Chapter 40.

 

Jared

 

 

Jared brought Dr. Maarchesin's image forward, cutting off the rest of the celebrating doctors and nurses, and there was no doubt at all, he thought, what she was. "And she is accepted as one of them," marveled Sofi, picking up on the signs also. "They have been among us all of this time!" Jared brought up the death certificate, pointing out the signature with a sense of inevitability; Carter and Maud and Dr. Maarchesin had set this up, without question, he thought.

"I have someone," he said, "a Tim Andes, trying to find out about the tissue samples. I don't know what they will tell us."

"Issio might know something," said Sofi.

"Clena, too," said Cara. "Any of the sisters."

"Good thought," he said, and put the screen aside and started to get up to walk over to their house, and realized that that wasn't going to happen just yet. Cara pushed him back into the chair with two determined hands, and Sofi, with a snap of her fingers, sent Al over to the Bahtan house instead.

"You are not a good patient," Cara said to him severely.

Al emerged with Clena and Mutai; Ollie was, Jared remembered, taking classes this afternoon, and he thought Evvie might have a private patient for a few hours every day or so. And they would leave Wundra on guard; by his count, assuming they had been too busy to hunt last night, they had two involuntary guests, including the one with the blue striped shorts.

Clena thought that the samples would be useful. They could compare them with Earthian samples and get an idea of how greatly they differed; they could begin to get a genetic profile of these aliens, she said, using the word matter-of-factly. And that was probably what they were, Jared realized – they were aliens, Gina's father, Maud, this doctor, Carter, who knew how many others? They were physically similar to Earthians – possibly to Zamuaons, also, although he himself had not seen this plump woman with jewelry – but they had a strong species resemblance among themselves, and technology markedly different from Alliance technology.

And if this was so, it was an odd thought to consider that he had lain with an alien and made love to her and not known it. With the cultural differences between Alliance species, there were not many cross-species affairs; the few he knew of involved Zamuaons and Earthians, and tended to disturb Earthians with their phobic reaction to physical difference, and to outrage Zamuaons with their reverence for family connections.

Maud's people were enough like Earthians to pass if you did not have reason, as he now did, to know better; he wondered how many others had engaged in such affairs without knowing it. There was Gillian Tylor-McIntosh-Linders for one, he reflected, disliking the thought that he and the children's mother might have anything in common.

"So with the estate business," said Mutai, "I am not sure how it would be, but perhaps if Jared has some legal standing –"

"I do not know what the law is in these matters," said Clena.

"I can consult my lawyer. The estate still isn't settled," said Jared, connecting with the conversation. "Which reminds me, I actually have an address for Carter; he knew her affairs better than I did, and I thought we should stay in touch."

"He sent you greetings through that man who spoke with Gina," said Sofi. "He knows that you are aware of the situation. You are not likely to find him available."

"True," Jared admitted.

"The question," said Clena, "is who owns the tissue samples; this is what we must learn. They belonged to the patient, but the patient is dead. Legally. Do they now belong to the hospital?"

"If they belong to the estate," said Mimi, "that would give Jared control, as executor of the estate."

"I'll ask my lawyer. If we can get hold of the samples," said Jared, "they do some tissue analysis at the Institute, I know; I can find out about it if I ever get back to work." He looked over the top of the screen at his left leg, which was, he thought, slightly less swollen, but that purple stuff was still dripping, and the towel underneath, which Cara had changed twice already, was unpleasantly stained. Following the direction of his gaze, Clena picked up the pot of ointment and began to smear it over the wounds, and the purple stuff acquired a sort of florescent quality Jared found disturbing.

"You'll be back to work by next week," said Cara. "That's what Dr. Frank thought."

"I hope so," said Jared, averting his eyes from his leg. He returned to the screen, tapping in an inquiry to the Wark's Ferry hospital, where Dr. Maarchesin must at least have hospital privileges, even if she did have a private practice.

He located her finally through the phone register; she had a family practice in conjunction with two other physicians. He wasn't familiar with Wark's Ferry and had no idea where the office was located, downtown, out of town, in a good area, in the slums, but he had an address, if he needed it, and he filed that in his noter while he was searching for more information. There was a holo of the office in Wark's Ferry, taken upon the opening of the place, a nice modern building with the three physicians standing before the front door. It looked pretty upscale. The other two physicians were men, an Earthian, darker than Jared, and a Zamuaon, black and white body hair, not at all plump, with very little visible jewelry.

