The Scent of the Blueberry -- 13

The weak Winter sun tried its hardest to stream though the passenger window as Evelyn struggled back from the scent. She tried to reach the throbbing part of her head but, when she lifted her right hand to touch the spot, her left hand came with it. Opening her eyes, she saw that she was sitting in the passenger seat of the Corolla – metal cuffs on her wrists connected by a 6-inch chain which was itself connected to an 18-inch chain that fastened her ankles. The seat belt and shoulder harness completed the restraint. “Oh,” she moaned.

“Sorry about the restraints,” Michel said from the driver’s seat. You obviously didn’t believe the explanation that I gave you back at the apartment. It was all true – I swear that it’s all true – but I couldn’t take the chance that you might do something. . . do something stupid while I’m driving. You understand, don’t you?”

“I understand that my head hurts like hell.” She was back to full croak mode.

Michel smiled. “You can’t blame me for that one. That was entirely your doing, slipping and falling on the ice like that.” Evelyn closed her eyes. “Maybe I wouldn’t have believed me either,” he admitted. “I guess I can’t blame you for trying to run away – so we’re back to the manacles for now.”

“For how long?”

“We’ll see. I think that the ones on your wrists can come off when we stop. The ones on your ankles may have to stay for a while. It’s just that you can’t seem to trust me, and I can’t seem to trust you to trust me.”

“My head hurts. Don’t make everything so complicated.”

Right, he thought. I wish this whole situation were as simple as it was supposed to be.

“Where are we, Michel?’

“You’ve been out cold for about an hour. We’re out of the city.” Evelyn really looked out her window for the first time – bare trees, with mountains in the background. She looked around – not a lot of other cars.

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see. I hope you feel up for a hike – we can’t drive all the way.”

The drive passed quickly. Evelyn seemed to perk up a bit as time went on – her head probably felt better, and the immediate cognitive effects of the blueberry scent were wearing off. And she didn’t make any further attempts to escape. For his part, Michel took care to obey the speed limit. He did not want to risk the opportunity of explaining his chained companion to a state trooper.

Finally she said, “Michel, do you have any money?”

“Why?”

“Well, I didn’t have the chance to get to the ATM yesterday. You can’t usually get very far without money.”

Michel looked at her. “That’s funny. I don’t remember seeing an ATM card in your apartment.”

“It was most certainly there. If I didn’t have people pawing all through my things, I might be able to find them. It wasn’t like it was there for you to see anyway.”

“Okay, point taken. Sorry. Don’t worry about money.”

They were both quiet for a few minutes. Finally Evelyn said, “So how far are we from a rest room.”

“A rest room?”

“Yes, a rest room. I have to go.”

“We’ll be stopping in a few more minutes.”

And, true to his word, they did. Michel hit the right-hand directional signal – who he was signaling to was anyone’s guess, Evelyn thought, since she hadn’t seem another car for at least 20 minutes, and headed down a dirt road for about half a mile into the woods. The road dead-ended in a meadow.

Michel turned to at her and handed her roll of toilet paper. “You have your choice of about 50 million trees to kill.”

“Thanks a lot.” She unbuckled the seat belt, opened the door and shuffled to the nearest tree.

When she had finished, she shuffled back to the car. “I suspect that there isn’t anyone around for at least what? Maybe 30 miles?”

“Maybe.”

“Maybe,” she echoed. “Makes a girl feel pretty safe, you know? Makes her feel that she might not need so much protection – at least, not from a guy who tells her how he isn’t going to hurt her, then knocks her out twice, ties her to a bed, then throws her in a car, shackled hand and foot, and drives her off into the woods. I mean, with that kind of protection, a girl gets to thinking that maybe she’d be safer,” she turned to him, “in a tank full of pirhana.”

“Yeah, okay. I know, I know. But aren’t you leaving out one important detail?”

“And that would be?”

“Allen.”

Evelyn shuddered. “Yes, Allen. But who is Allen? Or, at least, what is Allen’s connection to me? This enemy of yours – of yours, not mine – uses me as a pretext to find Allen’s address in your pocket – then goes to kill him. I mean, I am sorry about your friend, Michel but, even if all of this is true, exactly how does any of this affect me? Seems to me that the only way I’m in danger is if this enemy of yours finds me next to you.” Evelyn lifted her hands to rattle the chains demonstrably. “And if he finds me like this, I really will be up shit creek without a paddle.”

Michel took a deep breath. “Evelyn, do you really suppose that it was a coincidence that we met in the bar that night, or that I moved into an apartment upstairs from yours, or even that we modeled together that night?

“No,” she said (croaked) evenly. “I don’t think that it was a coincidence at all. You’ve been stalking me.”

Michel shook his head. “We can’t stay here all day and hash this out. I’ll try to explain it to you on the way.”

Evelyn looked around. “On the way where? This is a dead-end.”

