Surreal continuing story: walking through doors and passageways

[dougie_monty]

“They agreed not to gossip about Alice. You know—that she has wings. They haven’t caught on about yours—or Gwen’s, or Hermione’s.”
Samantha now scowls in an odd manner—not out of anger, but because she’s a little flustered. “Just after I made that point to them, April Blonda [Mary’s daughter] said, ‘I feel strange.’ The other girls left, but I went into a bathroom with April. Now she has wings!”

Fred is listening. He says, “We’ll have to meet with April and her parents, to invest her as a junior DXM member. It isn’t often DXM people are under 18.” (April is 14, though she is shapely enough to look 21.)

Samantha adds, “And April’s little brothers are so cute…little George once told me, ‘April was just a little girl but now she’s turned pretty so she’ll have to get married someday. All girls do this. So I guess that means I’ll have to love Maria Oranjeboom and marry her someday.’”
I consider this a poignant comment, not merely because of little George’s naïveté, but also because I know that Samantha herself has had a failed marriage.

Now I ask Fred about the gunmen, and any other people involved in the confrontation we had. I’m sure Señor Guzman and his secretary may become material witnesses.
Fred points something out. “Remember, those gunmen were flunkies. They might not have burst into the body-shop office in the first place had they not been in thrall to some mastermind like Lady Calley.

“And keep in mind too how you observed her reacting when the cops arrived on the scene. Even Hermione and Winifred, who arrested her, treated her in a very civil manner. And they revived her when she passed out. I understand she is recovering, in the hospital’s jail ward.”
“Were there witnesses on the street?” I ask. “Surely some passersby must have seen what was going on, including before Loochy trotted out there with the barrel of floor oil.”

“There are some,” says Fred. “We’ve left that to Mr. Galloway and Professor Fields.”
“I sure would like to know why Ms. Calley wanted to get to Red Nicholas in the first place.”

“Well, remember what we’ve said about the gems!”
I read Fred loud and clear.

Now Mary Blonda, in her usual Mary Blonda outfit, comes in for coffee and a banana.
“We’re going to want to tell you something about April,” says Samantha with a smile.

“April? What about her?” asks Mary, as she sits down. I can’t help but look at Mary’s figure: As I have known for years, Mary’s hips have an almost comical swivel.
I leave the kitchen just as Samantha and Fred break the news to Mary about April’s new wings. I just manage to hear Mary’s reaction of surprise and delight as I go out into the hallway.

On the way up to Bedroom No. 35, to meet Alice, I think about all the stuff we’ve discussed in the kitchen, including April. I know Bobby and George have said things to April like, “You’re going to be pretty like Mom is,” and I speculate on what the little boys will say once they find out their older sister has wings!
As I approach the door I send a telepathic message to Alice: mi venas (“I Come.”)
“Not yet, you don’t ‘come.’ Enter.”

I go in. Alice approaches and embraces me. Then she turns around and motions for me to slip her bathrobe off, in valet fashion. I do so and hang it on one corner of a wooden chair in the room. She steps out of her slippers. Then, still acting as valet, I lift her sheer nightie off and hang it on the other corner of the chair.
Now she becomes the valet and removes my clothing. When we’re both naked she motions for me to lie on the bed on my back. She then straddles me. She carefully positions herself as to lower herself onto my erection.

We embrace happily and nuzzle each other. She lets her loose hair fall all over my head. I have long considered her auburn tresses a turn-on, as much as her face, her graceful limbs, and her bust and hips.
We go through the usual routine of sex. It isn’t long before I shoot my wad into her. We thank each other, then just lie there cuddling happily.
“Did you hear that about April?” I ask.

“Oh, yes—isn’t that curious?” Alice asks. “I hadn’t thought a girl her age could get wings—especially April. Mary becomes invisible; she doesn’t have wings.”
“And April’s a nice kid,” I say. “I hope she learns to use the wings wisely.”

I tell Alice what Fred and I talked about, concerning Calley, Kalp, and potential witness to the armed confrontation we had.
We remain in the bed; Alice has rolled off me and we’re now side by side. We discuss the confrontation; April’s new attributes and the reaction Bob and Mary will have; Jeanette’s bold approach to Lupe in the kitchen :eek: ; and the plans for the performance—specifically, Harry Rudolph’s plans for publicity and the preparations Alice and the rest of the steering committee have made.

I stroke her long hair gently. She lies there in a languid manner, with one arm around my neck, and says about these matters:

[NDP]

“I have faith it will all work out.”

She sighs. There’s something else on her mind.

“_____, Fred and Salbert talked with me earlier today,” she says.

“And?”

