”

 

Murdock shook his head.

 

“They don’t say which goes with what! I don’t know. You know who knows?”

 

“Who?”

 

“Bristol. He has a system. But the only person in the whole world who understands the Bristol System is Bristol and he hasn’t been in to work for a week and a half. We’ve been looking for him everywhere.” He stared at Murdock. “Now. Do you have a decent recent photograph of yourself? Full-face is best. Profile will do.”

 

“What?”

 

“For our files.”

 

“But I’m not missing.”

 

“Not now you’re not. But what about next week? Or even tomorrow? Or an hour from now?”

 

Murdock found the thought chilling. He put it out of his mind.

 

“Well, do you?” the clerk asked.

 

“Do I what?”

 

“Have a decent recent photograph of yourself? I haven’t got all day to fool around with you, mister.”

 

“I don’t. Its my partner I’m trying to find. Not me.”

 

“Stand over there. That’s right. Over against that blank wall.”

 

Murdock gave up and backed over to the barren stretch of cinder blocks.

 

The clerk opened a desk drawer. Papers tumbled in heaps to the floor. He opened another drawer and found what he was hunting for. It was a Swiftshutter camera with an automatic ellipse attachment, held together by a ragged piece of twine. Fondling it, he faced Murdock.

 

“Smile.”

 

Murdock tried one last time. “I just want. . .”

 

“Smile, goddammit!”

 

Murdock smiled.

 

The clerk pressed a stud. The camera clicked, growled, farted and clicked again. Flipping open the slide, the clerk pulled out a print. It smelled faintly of urine.

 

“Not bad,” he said. “Would you like copies made?”

 

“Sure, sure,” Murdock mumbled.

 

“Sixty-nine cents each. Here’s a form. Just enter the information in the spaces provided. Any lies will leave you open for a charge of perjury. That’s a very serious offense in this state. You have fifteen minutes to complete it, starting when I say go. Sit there.” He pointed to a school desk with a chair attached.

 

Murdock sat.

 

“Do you have a cryptostylus?” the clerk asked.

 

“No.”

 

“Here.” He held out the computer pen. “That’ll be one dollar.”

 

Murdock gave him the goddamn dollar.

 

The clerk unpocketed a turnip that looked like an old-fashioned railroad timepiece with a long thin golden chain. But it had too many studs. The clerk pressed one of the studs and the turnip began to tick. He put it to his ear, shook it and pressed another stud. It stopped ticking. Satisfied, he turned to Murdock.

 

“All right. Ready? Go!”

 

Murdock worked steadily but carefully, filling out the form to the loud tick-tick of the turnip.

 

“Time!” the clerk called out. “Are you finished?”

 

“I’ve been finished for five minutes.”

 

“Okay, wise guy, we’ll be checking this against. . .” The clerk looked at the form, his lips moving as he scanned it. His mustache did the prone “. . . the Georgia State Police records. You’ll be hearing from us.”

 

“Now will you help me find my partner?” Murdock said.

 

“Jesus Christ, mister,” the clerk said. “Have a heart, willya? I can’t even find my partner. I explained all that to you earlier. What’s his name?”

 

“Bristol?”

 

“Hey, that’s my partner’s name too!”

 

“I meant your partner,” Murdock said with a sigh.

 

“You’ve seen him?” the clerk asked eagerly.

 

“No.”

 

“Neither have I. And just look at this mess he left me with, the thoughtless bastard. Some people have no consideration.”

 

Murdock backed away. As he sidled toward the doorway, the clerk said, “You can expect those copies in two to three weeks.”

 

Murdock nodded and left.

 

“C.O.D!” the clerk yelled after him.

 

* * * *

 

It wasn’t any use, Murdock thought. He felt infinitely weary. Nothing was of any use. He stepped into a public vidphone booth, slamming the door viciously behind him, and broke a nail punching 0 with his forefinger.

 

“Yes, sir?” the operator sneered at him.

 

“I want to put through a call to ...” He hesitated. It was right on the edge of his mind. Home. Yes. “. . . to Savannah, Georgia.”

 

“Your bug number, please?”

 

“What?”

 

“Your number. What number are you calling, please?” She gave him a faint smile and started to unbutton her blouse.

 

“MOrris 54692. Person-to-person to . . . to . . .” Hell, now he couldn’t even remember his wife’s first name. “To Mrs. S. Murdock.”

 

“One moment please,” the operator said. As she faded out of sight, he glimpsed a flash of blue. She was wearing a blue bikini top under the white blouse.

 

A One Moment Please sign appeared, slightly purple around the edges.

 

He waited.

 

The operator’s voice returned. The rest of her didn’t. The sign wavered, shimmering as the voice informed him, “We are ringing your party.”

 

The screen went dead.

 

He didn’t even bother trying again.

 

He wasn’t sure what was happening, but he knew one thing. He had to get home. Back to the familiar things he knew and loved. Back to whatever-her-name-was and the kids, whosis and whatsis. Back as quickly as he could. Fly back. If that pilot was still waiting for him at the airfield he could fly directly back instead of waiting for the morning flight tomorrow in Fort Myers.