“From here we walk.”

Evelyn objected that the hike would be easier without the shackles. Michel reasoned that there was little that she could do to hurt him, but that she might waste valuable time by trying to run away again. So he removed everything but the ankle restraints – deciding that they would enable her to hike, but not to run. Of course, she objected – saying that, if she were truly in danger, she might find herself in the position where she might have to run from the “bad guys” ( a term you used with more than a slight trace of sarcasm), but Michel knew better.

“So you know all about me.” Evelyn had been walking in front of Michel for about 10 minutes.

“No. Not all about you.”

“Have you been following me?”

“No.”

“Did you read the letters from my sister, Karen? The ones that were in the drawer?”

“Yes,” he admitted. He had read them before she had, of course, but didn’t see the need to offer that tidbit of information.

“And you know what I told you in the bar.”

“Yes.” So where was this going?

“So you know all this stuff about me. Not very attractive, is it? So I’m in danger. I need to be protected. I didn’t hire you – you’re not a cop. I don’t think you’re my guardian angel. So why would you care?”

“It’s my job.”

“Come again?” she said quickly.

“It’s my job.”

“Explain.”

Michel didn’t say anything.

“Explain. In what way am I your job? Are you saying that someone hired you to do this to me? That all of this is about somebody paying you money to do this to me?”

“No,” he sighed. “It isn’t like that at all.

“It isn’t like that at all,” she echoed. “Well, then. Exactly what is it like?” You heard me – what is it like?” Silence. “Dammit, mister, you owe me some answers!”

“Okay, okay. It’s just that you haven’t believed a single word that I’ve said to you so far. I can give you answers – all the answers you want – but I don’t really think that you’re going to believe them anymore than you’ve believed anything so far. So what’s the point?”

Silence. “Okay, that’s true enough. Maybe I wouldn’t believe you. Or maybe I’d believe you if you said something believable.”

Silence. “Michel?”

“What?”

“You know all this stuff about me. All this stuff. What about you? You said that this is your job – that you were hired to do this. I don’t think this has anything to do about modeling. What exactly do you do?”

“At this point, I provide security.”

“So you’re like a security guard?”

“No, it’s like security in the broad sense. A long time ago I was in the military, but there seems to be more of an opportunity to get involved with things on a case-by-case basis, as opposed to full-fledged wars.” Michel paused. “Sometimes it involves working as a bodyguard – which is pretty much what I’m doing here.”

“The protection thing.”

“Yes, the protection thing. And sometimes it involves training, or providing advice, or interfacing with other members of a given team.”

“Like Allen?”

“Like Allen.”

“Had you known Allen for a long time?”

“Oh, yes – in a sense.” Silence. “A while back, you asked me if I was religious.”

“Did I?”

“Yes, you did. I think you could say that I am. One thing that I don’t know about you – are you religious?

“What do you mean?” Evelyn asked sharply.

The Scent of the Blueberry -- 12

But the sun was beginning to come through Evelyn’s window, and the glare from the reflection from the new snow promised a particularly bright day. Today was not a day for training, not a day for self-flagellation – it was show-time. But first Michel had to talk to Evelyn – and he was not looking forward to delivering the message that had been Allen’s to deliver. He would have preferred the self-flagellation.

Evelyn was awake – she turned her head toward him as he walked into the bedroom.

“Ah, I see you’re awake.” A brilliant opening gambit, Michel thought sarcastically. Might as well have said, “Nice day, huh?”

“Michel, we both know that this can’t go on.” Her voice hadn’t recovered yet, Michel noted.

“I’ve been thinking about this, Michel. I mean, I’ve had a lot of time to just lie here, and I’ve been thinking about this a lot.”

“The way I see it – and you can tell me if I’m wrong – well, I don’t know what you had planned, but I’m guessing that, whatever it was, it hasn’t happened. Or, at least, it hasn’t gone the way you had originally planned. I mean, you seem like a reasonably intelligent guy, and it just doesn’t seem too likely that you would do this to me, then just leave me chained to a bed indefinitely. There must have been more to the plan than that – something more than re-carpeting my bedroom,” she said, indicating the rug that still remained at the side of the room. “Here’s my proposition – not just think about it for a second before you answer. No one has been hurt yet, right? I mean, I have been inconvenienced a bit, I know that, you know that, but I’m willing to let bygones be bygones. You release me, just let me go, and none of this ever happened. It was all a dream – gone, kaput. Over.”

“ And, be honest with yourself, now – if any of this had to do with you having any kind of, well, feelings about me, well, we can look at that. You seem like a nice enough guy. You had me in your power, and you didn’t do anything to me – you were kind of like a gentleman. If that has anything to do with it, I’m flattered. Maybe we could get to know each other a bit. Like we did that night at “The Hole”, you know? That’s how people usually do it. I wouldn’t mind that at all. I’d actually kind of like it. But this isn’t the way to do it. You know it, I know it, and I know,” she looked him right in the eye, "I know that you know it. So what do you say?”