“Well, they offered me a permanent position with the DXM League. It seems the League is very impressed with my work and wants me very badly to join them.”

“That’s great. I would take that as a highest compliment.”

“It’s not the first time this has happened. They first tried to recruit me when I was in college and then when I was working for British intelligence. But, aside from doing some temporary work for them, I turned down their offer each time.”

“Why?”

“Being a permanent member of the DXM League is a 24-hours-a-day, 365-days-a-year job. You have little time for your friends and family and no time for personal relationships. And, if I join, I can pretty much forget about getting an advanced degree.”

“Are there any advantages to the job?”

“Advantages? That’s an understatement. You have no idea of the importance and gravity that being a member of the DXM League entails. It’s far beyond that of the CIA, NSA, FBI, KGB, MI5, MI6, and Interpol combined times ten. In many ways, it’s my dream job.”

“So, what do you want to do now?”

Alice is quiet for a few moments. I can tell she’s torn about the choice she has to make. She then says to me…

[dougie_monty]

“I’ll want to know how much time the League will give me to decide what to do. I have maybe two or three courses left to earn the degree I’m now working on. My parents and I have invested considerable time and effort in my graduate studies and we wouldn’t want that to go to waste—any more than you’d abandon your quest for your law degree.”
“That seems to be a point you’d want to take up with Fred and Salbert…the better qualified you are in terms of education, as well as your experience [which I know is considerable], the more desirable a League member you would be.”

“Now that’s a good point,” says Alice, moving closer to me. “I’ll point that out to Fred at the Morpheus this afternoon…”
“This afternoon? We don’t have rehearsals today?”

“No, not until tomorrow. Mary, Thalia, and Eloise have been organizing the props and costumes. We’ve all been giving them the prop and costume lists for our various performances.”
I’m really happy for Alice. She has had a hard row to hoe—just being female, for example. The various escapades we have experienced would be a trial to anyone; Alice really rides the bumps in style. I remember how Lorna told me that Alice is one tough cookie—shortly after Alice cried in my arms in the admissions building.

In any case, I won’t stand in her way.
At this point, I lie there, with daylight shining in through the window, just admiring this woman who “measures 120" around the brain.” Her open face displays a happy smile. I assume this is because of the League’s offer, and, with a smidgen of self-praise, because she is happy to be there with me. The big brown eyes; the complexion; that long straight auburn hair; and that petite hourglass figure…

She says teasingly, “______, I know you’re admiring me, but you’d probably insist you love me for my mind.”
“No doubt about that, Alice,” I reply. “And I think it’s wonderful that that mind comes in such a beautiful container…”

She embraces me—holds me really close. We both shed happy tears.
I think soberly about her statement that the DXM League would demand most of her time. I’ve noticed how other people we know with DXM status have managed this. Fred as the Sharps’ butler; The Cigar Band (and why did Johnny Goss hesitate about answering me about the group’s rings?); and even Buster, and Loochy, Salbert’s burro. Perhaps Alice was offered an administrative post. Well, we shall see when she talks to Fred…

We shower and dress.

We have something else to do at this point. When we divvied up the silver and gems Nicholas gave us, Alice and I got three standard-size silver ingots, and ten each of the gems—diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, and pearls. Jack Sharp and Mr. Galloway gave us a long list of places to sell the silver and gems. And we remember what Mr. Galloway said about the rarity: Don’t sell too much at one time or one place.
With Fred’s assistance we go to the Sharps’ basement vault and trundle out one silver ingot. All are the same size; and Fred makes a record of who sells what, and how many, and what each person’s allocation is.

We get a notarized declaration from Jack Sharp to attest that the silver and gems are our property. We meet Professor Fields, who drives us, with the silver and the gems (each of us picked one of each kind of gem) to a jeweler named Sol Feldman, an old lodge friend of his and Jack’s. We’re ready to show the documents, but when Fields tells Feldman we were sent by Jack Sharp and Fred Moreland, Feldman nods. He makes his own record and buys the diamonds from Alice and me, for a handsome sum—well over $10,000 for each of us.

Now we go to an office across town, actually not far from the Terwilligers’ home. This is a business firm named Peterson, Waldron and Oranjeboom. Pete and Loora are partners there; Loora works there part-time as an assayer, office manager, and cashier.

When we come through the door—Professor Fields first, then me carrying the ingot wrapped in a small blanket, then Alice—Loora is on the phone, speaking in Dutch. She wears black slacks and a pink satin blouse that teasingly shows her bra lines and nipples. I see Pete at a nearby desk—and I can tell he plays it safe, because of the bulge in his coat that tells me he carries an automatic pistol in a shoulder holster. This is as it should be. (I still have my Magnum. I play it safe too.)

