08 Illusion (20 page)

He was unruffled. “That’s a fair question and here’s the honest truth: our government is one big inefficient mess, full of red tape, redundancy, and contradiction. Call one office, they’ll tell you one thing, call another office with the same question and you’ll get a completely different answer. I’ve made it my job to comb through the maze and learn where to get the right answers from the right people in the right order so we can get what we need while still using the system, and in an acceptable amount of time.

“It might be a revelation to you, but our government doesn’t care if you’re here illegally. That’s just paper, politics, and PR. All they care about is whether you’re their kind of people, and me, I don’t care at all. I just want you to be able to make a living and contribute to this country because I think it’s a great country.

“So yes, I’m a little slippery. I have to be clever and a little deceptive, but I make the machine work for you, and incidentally, it’s pro bono. That means I do it for free because it makes me feel good.”

Then he gave her a moment to think about it.

She sighed. She even got a little teary-eyed. It was funny how right and wrong could get so messed up for a person who was crazy, especially when doing the “right” thing would mean starving or landing in jail or the nuthouse. She sure wished she knew what God was thinking because she didn’t have a clue.

“Want to keep going?” he asked.

Her insides still ached a little, but she nodded.

“Okay then. You’re going to need some other documents besides your birth certificate. Social Security card for one, that’s a biggie. And photo ID: U.S. passport and … we might try for a military ID.” He tapped a button on his phone. “Pam? Let’s do a photo shoot, passport and military.”

Click! Click! She stood in front of a blue background looking as groomed as she and Pamela could make her.

Click! Click! She stood in front of a white background wearing a camouflage shirt and with her hair pinned back.

“That’ll do it,” said Pam.

chapter

18

C
orporal James Dose was a good soldier, so even though getting shot through the shoulder in a restaurant in Bremerton, Washington, had to be the most unlikely of events, he didn’t ask a lot of questions.

He marveled at how a team of paramedics just happened to be dining in the restaurant at the time of the shooting and had all their emergency medical gear in their cars parked right outside, but he just said thanks, not,
What are you guys doing here?

He felt rather important when a tight-lipped trio of army brass met him the moment he was wheeled into the hospital and, in terse, secretive phrases, advised him it was a matter of national security and therefore he couldn’t discuss it with anyone, so he just said
Understood
, and not,
Who in the heck shot me?

He was miffed that his family, particularly his fiancée, was barred from seeing him even when he was out of danger until a colonel let him know, off the record and under wraps, that he might have been shot by a terrorist cell group connected with the Taliban in Afghanistan, now operating in the vicinity of the naval shipyards and trying to send a message. Obviously such information couldn’t get out, as it would hamper containment efforts, risk lives, and, who could say for sure, even endanger his loved ones. He made no objections after that.

He even got out of bed in the middle of the night so army medics could load him into an ambulance and whisk him away for a secret debriefing in an undisclosed location. He didn’t ask if they would be bringing him back to the hospital in Bremerton or his company at Fort Lewis afterward, and they didn’t tell him.

They didn’t tell his family either.

And they never brought him back.

The team that conducted the crime scene investigation at the Quay were tight-lipped but pleasantly efficient. They were so thorough in gathering up anything bloodied, spilled, or broken that, after they left, one could never guess there’d been a shooting. As for the bullet that everyone thought had passed through James Dose—the exit wound was quite dramatic, to say the least—there was no bullet hole in the walls or woodwork, none in the furniture, simply no sign of a bullet anywhere. The official word from the hospital cleared that up: the bullet was lodged in the shoulder of the victim and was successfully removed in surgery. The victim would recover.

“Congratulations,” said Seamus Downey, sliding a manila envelope across his desk. “You now exist.”

Wow. In just three days!
Eloise opened the envelope with a touch of awe. Inside, she found what amounted to her personhood: a certified birth certificate, a Social Security card, a U.S. passport with her photo, and a U.S. military photo ID card, all for Eloise Elizabeth Kramer, born in Spokane, Washington, January 15, 1991. Each came encased in a plastic slipcover, and each was so real, so pristine, she felt irreverent touching them.

“But don’t forget now”—Seamus gave her a lecturing look—“you’re not a ghost anymore, the government knows you’re here. They’ll expect you to obey the laws and pay your taxes. Better read up on self-employment taxes, quarterly filing, and prepayments, all that. I can recommend an accountant if you like.”

She still had trouble believing all this. “You mean, the government has this Social Security number for me? I’m in the system?”

“Yep.”

“So I can work anywhere I want now.”

“Anywhere they’ll hire you. And you have an official passport so you can travel outside the country should you get the hankering.”

“How did you do it?”

“I didn’t. The government did. Eloise, they can give you a real runaround, but deep in their hearts they want you to be a person. Otherwise they couldn’t tax you.”

“Wow.”

“But the next thing you’re going to need to get a driver’s license is proof of Idaho residency. You’re renting, right?”

“Right.”

“Get your rental agreement, your utility bills, your home address, anything to verify that you’re really living in Idaho, and you should be all set to go—if you can pass the driver’s test.”

“Oh, I can do that.”

“All right then. Oh, and I wouldn’t flash that military ID around too much, only if needed. The army computers think you’re still serving, but if anybody asked, the army couldn’t actually find you.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“Now, one more item. Are you hungry?”

She didn’t quite hear his question. She was just beginning to fathom what he’d done for her. If Dr. Angela or Dr. Lorenzo or Bernadette Nolan ever asked her again who she was, she could tell them and they could check it out and she’d really be Eloise Kramer, born in a real place in 1991. Now she could win for a change. The days of fear and helplessness were over. Really.

