American Subversive (41 page)

WHAT HAD SHE HEARD? FOOTSTEPS? VOICES? I SAT UP IN THE DARKNESS. Paige was creeping barefoot toward the bathroom, the tired floorboards quietly cooperating. Then I heard it, too, the jangling of keys, followed immediately by another noise, closer, unmistakable: Paige opening a switchblade. My God. The front door was visible from the bed, and I watched paralyzed, helpless, as the lock began to turn. I was thinking
fire escape.
I was thinking
bum-rush.
I was thinking
blood.

I couldn't think at all.

Why the knife if we were only here to talk?

Why not call out to Keith?

Why didn't I do something?

The door was opening, the weak light from the hallway framing a male figure. He stepped inside, taking the key from the lock, head down, arm stretching out, searching for the light switch. I could see part of Paige, tucked against the wall around the corner like a TV cop. Not five feet away. She was watching me, waiting—for what: a signal?—all of this in two seconds, the time it takes to breathe.

Then the light came on, and the man, sensing something, looked up, just as Paige raised her arm, blade showing, the scene a horror movie still.

He saw me. I saw him.

And I shouted,
“Simon, stop!”

And Simon Krauss did exactly that, went dead still, the door slamming itself behind him. He looked at me in wonder, in disbelief, his mouth opening, forming words. Paige was staring at me, too, wild-eyed, desperate.
“Don't, Paige, I know him!”

“Aidan,”
Simon managed, still motionless.
“And Paige? Paige Roderick? It's okay. I'm here to help.”

Paige stepped into the narrow hallway, the knife still in her hand, but lowered now, at her side. They faced each other, neither ceding ground nor moving closer.

“Who are you?” she asked evenly. Simon, seeing the knife, didn't answer immediately. Paige turned toward me without shifting her eyes from the man before her.

“He's my mother's friend,” I said. “The one I told you about.”

Paige frowned. “How could you . . . why did . . . you
called
someone?”

“No,” I said.

“Then—”

“This is my apartment,” Simon said, in that calm voice I knew well. Or thought I did. His eyes were still on the knife. “I'm on your side. I know what's going on.”

“Well, someone better tell
me,
then,” Paige said, still blocking the hallway.

Slowly, Simon took his cap off, and then his coat—

“Don't.”

“I'm not armed.”

“I think we can invite him in,” I offered, but Paige ignored me. Instead, she closed the knife, put it in her pocket, and cautiously stepped up to Simon, who, without prompting, spread his arms. Paige patted him down, over his coat, then under. Simon stared serenely ahead, as if this happened all the time.

“Checking for a weapon or a wire?” he asked, when Paige had finished. She didn't answer. Instead, she turned and came back into the room. Simon, accepting this as an invitation, took his jacket off and followed her. I stood up and, having no idea what else to do, walked over and shook his hand.

“Surprised to see you here,” he said to me.

“Okay, enough with the reunion,” Paige said. “Who are you?”

“My name's Simon Krauss.”

“He's a famous artist,” I said.

“And your mother's boyfriend?” Paige asked.

“And Keith Sutter's . . .
patron,
” Simon added, completing the ad hoc résumé.

There was silence then, everyone absorbing, working this out. Paige was still studying Simon, who looked, with his messy gray hair and stubbly beard, his faded jeans and rugged flannel shirt, as if he'd just put his blowtorch down.

“So you know where Keith is then?” Paige asked.

“I was hoping he'd be
here,
” Simon answered, scanning the apartment the way Paige had scanned mine—in an instant. We were standing, the three of us, beside the table in the middle of the room, no one ready to commit to sitting, or anything else.

Paige wasn't done with him. “Tell me: if you know Keith so well, then what's his alias?”

“Todd Anderson,” Simon said. “And Lindsay's Laura Bellamy. And you're, let's see, A, B, C . . . Clarke. Isabel Clarke.”

Slowly, the tension in the room, the heaviness of the moment, evaporated. Paige exhaled. We all did. “Okay then,” she said. “Sorry about the knife.”

“How'd you know I wasn't Keith?” Simon asked.

“I wouldn't have heard Keith coming.”

He chuckled. “I must be out of practice.”

“When were you
in
practice?” I asked.

“We'll get to that,” Simon said, “but first . . . do you two have a flashlight? The sun will be up soon, but still, we shouldn't use the overhead.”

“Thanks for the tip,” Paige said, pointing out the flashlight on the floor beside the bed. She walked to the window and snuck a peek though the blinds. Simon picked up the flashlight, turned it on, then reached up and unscrewed the ceiling bulb.

“Safer this way,” he said.

“You bring sleeping bags with you again?” Paige asked.

“I didn't come here to change Keith's bedding. I came here to change his mind.”

“About what?” Paige asked, her voice softening.

“The N3 Action.”

“You know his plans?”

“As well as anyone,” Simon answered. “Which doesn't necessarily mean much.”

“No,” Paige agreed. Simon handed her the flashlight, which I took as a sign of acquiescence. Or maybe he just realized it was hers. I was still utterly confused by Simon's presence, his apparently secret life. It was like finding out your father was a war hero, or had killed someone, or both.

“Can I ask what's going on?” I asked.

“I think I can answer that,” Paige said, turning to address Simon. “You're EmpiresFall, aren't you?”

“No, he's not,” I said.

Simon cleared his throat but remained silent, waiting for Paige to continue.

“Of course he is. What, Aidan, you think it's a coincidence that your mother's boyfriend just strolled in here off the street? That's another thing I should have told you. Coincidence: there's no such thing.”

“She's right about that,” Simon remarked.

