Bradley, Marion Zimmer - Shadowgate 04 (44 page)

 
          
"Yes?"

 
          
"Colin?"
The voice was faintly familiar. "It's Michael Davenant."

 
          
"Michael,"
Colin said warmly, hiding his disappointment that the call had not been what
he'd wished. "How has life been treating you?"

 
          
"Oh,
I can't complain. You heard that we lost our funding?"

 
          
"No."
Even through his worry about Cannon, Colin was shocked. The Rhodes Group had
been privately funded and owed a good deal of its viability to government
contracts.

 
          
"Afraid
so. The Sharon Tate thing hit us pretty hard out here
—
that and the
Blackburn
murders were a sort of
one-two punch. Frankly, when the government contracts dried up, the group
couldn't make a go of it in the private sector."

 
          
"I'm
sorry to hear that," Colin said honestly. "How are you doing these
days?"

 
          
"Oh,
not too badly. There's always room for a good administrator. But I ran across
something the other day that I thought might interest you, and I thought I'd
buy you a drink and tell you about it."

 
          
"With
all due curiosity expressed," Colin said, "I
am
a bit tied up
here in
New
York
."

 
          
Davenant
laughed. "Oh, silly of me; I should have mentioned. I'm in
New York
, staying at the
Warwick
. Come on by
—
I guarantee it'll be worth
your while."

 
          
Colin
glanced at his watch. He tried to convince himself that Cannon still might
call, and failed.

 
          
"It's
four o'clock
now," Colin said. He mistrusted his own eagerness to
involve himself with Cannon's problem
—
he needed to step back from
it if he could. Meeting Michael would be a heaven-sent distraction. "How
about if I meet you at six-thirty? We'll have time for a drink or two before
dinner. I know a nice little Italian place only a few blocks away from where
you're staying."

 
          
"Great,"
Davenant said. "I'll see you then."

 
          
The
bar at the
Warwick
was like something out of a
lost world: dark and intimate, with a faintly shabby coziness. It seemed to
belong more to the fifties than to the seventies. Colin located Davenant at a
corner table and quickly moved to join him.

 
          
Part
of Colin's mind was still occupied with Cannon, but he'd called Claire to
phone-sit while he was out. She knew where Colin was, and Colin put more faith
in Claire's ability than his own to keep a frightened, distrait caller on the
line long enough to elicit some hard information. Her years spent manning
various crisis hot lines had honed her inbred people skills to the point that
nobody remained a stranger to Claire Moffat for long.

 
          
"You're
looking well," Davenant said when he arrived. "The publishing life
agrees with you, though it's a pity to lose your services in the field."

 
          
"I
do keep my hand in here and there," Colin admitted.

 
          
Davenant
smiled. "I was hoping you were. So many folks burn out, you know
—
get religion, or just lose
their taste for ambiguity. I'm glad you're still in the fight."

 
          
"So
to speak," Colin said.

 
          
They
ordered drinks, and chatted of current events
—
the Watergate break-in,
Nixon's reelection, the war
—
until they came. After they'd both tasted their drinks
—
the
Warwick
poured an excellent
selection of single-malts
—
Davenant finally broached the subject of their meeting.

 
          
"I've
already told you that the Rhodes Group is disbanding, but of course there's
still the matter of the company's assets to dispose of. The research library
—
not to mention the records
of our cases
—
constitutes a significant resource. And it would be a pity
if all that data were to be lost."

 
          
"It
certainly would," Colin agreed. "I suppose you'll be donating it to a
library or university?"

 
          
"Donating!"
Davenant laughed. "You've been out of the business world too long, Colin.
I've spent the last eight months looking for a
buyer
at the express
direction of the board."

 
          
"I
suppose so," Colin said noncommittally. He was always depressed when commerce
got in the way of pure research. "Any luck?"

 
          
"Fortunately,
yes. The library was broken up
—
most of it went to Duke, of course
—
but I'm happy to say I've
found the perfect home for our case files."

 
          
"Didn't
you have some confidentiality issues there?" Colin asked. "Some of
those case files have some pretty hot stuff in them."

 
          
"Oh,
well, of course. Naturally all the government files were turned over to the
Central Intelligence Agency
—
something called Project Star Gate has taken over our work
in-house over there, but you didn't hear it from me. As for the rest, real
names have been deleted, and most of our clients signed partial waivers back
in the beginning anyway. The only real problem was in finding a suitable
recipient, and fortunately, I have success to report. We ended up selling the
material lock, stock, and ectoplasm to the Bidney Institute, right here in your
backyard."

 
          
"Not
quite my backyard, Michael
—
Glastonbury
is a good ways up the
river. But close enough, I suppose," Colin said.

 
          
"Which
brings me to what I wanted to pass along to you. While I was up there closing
the deal, I happened to hear that they're looking for a new director, since
Newland's retiring next year. I suppose you're familiar with the terms of the
funding bequest?"

 
          
Coincidentally
enough, the book Colin was reading for Selkie Press was on the life of Margaret
Beresford Bidney. "As a matter of fact, yes. The institute is associated
with the college, but it manages and administers its own funding, including
that million-dollar prize."

           
"For just as long, I gather, as
the good doctor can keep the money out of the sticky fingers of the college
trustees. Well, now that he's decided to retire, the college is putting real
pressure on the institute to wind down and assimilate with Taghkanic."

 
          
"Which
would, of course, give Taghkanic control of the Bidney bequest?" asked
Colin, out of familiarity with the intricacies of both internal politics and
academic feuds.

 
          
"Precisely.
The institute won't have much hope of remaining an independent entity if they
can't search out a qualified director. While of course the college doesn't have
any actual control over who the institute chooses, if the institute makes a
really bad appointment, the college can always withdraw its support and leave
them without accreditation."

 
          
"Who
picks the new director?"

 
          
"The
outgoing director and the institute's board of directors. Frankly, I think
Newland's on Taghkanic's side, the way he's conducting his job search. Or maybe
he just doesn't want to get caught in the middle."

 
          
"I
can understand his feelings." Colin considered the matter. "Well, I
can hardly walk in and propose myself for the job. To be frank, I'm pretty
happy with Selkie Press and my consulting work. Still, if the institute is
going on the block, I'd at least like to take a look at it before it's
gone."

 
          
"That's
the spirit," Davenant said enthusiastically. "And speaking of spirits
—
"

 
          
The
conversation turned to parapsychology, and rambled through the field of mutual
friends and acquaintances. Soon the venue was moved to Colin's "little
restaurant around the corner," where both men did full justice to the
table d'hote. It was only at the end of the meal, over brandy and cigarettes,
that Davenant returned, briefly, to the subject of the Rhodes Group library.

 
          
"It
was a near thing, and even if the institute is going to go under next year when
Newland resigns, I'm still glad they got the records
—
they'll just roll over into
the Taghkanic Library, and you know how colleges are about letting go of
anything once they've got their hands on it. Anyway. I had a job of persuading
the board, because Hasloch, Morehouse, and Rand were frankly offering more
money, but
—
"

 
          
"Hasloch?"
It wasn't a common name, and Colin felt a chill strike straight to his heart,
as though he'd unwarily breathed in a deep lungful of arctic air. There were no
coincidences
—
all his experience and training had taught him that.
Michael had called today
—
and Colin had accepted his invitation
—
for a reason, and now he
knew what it was. Suddenly, without any need for temporal proof, Colin knew
the enemy he faced.

 
          
"Toller
Hasloch," Davenant said. "Hotshot legal beagle: used to be Hasloch,
Hasloch, and Morehouse before Hasloch's father died last year and one of the
senior associates got promoted. Apparently they were bidding for a client who
didn't want to be named
—
I can't imagine what interest a
New York
law firm would have in
parapsychology."

 
          
For
an instant the cozy restaurant was gone, and Colin stood in the basement in
Berkeley
, looking up at the
blasphemous inverted figure hanging from the cross.

 
          
"Neither
can I," Colin said evenly.

 
          
The
talk moved on, but the mood of the evening had been clouded, and when Davenant
pleaded an early flight on the morrow, Colin was almost eager to let him go.

 
          
He
decided to walk at least partway home, in hope of finding an off-duty cab, and
went a few blocks out of his way to inspect the big tree at
Rockefeller
Center
. It towered brilliantly
over the plaza, its colored lights casting a sort of a magic glow over its
surroundings in token of the greater Light that this season celebrated. The air
had that almost-minty bite that spoke of snow, but even four days before
Christmas, any flurries they got weren't likely to stick.

 
          
Colin
felt his heavy mood lighten a little and was even moved to purchase a copy of
the
Times
from a kiosk at the edge of the plaza. Claire always accused
him of burying his head in his work and paying little attention to current
events.

 
          
Perhaps
he had, but he couldn't imagine how even the most scrupulous attention to
world events could have warned him about the reappearance of Toller Hasloch in
his life. The boy had been so young . . . Colin had always hoped that the
fright he'd given him had been enough to turn him away from the Shadow, but in
his heart, he'd always know it hadn't been.

 
          
Almost
absentmindedly, Colin reached toward his pocket, feeling for the weight of a
gun that wasn't there.