Chapter 5 
Chapter 5
The Down Time’s pool room was a snoop’s paradise. Thanks to the acoustics, it was possible to hear snatches of several conversations at once. Kit had always wondered if the place had been purpose-built. He lined up a shot, called it, and put the two ball neatly in a side pocket. Out in the bar proper, somebody was laughing about an invasion of grasshoppers at TT-37.
“Came right through a random gate into Commons. Tourists screaming, Station Pest Control tearing hair and swearing. Must’ve killed a million of ’em, minimum. Took days to sweep ’em all up.”
In another corner, Robert Li’s unmistakable bass voice rumbled, “. . . so when Wilkes said that, Bull told him all ATF courtesy passes were canceled, effective immediately. . . .”
Kit grinned. Another wrinkle in the continuing saga. The station manager’s battle to keep ATF’s nose where it belonged—out of everybody else’s business—had spawned an entertainment form unique to La-La Land. Known as “Bull Watching,” it involved avid betting on the outcome of any random encounter between Bull Morgan and Montgomery Wilkes.
Kit called and sank another ball, then lined up his next shot. Over in the corner, Goldie Morran frowned, looking every inch the disapproving dowager one might see on the Paris Opera House’s grand marble staircase opening night, dressed to the nines and staring down that long, thin nose of hers like a Russian aristocrat Even the hair—a particularly precise shade of purple Kit still associated with seventh-grade English teachers and aging duchesses—contributed to the overall impression.
Goldie eyed the line of Kit’s cue stick and sniffed. “I knew I would regret this game. You’re too lucky.”
Kit chuckled. “Luck, dear Goldie, is what we make it.” The next ball he called rattled musically into the far corner pocket. “As you, of all people, should know.”
She only smiled, a thin hawkish smile that spoke volumes to those who knew her well. Kit suppressed the urge to look for the knife about to plunge into his back. He lined up his next shot and was just about set when Robert Li’s voice interrupted from the doorway.
“Ah, Kit, there you are.”
La-La Land’s antiquarian, a long-time friend, knew that interrupting a game for anything less than catastrophic emergency was considered a hanging offense. Particularly when the opponent was Goldie Morran. Playing Goldie took concentration if you wanted to leave the room wearing the shirt you’d come in with. Kit had momentary visions of Tokugawa samurai pouring through the Nippon Gate into the Neo Edo’s main lobby, demanding room service.
“What is it?” he asked warily.
Robert lounged against the door frame and idly inspected his fingernails. “Seen the Wunderkind lately?”
The Wunderkind could refer to only one person: Margo.
Oh, great. Now what’s she done?
In her four days at La-La Land, she had managed to set more tongues wagging than Byron and his sister had in four months of Sundays.
“Uh, no.” He lined up his shot again. “Don’t much care if I ever do, either.” He began the shot.
“Well, she’s been hanging around with Skeeter Jackson. Says he’s going to teach her to time scout.”
The shot went wild. Kit’s cue actually raked the felt table, leaving an ugly mar in its smooth surface. He swore and glared at his so-called friend, then at Goldie. She widened her eyes and shrugged innocence, reminding Kit unpleasantly of Lucrezia Borgia that night he’d accidentally surprised her in the infamous walled garden. . . .
“Huh.”
Kit surrendered the table with as much grace as he could muster and said goodbye to the game. Robert Li, whose maternal Scandinavian heritage—fair skin and rosy cheeks—was over-shadowed by a Hong Kong Chinese grandfather’s legacy, only grinned. A completely scrutable scoundrel, he settled his shoulder more comfortably against the doorframe to watch. During the next two minutes, Goldie ran the table, hardly pausing for breath between shots. She spun the final shot off Kit’s scratch, giving the ball just enough English off that long mar in the felt to sink it with a rattle like doom.
“Tough luck,” she smiled, holding out one thin-boned hand.
Kit dug into his pocket and came up with the cash, paying her off wordlessly. Robert, still standing in the doorway, grinned sheepishly as she passed him on the way out.
“Sorry, Kit.”
“Oh, don’t mention it. I just love ruining a perfectly good pool table and losing a week’s profits.”
‘Well, gosh, Kit, I just thought you’d laugh. How was I to know you’d take the news so personally? Don’t tell me the famous Kit Carson has fallen for that redheaded imp?”