It was a nice speech, carefully rehearsed and eloquently presented, Michel thought. Too bad it was total bullshit. And too bad that I don’t have a correspondingly rehearsed and eloquent response. Guess I’d better cut to the chase. Allen would never have done that, but I’m not Allen.

“Evelyn, do you remember yesterday when I told you about your being in danger, and that I was going to protect you?”

Evelyn hesitated for a heartbeat, then swallowed and nodded.

“Well, I’m going to show you what I mean.” Michel walked to the rug and unfurled it. Allen’s bound and lifeless body rolled onto the floor, coming to rest face-up and staring at the ceiling. At least, it would have been staring at the ceiling if the eyeballs had remained in their sockets. The corpse was also missing the nose and both ears, while the pants and underpants had both been lowered to Allen’s bound knees with the apparent intent of facilitating the amputation of the penis and scrotum. Michel’s eyes never left Evelyn’s face.

Evelyn stuffed almost her entire hand into her open mouth and shrank to the opposite side of the bed.

Michel said, “I really didn’t want to show you this – but I had to. I had to show you to convince you that this isn’t a game – that I’m serious when I say that you need my protection. This is Allen – or was Allen, at any rate. He was the one who was supposed to take care of you from here – but they found out where he lived. Do you remember the Jerk in the bar?”

Evelyn nodded wordlessly.

“Well, after he left I noticed that I was missing a small slip of paper from my pocket. Allen’s new address was written on the paper. Now I doubt that he told them anything – Allen was trained to the point where he could resist just about any kind of short-term torture – but, if these people found us, I think that the results would probably be equally unpleasant.”

“Equally unpleasant? The guy is practically. . .” – her voice trailed off into a croak.

Michel leaned forward to close the deal. “Evelyn, I’m going to do exactly what you asked me to do. I’m going to release you. But here’s the thing – these guys can find you. The cops can’t help you on this. I’m the only one who can deal with these people. I can protect you. But you’ve got to trust me. You have to come with me and stick close. Like you say, I haven’t hurt you, and I have no intention of ever hurting you. I promise to explain more of this as we go along – we just don’t have time now – but I will tell you that I have been training for this task. I’ve taken these people on before, and I swear to you that I’ve come out on top. But I need you to trust me. I knew Allen for a very long time, and I don’t want to lose two of you like this.”

Michel studied her eyes and reminded himself to breathe. Whatever else he had said, he knew that he had no intention of releasing her unless she was willing to go with him. Refusal would have meant that Michel would have had to go to Plan B -- and there was no Plan B. He only knew that failure of a Level 5 operation, his Level 5 operation, was totally inconceivable.

Evelyn swallowed and nodded. “What do I have to do?”

“I’ll unlock the manacles. You should just take a few minutes to grab a quick breakfast and put a few clothes and some food into a backpack. It’s likely to be a little cold where we’re headed.” She nodded.

Michel produced a key. “You’ve made the right decision. Just do everything I say, and everything will be fine.”

Forty-five minutes later, Michel was still waiting impatiently while he heard the shower running in the bathroom. He sighed. He was pretty sure that Allen hadn’t talked – hadn’t revealed their location, but was also fully aware of his opponent’s resourcefulness. I mean, it’s not like we’re going to the prom, or something. Let’s go!

Ten minutes later Evelyn came out of the bathroom wearing a white bathrobe and brushing her long hair with a large bath towel. “Okay, I know that we’re in a hurry,” she said. “But I just felt so grimey. I promise not to hold us up on the road. Where did you say we’re going?”

“I didn’t,” Michel said.

“No, I guess you didn’t. Please turn around so I can get dressed.”

But Michel had no reason to trust her yet. “I don’t have to turn around. I saw you for 3 hours that night with your clothes off.”

Evelyn looked surprised. “That was different. Don’t you understand how that was different?” She paused. “Oh well, I suppose it’s better if you don’t understand. How do I explain all of this to my boss at the department store?”

“If we don’t get out of here soon, you won’t have to explain it to them. They’ll see you on the evening news – and you’ll look a lot like Allen.”

Evelyn shuddered. “But what about Allen? What do we do with him?”

“He’ll be okay here for the time being. We really don’t have too much choice – anything that we did with the body right now would slow us down too much. Besides, it’s only his body – his spirit is elsewhere.”

“Hmm, are you religious?”

“You might say so.”

