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All abstract thoughts about danger and loss left him in a moment, blasted away by the reality of Vivien Fe
He struggled to find words. "Oh, Ms. Fe
"We got your message. Thank you for your prayers and kind thoughts." Her voice might have been a sleepwalker's.
"I . . . I called to say how bad I felt about missing Orlando's memorial service. . . ."
"We understand, Mr. Ramsey. You're a very busy man."
"No!" Even this inappropriate outburst did not startle any deeper reaction out of her. "No, I mean, that's not why I missed it. Really." He felt himself suddenly in deep water, floundering. What could he tell her, even over a safe line? That he had been afraid agents of a secret conspiracy might follow him back to Sellars and the others? He had already withheld crucial information from her once, fearing to deepen her grief. What could he tell her now, after the worst had happened, that would make any sense at all?
At least some of the truth, damn it. You owe her that.
She was waiting silently, like a doll left upright, slack until someone came again to give it life. "I've been . . . I've been following up the investigation I told you about. And . . . and there's definitely something going on. Something big. And that's . . . that's why. . . ." He felt a weight of sudden fear on the back of his neck. Surely if these Grail people were willing to steal Major Sorensen out of a public place, they wouldn't balk at tapping Orlando's family's home line. What could he tell her? Even if everything Sellars said was true, the Grail conspiracy didn't necessarily know how much Ramsey himself had discovered—how deep into it all he now was. "Orlando . . . all that stuff he was doing online. . . ."
"Oh," said Vivien abruptly, animation flickering across the Kabuki mask of her face for the first time. "Was it you who sent those men?"
"What?"
"Those men. The men who came and asked to go through his files. I thought they said they were government researchers—something about Tandagore's Syndrome. That's what they say Orlando had, you know. At the end." She nodded slowly, slowly. "But it was the day after Orlando . . . and Conrad was back at the hospital . . . and I wasn't really paying attention. . . ." Her face sagged again. "We never did find that bug of Orlando's, that . . . agent. Maybe they took that thing, too. I hope they did. I hated that creepy little thing."
"Wait a minute, Vivien. Hold on." The weight on Ramsey's neck suddenly felt like a ton. "Somebody came to your house? And went through Orlando's files?"
"One of them gave me his card, I think. . . ." She blinked, looked around. "It's around here somewhere . . . hold on."
As she wandered out of range of the screen, Ramsey tried to hold down the sudden rush of panic. Don't, he warned himself. Don't do it—you'll turn into one of those professional paranoids. It could have been actual researchers, maybe from the hospital, maybe from some government task force. Tandagore's been getting press lately, some real officials may be feeling the heat. But he didn't believe it. Even if they're with the Grail, so what, man, so what? Just slow flow, man. You never even talked to Orlando Gardiner about any of this stuff—never even met the kid, except as a warm body in a coma bed. But the bug. Beezle Bug. If they ever find that gear, the Beezle program, what has it got in its memory?
He had managed to calm himself into near-fibrillation by the time she returned.
"I can't find it," she said. "It was just a name and a number, I think. If I find it, do you want me to send you the information?"
"Yes, please."
She was silent a moment. "It was a nice service. We played some songs he really liked, and some of the people from that game he played showed up. Some others from that Middle Country sent a kind of tribute that they played on the chapel wallscreen. Full of monsters and castles and things like that." She laughed, a sad little laugh, but it seemed to crack the mask: her jaw trembled, her voice hitched. "They . . . they were just kids! Like Orlando. I had been hating them, you know. Blaming them, I guess."
"Look, Vivien, I'm not your attorney, not in any official way, but if anyone else comes around wanting to look at Orlando's files, I strongly advise you not to let them. Not unless they're the police and you're damn sure that they are who they say. Understand me?"
She raised an eyebrow. "What's going on, Mr. Ramsey?"
"I . . . I can't really talk. I promise I'll tell you more when I can." He tried to think—were they in any danger, Vivien and Conrad? He couldn't imagine how. The last thing these Grail folks would want to do would be to make an even bigger news story out of another Tandagore tragedy. "Just . . . just. . . ." He sighed. "I don't know. Just take care of each other. I know it doesn't mean anything right now, but there's a chance your suffering won't be completely pointless. That doesn't make anything better, and I can only guess at how terrible this is for you, but. . . ." There was really nothing else he could think of to say.
"I'm not quite sure what you mean, Mr. Ramsey." She had retreated a little, either out of reflexive distrust of anything that might force her to engage the horror more deeply, or simply because the effort of having a human conversation had finally worn her out. "Never mind, Ms. Fe
Sellars sensed his mood and was kind enough to let Ramsey slump silently on the couch for a while, pretending to watch the wallscreen. It was a model at least twenty years off the showroom floor, a plasmacolor that stuck out from the wall a full two inches, the top of the frame speckled with dust, its screen only slightly larger than the ghastly painting of a sailboat that hung over the couch.
"I'm suddenly remembering how much I hate motels," Ramsey said. The ice in his drink had melted, but he couldn't even sit up straight, much less walk out to the ice machine in the hall. "The bad paintings, the weird-colored furniture, the grit you find in all the corners if you look too closely. . . ."
Sellars bobbed his head and smiled. "Ah, but you see, Mr. Ramsey, it's all a matter of perspective. I spent decades in a small house that was my prison cell. More recently, I lived for several weeks in a damp concrete tu
Ramsey swore under his breath. "Sorry. That was self-centered. . . ."
"Please." Sellars raised a thin finger. "No apologies. I had no hope of allies, and now I find I have several. You are a volunteer for a dangerous mission—you're entitled to complain about the accommodations."
Catur Ramsey snorted. "Yeah, and even I have to admit I've seen lots worse. Just . . . just in a kind of twisted mood. The call to Orlando's parents. . . ."
"Bad?"
"Very." He looked up suddenly. "Someone's been to their house—been through Orlando's files." He gave Sellars the details. While Ramsey spoke the ru
"I'll have to look into it further," was all he said when Ramsey finished, then he sighed. "I am very tired."