Ann's car pulled up to the curb with a flourish, and she got out into the afternoon sunshine. Vowed to lifelong chastity following Roger's betrayal, Ann was clad in extremely short shorts and a green top with a neckline that plunged to her waist. She carried a reader and a bouquet of flowers about the same shade as the stuff seeping out of Jared's bite wound. Mimi and Al and Clyde at the picnic table greeted her, both men stealing peeks at her green top and at the rear view as she waved and passed them to get to Jared's porch. Jared settled for a quick, appreciative glance and went back to the screen.

"Oh, wow," Ann remarked, looking at his leg, and handed him the flowers and the reader. "That thing really got you." She eyed the oozing purple. "I guess I picked the wrong color of flowers," she murmured.

"Looks very appropriate," said Jared, laughing. "Thanks, Ann." The reader, containing five of the works of Stephen King, a Twentieth Century Earthian writer of horror fiction, was appropriate too, he thought, under the circumstances.

"Sorry I wasn't here to help yesterday," said Ann. "You should have called me, Cara. I wasn't doing anything."

"It got hectic," said Cara, taking the flowers, "or I would have." She, too, took note of Ann's overall appearance. "Ann are you seeing someone?" she inquired, evidently finding the signs familiar, and Ann blushed. She had very fair skin, Jared noticed; the heavy black hair with the red streaks was a fashion whim, not her natural color. He was glad Cara had a good enough sense of style and color to avoid it.

Ann had to be flamboyant; it was clearly in her nature.

"Well, sort of," she said. "I just kind of met the guy, you know; I can't really tell yet if it's anything or not."

"He's crazy if it isn't anything," said Clyde, at the table, and Mimi swatted the side of his head.

"I'll get a vase," said Cara, and retired to the living room.

Ann surveyed Jared's leg. "That looks absolutely awful," she said. "Is it still painful?"

"Thankfully, no," said Jared.

"Must have been really nasty poison."

"In some circles," said Jared, "you could sell that stuff by the drop and make a fortune."

"Yes, he was seriously tripping out," said Clyde over the Monopoly board. "The flowers growing on the clouds, and the cute little black butterflies coming out of the doctor's scanner."

"Did I really say that?" said Jared, appalled, and Clyde and Mimi and Al all laughed.

"That was the least of it," said Mimi. "Our sober straight Jared, watching the pretty music."

"I don't want to know," said Jared, and Ann giggled.

Cara emerged from the house with the flowers in a vase that had come from among Granny's things; she set it on the windowsill. "I have some iced tea," she said to Ann, and Ann shook her head.

"I just wanted to see how Jared was," she said, "and then I'm going to go through the woods again. Sooner or later, one of us is going to find those weird people."

"Have you seen anything?" asked Mimi.

"There's a new hatch of some kind of bug out there," she said. "They don't bite as bad as that D'ubian whatever, thank goodness. Where is it, can I see it when I come back? I bet it doesn't sound as bad as that fly does. Dr. Lindstrom is the absolute champion."

"This one mainly swears in D'ubian," said Mimi, "but it speaks Trade, too. I don't think it's quite as, well, colorful as the fly, but it's pretty good. It's in our basement."

"Oh, yes, I nearly forgot." Ann dug into the pocket of her shorts and produced a silver chain with assorted charms jangling from it. "I know Issio says Sofi is being superstitious, but just in case silver helps keep the thing trapped –" She handed the chain to Mimi. "That loser boyfriend of mine gave it to me last Solstice; it may as well be doing something useful."

"Dural and Duroh brought over a couple of their silver axes," said Mimi, "and we put them on the top of the aquarium, but we could hang this on the little food hatch Issio made; it would be a lot handier than another ax. Thanks, Ann."

It struck Jared as Ann cut through their house to reach the woods that there had been one significant change since yesterday; the whole neighborhood was referring to individual D'ubians by name. "Did they actually introduce themselves?" he asked Cara. "The D'ubians?"

"They were all so upset," she said. "They thought they were responsible; they thought they had killed you. So they were all talking and giving suggestions and answering Dr. Frank's questions. We thought they let Dural do the talking for them because they don't speak much Trade themselves, but it turns out they all speak it. It's just a convention, dealing with non-D'ubians. And our group isn't all that conventional when you get down to it."

