Peace and War - Omnibus (93 page)

'I don't know,' Amelia said. 'Since I outrank you, I should get to sit on your lap.'

The cab made good time. Amelia uploaded twelve copies of the proof, along with personal messages, to trusted friends, and then posted copies on the public domain physics and math nets. She put Ellie's version on both popular science and general news, and then we ran for the flyboy.

R
ushing off to the air base, rather than waiting in the motel for the next commercial flight, probably saved their lives.

A half hour after they left, Ellie answered a knock on the door to Amelia's adjoining room. Through the peep-hole, she saw a Mexican maid, apron and broom, pretty with long black hair in ringlets.

She opened the door. 'I don't speak Spanish–' The end of the broom handle plunged into her solar plexus and she staggered backwards, crashing to the floor in a ball.

'Neither do I, Satan.' The woman lifted her easily and threw her into a chair. 'Don't make a sound or I'll kill you.' She pulled a roll of duct tape out of the apron pocket and wound it around the woman's wrists, and then wound a tight loop twice around her chest and the chair back. She tore off a small piece and smoothed it over Ellie's mouth.

She shrugged off the apron. Ellie gasped through her nose when she saw the hospital blues underneath, streaked with blood.

'Clothes.' She ripped off the blood-stained pyjamas. She pivoted, tense muscular voluptuousness, and saw Ellie's suitcase through the open double door. 'Ah.'

She walked through the door and came back with jeans and a cotton shirt. 'They're a little baggy, but they'll do.' She folded them neatly on the end of the bed and peeled away enough of the tape so that Ellie could speak.

'You're not getting dressed,' Ellie said, 'because you don't want to get blood on your clothes. My blood on my clothes.'

'Maybe I want to excite you. I think you're a lesbian, living here alone with Blaze Harding.'

'Sure.'

'Where is she?'

'I don't know.'

'Of course you do. Do I have to hurt you?'

'I'm not telling you anything.' Her voice shook and she swallowed. 'You're going to kill me no matter what.'

'Why do you think that?'

'Because I can identify you.'

She smiled indulgently. 'I just killed two guards and escaped from the high-security area of your clinic. A thousand police know what I look like. I can let you live.' She bent to the floor in a gymnast's sweep and took a glittering scalpel from the apron pocket.

'You know what this is?'

Ellie nodded and swallowed.

'Now, I solemnly swear that I will not kill you if you answer my questions truthfully.'

'Do you swear to God?'

'No, that's blasphemy.' She hefted the scalpel and stared at it. 'In fact, though, I won't even kill you if you tell me lies. I'll just hurt you so badly that you'll beg for death. But, instead, just before I leave, I'll cut out your tongue so you can't tell them anything about me. And then cut off your hands so you can't write. I'll tourniquet them with this tape, of course. I want you to have a long life of regret.'

Urine dripped on the floor and Ellie started sobbing. Gavrila smoothed the tape back over her mouth.

'Did your mother ever say
"I'll
give you something to cry about"?' She stabbed down hard and pinned Ellie's left hand to the chair.

Ellie stopped sobbing and stared dully at the handle of the scalpel and the rivulet of blood.

Gavrila rocked the blade slightly and eased it out. The flow of blood increased, but she gently folded a Kleenex over it and taped it in place. 'Now if I let you talk, will you just answer questions? Not cry out?' She nodded her head listlessly and Gavrila peeled back half the tape.

'They went to the airport.'

'They? Her and her black friend?'

'Yes. They're going back to Texas. To Houston.'

'Oh. That's a lie.' She positioned the scalpel over the back of Ellie's other hand, and raised her fist like a hammer.

'Panama!' she said in a hoarse shout. 'Portobello. Don't … please don't–'

'Flight number?'

'I don't know. I heard him write it down' – she pointed with her head – 'over by the phone there.'

She walked over and picked up a piece of paper. '"Aeromexico 249." I guess they were in such a hurry they left it.'

'They were in a hurry.'

Gavrila nodded. 'I suppose I should be, too.' She came back and looked at her victim thoughtfully. 'I won't do all those terrible things to you, even though you lied.' She smoothed the tape over Ellie's mouth and took another small piece and pinched her nose shut with it. Effie began kicking wildly and jerking her head back and forth, but Gavrila managed to make a couple of tight turns of tape around her head, fixing the two small pieces in place and cutting off any possibility of air. In her struggles, Ellie tipped the chair over. Gavrila brought her back upright with an effortless lift, as Julian had done with her a couple of hours earlier. Then she dressed slowly, watching the pagan's eyes as she died.

T
here was a message waiting for us in my BOQ office, flashing on the console screen, that Gavrila had overcome her guard and escaped.

Well, there was no way she could get to us inside the base, locked inside a building isolated by Pentagon decree. Amelia was worried that the woman might find out where she had been living, so she called Ellie. There was no answer. She left a message, warning about Gavrila and advising her to move to some random place across town.

Marty's schedule said he was in surgery and wouldn't be free until 1900 – five hours. There was some cheese and beer in the cooler. We had a slow snack and then collapsed into bed. It was narrow for two people, but we were so exhausted that anything horizontal would do. She fell asleep with her head on my shoulder, for the first time in a long time.

I woke up groggily to the console pinging. It didn't wake Amelia, but I did, in my clumsy efforts to extricate myself. My left arm was asleep, a cold tingling log, and I had romantically left a spot of drool on her cheek.

She rubbed at that and opened her eyes to slits. 'Phone?'

'Go back to sleep. I'll tell you if it's anything.' I walked into the office, beating my left arm against my side. I snagged a ginger ale from the cooler – the favorite drink of whoever had lived there previously, and sat down to the console:

Marty will meet you and Blaze at 1915 in the mess hall.
Bring this.