She finishes her call a moment after we come in.
“Goeden morgen—er, hi!” she says, putting the handset down.

“Loora,” says Alice, “We’re here to sell one of our silver ingots.”
I lift the ingot, and carefully set it down on the oak counter. Boy, it’s heavy. I unwrap it. Alice presents the documents.

“Your papers are in order,” says Loora, facetiously imitating the speech of a KGB agent. She notes the day’s silver price on a commodity chart with today’s date printed on it. She notes the stamped weight on the ingot and calculates how much to pay us for it.

[NDP]

“Silver’s dropped eight cents so today it’s going for about $4.78 per ounce,” she says as she closely examines the 500 ounce ingot. Yet, more than the weight is inscribed on the ingot.

“Has anyone noticed these intricate patterns and lettering on this ingot before?” Loora asks.

“We’ve only had this for a short time so we’ve never taken really taken a close look at it,” I say.

“Well, you should. If these inscriptions mean what I think they might mean, it’s especially important for you, Alice, and anybody who’s with the DXM League to take a look at it–but not quite yet. I want someone who’s more experienced take a look at it first.”

Loora picks up her phone, presses a button, and asks to speak to someone named Roman Merriwether. After a short phone conversation and a few minutes pass, Loora’s office door opens and in walks a man I am fairly sure is Roman Merriwether.

Mr. Merriwether is definitely not someone who you can forget. For one thing, he’s…

[dougie_monty]

…rather short, but looks to be rather well muscled. He resembles a fellow named Dirk Martin, from the varsity wrestling team at my high school; he graduated with Laura Clouse. He wears an old-fashioned black blazer, pin-striped trousers and a Homburg hat.
We introduce ourselves. As he speaks, I notice he has an accent very similar to Alice’s, and a deep voice like Brad Garrett’s. I guess him to be about 60 years old. He wears pince-nez glasses, and has a well-groomed handlebar mustache and blond and graying hair, and a small hearing aid in his right ear. Also, like Alice, Mr. Merriweather is left-handed. He walks with a slight limp, favoring his left leg, something like Dr. Watson of the Sherlock Holmes stories. I can picture him as a Dickensian character—Micawber from David Copperfield, for example.

He greets us politely and is particularly charmed by Alice.
Loora says, “We noticed some odd patterns and lettering on this ingot, Mr. Merriweather, and we thought you might want to give it a close inspection.”

“Well, Ms. Oranjeboom, I’ll give it a cursory inspection right now.” He moves the ingot slightly—the blanket is still under it—to brighter light. Then he takes a jeweler’s loupe and looks closely at the surface. He inspects the ingot thoroughly. He doesn’t say anything yet, but he appears quite impressed.
“I should like to make a lithographic impression from the surface. It’s easier to examine the patterns and inscriptions from a printed page than on the ingot itself.” He smiles and turns to Alice and me. “Ms. Terwilliger, Mr. ______, this ingot, and others like it, may be worth far more than the $2300 or so the silver is worth.”

“Tell us more!” says Alice.
“I would prefer to complete the inspection first.” He gets in the intercom. “Peter, please come out to the counter.”

Pete Oranjeboom appears in a few minutes.
“It is possible,” says Mr. Merriweather, “that this ingot, and quite a number of others like it, were actually used to store data that would, for obvious reasons, be known only to the wealthy—a plutocracy, if you will.”
Now comes the inevitable question.

“Where did you get it?”
Professor Fields shows Mr. Merriweather the documents we have.
The broker examines the notarized paper we got from Red Nicholas and the elaborate inventory record prepared by Fred Moreland. Then he looks at the three of us, as if to assure himself that we are not spies, lunatics or thieves. He appears satisfied.

“I had heard rumors about gems and silver in the Morpheus Theatre,” he says. “And a grizzled recluse from the nineteenth century, who conducted Satanic rites and smoked opium. It all appears to me to be pure poppycock!”
Alice, Fields, and I :rolleyes: .
He looks at the ingot again and at the papers Fields has showed him.

“However, I am hard put to ignore such obvious evidence. I have lithographic facilities on the premises. Come, I’ll show you what I mean.”
Pete and Loora set the ingot on a heavy wheeled cart. Loora stays at the counter; the rest of us go to the back of the building, Pete pushing the cart, and we reach a room right next to the rear entrance to the building. Mr. Merriweather shows us a room filled with old-fashioned printing and photography equipment. A few people are working at the other end of the room.