Wisely, Robert made himself scarce. But the antiquarian chuckled all the way out to Commons. Kit muttered impolite words under his breath. With such friends . . . He unscrewed the sections of his cue stick and slipped them into their leather case, then settled up the damages with Samir Adin, the night manager. “You what?” Samir asked in gaping disbelief.
“I scratched. Here, this ought to cover the cost of refelting it.”
“You scratched. Unbelievable. Did I miss the earthquake or something?”
Kit scowled. “Very funny. Frankly, I’d say it hit at least 7.5 on the Richter. Had Goldie’s name all over it. Give me a Kirin, would you?”
Samir chuckled and dug for a cold bottle. “I keep telling you, Kit. If you want to beat Goldie Morran, play her when she’s unconscious.”
Kit downed the Kirin in five long swallows and felt better immediately. “Well, a man can dream, can’t he? Hillary had Everest, Peary had the Pole, and I cling to the dream of beating Goldie Morran at pool.”
Samir, a deeply sympathetic soul, broke into song, giving him a stirring rendition of “To Dream the Impossible Dream”.
“Oh, you’re no help,” Kit grinned. “Why do I come in here, anyway?”
Samir chuckled. “That one’s easy. All time scouts are gluttons for punishment. It’s in the job description.”
Kit laughed. “You’ve got me there. I wrote the damned thing.”
Samir thumped him on the back by way of condolences and sent him on his way. Kit shoved hands into pockets, cue case tucked under one arm. Well, that story ought to be a nine-day wonder. It’ll be all over La-La Land by bedtime. He strolled glumly through Urbs Romae, going nowhere in particular, then sniffed appreciatively at the scents wafting from the Epicurean Delight. Dinner sounds good, after that beer. Hmm . . .
He wondered what Arley Eisenstein had written on the Special Board for tonight. Arley’s restaurant was the place to eat in La-La Land. Other restaurants boasted more posh in their decor, but Arley had discovered the secret of enticing the world’s best chefs to take turns in his kitchen. Down-time agents on his payroll obtained recipes in exchange for a slice of the Epicurean Delights profits. Some of what they brought back, of course, made haggis sound appetizing. But he came up with enough “lost” winners to make a tidy profit.
Chefs who wanted access to Arley’s culinary secrets paid through supervising Arley’s kitchen for a stipulated number of days per year. Since most tourists couldn’t identify ingredients in what they ate, never mind figure out procedure . . . From the rumors, the arrangement was wildly profitable in up-time restaurants.
It certainly was for Arley. Unless you were a resident, you booked reservations two months in advance. ’Eighty-sixers, on the other hand, sampled the Delight whenever they liked. Arley made it a policy always to hold back at least three tables for station residents. Any given night, all three would be full.
Kit’s mouth was already watering.
He cut around a column to head for the restaurant and very nearly ran down Connie Logan. She emitted a tiny screech and teetered. Kit grabbed her arm and steadied her.
“Sorry,” they said simultaneously.
Kit blinked. She was about a foot too tall.
“Good God.”
Connie was clad in a silk kimono held together by sewing pins and basting threads. Peeping out from under the pinned hem were “shoes” that resembled beach thongs, except they were made of wood and the soles were at least eleven inches thick.
Connie blinked, owl-like, from behind her glasses. “Hi, Kit. What do you think?” She held out both arms to display the half-finished work to its best prickly advantage.
“Let me guess,” Kit said drolly. “Your customer wants to join the semi-annual grand procession of harlots through Yoshiwara?”
Connie rolled her eyes. “No. He wants to give his favorite down-time mistress a present. I’m trying it out, to be sure it can be worn. Now I understand why those old woodcuts show guys walking on either side of those poor girls, balancing them. These shoes are murder.”
Kit grinned and offered his hand. “Shall we dance?”
Connie stuck out her tongue, but accepted the offer with alacrity. “Just help me over to the bench and I’ll get rid of these lousy clogs. I was afraid to kick them off. Didn’t want to lurch off balance and break an ankle.”
Kit glanced around and guided her toward the targeted seat. Even in La-La Land, Connie was attracting stares. The shoes thunked with every step. “So who is this customer?”