 

If the pilot was waiting.

 

Murdock wasn’t counting on it.

 

His fingers worked frantically at the pentadodecahedron as he hurried to Loshun Mall. The bicycle was leaning against the wall where he’d left it. A parking ticket fluttered from the high handlebars.

 

He stared at the little white card, then ripped it off and tore it into quarters. He tore the quarters into dimes and dropped the change into a litter basket, then climbed onto the bike and pedaled like hell back to the airfield.

 

The Piper Yamacraw sat beside the candy-striped hangar, a large patient bird squatting on a barren nest. No one was in sight.

 

Murdock pedaled anxiously around the hangar. He found Dallas in back, playing quoits with the kid.

 

He swung off the bicycle and let it fall. His fingers strove into his pocket and fisted around the pentadodecahedron.

 

The pilot grinned amiably at him. “Back to Fort Myers now, Mr. Murdock?”

 

“Savannah!” he answered. “Can you fly me to Savannah?”

 

“Sure . . .”

 

“All right, then, let’s go.”

 

The kid shouted after them, “Look out for the peripheral crosswinds, suckers!”

 

* * * *

 

Murdock merely muttered, grunted and mumbled in response to the pieces of travelogue the pilot gave him. He gazed out the window at the gray mush of cloud cover that hid the Okefenokee. He nodded abstractedly as he was told that they’d follow the coast up from Brunswick. He didn’t bother to ask which when Dallas told him one of those islands below was St. Simon’s and another Sapelo. He just didn’t give a damn.

 

But when Dallas said, “That’s Skidaway, and there’s Tybee up ahead,” he squinted to pick them out. Tybee marked the mouth of the Savannah River.

 

Almost home.

 

There was the island, and there was the river spilling itself into the sea. Upriver, the long thin strip of Cockspur Island sat stolidly, with Fort Pulaski standing vigil at one end. Then the pine islands and the grassy marshes cut by twisting ribbons of creeks and rivers. And there the high bluff where Oglethorpe had established his colony in 1733—the site that had become the city of Savannah.

 

There. The bluff.

 

There.

 

Murdock stared at the vast grassy space atop the bluff. It stretched out for miles, open and empty, sloping into the marshlands, fading into piney woods. Empty. Nothing.

 

“Savannah,” Murdock said softly.

 

“Huh?” Dallas said.

 

“Savannah. It’s . . . gone?”

 

The only reply Murdock got was a slight shrug.

 

“It can’t be gone,” he said. He stared at the ground. “Can you land here?”

 

“Sure can.”

 

The plane dipped one wing. Banking, it began to circle. Murdock saw nothing but grassy vastness.

 

“Maybe we . . . took a wrong turn somewhere?” he suggested.

 

“Nope,” Dallas said. “Savannah, Georgia. This is it.”

 

Murdock kept staring at the red river, the bluff, the bottoms, the wide flat of Hutchinson Island and the marshes that decades ago had been rice paddies. There was the point where the Talmadge Bridge should have stood. There was the narrow lip at the foot of the bluff that should have been River Street. There, outlying from the townsite were the swamplands that had been drained and filled for the ever-expanding suburbs. But there weren’t any suburbs. No suburbs, no city. Nothing.

 

Grass bowing gently in the breeze.

 

It must be a mirage, he told himself. He wasn’t convinced.

 

The wheels of the Yamacraw touched the grass, moved away, touched again and began to roll across the bumpy ground.

 

“It’s gone,” Murdock said dully. “It’s really gone. My home, my wife, my poor children. My home. For God’s sake, Dallas,” he pleaded, “what’s happening here?”

 

The plane jolted to a stop.

 

“Perspective causes parallel lines to converge,” the pilot said.

 

“What the hell are you talking about?” Murdock snarled in sudden fury. He turned to glare at the man. And failed.

 

The pilot was gone.

 

Murdock sat for a moment, feeling the anger drain out and numbness seep in.

 

Then he slowly opened the door of the plane, put a careful foot on the step and lowered himself to the ground.

 

The grass was thick with weeds and the wind was picking up, blowing across the river. It carried the salty scent of marshes. There was no one in sight. No one to question. No one to blame.

 

Murdock pinched his nose and turned in a full circle.

 

Nothing. The plane had disappeared while his back was turned.

 

There had to be an explanation. There had to be a rational explanation. Had to be.

 

Nothing. Nothing except Murdock. Nothing except himself.

 

He turned his back to the bluff, turned to face the wind. He began walking.

 

Before he’d gone far, he sat down and removed his shoes. The grass was soft. He stood up and started to run. After a short distance, he’d winded himself, but he kept on going.

 

The sun went down and it got dark and cool. Dew formed. His socks were sopping wet. He stripped them off and stuffed them into his shoes, then threw the shoes over his shoulder and kept on going.

 

Toward. Not away.