Angel Landing (29 page)

“Pretty fucking common,” Carter snapped. “That's what I've been trying to tell everyone.”

“Just how important is the human-error factor in the construction of these plants?” the reporter went on.

“Pretty fucking important,” Carter cried.

“And what will this new explosion mean to the case of Michael Finn, already on trial for his error in installing a valve?”

“What will it mean?” I asked, but the reporter had finished his story, and I turned to Carter for the answer.

“It will mean that people may begin to realize how dangerous these plants are,” Carter said.

“Everything is dangerous,” the construction worker to our right said. “Everything gives you cancer,” he went on. “The only way to avoid danger is to be dead.”

“I disagree,” Carter said. “I for one am going to try and stop the danger.”

“Good luck,” the man said, and he turned back to his friends.

“What about Michael Finn?” I said to Carter. “What will it mean to him?”

“I'm talking about a technology that could destroy the planet, and you're concerned with Finn?”

I hung my head.

“I'm talking about millions of people,” Carter told me. “Billions.”

He searched in his pockets for change, and then walked to the rear of the bar, to the telephone booths. He was calling the members of Soft Skies to mobilize a demonstration in Elizabeth, New Jersey. I drank the rest of my whiskey and glanced around the Modern Times. There were men in the room who probably knew Finn, who had worked with him; it was such a small town some of them might have even gone to Fishers Cove High School with him, or sat by his side in first grade at the old elementary school. Over by the jukebox, a young man sang along with an old song about loneliness. When he sang he closed his eyes; his face was pained, as if he meant every word. I pushed my glass away and followed Carter to the telephone booths. He was so filled with energy that the phone booth couldn't contain him; he stretched the cord out into the hallway and gestured with his arms as he spoke with the New Jersey chapter of Soft Skies.

“Can you lend me a dime?” I asked.

Still talking, Carter reached into his pocket for change, and handed me a fistful of quarters and dimes. I sat down in the second booth, closed the doors, put in a dime, and dialed. I could still hear the song about loneliness, I could hear Carter talking about raising bail for the welder from New Jersey if he should be criminally charged. I waited, listening for the phone to be answered until, finally, on the fourth ring, Reno LeKnight picked it up.

“I'd like to talk to Michael Finn,” I told the attorney.

“Aren't you too embarrassed to be calling here?” Reno LeKnight said when he recognized my voice. “Aren't you even going to apologize for fucking up my entire defense?”

“Will you let me talk to him?” I asked.

“I certainly will not,” Reno LeKnight said.

I had not really expected that he would, I was not even certain I wanted to talk to Finn, I only wanted to share the news that might free him. “Did you watch the evening news tonight?”

“Listen, I'm not about to make polite conversation with you,” LeKnight told me. “I'm not going to make any conversation at all.”

“There's been another explosion.” I spoke slowly, flatly, for I was afraid that LeKnight might not believe a word I said.

“What?”

I could hear Reno LeKnight's breath come through the receiver like soft expectant waves. “An explosion,” I repeated.

“Where?” he asked.

“Elizabeth, New Jersey.”

“What's the situation?” Papers rustled as Reno must have been reaching for a pad and a pen.

“A lot like Finn's,” I said. “A valve was installed wrong. Actually the welder fell and broke both his legs. Right now they're calling it a mistake.”

“My God,” Reno LeKnight said. “My God,” he crowed.

“You don't think he might want to talk to me?” I asked.

“Do you know what this means?” LeKnight said. “I've got to get that other welder. I've got to subpoena him.”

“He's broken both his legs,” I reminded Reno LeKnight.

“They may even drop the charges,” the attorney went on. “Of course, the dramatic impact of Finn's case will be minimal if that happens. For all I know this case could set a precedent; it may end up in the lawbooks.”

“Of course, if he doesn't want to talk to me, I'll understand,” I said. “I just wondered if he might.”

“Finn won't talk to you,” Reno LeKnight said. “Don't take it personally; he's not talking to anyone, he's not even talking to me.”