Connie shuddered. “Don’t ask. He’s about seventy-five and covered with tattoos.” Yakuza. Japanese mob . . .
Sixteenth-century Edo’s Yoshiwara district had become a popular spot for Japanese businessmen’s tours. Japan’s recovery from the tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and economic disasters left behind in the aftermath of The Accident, as that fateful orbital blowup had come to be called, had astonished most of the world. For the survivors, it was back to business as usual and most of the businesses were rich and getting richer. Japanese corporate tours were mostly organized by Yakuza gangs—which had really cleaned up in the reconstruction, since they apparently controlled the lion’s share of the Japanese construction industry.
Kit wondered how Time Tours guides enjoyed rubbing shoulders with Japanese gangsters. He knew Granville Baxter hated them, but business, as they say . . . Grant didn’t make corporate decisions. He just dealt with the field problems and gritted his teeth while making the home office a ton of money.
Kit eased Connie down to the bench. “There,” he smiled. “All safe and sound.”
She winced and wriggled to avoid pins, then sighed. “Thanks a million. Computer design may be my forte, but it just doesn’t take the place of field testing. Sometimes,” she grimaced at her feet, “it’s a little rough on body and soul.”
Kit stooped and eased off her shoes, earning a deep sigh. Connie’s feet, clad in tabi socks, were visibly swollen even through the cotton. He rubbed gently. She collapsed bonelessly against the backrest.
“Oh, God . . . I love you, Kit Carson.”
Kit chuckled. “That’s what all the ladies say. Had dinner yet?”
She peeled one eyelid. “No, but I don’t have time. Still have a special order for the London run to finish designing and after that I have a new batch of sketches from Rome and some samples that you just wouldn’t believe, how gorgeous they are. . . .”
Kit grinned. “I’ll take a rain check, then. Don’t forget to order pizza or something.”
“Scout’s honor.” Connie melted another few inches down the bench while Kit finished her feet, then sighed and stood up. She wriggled cotton-clad toes against the concrete. “Blessings on your soul, Kit. I may be able to limp back, now.”
“Mind if I ask a stupid question?”
“Shoot.”
“How come you tortured yourself into walking halfway down the Commons in those things?”
Connie grinned. “I paced it out beforehand, to the exact distance of the harlots’ processions through Yoshiwara. If I can go the distance in those infernal shoes, anyone can.”
Connie Logan wasn’t exactly sickly, but she was fragile. Kit scratched the side of his jaw. “Well, I guess you have a point. Still seems a helluva way to design costumes.”
Connie laughed. “This, from the man who pioneered masochism into a new art form. Just why did you become a time scout?”
“I cannot tell a lie.” He leaned closer and whispered, “Because it’s fun.”
“There you have it. I get to play dress-up, every day.” She stooped for the hideous shoes, then gave him a quick hug full of pins. “Thanks, hon. Gotta go. Oh . . . I saw that kid the other day, with Skeeter Jackson.”
Kit groaned.
Connie’s brows twitched down. “Good grief, Kit, she really got to you, didn’t she? You ought to say something to her. She worships you, and Skeeter’s going to get her killed. You wouldn’t believe what he had her wearing.”
“Great. Since when did I get promoted to greenhorn-daddy?”
Connie flashed him a grin. “You don’t fool me, Kenneth Carson. You care. It’s why we like you. Gotta run.”
Kit was still grumbling under his breath long after Connie had vanished back toward her outfitters’ shop. “Sometimes,” he groused, “this Mr. Nice Guy rep is more trouble than it’s worth.” He sighed. “Well, hell.” He really couldn’t countenance allowing Skeeter Jackson to pass himself off as an instructor of time scouts.
Normally residents didn’t interfere in other residents’ business dealings. But there was a difference between fleecing obnoxious tourists out of a few dollars and perpetrating negligent homicide. Skeeter, never having been a scout—having rarely even been down time—probably didn’t realize just how deadly his current scam was. Kit swore under his breath. He probably wouldn’t earn any thanks, but he had to try.