There was something too calm about Evelyn, Michel thought. Like she didn’t really believe that she was in danger, or that Allen’s body was a real body, or that any of this was real. It reminded Michel of certain adventure shows he had seen when he was a kid – when the hero or heroine had been captured by the bad guys but, even though they were in mortal danger, they still were capable of witty repartee with the head bad guy. Either they had ice water in their veins, Michel had thought, or they had already seen the script – and known that it all turned out right in the end. Well, he thought that Evelyn was a perfectly regular human female being – with blood, rather than ice water, in her veins – and was reasonably certain that she hadn’t read the script – since there was no script. One possible explanation was that she had not really bought Michel’s story and would attempt to escape at the first reasonable opportunity. Or it was possible that she was clinically depressed – that the aftermath of the abortion had left her unable to feel or, at any rate, express her feelings in a normal way?

Michel would never have the opportunity to discover whether depression was part of the explanation, but the deception was definitely a factor. Evelyn made her escape attempt when she first set foot outside the door, racing off down the sidewalk and yelling “Help!” as loudly as possible. Michel’s eyes flashed with anger – the stupid idiot might as well send an engraved invitation to his Adversary – but was relieved when she almost immediately slipped on the ice and fell on the sidewalk – cracking her head on the side of a trash receptacle. Momentarily dazed, she didn’t resist as Michel picked her off the sidewalk and carried her off to the car that he had rented for the occasion. As she revived, she wondered sleepily why a new car smell should so closely resemble the scent of blueberries – and fell back into unconsciousness.

The Scent of the Blueberry --11

Michel knew that he would have to bring Evelyn to the predetermined meeting place by himself. This, of course, wasn’t his preference – but Allen’s absence meant that Michel would have to pull double-duty. So the next step was to stop by his own apartment to quickly pack for the trip.

Since he was carrying a corpse in a rug, Michel knew that he didn’t want to encounter any of his neighbors, so he took the stairs to his apartment. Of course he realized that, if he had bumped into anyone who lived there, they might wonder why anyone would carry a rug up the stairs when they could have taken the elevator, but Michel didn’t really expect that to happen. And, miracle of miracles, for once that evening everything went smoothly, and Michel leaned the Allen-filled rug against the wall while he fumbled for his keys. He could have picked the lock rather easily, but that would have been showing off.

Michel’s apartment was similar in size and lay-out to Evelyn’s, but it did not betray the slightest concern related to the different effects of earth colors and the cooler portion of the spectrum. No tables, no lamps, bare walls, a mattress on the floor of the bedroom. An old mattress. Next to the bed was a chess set – standard Staunton design – a dog-eared copy of “The Art of War,” and a single manila file folder (containing photocopies of Karen’s recent letters to Evelyn. Michel’s security-related abilities included an easy familiarity with the locks on the apartment building’s mailboxes.) A few clothes were piled on the floor. The only grace notes were a bulging bookcase in the living room – prominently featuring works on physical fitness, nutrition and military history – and a 110 pound set of barbells in the far corner. The bathroom featured a single copy of the King James version of the Bible, as well as Michel’s laptop computer – primarily used to view the video from the secret camcorder that he had installed in Evelyn’s apartment in September.

At this point, all of this stuff seemed totally irrelevant. If the trip went well, Michel knew that there would be plenty of time to come back and tie up the loose ends. If it did not go well, none of the loose ends would matter. To tell the truth, Michel thought wryly, not much else would matter, either. So he stuffed some clothing into the backpack along with some trail mix, filled his old Army canteen with water, threw the “Allen rug” back over his shoulder, and wondered whether a man carrying a rug with a corpse and a backpack on the stairway would seem any more suspicious than a man merely carrying a rug with a corpse. At some point, maybe he could pose that question in a discussion group but, in the meantime, Michel adjusted the positioning of the rug on his shoulder and descended the stairway to Evelyn’s apartment.

Evelyn, surprisingly enough, was asleep. Sound asleep. This gave her a new respect in Michel’s eyes – he suspected that most women, drugged, manacled and left alone by their captors, would be far too hysterical to do anything as logical as renewing the stamina to deal with whatever lay ahead. Waking her was out of the question, he thought – the sleep was absolutely necessary for her to deal with the journey and, even though he had trained his own body to accept the strains of challenges that he faced, he had to admit that lugging Allen around the city, not to mention up and down the stairs, had left him just a little tired as well. A few hours of sleep wouldn’t hurt – particularly since the Adversary seemed to have no idea where they were, and Michel felt that they would blend into the city’s population more easily in the daylight, anyway. So he left the carpet on the floor in Evelyn’s bedroom, stretched out on the sofa in the living room, and fell into a deep sleep.

1,943. . . 1,944. . . that was the wonderful thing about push-ups, he thought. Such a simple exercise, such a remarkably simple exercise, but so easy to modify to escape the boredom and multiply the positive effects. Move the hands slightly out or slightly in – and you attack the muscle groups from a totally different angle. Fingertip push-ups, thumb push-ups – shifting easily from one variation to the next like a guitarist changing chords. 1, 950. Time for crunches.