I sat in the phone booth after Reno LeKnight had hung up. I stayed there until Carter had finished making plans with the New Jersey group. When he hung up the phone in the other booth and banged on the doors, I went out into the hallway.

“I've got to get to New Jersey tonight,” Carter told me. “The gas line in the MG is frozen, and I need a ride to the bus station.”

“I'll borrow Minnie's car,” I said.

“If you want,” Carter said slowly, “you could drive me to New Jersey. I'll be back for the rest of the trial. We could stay at a Holiday Inn.”

“I don't think so,” I said. “I think it's too late for that.”

We walked out of the Modern Times to go pick up Minnie's Mustang. At the house, I went to tell Minnie and to open the garage door. Carter stood in a snowdrift at the side of the driveway. He stomped his feet and blew on his ungloved hands; he counted his change for the bus to New Jersey. I wondered if there was a minute, one second when Carter was not threatened by the dangers he saw all around him; even when he rode the Greyhound bus, when he checked into the Holiday Inn in New Jersey and prepared his speech for the Elizabeth demonstration, he would be shivering. When I pulled the Mustang out of the garage and Carter came to sit in the passenger seat, I threw my arms around him so suddenly that he lifted his hands up to protect himself.

“What's this all about?” Carter asked when I had moved away from him and had begun to back the car out of the driveway.

Until I had seen him shivering in the snow, counting his change, I had not realized how serious Carter was about the danger he spoke of, the danger he fought as if radiation and terror could be weighed on a scale as easily as a dragon. I had not realized I would miss him until I imagined him riding off on that bus to New Jersey and never returning.

“I'll miss you,” I said.

“You will?” Carter said as we drove through Fishers Cove toward the bus station at the edge of town. When we got there, we sat in the car, with the engine turned on, waiting for the bus.

“I hope everything turns out the way you want it to with Michael Finn,” Carter Sugarland said.

“Oh, there's no chance of that,” I said quickly. “But thank you.”

We watched as the headlights of the bus appeared on the hill above Fishers Cove. Carter checked once more to make certain he had his notes, his pamphlets, his money, and a list of telephone numbers to dial in case of emergencies.

“Good luck,” I said when he was ready to go. “I hope you close down the plant.”

Carter got out, but he leaned in the open door. “Don't do anything rash.”

“I'm not jumping out of any windows.” I smiled.

“No,” Carter said. “I suppose you won't.”

Still, he looked at me carefully as the engines of the Greyhound strained.

“Honestly,” I said to Carter. “Don't worry about me. I'm going home right now and mailing my résumé to Florida.”

Carter nodded slowly, shut the car door, and walked to the bus. I watched as he got on; he moved to the rear, where he sat by a window that was coated with a film of frost. Carter couldn't possibly see out that window, but I waited in the idling Mustang until the bus had shifted gears and rolled out of the parking lot, and then I drove slowly home. I would start a new life, I decided, deep in the sands of western Florida. I would drive home to Minnie's, and later that night I would sit in the parlor and address a blue envelope to the agency in Florida. I passed through the familiar streets of Fishers Cove on the trip home, imagining that I was on my way to Finn. Any minute now I would see Finn's white shirt sway in the wind and the long scar across his cheek. There he stood in the shelter of the already bleached piece of time that had unmistakably become the past.

THE NEW YEAR

ONE

T
HE ONLY MENTION OF
our affair was a small article in the
Herald
entitled “Beyond the Call of Duty.” Photographs of Reno LeKnight were published in
Newsweek
, and a long article about EMOTE was printed in
Psychology Today.
But in our town only the
Herald
was read, and it was about me and Michael Finn that everyone was talking.

Even those who didn't care at all whether Angel Landing stood or fell understood the seductiveness of stolen kisses. Waitresses at Ruby's Café wondered if Finn and I had made love right across the street in the Outreach office; taxi drivers waiting at the railroad station for the next train wondered about the secrets Finn and I had traded with our tongues. Because Fishers Cove was so small, it wasn't long before everyone knew that Michael Finn and I had once been lovers, and that certainly included the staff at Outreach.