Kit dropped by the Neo Edo just long enough to put away his cue case and be sure Jimmy had the business well in hand, then started asking around for Skeeter. Typically, nobody recalled seeing him. Kit knew some of his favorite haunts, but the rascal wasn’t in any of them. Skeeter generally avoided Castletown, since even he didn’t care to risk fleecing the wrong person and end up someplace really nasty, minus several fingers. Kit checked all of Skeeter’s favorite watering holes in Frontier Town, then hit the pubs in Victoria Station. Nothing. Skeeter Jackson was making himself mighty scarce.
“Well, he’s got to be someplace.”
With no gates currently open, Shangri-la Station was closed up tight. The only exits were hermetically sealed airlocks leading—if the main chronometers and Kit’s own equipment were correct—into the heart of the Tibetan Himalayas, circa late April of 1910. The only reason those airlocks would ever be opened would be to escape a catastrophic station fire. And since Halon systems had been built into every cranny of La-La Land . . .
Skeeter hadn’t left the station, not unless he’d fallen through an unstable gate somewhere.
“We should be so lucky,” Kit muttered. “Well, genius, now what?” He planted hands on hips and surveyed the breadth of Victoria Station, which wound from one side of Commons to the other in a maze of pseudo-cobbled streets, wrought-iron “street lamps,” park-like waiting areas, picturesque shop fronts, and the inevitable cob-webbing of catwalks and ramps which led up to the Britannia Gate near the ceiling.
A tourist in a garish bar-girl costume left the Prince Albert Pub and fumbled in a small purse that would have been more appropriate for an American frontier matron. Slim white shoulders rose above a shocking neckline. Kit couldn’t see her face. A drooping bunch of black feathers from a hat that should have been paired with a tea gown hid her features. The hemline of her dress was cut rakishly high enough to reveal shoes that were completely out of period.
“Huh. She went to a lousy outfitter.”
The tourist closed her purse, then turned on an emphatic stilt heel. Kit groaned. It figured.
Margo . . .
“Well, Connie did warn me.” He squared metaphorical shoulders and moved to intercept her, stepping out from behind a “street lamp” into her path. “Hi.”
Margo glanced up, badly startled, and teetered on high heels. Kit let her regain her balance.
“Oh. It’s you.” Belatedly, she said, “Hi.” Then her chin came up. “I found a teacher.”
“Yes, I know. That’s why I want to talk to you.”
Margo’s eyes widened. “You do?” Almost instantly, suspicion flared. “Why?”
Kit sighed. “Look, can we just declare a truce for about fifteen minutes?”
She eyed him narrowly, then shrugged. “Sure.” She tossed her head slightly to bounce feathers out of her eyes.
Kit started to say, “That hat’s on backwards,” then bit his tongue. He didn’t want to antagonize her. He wanted to save her life. So he suggested, “Let’s go over to the library. It’s quiet. We shouldn’t be interrupted.”
Margo eyed him curiously. “Why are you taking the trouble? I thought you hated me.”
“Hated you? I don’t hate anybody, Margo. Time scouts can’t afford the luxury of hate.”
Or love . . .
Margo’s eyes had gone curiously wide and vulnerable, “Oh. Well, I’m glad.”
Kit recalled what Connie had said—“she worships you”—and sighed. He wasn’t cut out to be anybody’s personal hero.
“Come on, Margo. The sooner I get this said, the sooner you can tell me where to jump off, then we can both call it quits.” He eyed her unhappily. “And contrary to what you clearly believe, I don’t enjoy hurting people’s feelings.”
For once, she didn’t come back with a sharp remark. She just followed him wordlessly toward the library.
Margo knew time terminals had libraries. Tourists, guides, and time scouts all used them, to one degree or another. Her original legwork had revealed that time terminal libraries were among the most sophisticated research facilities in the world. But Skeeter Jackson hadn’t suggested they go there and she hadn’t given it much thought. Margo had never been fond of books. She preferred direct, dramatic action and firsthand experience. Poring through dusty, musty pages nobody had cracked open in fifty years only made her crazy. Besides, all those experts disagreed anyway, and a time scout’s job was to go places and find out what the truth was.
Still . . .
La-La Land’s library overawed.
Margo repressed a delicate shudder and didn’t even try to calculate the number of books contained in this . . . the word “room” seemed inadequate. And computer terminals, too, with recognizable CD-ROM and video drives, all voice-activated. Judging from the snippets of soft-voiced commands she heard from a dozen busy users, they were programmed for multiple-language recognition. The computers drew Margo’s attention more thoroughly than any of the books.
