Jack McDevitt - SEEKER

I killed the lights, draped my robe across a chair, and climbed into bed. The room was dark except for a few squares of moonlight on the floor, and the illuminated face of a clock on top of my bureau. I pulled the blankets up around my shoulders, snuggling down into their luxurious warmth.

Back to the office in the morning.

I was trying not to enumerate the next day’s tasks because that would wake me up, when Carmen told me we had a visitor.

At this hour? I immediately thought of Hap.

“A woman,” she said. I heard voices at the door, Carmen, and someone else. “Chase, she says her name is Amy Kolmer.”

That couldn’t be good news. I reached for a robe. “Let her in,” I said.

Perception is everything.

- Source unknown, approximately twentieth century C.E.

Amy looked distraught. Her blouse was half-hanging out of her belt, her hair was disheveled, her colors clashed. She looked as if she’d gotten dressed on the run. She sighed when I opened the door, thank God I was home, looked back down the corridor, then pushed past me into the apartment. Her eyes were wild.

“He was behind me,” she said. “Just a few minutes ago. He was right behind me.” She was carrying something wrapped in red cloth.

“Hap?”

“Who else?” She went to the window, stood to one side, and looked out. Then she fussed with the drapes. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I know it’s late.”

“It’s okay. Are you all right?”

“I didn’t know where else to go.”

“Okay. Sit. You’re safe now. How’d you find me?”

“You’re the only Chase Kolpath listed.”

“All right. Good. You did the right thing.”

“He showed up at my place. Pounding on the door. Yelling about the cup.” She wiped away tears and tried to straighten herself.

“What did you do?”

“I told him it was mine.” She started to tremble. “I went out the back. When he gets like that he’s out of his mind.” She unwrapped the red cloth, which was a blouse, and produced the cup. “If it’s okay, I wanted to leave it with you.”

“Sure. If you want.”

“It’ll be safer here. If he gets his hands on it, I’ll never see it again.”

“You said you saw him behind you?”

“A few minutes ago. As I was coming up the walk. I don’t know how he found me here.”

It might have had something to do with your mentioning my name to him, you nitwit.

“Okay,” I said. “Just relax. Everything’ll be okay. We’ll get you some protection.”

“He says it’s not really mine. That he didn’t mean for me to keep it.”

“Why didn’t you call the police, Amy?”

“He’d kill me if I did something like that. You don’t know what he’s like when he gets mad.”

“Okay.”

“He goes crazy.”

I was thinking how much trouble people get into because they can’t keep their mouths shut. “Listen,” I said, “you better stay here tonight. Tomorrow we’re going down to report this and get some help.”

She shook her head violently. “Won’t do any good. He’ll be out again in a couple of days.”

“Amy, you can’t live like this. Eventually, he’s going to hurt somebody. If not you, somebody else.”

“No. It’s not like that. We just need to give him time to cool down.”

Carmen’s voice broke in: “Chase, we have another visitor.”

Amy began to tremble. “Don’t let him in,” she said.

“Relax. I won’t.”

“He’s on something.”

The door has a manual bolt. Extra security because I’ve never completely trusted electronics. I threw it just as the lights went out.

“He did that,” she said. “He has a thing -”

“Okay.”

“It kills power-”

I immediately thought of the Bayloks and their power drain. “I know. Take it easy.

We’re okay. Carmen, are you there?”

No response.

“It shuts everything down-”

A fist pounded on the door. It sounded heavy. Big.

“Open up, Amy.” It was Hap’s growl. No question about that. “I know you’re in there.”

“Go away,” she said.

More pounding. The door, barely visible in the glow of the moon and a streetlamp, literally bent. She was off the sofa, cowering near the window. But we were on the third floor. We weren’t going to get out that way. And there was no back door. “Don’t open it,” she pleaded. Her voice squeaked.

It sounded as if Hap was using a sledgehammer. I took a quick look out the window and saw that the other lights in the building were out, too. “Get into the bedroom,” I told her. “There’s a link on the side table. Use it. Get the police.”

She stood looking at me. Paralyzed.

“Amy,” I said.

“Okay.” Her voice was barely audible.

“Go away,” I told the front door. “I’ve called the police.”

Hap returned a string of profanity. “Open up, bitch,” he added. “Or I’ll do you, too.”

Amy disappeared into the bedroom and the door closed behind her. It had no lock.

Hap went back to pounding, and the latch started to come loose. I tossed the cup on the sofa and threw a cushion over it. Not much of a hiding place. Then, stumbling around in the dark, I drew the curtain across the kitchen entrance and closed the bathroom door.

“I have a scrambler,” I said. “You come in here, and you’re going down.” In fact I did have one, but it was up on the roof, in the skimmer. Good place for it.

He responded with a final hammerblow and the door flew open. It ripped around on its hinges and banged against the wall and he stumbled into the room, big and clumsy and ugly. He was an unnerving sight. I hadn’t taken much notice when I’d visited him under more peaceful circumstances. He was a head taller than I was and maybe two and a half times the weight. He wore a thick black sweater with enormous side pockets. The side pockets bulged, and I wondered whether any of them contained a weapon. Not that he’d need it.

He turned on a flashlight and stuck it in my face. “Where is she?” he demanded.

“Where’s who?”

I heard voices in the corridor. And doors opening. I thought about calling for help but Hap read my mind and shook his head. “Don’t do it,” he whispered.

My neighbor across the hall, Choi Gunderson, showed up in the doorway. Was I okay?

Choi was thin, fragile, old. “Yes, Choi,” I said. “We’re fine.”

He stared at the broken door. And at Hap. “What happened?”

“Had a little accident,” Hap growled. “It’s all right, Pop.”

“I wonder what happened to the power,” Choi said, and I thought for a moment he was going to try to intervene. I hoped he wouldn’t.

“Don’t know,” said Hap. “Best you go back to your room and wait until the repair people get here.” The lamplight fell across his open door.

Choi asked again whether I was all right. Then: “I’ll call Wainwright.” The property owner. He withdrew, and I heard his door close.

“Good,” Hap told me. “You’re not as dumb as you look.” He swept the room with the lamp. “Where is she?”

“Hap.” I tried to keep my voice calm. “What do you want?”

He started to say that I knew what he wanted, but stopped in mid-sentence to stare at me. “You’re from the survey.”

I took a step toward him. “Yes.”

“You’re the bitch who came to the house.” The veins in his neck bulged.

“That’s right.” No use denying it.

I was going to say something more, not sure what, I was making it up as I went along.

But he broke in before I got started. “You’re helping her cheat me.”

“Nobody’s cheating you, Hap.”

He grabbed my shoulder and threw me against a wall. “I’ll deal with you in a minute,” he snarled. Railing about what he was going to do to “these goddam bitches,” he looked in the kitchen, used his elbow to knock some glasses to the floor, checked the bathroom, and headed for the bedroom.