"We started asking their names," said Mimi, "and we got them sorted out. Dural is the tallest, and then there is Duran, and Durakal is the middle-sized one. Duroh is the second smallest, and Durata is the smallest. Durata and Duroh are both kind of feminine, so we keep thinking of them as 'her', and the others as 'him', which isn't accurate, of course, but it gives us a way of identifying them."

And the interesting thing, Jared thought, was that they now knew the individual members of the Duri group well enough to distinguish among them; he thought that was nearly unprecedented for anyone but Terry.

Ann was right; this was an interesting neighborhood.

 

The Bahtan sisters returned to whatever they were doing across the street and the Monopoly players resumed their game, although Clyde was starting to make noises about dinner. It was, in fact, getting late in the afternoon. Issio pulled into their carport, and Sofi took her printouts and headed home to see what he had brought from the butcher; Cara went inside to check out the food keeper.

Left momentarily alone, Jared scrolled for Trudy's office number and connected the phone with his screen.

"Jared," she said, looking at his image on her desk screen. "Are you feeling all right? You look a little – off."

"Thanks a lot," he said, laughing; at least his leg wasn’t visible on her screen. "You look beautiful. You’re letting your hair grow." And it suited her, set off her eyes, liquid golden brown. Nothing could conceal her weight, but she dressed well, in clothes that fit properly, and if her body wasn't fashionably slim, she was at least imposing, not a bad look for an attorney.

"Flatterer. As always. So how about you?"

"I'm okay." She looked at him; he laughed again. "I was bitten by some sort of D'ubian pest. I told you about the Duri group, down the street. It's not a big problem; it's mending." Even if it did tend to glow iridescent purple, he thought, glad she couldn't see it. "I have a legal question, Trudy, so of course I thought of bothering you."

"Suing your D'ubian neighbors?"

"No, indeed. This relates to Maud's estate. The day before her death she was hospitalized, as I think I told you; Alliance General took tissue and blood samples for analysis and for cloning, new heart transplant. I don't know what they've done with the samples, and I'm wondering if they belong to the hospital now, or to her, that is, to her estate."

"That would depend on several things. Do you have copies of the consent forms she signed?"

"I'm not sure. I can look for them."

"The odds are that on her death, the samples would go into the hospital's research pool; this is common practice," said Trudy. "So that the ownership would rest with the hospital."

"Is there any way I could get possession of the samples, as her executor? Or, at the worst, the analysis they must have done on them?"

Trudy thought about it. "Tell me," she said finally. "Why do you want them? If there is a case we could make, compelling need –"

He considered; the full truth wouldn't quite make it, but a partial truth might work. "Maud was cremated, by her wish, and the ashes scattered," he said. "So there is no body remaining. These samples would be the only cells left for DNA analysis. A question of maternity has come up. This would be the way to resolve it."

"You found a relative," said Trudy. "I thought so. All those questions you asked last time you called. Someone has turned up; there's a claim on the estate."

"By no means." He couldn't imagine Cara making such a claim under even ordinary conditions, which these were not. And, while this wasn't the reason he had been looking for the samples, it was just as important, a means of telling them once and for all if Maud was her mother. "This is a matter of determining genetic heritage. But that's important to the person involved, you know."

"Yes, indeed. And this person has been in touch with you. From where, that planet, what was it, Linden's World? Or old Earth?"

"We've been in touch, yes," he said; on a daily and nightly basis, in fact, but he wasn't sure how much he wanted to tell even as dear a friend as Trudy. "It's complicated, Trudy; it's hard to explain. But if you could find out for me the status of those samples, that would be a starting point."

"I can do that." She was scribbling on a noter. "And get back to you, and we'll decide how to proceed from there. You're aware that if maternity can be proved, this person has a claim that could be heard in court? One we would need to consider?"

"Yes. I don't think it will be an issue."

"All right," she said, doubtfully. She had still not quite adjusted to the idea of his disinterest in Maud's estate; she was used to a very different mind set in her clients, which was a sad reflection on the general public, at least those members of it involved with attorneys. "Okay. I'll see what I can find out. By the way, I hear interesting gossip about you."

"You do?"

"Sean," she said, grinning, "told me you have an attachment now."