Mr. Carson—she had trouble thinking of him as “Kit”—spoke briefly with a slim, dark-skinned man in his mid-thirties, then steered her toward the back.
Several private cubicles had been built into the back wall, complete with computer and sound-board hookups.
“What are these for?”
“Language labs.” Carson said quietly. “I take it you haven’t been here yet?”
Margo detected no particular edge to his voice, but the question irritated her. “No. Skeeter has me busy doing important things.” Like earning a living to pay for the equipment I’m going to need.
“Uh-huh. This one’s empty.” He pushed open a door and held it for her.
Margo fluffed inside and took the only chair. Her nemesis closed the door with a quiet click of the latch.
“Now. About this teacher of yours . . .”
“I suppose you’re going to tell me how he’s charging more than I can afford and what a fool I am and how I’ll starve before I get my first big contract with Time Tours or some other outfit. Well guess again. He’s not charging me anything but an advance on expenses and most of what I need I’m earning with the job he helped me find. He wants a partner.”
Kit Carson just looked at her. He leaned against the door, crossed his ankles comfortably, and looked at her like she was the most recalcitrant, lame-brained child he’d ever encountered. It made her mad. “Don’t smirk at me, you egotistical—!”
“Margo,” he formed a classic “T” shape with his hands, “time out, remember? No insults, no temper tantrums. And I’m not smirking.”
“Huh. Could’a fooled me.” But she subsided. He was trying to be nice for a change; the least she could do was listen. “Okay, go on.”
“Skeeter Jackson has told you he’s a time scout, looking for a partner. True or false?”
“True.” She bit one fingernail, then folded her arms and tried not to fidget. “What of it?”
“He’s not a time scout. Never has been, never will be. Frankly, he’s neither crazy nor stupid and he knows his limits.”
Oh, no . . .
“Are you calling Mr. Jackson a liar?” she asked quietly.
His smile held a certain strained quality. “Yes. And before you say anything, I’d like to point out that liar’s not the worst thing he’s been called. Backstabbing cheat comes a little closer.”
“How dare you—”
“Shut up and listen!”
The indolent pose had vanished. Margo shut up. She’d never heard such cold authority in anyone’s voice. He wasn’t angry—just relentless. And Margo was scared. After Billy Pandropolous . . .
“Skeeter Jackson is a con artist. A two-bit operator who makes his living fleecing tourists. If there’s a scam on the books, he’s used it. Currency exchange scams, luggage theft, pick-pocketing, black-marketeering, you name it.”
Margo didn’t want to hear any more. Every word he clipped off reduced her closer to the status of gullible fool—again.
“Skeeter doesn’t touch ’eighty-sixers, which is the only reason Station Security tolerates him. He’s probably wanted in half the sovereign nations in the world on various charges. Nothing violent, nothing dangerous . . . until now.”
“What do you mean?” Even Margo realized how petulant she sounded.
“If I thought all you’d lose was the shirt off your pretty back, I’d let you have all the rope you want to hang yourself. But if you keep ‘studying’ with Skeeter Jackson, then walk through an unexplored gate thinking you’re a time scout, you won’t come back.”
“Well, you didn’t leave me much choice, did you? I did come to you first, if you’ll recall.”
He nodded. “Yep. And I gave you a fair assessment of your chances. I just thought you deserved to know how deadly this little game of yours is. Walking in with eyes wide open is a little different from being conned. Like I said before, I don’t want your death on my conscience.”
“Thanks for caring!” Margo snapped. “I can do without your advice, if that’s all you’ve got to say!” He sighed and didn’t offer to move. “Well? Are you leaving or what?”
“Just what is he teaching you?” Margo crossed her arms again.
“None of your business. If you won’t teach me, why should I bother answering questions you’ll just charge me money to answer?”
His eyes narrowed. “Don’t be insulting. Who picked out that ensemble you’re wearing?”
She just glared at him. Clearly, she’d made some mistakes—and vowed she’d die a torturous death before she admitted it.