I stayed home from work and persuaded Minnie to tell Claude Wilder I was out each time he called. Yet, sooner or later I would have to face Outreach's board of directors, and so a few days after my appearance in court, during the trial recess that Reno LeKnight had requested in order to secure a surprise witness, I went to the Outreach office. I opened the door slowly, afraid that Claude Wilder was lurking behind the wood, but only Emily sat in the waiting room.

“Hello,” I called softly.

Emily dropped the pencils she was sharpening and ran to embrace me. “I think it's wonderful,” she said. “I knew it all along. I knew it the first time I saw you and Michael Finn walk out of that office together. I just knew it.” She lowered her voice. “They're waiting for you,” she nodded toward Claude's office. “They've been waiting all morning.”

There was no putting it off; I walked into the office to face the eyes of the tribunal.

“Ah ha,” Johnson said when I entered and closed the door behind me.

“Good morning,” I said, choosing the chair nearest the door.

“Let's not play games,” Gerkin the fund raiser said. “Someone tell her she's fired.”

“How could you?” Sally Wallace said to me. “How could you have betrayed our trust?”

“I don't think I actually did,” I said.

“You don't?” Claude said. He held a copy of the
Fishers Cove Herald
in the air. “Have you seen this?” He opened the paper to “Beyond the Call of Duty.”

“I've seen it. I haven't read it, but I've seen it.”

“Christ,” Johnson shook his head. “How could you?”

“Just one question,” Claude said, “because we don't want any rash accusations made.” He waved the newspaper in front of me. “Is this article factual?”

“Does it say that Finn and I were lovers?” I asked. Claude nodded solemnly. “Well, then, I suppose it's factual.”

“Ah,” Johnson said.

“That's it then,” Sally Wallace agreed.

“It's all in your contract,” Claude told me. “It's in the Outreach guidelines. No personal contact with clients outside of working hours. Those were the rules that you were legally bound to.”

“I understand,” I said. I was prepared to give up my job; I would sign any documents they asked me to.

“It's nothing personal,” Claude went on. “But let's face it—you broke the rules. And when you do that, you have to expect to pay the price.”

The door of the office swung open and Lark appeared in the doorway dressed in cashmere and pearls. “I heard you,” she said, shaking a finger at Claude. “But who here hasn't broken the rules?”

“I beg your pardon?” Claude Wilder said.

“You've never taken fees for private consultations?” Lark asked Claude.

“I don't know what she's talking about,” Claude said to the board of directors.

Lark threw a copy of the Outreach guidelines onto Claude's desk. “We're not allowed to accept payment for private consultations, and yet I know of at least eight times when you did exactly that.”

“Ridiculous,” Claude Wilder said.

“You deny accepting money from private clients?” Lark said.

“These young women are overly sensitive,” Claude said to the board of directors.

“Have you accepted fees?” Sally Wallace asked.

“That's not the point,” Claude said. “The point is the publicity that surrounded Michael Finn's trial. Rules were broken in the public eye.”

“All right,” Lark said to Claude, “you may be unwilling to admit that you've broken the rules, but I'm not, and I'm afraid I'll have to hand in my resignation.”

“Just a minute,” I said to Lark, “this isn't necessary.”

“I've broken the rules continually,” Lark went on, ignoring me. “I've had contact with my clients outside of the office. I've had clients to my home, to dinner, I've given most of them my home phone number, I've even let one or two of them sleep on my couch.”

“This has nothing to do with you,” Gerkin said. Without Lark, Outreach would lose a great deal of funding: the parents of some EMOTE members donated generously to both agencies.

“But I've broken the rules,” Lark said. “Quite a number of them.”

“Lark,” I said. “Don't.”

“This is ridiculous,” said Johnson. “There's no parallel between your situations.”

“There's no comparison,” I added.

“Of course there is,” Lark said. “If they fire you, they'll have to fire us both.” Lark smiled as she twisted the gold and ruby ring on her finger.