“One of the things we do here is inspect artifacts, paintings, and such, for museums. We have often been engaged by The Antiques Roadshow to verify such things as Mexican masks, Sumerian cuneiform inscriptions, and Stone Age pottery from Oceania. You have heard, perhaps, of the Rosetta Stone?”
“Certainly,” says Alice. “Napoleon brought it back from Egypt. Without its Greek and demotic Egyptian inscriptions we would never be able to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphics.”

“Exactly,” says the broker. Now he scowls. “The stone was slathered with printer’s ink and paper was pressed against it. A truly ghastly process! We use more sophisticated processes here.”
He introduces us to the shop foreman, a small Japanese man named Ed Fukushima. Ed rolls the cart over to a “stone,” a steel printer’s tabletop. He uses brushes, strange liquids, sponges, this and that, and in 20 minutes or so produces a print of the patters and inscriptions.
The print is now dry and he hands it to Alice, bowing.

“Arigato,” says Alice.
Mr. Fukushima, and Mr. Merriweather, are slightly taken aback by Alice thanking the foreman in Japanese. Then the foreman politely excuses himself, and returns to his work.
We return to the entrance with Mr. Merriweather. I can’t help but feel sympathy for this man, with that limp, despite his obviously robust physique…

“I’ll inspect the print myself, Mr. Merriweather,” says Alice.
Now the broker authorizes Loora to prepare a check made out to both Alice and me, for $2390. He doesn’t sign or date it.

He explains. “If it is determined that the ingot is valuable beyond its silver content, you will be paid a much larger sum than the $2390 on the check.” Alice and I thank him.
“Oh—one more thing. Were there any valuables besides the silver? I’m sure the legends connected with the Morpheus mentioned gems…”

“They did,” says Alice.
“I know a jeweler who inspects gems for such things,” Mr. Merriweather continues. Sometimes he finds inscriptions on the gems themselves, sometimes he doesn’t. If he does he adds to the price he pays. Sol Feldman.”

“We went to his shop today,” says Fields. “Alice and ______ sold him one diamond each. No mention of inscriptions.”
“Did he inspect the diamonds you sold him?”
“Yes,” says Alice. “He used a loupe. He sighed after looking at the diamonds, then carefully put each one in a small box lined with velvet.”
“That would mean he found nothing on the stones. But Sol and I have heard about the fabled gems of ‘Red’ Nicholas. If you find gems with inscriptions, please contact Sol or me—or another old friend of mine, George Galloway. We’re all members of the same lodge.”

This is a pleasant surprise. “We know Mr. Galloway very well,” says Alice.
Mr. Merriweather has another surprise. He gives Alice and me each a 10x jeweler’s loupe.

We thank him again. We say goodbye for now to the broker, Pete, and Loora.

---

With Fields we return to the Morpheus.
On the way there, among other things, we talk about Mr. Merriweather.

“He seems somewhat mysterious,” I comment to Alice. She and I are in the back seat. Fields has put the papers, including the unsigned check Loora gave us, into a portfolio sitting on the other front seat.
“Why?” asks Alice. “Is he mysterious because of his accent?”

I grip her hand snugly. “No—your accent didn’t make you mysterious—just so very appealing.” She kisses me.
So Merriweather knows George Galloway—and Sol Feldman. We may even want to ask Nicholas (between TV shows) if he has heard of Merriweather or Feldman.

Now we go into the theater, and meet with Eloise, Mary Blonda, Jane Bradley, and Jeanette Strong; all the women are wearing ordinary, and modest, clothes. Alice wants to go over the prop and costume arrangements; I am ready to prepare a program, from the notes the steering committee has, and submit it to the college. And we tell Eloise and the others, now including the curious Buster, what happened with Feldman, Loora, and Merriweather. Eloise has some comments.

[NDP]

“I think Merriwether was on to something when he theorized that those inscriptions carved on the ingot were done to store information or maybe they’re symbolic of something or some kind of code.”

“So do we,” Alice states. “That’s why I’m going to examine a print we made of the inscriptions right after we’re done here today.”

“How old was that ingot anyway?” asks Buster.

“We never asked,” she answers. “I think maybe from the late 19th century. We’ll have more of any idea when I get done analyzing it.”

“You are going to ask Red about it?” inquires Eloise

“We’ll try to get some questions in if he’s not too absorbed with his new entertainment system,” I reply.

“That might be tough,” Buster comments. “I’ve heard that TV in the sub-basement hasn’t been turned off once in the last few days.”

The door to the theater opens and we hear someone enter and briskly walk up aisle to where we’re seated. It’s Roman Merriwether and he has a rather distressed look on his face.

“Mr. ________, I need to speak with you and Alice right away!” he says with urgency.

“What’s the problem?” I ask.