“Okay,” he muttered, “the kid gloves come off. Let’s say Skeeter sends you through the ‘safest’ tourist gate there is, just for practice. If you walk through the Britannia Gate wearing that getup, the first thing that’s going to happen is some well-bred lady on the other side will either scream or faint. Whores don’t generally stroll through Battersea Park.”
Margo paled, then flushed bright red. “I’m not a whore! And I’m not wearing this dress in London, you’ll notice! I’m wearing it for a bunch of drunken tourists in Victoria Station! Besides, what’s wrong with it? Skeeter showed me photos—”
“Margo, you look like a two-bit trollop in that thing. Skeeter likes skin and he doesn’t have the faintest idea what decently bred Victorian women wore. If he had a photo, it was of a Denver saloon trollop. Denver cathouses are among the few down-time attractions Skeeter Jackson has visited.”
Margo wanted to hide. At least she’d had the sense to tell Skeeter no the couple of times he’d suggested . . .
“Margo, you’ve just illustrated my point for me. You don’t know what you’re doing and neither does Skeeter. If you’d have walked through the Britannia Gate in that dress, here’s what would’ve happened: After some poor, shocked matron had a fit of vapors, her outraged gentleman companion would have called for a constable. You’d either have ended up in the Old Bailey for peddling your wares in the wrong part of town or landed in an asylum. Street walkers who went mad from syphilis weren’t handled particularly gently.”
Margo didn’t want to hear any more. Rose-colored balloons of hope broke with every word, but Kit Carson showed no inclination to stop. “Let’s even suppose you didn’t get nailed by the law. That by some miracle you actually found the slums where that getup might look more appropriate. Do you know what they were called? Never mind where they were? If you stumbled into them by sheer chance, you’d still be in trouble. Because some whore would carve you up for encroaching on her territory or some tough would decide to make you his meal ticket—after trying out the wares for himself first. Unless, of course, you were really lucky and the Ripper decided you were a likely looking target.”
Margo went cold all over. Jack the Ripper? She couldn’t help glancing at her dress, any more than she could hide an involuntary shudder. Carson, to give him his due, didn’t crack a smile. He just nailed home the point like a vampire hunter pounding in the stake.
“The Ripper liked his victims helpless. Most psychopaths do. Step through the Britannia Gate without training or a guide, and you’ll end up looking more helpless than any other walker on the street. Believe me, it won’t be long before Red Jack starts having a bloody good time gutting you like a market fish—”
“STOP!” Margo had covered her ears. He stopped.
Margo was breathing as hard as she did after a sparring session in the dojo. Kit Carson, curse him, might have been sipping tea at a garden social for all the emotion he betrayed. I won’t give up! I can’t! Margo literally had nowhere else to go. And she was running out of time. Her six months were nearly one-sixth gone already. “I can take care of myself,” she said stubbornly. “Skeeter’s all I’ve got left. Any teacher’s better than none and you won’t help me.”
He straightened up from the door. “That’s right, kid. I won’t. And if I let you stick with Skeeter, he’ll get you killed. Not even he realizes what he’s setting you up for. Believe me, when I catch up to that young fool, I’ll roast his ears good.”
“What?” She came to her feet, shaking to her pinched toes as panic set in. She was out of money, out of hope, out of everything. If Kit forced Skeeter to kick her out . . .
“You can’t! If you bully him off the job . . . You just can’t!”
Blue eyes glinted like hard sapphires. “Oh, yes I can.”
“Dammit—!”
“Don’t you have any brains in that decorative little head of yours?” He took a step forward, evidently intent on opening her skull to look.
She held her ground. “I will not give up! And you don’t have any right to interfere! It’s my life, not yours. I’ll risk it as I please, Mr. Hot-Shot Retiree!”
He flushed. “Look, you stubborn little—”
“Stubborn?” Margo laughed shrilly. Then, before she could quite believe she’d said it, Margo heard herself say, “Well, if I’m stubborn, I come by it honestly! With you for a grandfather, what else could you . . .”
Kit Carson halted mid-stride. His face collapsed into a tangle of weathered lines, aging him ten years in an instant. Despite the tan, he had blanched the color of dirty snow.
A knot of panic condensed in Margo’s belly, the germ of a glacier. Shit . . . oh, shit, me and my big mouth . . .