"Oh, did he? And did Sean happen to say where he heard this?"

"Agency people," said Trudy, "get around. He said you not only met someone, you're actually living with her. Very fast work, he said."

"Oh, hell."

"So it's true?"

"Is this anyone's business?" he inquired, and she laughed.

"Well, I just wanted to tell you congratulations, and I hope you're having fun. It's about time. And I hope she knows what a lucky girl she is."

"I'd like to congratulate you," he countered. "When do I get to do that?"

"There's an old saying about hell freezing over," she said. "Anyway I'll talk with the hospital and I'll see what I can find out. And if you find Maud's copies of the consent forms, let me know."

It was late by the time Ann came back for her car. Jared's all-too-willing helpers had brought him inside and carried off his screen. He had checked with his team at the Institute. Ott, who said her husband had the kids at the jetball tournament, was shutting down in the conference room. They had finished the initial survey of the first arch with the Zeilmars and the new figures, and proposed to bring up the second one tomorrow, unless Jared wanted them to wait until he was there. Considering that there were ten arches to study, Jared thought there was no reason to delay.

Weston, she said, had left early for a change, which was a surprise, since he had, as far as Jared could figure, no discernible life of his own outside the Institute. It was something about the special at the Creative Gourmet, which they tended to run out of after seven, Ott explained. Patterson had gone home to his sister's laundry room, Ott having personally walked him to his car. He needed, she said, a bath and a change of clothes. Especially, she commented, a bath.

The D'ubians appeared just as the sunset was fading, carrying their instruments, knocking very politely before they trooped into the living room. "You are greatly better," Dural said, looking at Jared's inflated leg. "We very much regret this injury. It is our It which bites you and causes many problems."

"It was your ointment that helped me," said Jared. "Don't worry about it, please. I'll be up and around in no time."

"Still," said Dural.

Jared found the smallest D'ubian just peeking over his outstretched foot, with an expression of shy curiosity. "You're Durata," he said, remembering the description Mimi had given, and she nodded and ducked her head, but not before he saw the sparkle in her eyes; she reminded him of a small, harmless animal, a gopher sort of thing, curiosity outweighing wariness as she peeked to see what was happening around her.

He thought it was a shame he had never taken time to get acquainted with each member of the group, that he had, like most people, seen them only as a single unit.

Ollie stopped by to see how he was and said his leg was much better. Evvie ran in to ask him the details of his work on Maud's estate; her patient was a lawyer, she said, and he would be happy to tell her what he could. He had, in the flush of returning health, given her a good deal of advice about setting up a clinic; the Bahtan sisters had been contemplating such a thing for some time, and now that Ollie had nearly certified, they could see a real possibility of it succeeding.

The D'ubians were still sitting out on the front porch, melody drifting on the summer evening breeze, but the Monopoly players had given up and gone home when Ann arrived, pausing to greet the musicians as she crossed the porch; hearing her voice Cara got up to open the door.

"Just wanted to say goodnight," said Ann, leaning in to wave at Jared. "You look better," she said.

"Have you been out in the woods all this time?" Cara asked, and Ann blushed.

"Well, sort of," she said. "Anyway I'll see you guys tomorrow, okay? Don't get bitten by any more Its until then. I still want to see the one in Clyde's basement, but their car is gone, so they aren't home."

She vanished; Cara, shaking her head, went to the front window to see her off. "It's just that she has such awful taste in men," she said. "Roger was pretty bad, but you should have seen the one before him. I mean, I was actually afraid of her being alone with him. And the one before that forged vouchers for five hundred of her credits, and made off with her great-grandfather's antique hunting rifle, one of those old projectile things; it was worth a fortune."

"She's a full-grown adult," Jared reminded her.

"I guess she's one of those people who have to learn the hard way," said Cara, and Jared kept to himself the reflection that many of those people never did learn.

 

"She didn't say she was my mother," said Cara, closing the dish washer, and Jared, who had been wondering when she would bring up last night's conversation, turned off his noter to give her his full attention.

"She said," he answered, "that Maud Clipper – the role she played, in other words – hadn't had children, which is what she always told me, but she herself, outside that role, I suppose, had two."

"Contributed genetic material," said Cara, leaning elbows on the breakfast bar, "Is what she actually said, and there wasn't much contact with one of them. But she didn't come out and say it was me. And if I am, does that mean I have a sister or brother somewhere?"