The hours before dawn – he dreaded the expectation. His living room window faced the southeast—every day he finished the morning exercises at 5 minutes before dawn. Then he would sit on the floor in front of the window—holding the stick in his hand. The stick was shaped like a wooden billy-club with five 18- inch lengths of chain attached to the far end. Each link of each chain had a different type of barbed wire attached. Michel had made the stick himself – researching and replicating the different types of barbed wire used by the ranchers in the American West to mark the borders of their land. Every day the sun would rise, and every day Michel would raise his arm. 6. . . 7. . .8. Left hand, right hand. The back, the front, the legs. The had been a time when Michel – or more precisely, Michel’s spirit – would have found the practice barbaric, would have screamed and cried and well, it didn’t matter at this point. At this point, Michel only knew that it was necessary. A minor inconvenience, a mosquito bite, compared to what he might be called on to endure in the real world without flinching.

As he did every day, Michel thought of Bud Grant. Bud Grant had been the head coach of the Minnesota Vikings in the National Football League. In the days before domed stadiums, football games in Minnesota played in December or January could be extraordinarily cold – dangerously cold. The players could not, of course, wear mittens or overcoats – they would have to play in the middle of an open field that provided no protection against a wind-chill that would frequently fall well below zero degrees Fahrenheit. None of the visiting teams looked forward to playing in Minnesota and, to tell the truth, the hometown heroes weren’t thrilled about it, either.

To try to combat the effects of the cold, the teams would built makeshift shelters, almost like tents, on the sidelines, and have hot air blown into them. That was, at least, the players could keep warm – relatively warm, anyway – while they sat on the bench. After all, when they were on the field at least they were moving around and were directly involved in the game – on the bench, it was a different story.

All the teams, that is, except the Vikings. Bud Grant would have none of it. Grant reasoned that a player who had been toasty warm on the bench would not be prepared and would not perform as well when he ran on to a field that featured a minus 20 degree wind-chill factor. On the contrary, at least some of the players would want to get back off the field as quickly as possible – back to the relative warmth and comfort of their heated bench. Grant had decided that that was no way to win football games – so his players would freeze on the sidelines, while their opponents encountered far fewer cases of frostbite.

Of course, maybe it was because he had superior talent but, in those days, Grant’s Viking teams won a lot of football games. And Bud Grant, as the coach, stayed on the sidelines with his players for the entire game – freezing his ass off, leading his troops, without ever changing expression.

Michel knew that he might not always have a superior team – not like that day so long ago. He knew that preparation was key and, if a little pain was involved well, so be it.

But Michel wasn’t in his apartment anymore – or even on a frozen football field in Minnesota. He was posing with Evelyn, morphing into the long, incredibly difficult poses that were part of his discipline.

Michel wasn’t too worried that Evelyn would notice, let alone question, the scars associated with the creation of his navel. There were too many scars all over his body, he knew, for any particular mark to draw a lot of attention. He was concerned that she was close enough to see them at close range – far closer than anyone had ever been to his naked body before. Michel realized that they appeared to be more prominent under close examination. He fully realized that the condition of his skin was probably the subject of a certain amount of idle gossip among the artists – that was to be expected, and Michel did not believe that this posed a threat to his privacy. But close examination might be more revealing to a trained eye, and Michel’s limited surveillance opportunities had furnished no clues as to whether Evelyn would react to his condition.

The other issue was that, other than the night they posed together, Michel had never been this close to an unclothed woman before. He did not have, nor did he fear, any kind of involuntary physical reaction to this situation. He knew that his training would protect him against that temptation. At the same time, he did have a deep, not to mention surprising, feeling of . . . what? Pity? – well, not exactly. It was born from an understanding of a kind of history – a history of the pain that was associated with this particular female. The sexual and emotional pleasure that had been so surprisingly transformed into her pain – multivaried: physical, emotional, spiritual, psychological. A systemic reaction that Michel channeled in a very personal, visceral way – even more visceral than his own daily floggings. He didn't know an English word for this feeling -- although there was a word from an ancient language in another galaxy that came close to describing it. He felt a strong and immediate urge to hold her, to tell her that he would take her pain and simply add it to his own burden. Then he would lie to her, and tell her that everything would be alright.

And that was the real temptation, he thought.

The Scent of the Blueberry -- 10

Michel hated this part of the assignment – truly hated it. He knew what Evelyn must think of him and that her confinement was for her own good. Women were not Michel’s specialty – sometimes he felt like he had missed the class that covered female human psychology, assuming that there was such a class. He did know that he did not enjoy causing her distress. From their conversation in the bar, Michel had concluded that Evelyn had already encountered sufficient trouble in the recent past – he had no desire to add to it. He was relieved that he would soon pass his responsibility on to Allen – that was much more of an Allen-type task anyway. Michel felt perfectly comfortable when he dealt with the enemy – he had long since observed that his real problems tended to be caused by his friends and allies. Let Allen handle the subtleties – Michel would be glad to handle any type of rear guard action.

But, speaking of Allen, why hadn’t he returned Michel’s call? That wasn’t like him. Michel fully realized the risks associated with leaving the apartment at this point, but he also fully appreciated the important of Allen’s role in this particular operation. And, of course, this was a Level 5 operation in a universe that was not designed to support Level 5 operations. And Allen knew that. So where was he?

Michel had not expected to find good news at Allen’s apartment – and he was not disappointed. The body was, of course, just that – a body. Just another corpse – Michel was used to it. How could he be so careless? How could they have been so complacent?

Of course -- the man in the bar. The original piece of scrap paper that Allen had given him with his new address. Michel had put the paper in his pocket, but hadn’t been able to find it later that night. “The jerk in the bar” hadn’t been interested in Evelyn after all -- he had been interested in Michel’s information. Michel had inadvertently led the guy to Allen.

Michel shuddered as the guilt hit him. How could he be so stupid? But, then again, how could his adversary have been so stupid? He obviously didn’t know who Evelyn was yet. She was the ultimate prize – not Michel or Allen. He had had her in his grasp – without even realizing it.

And where was King? King was Allen’s Siberian husky – “King” – kind of like “Rex”. No matter. Had Allen decided to board King is the kennel while he moved to the new apartment? King usually stayed in the bedroom in Allen’s apartments, but there was no sight of the animal. If King had not been in the kennel – if somehow his adversary had not noticed the dog in the bedroom – but the bedroom window was closed. It didn’t seem likely that Allen could have used King to escape. But Michel decided to check the kennel on the way back to the apartment. Not that he had much time for side trips – if the Adversary was around and about, it was especially important to return to the apartment.

Michel had a thought. This was definitely not his area of expertise – Allen would have known better – but it occurred to Michel that a bound body of a murdered Allen might frighten Evelyn just enough to get her to cooperate with the next phase of the operation. In any event, he certainly had no intention of leaving Allen’s body there for the police – an inquisitive medical examiner might discover that Allen’s navel, like Michel’s, was surgically created, and who could predict where that line of inquiry could go? So Michel wrapped the body in an area carpet, hoisted it onto his shoulder and walked out the door.

The trip back to Evelyn’s apartment was just long enough for Michel to revise the overall plan. Originally he was simply supposed to deliver Evelyn to Allen, leaving the explanations and travel considerations to his friend. This made sense, he thought, since his (Michel’s) specialty was security and martial tactics, while Allen was more entrepreneurial in his approach and capabilities. Allen’s death, then, was not just a personal loss for Michel – it thrust him well out of the comfort zone of his self-perceived capabilities. The idea of arranging and providing for Evelyn’s transportation was definitely not appealing – particularly under game conditions. Positive self-talk, Michel thought. Maybe he should try it.

Next stop was the kennel. The kennel owner was certainly not paranoid, given the simplicity and antiquity of his security treatment. Michel knew that he had another advantage – the dogs in the kennel would not pick up a scent from either Michel or Allen’s body – aside from visual contact, and any inadvertent noise that Michel might make, the dogs treated the intruders as though they were two stuffed animals.

No – no huskies at all – let alone King. This was a good outcome. If King wasn’t in Allen’s apartment, and wasn’t in the kennel, then maybe – just maybe – Allen had found a way to transfer his spirit to King at the moment of his death.

Michel knew only too well that the process of trans-species spirit migration was still highly experimental. The R&D department had been working on that project for, well, seemingly forever – and there had been numerous failures along the way. Still, technological progress was always necessary, especially since it was well known that the Adversary had an active development group as well. Contrary to popular opinion, the opposition’s talent pool wasn’t limited to former lawyers and politicians.

So Allen – more precisely, Allen’s spirit – might have escaped from the apartment – might still be out there. The possibility suggested that Michel should leave a trail for Allen to follow. If he had assumed the body of a dog, it would seem logical that he would possess the tracking abilities of that species. The problem was that, if Michel let a trail for Allen/King to follow, the Adversary would be able to follow it too. Michel’s knowledge of and experience in security issues had made him fully aware of that possibility and, as he made his way through the deserted, snowy streets of the city, Michel frequently doubled back and covered his tracks to ensure that he wasn’t being followed.

George couldn’t believe it – as Michel drunk? When he realized that Michel was merely trying to ensure that he wasn’t being followed, George couldn’t decide whether to laugh at the incompetence. He had come out on the short end of his dealings with Michel before, and the very idea that he could ever have been defeated by such an idiot, such a buffoon, such a moron – it was almost too much for George to bear. After killing Allen, George reasoned, it was natural to expect that Michel would have eventually shown up at Allen’s apartment. George could simply have hid in the apartment and waited – Michel was an unusually capable fighter, but George would have had the advantage of surprise. He was quite sure of his likely success but, attractive as the possibility seemed, he suspected that Michel could inadvertently lead him to the Woman. Michel – well, that was revenge, that was personal. The Woman, whoever she might be, was the real objective. Now, if there was even the slightest possibility that he might have a shot at both Michel and the Woman. . . now this would make his day. Year. Century. Millennium. Eon. The perfect tonic for his chronic boredom.

So instead of ambushing Michel in Allen’s apartment, George had simply inserted a small tracking device under the skin of the corpse. Almost insulting in its simplicity, in its obviousness, George thought. If anyone had ever tried to pull such a blatantly obvious trick on him, he would have been extremely insulted. But George was counting on the inelegant nature of the plan to help it to succeed. He had a well-deserved reputation for deviousness and complexity of planning, and he gambled that Michel would never associate the simple use of a tracking device with George. It was so easy that George almost felt guilty, but guilt was something that George generally caused in others – without ever making it on to his personal play-list.

Sometimes, though, it does seem that bad things also happen to bad people. In the midst of George’s lexical search for words to describe the vegetative state of Michel’s mind, the low battery light began to flash on George’s receiver. George’s mood changed for the worse – instantly. Traveling light, he had not packed a spare set of batteries and, while a more objective individual would have reflected on the irony of labeling a fellow creature as an imbecile literally moments before running out of batteries himself at a critical moment on the most important mission in a celestially long time – a Level 5 operation, no less -- George was totally lacking in that brand of objectivity. He barely managed to summon the self-control necessary to prevent himself from hurling the unit to the pavement. Instead, he confined his outburst to simple cursing -- and set off in search of an all-night drugstore.

The Scent of the Blueberry -- 9

Slowly, Evelyn came out of her reverie but, as she did, she began to realize that something was wrong. Her leg, yes, her right leg, seemed heavy and cold. Not like “pins and needles” – not like you feel when you’ve been lying on your arm and can’t move it anymore. She could move it – but it was somehow heavy. But she wasn’t prepared for what she saw when she opened her eyes.

There was a thick metal ring or bracelet of some sort, almost like a single handcuff, around her right ankle. She could indeed move the leg freely but, judging from the length of chain that seemed to attach it to the bed, she didn’t have more than a foot or two of slack to play with.

Mentally, she ran a quick check of herself. She was in her own bedroom – a usually safe place. And she didn’t seem to be restrained in any additional way. She was wearing the clothes she had worn earlier that evening – she had no sense of having been molested or hurt. But she was chained to her own bed. Huh?

Michel. What about Michel? He had been making the phone call, there was the tea and the smell of blueberries. Where was Michel? Was he OK? She really didn’t know much about him – with all the scars, had he been somehow involved with some people who had put her out of the way so they could do something to him? Or. . . was he the cause? Was he just another guy like the jerk – or the bastard. Did he want to rob her? Of what – a TV? She didn’t have much else. . . blueberry tea. . . or did he have some kind of weird, sick ideas in mind? She remembered the scars again, and shuddered. Who the hell was Allen, anyway?

And then she realized that her room had acquired a new piece of furniture. Over in the far corner, Evelyn squinted to see it, yes – it was definitely a portable toilet. Evelyn knew that she had accumulated a certain amount of junk, but she knew damn well that she did not own a portable toilet. Correction, she thought – she did now. And she wondered whether its presence implied an extended stay. Maybe it meant that no one was going to hurt her. But it also seemed to suggest that this whole chain of events had been planned – and Evelyn definitely didn’t like that idea at all.

In any event, Evelyn had to decide whether to play the one card that she thought she might have. Unless her captor had a hidden camcorder somewhere in the room, he (or maybe she?) didn’t know that Evelyn was awake yet. With her foot firmly attached to the bed, she wasn’t sure how she could convert that advantage in information into something more concrete. The question was: Should she call out in the hope of being heard – maybe even rescued? Or would that make the invisible captor(s) angry? And wasn’t that kind of obvious – what kind of stupid captor would go to this much trouble, and totally overlook the possibility of her screaming? But, then again, how else was she going to get any answers to her questions about her predicament? Maybe it wasn’t so bad. They hadn’t hurt her – maybe she could talk to them, assuming that no one heard her scream and rescued her. Certainly no one could blame her for trying.

So Evelyn opened her mouth and screamed – loudly. Unfortunately, the sound that came out of her mouth was not nearly as loud as she had intended. Actually, it sounded more like a croak. So that’s why they’re not worried about a rescue, she concluded. However, it did attract someone else’s attention.

Michel – yes, Michel walked though the door, carrying a tray of sandwiches and water. He didn’t seem injured, or in captivity – he seemed perfectly fine. “Are you feeling OK? Hungry?”

Evelyn censored the obvious response, “Just peachy-keen, you shithead! Get this fucking bracelet off my ankle before I get really pissed!” No, that didn’t seem like a good idea. What had that cop said on TV that time? “You have to connect with him. He sees you as an object. Get him to see you as another human being. Empathy.” (On the other hand, it could’ve been a quote from “Silence of the Lambs.”) Anyway, it sounded like a plan. Maybe she’d even recover her voice in the meantime.

Evelyn cleared her throat and croaked, “Michel. We have to talk – please have a seat. . . not there”, she said as he went to sit on the bed with her. “Over there, on the chair, please.”

“I realize that you must have a million questions, and I wanted to assure you that my intentions are totally honorable,” Michel said, as he sat on the indicated chair.

Did he actually say, “totally honorable”? But Evelyn let it pass – she had an agenda.

“Look at me – please Michel. Now I realize that you’ve met me 2 times in the past. The first time I was naked in front of a group of people and the second time I was half drunk in a bar. Now I realize that first impressions do count for a lot, but I just wanted to tell you that, well, I’m not just that.” Her voice remained steady even though still a croak. “What I mean is, I know I’m not perfect but, you see that picture on the dresser over there?” Michel glanced in the indicated direction, looked back at her, and nodded.

“Well, that’s a picture of my sister, Karen and my mother. Karen is the person who wrote the letter to me – the one I retrieved from the mailbox.” Michel nodded.

So far, so good. No outbursts, no violence. Evelyn took a deep breath and continued.

“Michel, these people love me. They don’t see me as something that people draw, or as something that absorbs alcohol. They see me as a person, a real person – just like you. And Michel, I love them. A lot. They mean everything to me. And he’s not in the picture, but there’s a dog, too. A lab, a black lab named Rex. Kind of a common name for a dog, I know, but he loves me, too.”

“And Michel, I have hopes – hopes and dreams of my own. I know that I probably didn’t sound like I had much going for me in the bar but, even though you know that things didn’t work out the first time, someday I want to meet the right guy and have a family. And a career, too – maybe not the President of the United States, but I think that I can do some good in this world. For somebody. Deep down inside, is that so different from what everyone wants? Is that so different from what you want? Michel, are we really that different?”

Michel exhaled, looked at her, and in a quite voice said, “Evelyn. You have no idea how different we are from each other.”

“Look,” he continued, as her heart sank. “I’m sure that a million things are going through your head right now. I realize that you have absolutely no reason to believe me about anything. About the only thing that I can assure you of right now is that I have no desire, and absolutely no intention, of hurting you. Not going to happen. But, you see, if I had just come to you out of the blue and told you that you were in danger, that you had to trust me, that I had to keep you out of sight for a while, you would have thought that I was totally crazy. Dangerously crazy. Right?”

Exactly what I think now, she thought.

“Probably exactly what you think now,” Michel said. “But my job is to protect you. That’s all I want to do."

“Protect me? From myself? Michel, who’s going to protect me from you?! You’ve got me chained to the bed! Do you realize how many years in prison that would buy you?” Evelyn regretted those words the moment she’s blurted them out. “Look, nobody’s been hurt, right? Just let me go, and we can write all of this off as a bad dream. Believe me, I’ve had more than my share of bad dreams lately. What’s one more?”

“Sorry, no can do. Look, I've got to go out for a while. I’ve given you a portable toilet – I’ll move it over by your bed. You have food and water on the bureau. There’s nobody else around, so you’ll have plenty of privacy. And don’t worry about your voice. As you’ve probably already figured out, it’s related to the blueberry scent – it should be back to normal in about 12 hours.”

“Michel, please. Anything that’s in the apartment. Take it – it’s yours.”

“You weren’t listening. It’s about protecting you – think of it as a kind of protective custody. Anybody who wants to hurt you is going to have to come through me.”

“You said you’re going out? ‘Through you’, but you won’t even be here. What if there’s a fire? You say you want to protect me but, if there’s a fire, I’d never get out of here alive.”

Michel paused. “That’s true, but, I hate to alarm you, but the possibility of fire is the least of your concerns. Trust me. The least of your concerns.”

“Michel, this isn’t about the abortion, is it? This isn’t about, somehow, trying to punish me for doing that, is it?” But she didn’t say that – she didn’t want to know the answer.

And then he was gone. Dammit. She hadn’t even had a chance to ask him how she was supposed to get to her job at the store in the morning. She supposed, though, that that really was the least of her concerns.

She wasn’t giving birth to a baby – the doctor was pulling it out of her. He almost had it out – but the baby had grabbed on to her and was holding on by his fingertips. He looked down and the baby looked back at her – old and bearded, with rotting teeth. He opened his mouth to scream, but only formed a soundless word with his lips as he stared at her. “Why?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know.”