For at least ten thudding heartbeats, he just stood there, looking like a stray word might knock him to the ground. Piercing blue eyes had lost their focus. Margo groped uncertainly for the chair and shoved it aside, anxious to put room between herself and the forceful man who would be coming out of shock any second.
Empty blue eyes focused slowly on her face. His brows came together. He studied her for another thudding stretch of heartbeats. Margo didn’t know what to say or do to fix this. When he drew a halting sip of air, she braced for the worst, but he didn’t say anything. He seemed incapable of speech. After a moment, he shut his eyes. Then, without a single word spoken, he turned and opened the door. He left her standing behind the chair, feeling like she wanted to die and get the hurting over with, rather than face what she’d just done.
Kit didn’t hear or see much of anything. He navigated the library on autopilot and found Brian Hendrickson behind the main reference desk. He located the desk by bumping into it.
“Good afternoon, Kit. What can I—dear God, what’s wrong?”
The librarian’s face swam into focus. Kit gripped the edge of the reference desk until his knuckles hurt. “Am I awake?”
“Are you what?”
“Am I awake?”
Brian blinked. “Uh—yes?”
Kit swore. His belly did another drop into oblivion. He wished for the tiniest of moments he could follow it. “I was afraid of that.” He left Hendrickson gaping after him and literally ran into Margo halfway back to the cubicle. She staggered, blinking tears, then made to cut around him.
“Oh, no you don’t!” He sidestepped quickly, blocking her path. “Back where you came from!” He pointed imperiously.
Her face was blotched and red. “Leave me alone!” She tried to bolt. He cut her off neatly and resisted the urge to seize her wrists. The last thing he wanted her to do was scream. But when she shoved him hard enough to stagger him off balance, he reacted before his brain could catch up—which wasn’t very difficult in his current state of mind. Kit snatched her off balance, swearing under his breath, and forcibly pulled her toward the back of the library. Predictably, she resisted.
Kit swung her around hard enough to jounce her teeth together. “Do you really want me to turn you over Grandpa’s knee, little girl?”
Margo worked her mouth like a drowning fish. “You—you wouldn’t—” She halted mid-protest. “You would.” For a moment, they stalemated in the center of La-La Land’s library. Then she wrenched free of his grip, with an against-the-thumb movement that spoke of some martial arts training, but she didn’t try to leave. She stood glaring at him, chest heaving against the plunging neckline of her dress in a fashion that made him want to throw a flour sack over her torso. Then she broke and fled toward the language lab. Kit drew a deep, shaky breath.
Dear God. . . .
He needed time to absorb this, time to figure out when and how . . .
Sarah, why didn’t you ever tell me?
The hurt in his chest made his whole soul ache.
Kit lifted a shaking hand to his eyes. Gotta think. Sarah and I broke up in . . . if she was pregnant then, and had a child before . . . Sarah’s child would’ve had to be about seventeen when Margo was . . . “Dear God. She could be.”
Teenage pregnancies had very nearly become the rule, rather than the exception, during the years Margo’s mother would have been a teenager. Margo had reminded Kit all along of someone. Now he knew. She didn’t look much like Sarah, but that temper, not to mention the pride . . . even the determination to get what she wanted and everything be damned that stood in her way. Margo was Sarah van Wyyck all over again.
He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry or swear aloud.
Meanwhile, his granddaughter had to be faced.
“Christ, and she’s still set on being a time scout.”
His viscera did another swan dive into a bottomless chasm. I can’t let her do this. . . .Hard on the heels of that thought came another. And just how do you propose to stop her?
The whole library wavered in his vision for a moment as he superimposed Margo’s face over some of the sights that still gave him nightmares. She doesn’t understand . . . thinks it’s high adventure and she’ll live forever . . . and I can’t even insist on partnering her, can’t even go along and watch her back . . .
If Kit stepped through another unknown gate, odds were extremely high the attempt would kill him.
“What am I going to do? She wants this . . .” And was it any wonder? What must the kid have grown up thinking and dreaming every time she heard about her famous granddaddy?
“Dammit, Kit, pull it together. . . .”
Walking back into the language lab was possibly the hardest thing Kit had ever done.