"Yes, half blood, anyway. And she said 'Rapunzel'. That was what I said, the night she told me about having a daughter. That was in the message she sent through Gina. I take that to mean you, sweetheart."

"And she said you were supposed to rescue this daughter from the ivory tower and the witch." She smiled. "Not a bad description of the fly," she said. "Actually Ann always called my mother a witch. Dr. Lindstrom, I mean." She paused to consider this. "That's strange," she said. "I guess she wasn't that much of a mother to me, but it's strange to think of her – not being related."

"It would be hard to get used to the change," said Jared, wishing he could get up and go to her.

"Yes." She thought deeply, frowned. "Yes, it is," she said, and then shook it away for the moment. "You were supposed to rescue – Rapunzel, right? And then what were you supposed to do?"

"I think the rescue was the important part," said Jared, "at least to me." The rest of the conversation was, he thought, better forgotten. Stress, he heard Issio saying.

"Ride away into the sunset?"

"That was my idea, not Maud's," said Jared, "riding away with a beautiful girl I had just met and already knew I wanted to be with for the rest of our lives. I didn't think about Rapunzel. Ivory towers. Witches. Except for that damned fly, I suppose. I did think about Maud, Cara mia; I thought it was time to put her into the past, and go on into the future with you."

"You said that to her last night. More or less."

"Yes. I wanted to make that very clear to her."

"The journal, the one with your article, was on my desk," she said, and he scrambled to follow her.

"It was?"

"Ann gave it to me, but I just sort of tossed it aside. And then it turned up on my desk, open to your article, right in the middle of my desk just before Spring Break, when Ann was going off with her boyfriend and Ollie was just home making up for lost time with her sisters and I had nothing much to do for a long weekend. Just sitting there, and I read it and I called you. And what I want to know is, how did it happen to turn up on my desk?"

"Ann showed you the article, so it was turned to that page when you tossed it aside. And maybe a cleaning robot knocked against the shelf where you left it and knocked it down. Maybe Ann spotted it and put it there for a hint. Maybe one of your students found it and happened to be looking at it before you came in."

"Maybe someone left it there so I would read it and call you, because I had nothing much to do and I was feeling a little down and I needed a project."

"Someone."

"Someone who was trying to get you and Rapunzel together," she said.

"You're saying that Maud – or maybe one of the others, that Zamuaon woman, or that man in the woods – engineered our meeting."

"Yes." They looked at each other; she was absolutely serious, he saw. "She wanted us to meet," said Cara. "She told you to look for me. She sent you a message that she was glad you found me."

She said, Jared remembered, that if he found and rescued her daughter, he might have her. She was leaving this daughter to him, a strange legacy, and it was just possible, he thought, that Cara might have a point or two. And if it made him uncomfortable, what did it do to her? "How does that make you feel?" he asked.

She didn't bother to weigh it. "I've been thinking about it," she said. "That we were put into this situation, that you were set up, so to speak. That here I am, a junior Maud, a younger version of your previous lover, so of course you were attracted, and that's all it is, when you come down to it."

"Cara – "

"But I don't care," she said, looking at him over the breakfast bar, a look of great determination, he thought. "I just don't care. Because I love you, and I want to be with you. If I remind you of Maud, if it's some heredity thing, something genetic that appeals to you, that's fine, it doesn't matter, it keeps you with me, you see, and that's what's important. Maybe in time you'll find out you like me, too; that would be good. But I don't care. I just want you, whatever it takes. I didn't think I'd feel like this; I guess I'm not that much better than Ann – but at least I have better taste in men, there's that."

Words and language; they were his major interest, they were his profession, whether teaching or studying or translating, and they all failed him now.. For a moment, very clearly and concretely, he wished Maud at the bottom of the ocean, in the Zamuaon slime pits, in the Bahtan's desolate desert, anywhere at all, in fact, where she could not taint their relationship, even in Cara's mind.

But there she was, and there they were, and Cara would be haunted by doubts for a long time, he thought, but time would help, and love would help, and perhaps it would help that he himself had no doubts at all. "I have already found that I like you, just you," he said. "And I don't care about any of the rest of it, right or wrong. Come here, Cara, come to me." He reached out an arm to her, and when she crossed the room he refused to think any longer about anything else.