“So what happened?” Paige asked. “Wait, let me guess. Keith starts making you nervous and you decide he has to be stopped. And I'm your sacrificial lamb. The photograph of me outside Barneys. You took that, right? But if you're going to blow the whistle, why on earth did you e-mail the photo to Aidan? Why not tip off the mainstream media? Or the Feds?”

“Because we don't squeal on our own. Not like that. Keith may be misguided—”

“Try unhinged,” Paige said.

“—but he's still one of us. I didn't want any of you getting arrested, so I came up with the Roorback idea. I'd send you the photo, Aidan, and one of two things would happen. Probably, you'd think it was a joke and post it. Everyone would link to the thing, and it wouldn't take you long, Paige, trolling the Internet up there in Vermont, to realize your cover was blown and scrap the Action. The three of you could fold up shop and disappear with a head start. At least you'd have a fighting chance.”

“Or?” I asked.

“Or you
wouldn't
post the photo,” Simon said, “and you'd do a little
digging yourself. Journalism, I think they call it. Maybe a picture of Paige would get you off your laptop and out into the world. Which is something you should have done ages ago.”

“How'd you know
I
wouldn't call the cops?” I asked. “Or tell Cressida?”

“Because you'd never forgive yourself,” Simon answered, and nodded toward Paige. “A girl like that.”

Paige, who'd been listening intently, rolled her eyes back out to the street.

“So when I saw you at my mother's house, you knew what I was up to?”

“Of course. Though I was surprised it had gotten that far. I never thought you'd actually track Paige down. At best, you'd get close enough to spook her. Spook them. Instead, here we are. Your mother's going to kill me. We need to get you out of here.”

“Tell me
she's
not a part of whatever it is you're doing,” I said.

“No, no, she doesn't know about any of this. Let me . . . I should just make this clear: I love your mother a great deal, and would never put her in harm's way. Please remember that. Besides, she's never been
involved
like that. Even at Yale, from what she's told me, she always stuck to campus stuff: antiwar rallies and civil-rights sit-ins.”

“As opposed to you?” Paige asked.

“As opposed to me,” Simon answered.

“Well, I've got bad news for you in terms of the home front,” Paige said. “It's a bit too late to put Aidan on a bus up to Woodstock.”

“What do you mean?”

Paige told Simon about seeing Cressida in the stairwell, and from there we took turns filling him in on the rest: Fishers Island; the state fair; the Liberty Inn; and our plan to expose the N3 Action on Roorback if we couldn't find Keith soon. Simon listened carefully, his face creasing in concern, and what looked like regret. Was he blaming himself? He was, after all, responsible for the two of us being there. And Paige? Why wasn't she still spewing venom at the man who'd leaked her identity? Perhaps it was something they shared, these two, beyond searing passion and cool objectivity, this ability to steer around impediments, around tragedy. Is that what kept them alive to the damaged world? Or alive in it?

It was still so early, 6:30 a.m., and we took a few minutes to collect ourselves. Simon's sudden appearance had changed the parameters of our situation. But it also focused us. There were too many questions to ask, so we didn't ask them. Instead, we put on coffee and sat down around the table. Simon thought we should give it twenty-four hours; if Keith didn't come through the door by first light the following morning, then I was to go back to the Internet café and inform the world—or at least the Web—of his violent plan, while Simon snuck Paige out of the city.

And if Keith did appear, well, then we needed to be ready.

Simon knew a lot about N3 and, like Paige, believed there was a good chance Keith would still try to carry it out. It was now Thursday morning. The N3 Action had originally been planned for Saturday night, when the building would be least busy, and major Actions were not easily rescheduled. But a lot had changed since Simon and Keith had last spoken. Paige had split, for one. And the Flushing Four had been charged. And Keith and Lindsay had disappeared.

“I drove up to Mad River yesterday,” Simon said, “and the house looked like it'd been deserted for months.”

“Did you check the garage?” Paige asked.

“Yeah. It was empty.”

Intercepting Keith in New York was Simon's last hope, as it was ours, and we could do nothing now but plan for the confrontation. I was thinking about Paige's knife, whether she'd have used it if Simon had been someone else. Then I thought about her, and the night before, the two of us together on the mattress. How much of it had been comfort, a simple matter of close quarters, and how much had been . . .

Enough. I poured coffee as Paige and Simon discussed contingencies—what would happen the moment Keith walked in, and what would happen after. Paige had been reticent when I'd pushed her on the subject, but with Simon she came alive. They were two professionals, speaking the same language. Neither believed it would get violent, but still, they ran through a half dozen potential scenarios. Paige stood up every few minutes to peek through the blinds, but the street
below was quiet. Eventually, Simon leaned back and rubbed his hands together. “So now we wait,” he said. He fished a phone out and began checking messages.

“I hope you know what you're doing with that thing,” Paige told him.

“Don't worry, it's clean.”

“And what about ‘Simon Krauss'?”

“It's held up for thirty years.”

“You're kidding.”

“I should think,” Simon said, “that under the circumstances, you'd be thrilled to know it's still possible to survive underground in America.”

“You're saying I have a chance?” Paige asked with a wry smile. “What were you, a Weatherman or something?”

“As a matter of fact, I was,” he said, putting his phone away. “Up through the Northwestern chapter of SDS. A part-time student and full-time agitator. I managed to get arrested at every march in Chicago, and I guess that's what the leadership was looking for—Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dohrn, Terry Robbins—someone with a natural aversion to authority, who thrived on all that us-against-the-world shit. The Weathermen measured a person's worth by how far he or she was willing to go. A lot of it was ego and bluster, and early on we alienated some people—”