Margo had pulled the chair into the far corner, but she wasn’t sitting in it. She’d taken up a stance behind it, gripping the back as though he were a savage lion in need of taming. He recalled some of the ugly things he’d said to her and swallowed. Damn . . . Kit closed the door softly and faced her. Tear streaks ran down her face in jagged paths. But her chin was still up, still defiant, despite visible fear in her eyes.
“I’m not an ogre,” Kit muttered. “You can put down the chair.”
Very slowly, Margo let go her death grip. The front legs settled with a quiet thump. She swallowed a couple of times. “I didn’t mean—I mean, I didn’t plan to—”
“It’s said,” Kit interrupted brusquely. “And yes, you do come by it honestly.”
For some reason, that brought a fresh flood of tears. Kit felt as though he’d just hit her and couldn’t for the life of him figure out how to repair the damage. The sense of helplessness which paralyzed him reminded Kit unpleasantly of the times Sarah had dissolved into tears.
“I—Skeeter, he—and you—” Margo’s voice control was gone.
Kit finally thought to hunt for a handkerchief and found a rumpled one in a back pocket. “Here.”
She all but snatched it out of his hand, then turned her back and struggled visibly to regain the shreds of her dignity. Kit waited quietly, aware that a woman’s pride was a far more serious matter than a man’s—and men had been known to do murder when theirs was injured. She hiccoughed a few times and blotted her face, then blew her nose.
“Sorry,” she muttered. “I ruined Skeeter’s hanky, too.” Kit winced. He decided he did not want to know how Skeeter Jackson had comforted his granddaughter. If he’d hurt her . . . I’ll toss him through the next unstable gate that opens. She finally faced him, a watery-eyed waif in a bedraggled strumpet’s gown. No wonder she paid somebody to change the name on her ID card to Smith. Didn’t want anyone to know who she really was, desperate to do this on her own merits . . .
Kit knew only too well how that felt. He cleared his throat, more to gain time than anything. “You’re dead set on this time-scouting business.”
She swallowed. Her eyes, red and angry as bee stings, still brimmed with unshed tears. “I’ve wanted it all my life.”
Once again he cleared his throat. “Things as they are, I can’t say I blame you. . . .” Then he eyed her critically, studying her for the first time as a potential scout. He shook his head over the visible cleavage. “Best thing to do would be disguise you as a boy, but you’re not really built for it.”
Her eyes widened. “You mean—” Then, hastily, “It’s not real. I mean, they’re real, but I’m wearing stays. A corset. Skeeter bought them for me at an outfitter’s. They really make me look . . . well, more voluptuous.” Kit, thoroughly familiar with the bio-mechanical effect of a woman’s corset stays, flushed. I’m talking to my granddaughter about the size of her breasts . . .
Margo was still talking as fast as possible. “I could wear baggy shirts, you know, to hide things, and my hips aren’t really that wide, it’s just I have a narrow waist. . . .”
Kit shook his head. The kid really did want this. God help us both . . .
Her face fell. He realized she must have misinterpreted that head shake. Kit sighed. “All right, Margo. I’ll do it. But under conditions—”
“Really?” Her voice squealed into the soprano register. Her bedraggled face lit up like Christmas.
“Under conditions!” Kit repeated sharply. She gulped and heard him out. “First, I decide when—or if—you’re ready. Second, you agree to do everything I tell you, exactly as I tell you. Understand? And you don’t do anything I don’t specifically tell you to do. If, after we’re into training, I decide you don’t have what it takes, you agree to switch to something else, time guiding, maybe.
There’s a world of difference between the two professions. Guiding’s fun. Sometimes dangerous, but mostly not. Scouting’s deadly. If you thought convincing me to train you was hard, you don’t even know the meaning yet. By the time I’ve put you through training, you will. Any time you want to quit, holler.”
“I won’t quit.”
Kit managed a wan smile. “I expected you’d say that. But I mean it. Remember the bourbon. Knowing when to quit can be just as important as fighting for what you want.”
A flush of pink crept into her cheeks. She rubbed her nose with the back of one hand and sniffed hugely. “Okay.”
“Any questions?” She shook her head.
“Okay.” He had about a million of his own—but now wasn’t the right time to broach them. He took a deep breath and struggled against the cold in the pit of his belly. “Let’s get started.”