She broke down. Seamus came around his desk to stand beside her, a comforting hand on her shoulder. Pamela knelt beside her, arms around her, and offered her a tissue. They were just so kind, such good friends, just what she needed. “Thank you, thank you, thank you.”

“Oh, you’re most certainly welcome,” said Seamus. He then asked Pamela, “What time does Angelo’s open?”

“Five, every night but Monday.”

Seamus leaned close to Eloise, his voice gentle and comforting, and wow, even his breath was clean. “Do you like Italian?”

She blew her nose. “Sure.”

“Pam and I would like to take you to dinner to celebrate.”

Her smile would be the first of many, she was certain. “I would love that.”

November 22, Monday, Dane awoke to find the yard outside sugared with an inch of snow. The snow came right when Shirley predicted. She was quite the weather watcher and had much to say about how the coming winter would compare to the last one: more snow this time around, starting about mid-November, and she was right.

By the time he settled at his drafting table up in the loft, he could look out the east windows and see the snow shrinking into patches on the meadow. The roof of the barn was clear and steaming in the sun while snow remained within the barn’s long, November shadow. Wisps of morning fog drifted over the surface of the pond.

Looking out the south windows, he could see the driveway winding down to the gate on Robin Hill Road, and beyond them, the valley, the deep greens now giving way to yellows, browns, and patches of white.

So the seasons were changing, the morning was beautiful, and it was about time he got to work on something, anything.

Perched in his chair, No. 2 pencil in hand, he stared at a rough drawing he and Mandy had brainstormed: an escape trick using a tight metal cocoon hanging from a one-hundred-foot boom. It was a spin on metamorphosis, being trapped as one thing, escaping as something or someone else. Intriguing idea, but so far the whole thing was easy and boring. It needed more tension, which meant more danger, which would mean more safety design, which would mean more money. Funny how it always came to that.

So, safety bolts on both sides, a backup clevis … secondary cable, but now we’re blocking the hatch and how do we hide it …

After maybe two minutes of his thoughts and pencil lines meandering around a vast white void, he glanced at the erasable calendar on the wall above his desk and noticed he’d walked out on Eloise Kramer a week ago yesterday.
Well?
he asked himself,
any regrets? Should you have gone back, looked her up again? You told Arnie you’d give it some thought. Did you?

So this was Robin Hill Road. Gorgeous! Driving a Volkswagen Beetle through this valley with its farms, forests, barns, and pastures brought back feelings Eloise had sorely missed. Call her crazy, but she—or Mandy—grew up in a place like this and once drove a car like this. The classic whir of the engine behind her took her back to when she was, well, the
other
nineteen, and as the little car topped each rise and rounded each gentle turn, another beautiful sight made the feelings go wild inside her.
Oh, dear Jesus, please let me come home to a place like this someday.

She eyed the mailboxes she passed, watching the numbers count upward, looking for 1250 Robin Hill Road.

1090 … 1180 … 1200 …

She came over a rise, and her foot came off the gas pedal. The Beetle eased to a crawl.

On her right was a white paddock fence and a gravel-lined ditch between the fence and the road shoulder. The pasture was yellowed and patches of snow trampled the grass, but she knew this place. Didn’t she?

She pressed the pedal lightly. Up ahead were a mailbox and a heavy wooden gate.

She let out a yelp, her fingers over her mouth.

It was
the
gate,
the
fence,
the
driveway,
the
three aspens, and atop the hill at the end of the long driveway,
the
house, in glorious, magnificent daylight.

On the mailbox: 1250.

Actually, Dane had thought about Eloise Kramer enough to decide not to think about her. Life was much simpler with his eyes forward, planning projects, designing, imagineering. Most every day he thought about not thinking about her. He was thinking about not thinking about her even as the phone rang, the rings coming in pairs. It was the gate.

For no reason that he knew, Dane glanced at one of Mandy’s pictures—she was doing a curtain call in flowing, sequined white, with diamonds in her golden hair—before swiveling his chair toward the south-facing windows.

There was a blue Volkswagen Bug down at the gate.

The phone rang again. He had an extension beside his drafting table. He picked it up.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Mr. Collins?”

The voice was unmistakable.
Oh, God, no.

“Hello?” she asked again.

“Yes …”

She sounded breathless. “This is, this is just so unbelievable! I can’t believe I found this place, I can’t believe I found you!”

Oh, I just so much do not need this.
“I can’t believe it either.”

“It’s amazing! It’s a God thing, you know? I don’t know if you believe in God, but that’s what it is!”

“Did God show you where I live?”

“Umm … it was, I got your name, you know, I wrote it down on the back of that business card and then I got your phone number, and then I met a nice lineman from the phone company. He was fixing some wires and he had a map in his truck.”

This
was
unbelievable. “Why?”

“Umm …”

“Don’t say ‘umm,’ just answer the question.”

“Umm—I … oh, this is going to sound so crazy. I think we’re supposed to meet or something, I don’t know why, but, I don’t know, I just have this really big
feeling.
”

A feeling. Right. It’s all about feelings now.
“Young lady, feelings can get you into trouble. Be careful with feelings.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I guess I just need the time to explain it.”

“I told you I wasn’t interested.”

“But you are! I know you are!”

He opened his mouth but only an agitated breath came out. What could he say without lying? “Are … aren’t you being just a little forward here?”

“It’s got to be important. I got a driver’s license and then I got a car and then I found out where you lived so I could talk to you about it.”

Well, actually, really, considering all the ramifications and what constituted wise business, he could be honest saying … “I’m not interested.”

He could hear the click of a door latch and the groan of hinges, and through the window he could see her getting out of the car and standing beside it. What was she … ? He grabbed some binoculars from his desk.