Merriwether takes a breath and tell us…

[dougie_monty]

“The ingot has disappeared!”
Alice and I slump into chairs, in shock. The other women react similarly. Buster scowls.
“You’ve called the police already?” I ask.

“I did. The ingot had been in the printing room. I asked Ed Fukushima to trundle it into the vault—we have a large vault room, much like a bank vault. He said he couldn’t find it; and we looked everywhere in the printing room for it.”
“Well, it’s not likely anyone could just pick up a thirty-pound block of metal and make off with it,” says Alice.

Now Mr. Merriwether gets a call on his call phone. At the same time, Alice gets a call on hers.
The broker says, “That was Ed. He said his van was missing. Apparently one of our part-time printing employees stole it!”

Alice says, “My call was from Bob Long.” All of us present except form Mr. Merriwether react with relief. “He says he’s chasing a stolen van which suddenly turned and headed this way!”
A few silent minutes pass. Then we hear a siren, some loud engines, tires screeching, and a crash. We all go outside through the main entrance, except Buster.

A large pale-green van has struck a parked car. None of us know whose car it is. We stay back, as Bob Long and Winifred get out of the police car that stopped behind the van. They call for an ambulance and a wrecker. Bob pulls the van’s driver out of the seat. The driver is a tall, husky woman with thick black hair tied behind her head. She wears rimless glasses with steel temples and is in coveralls. She is apparently unconscious.
The paramedics come. They revive the woman, and when the paramedics permit, Bob reads her the Miranda rights. She clams up. The van hit the parked car with the middle of its front bumper striking the left rear corner of the parked car, a dark blue Taurus.

Now an older, heavy-set woman comes out of the hairdresser’s place. I recognize her as Sofia Luglio, Ferruccio’s wife. She sees what has happened and runs to the scene. She talks to Winifred, who calms her. Obviously the Taurus is Sofia’s car.

Mr. Merriwether sees the woman for the first time. He identifies himself to Bob Long and explains his presence.
“I am a broker and partner with the firm of Peterson, Waldron, and Oranjeboom at 2300 Bascombe Street.”

“That’s not far from home, Alice,” says Winifred. Alice and I, standing together with arms linked, nod.
“This woman is an employee of my company, named Dawna Korey,” continues Mr. Merriwether. “She’s only been with us a few months. In fact my printing foreman [Fukushima] said she hadn’t come in, the last few days…”

“Do you know whose van this is?” asks Bob.
“Yes, it belongs to that foreman.” Bob now runs a routine make on the van’s plates.
“Odd that she should show up on the day the company buys some silver,” says Alice.

Eloise suddenly says something to Mary, who goes back inside.
Mr. Merriwether calls Ed on his cell phone. The van is not old—it’s newer than the Taurus, in fact—and fully insured. The broker authorizes the wrecker to tow it to Guzman’s, but not before Bob and Winifred inspect the van thoroughly. Sofia Luglio is slightly mollified by Mr. Merriwether’s assurance that her car will be repaired. She now talks with Jeanette Strong, who is a first cousin of Sofia’s husband Ferruccio.

Bob and Winifred finish their inspection, including taking photographs and making drawings. And they note two things to be removed from the van: the ingot, still in my blanket; and a large wooden box of tools that Mr. Merriwether says don’t belong to Ed.
The van and the Taurus are not driveable. Mary pushes a wheeled cart out onto the sidewalk. With the van’s side doors facing away from the street, Winifred allows Mary to open the undamaged side doors. I help Bob lift the ingot out and set it on the cart. He and Winifred take the wooden box of tools and put it in their patrol car.

Another tow truck appears, to hook up Sofia’s Taurus. She gives Bob a statement.
Then the officers leave for the hospital, following the ambulance. The tow drivers sweep up and tow the cars around to Guzman’s.

The rest of us, including Mr. Merriwether and Sofia, go back inside, to the conference room. Bob and Winifred have given Mr. Merriwether a copy of the report they filled out on the scene.
Jack Sharp meets us in the conference room. He says he has ordered a large safe to be delivered and put into the main utility room with that ingot, and some other valuables, in it. He tells Mr. Merriwether about this since technically the silver belongs to the firm now. Alice and I know we’ll have to furnish a statement to the police, just the same; Winifred has told us she’ll come back with the forms when she’s off duty.

Now Eloise and Jack sit with Sofia. So does her relative Jeanette. “We’ll loan you a car to use until yours is finished, Sofia,” says Eloise.
“Grazie,” says Sofia.

“What about Mr. Fukushima?” asks Alice.
“He lives only a few doors away from Pete and Loora, so he can ride to work with them until his van is repaired,” says Mr. