The Silenced Tale, стр. 19
From there, I should be able to scan the returned stories and see if there is any sort of pattern, any sort of . . . well, anything. I hate being passive and waiting for the information to come to me when I itch so for the truth. But I am well practiced in it. It always took weeks for my Shadow’s Men to return information to me. This program, at least, will do so in a matter of hours.
As I set it into motion, I wonder if I should give it a clever name, the way they do in the movies. Perhaps Finnar, who was my chief leg-work man when I still wore the mask.
Apt, I muse.
With Finnar running all over the web, I push back from my desk. The squeak of my chair wheels wakes Alis, who snuffles and pulls herself upright by the side of the playpen. Though she is advanced in the realm of communication for one her age—her handful of words tops out at about twelve now, in both English and Mandarin—she has yet to master “hungry.” Instead, she scowls miserably at me, red-cheeked and flushed, and sucks at the air with her pursed lips.
“Yes, of course, sweeting,” I say, and fetch her up. She rolls her forehead against my shoulder and heaves a put-upon sigh. “What do you think? Hard-boiled eggs, perhaps some of that purple applesauce?”
“Nǎi,” Alis says.
“Niúnǎi,” I correct. “Yes, you can have some milk, too, if you like.”
We have just reached the kitchen when my pocket begins to vibrate.
Alis knows what it means when my smartphone plays a fife-and-fiddle tune. It is a piece that Elgar Reed sent to me. He told me that I was not allowed to share it with anyone, asked my opinion of the arrangement and how accurate it was to the songs I knew from my youth, and then promptly made it my ringtone for his number the next time we got together.
So much for secrecy. Ridiculous man, I had thought at the time. But I do appreciate knowing it is him before I answer the phone. Though this time, Elgar’s call worries me. Perhaps it is disingenuous of me to pretend that all is right, and that his fears are for naught, but until I know more, I do not see the point in inciting a panic in my creator. More than once, I’ve wished I had a surveillance camera installed inside his home.
Alis, overjoyed by the sound of the phone, shouts, “Gar Gar!”
“Hello?” I answer.
Elgar
His stomach aches from bolting his breakfast, so he nearly doesn’t see the stranger in black until he’s practically standing beside him. The sinkhole of unmoving shadow registers in the corner of his eye at the last second, and Elgar feels the sidewalk drop away as soon as the man is fully in his sight line. The sun has come out, working hard at evaporating the last of the slushy rain on the pavement, but somehow, the man seems to suck even that light up, like a black hole.
Elgar debates stopping, or turning on his heel and going home another way, or maybe even crossing the street to avoid this sinkhole of shadow. In the end, he tucks his chin under his scarf, pulls his cap down on his forehead, and stares at the ground as he scuttles by like a nervous crab. The intense feeling of being watched, of being stared through, surges up. With his eyes down, he notices, somewhat distantly and with no little bit of hysteria, that the stranger in black is wearing women’s boots. They’re knee-high, leather, with a low wedge heel and a lot of Gothy hardware and zippers. It’s an incongruent detail. It almost makes him freeze and stare.
Almost.
He takes the long route home, looking back over his shoulder—for what, he isn’t sure. He adds a bunch of extra turns before coming in through his back gate and into the kitchen from the garden. He feels so damn foolish for doing it, but it makes something in him feel safer, more relaxed . . . more . . . yeah, okay, crazy is what it actually is. Totally bonkers. Mental. Insane.
A strange man in black with women’s boots and a waitress whose eyes are maybe supposed to be blue. An assistant who thinks he’s been doing drugs. A fear of his own damn job. A worry that his own cleverness is starting to bite him in the ass. And a fictional character he calls his cousin, but thinks of as a son.
His life is mad.
Or he is.
“Forsyth,” he says aloud. “I gotta talk to Forsyth.” He sheds his outerwear and checks on Linux, who’s napping peacefully in front of the cold fireplace in his living room. Elgar gets out his phone, turns on the fire, and settles on the sofa. He rubs his stomach to get rid of the cramps as the phone rings, and then Linux’s back when the cat crawls onto his lap and stretches his head up to tuck it against the side of Elgar’s beard.
The soft rumble of the cat’s purrs is soothing. It helps to ground him.
“Hello?” Forsyth says on the other end of the line. “Well, this is a surprise. You don’t usually call so early. To what do we owe the honor?”
Elgar looks at the clock on the mantel. It reads five after eleven. That is early for him. Usually, he’s just making his first pot