Charles De Lint - Memory and Dream

“I don’t really care about that at the moment,” Alan said. “I just want Isabelle to be okay.”

“That’s why we’re here.”

Alan nodded. “But what can we do?”

Marisa gave his arm a reassuring squeeze. “Whatever we have to.”

Up ahead of them, Cosette came to an abrupt halt at what had once been a crosswalk. The painted markings on the pavement were almost erased by the weather, but two unraveling strands of wire still held the crosswalk lights aloft. The hulking bulk of an overturned city bus was rusting in the middle of the intersection, its surface a bewildering array of graffiti ranging from gang signs to slogans and crude art.

Piled up against the bus were the remains of a couple of cars that had obviously been driven into the toppled vehicle by joyriders and then abandoned.

Cosette darted across the intersection and hunkered down behind one of the cars. When Alan and Marisa joined her, she pointed to a run-down tenement building that stood a little way down the block on the far side of the street.

“That’s it,” she said. “Isabelle’s in there.”

The nondescript building took on an ominous look in Alan’s mind once Cosette spoke. The street in front of it was relatively clear of rubble and abandoned cars. It must have been an office building of some sort, Alan decided. Perhaps a bank. Along its second-floor ledge he could see a row of gargoyles—or at least the remains of their bases. Only one of the stone statues was still standing. Like the bus, like almost every surface that could hold paint in the area, its walls were festooned with graffiti.

“Where’s John?” Alan asked.

Cosette closed her eyes. Cocking her head, she seemed to be listening to something, but Alan couldn’t figure out what. All he could hear was the traffic a few blocks over on Williamson Street where it cut through the Tombs, the vehicles all speeding along that stretch of the thoroughfare. No one in their right mind stopped their car in the Tombs. They especially didn’t go wandering about on foot the way he and his companions were.

Closer he could hear the sound of the wind, blowing down the deserted streets, occasionally bringing them a snatch of music from the boom box of one of the area’s squatters. They’d seen very few people since first entering this wasteland of empty lots and abandoned buildings. Those they had were all the kinds of people that Alan would normally cross a street to avoid. They always had an attitude. But here, on their home turf, the inhabitants of the Tombs seemed content to ignore them. Watching and waiting, perhaps, to see what had brought them here.

“I can’t find him,” Cosette said, looking alarmed. “Usually I can almost see him in my head—not clearly, the way I can always see Isabelle, but I can sort of feel where he is.”

“Do you feel him now?”

“No,” Cosette said. “I can’t feel him at all.”

“But Isabelle’s inside?”

When Cosette nodded, Alan glanced at Marisa.

“We’re not going to do any good hiding out here,” Marisa said.

Like they were going to do so much good inside, Alan thought. Then he sighed. He studied the ground around them, looking for something he could use as a weapon, although use was perhaps too strong a word. Something he could hold to give him courage. He wasn’t sure that he was actually capable of hitting someone, little say murdering Rushkin the way Cosette wanted him to.

He got up and edged away from the car they were hiding behind to peer into the open trunk of the other vehicle. There he found a rusting tire iron. Picking it up, he turned to his companions, holding the tire iron awkwardly in his hand. When he returned to where the others were waiting for him, Cosette regarded his makeshift weapon with approval but he saw sympathy in Marisa’s eyes. Alan swallowed thickly.

“Okay,” he said. “Let’s do it.”

Before he could step around the car, Cosette suddenly pulled him down again behind the vehicle.

“What—” Alan began.

Cosette put a warning finger to her lips and then Alan heard it as well: two voices raised in argument.

A man and a woman. The sound came from the direction of the building they’d been about to enter.

Peering over the hood of the car, Alan saw two figures leave the tenement. One he recognized as John Sweetgrass until he realized it had to be John’s doppelganger, since Cosette, sneaking a quick glance beside him, drew in a sharp breath at the sight of the approaching pair and quickly dropped out of sight again. The doppelganger’s companion he only recognized from Nora’s description of “a real punky-looking girl.” These were the two people who’d kidnapped Isabelle from the courtyard in Joli Coeur. Rushkin’s creatures.

“Don’t let them see us, don’t let them see us,” Cosette was chanting under her breath.

Alan ducked below the hood as the pair crossed the street.

.. have to walk back, thanks to you,” the man was saying.

“Don’t blame me. I think she almost broke my fucking wrist.”

“Serves you right, panicking the way you did.”

“They’re supposed to be social workers in that place,” the girl said. “Not street fighters.”

“That’s no excuse. If you hadn’t screwed up, we’d have the paintings and not have to walk back across town to get them.”

“So we’ll steal another car.”

“So we’ll steal another car,” the doppelganger repeated, mimicking the girl’s voice.

“I didn’t see you doing all that well,” the girl responded sharply. “No one said you had to follow me back.”

“I couldn’t very well take the paintings and fight them all off at the same time once you buggered off on me.”

“I’ll tell you one thing,” the girl said. “If that black bitch is still in the office when we get there, I’ll rip out her heart.”

They were talking about Rolanda, Alan realized. They’d gone after the paintings hanging in the Foundation’s waiting room and somehow Rolanda and the others there had chased them oft: And now they were on their way back. He turned to Cosette, about to whisper to her that Rolanda had to be warned of a second attempt on the paintings, when he realized that the conversation they’d been eavesdropping on had suddenly fallen silent.

Oh, shit, he thought.

There was no time to do anything. The doppelganger came around the front of the car before Alan could stand up. When he did, he raised the tire iron only to have the girl drop silently from the roof of the car and kick him in the shoulder. The tire iron fell to the pavement with a clang, and Alan backed away from the girl. His whole arm had gone numb, from his shoulder down to his fingers.

“Yum, yum,” the girl said, a feral light burning in her eyes as she caught sight of Cosette trying to hide behind Alan.

“Scara!” the doppelganger warned.

The girl gave him a sour look. “Who put you in charge?”

“Plain common sense. She belongs to Rushkin—or do you feel like explaining to him why you took her instead of bringing her to him?”

Scara’s only reply was to look sullen. She spat on the ground at Alan’s feet, but made no further move toward Cosette.

“Don’t even think of it,” the doppelganger said, directing his attention now to Marisa, who’d been edging her hand toward the fallen tire iron.

Marisa let her hand fall back to her side and rose to stand beside Alan. Cosette got to her feet as well, trying to wedge herself into the narrow space between Alan and the car so that Alan would be between her and Scara.

Considering the hungry light in the girl’s eyes, Alan didn’t blame Cosette at all. He wished there were someone he could hide behind.

“What—” Alan had to clear his throat before he could continue. “What do you want with us?”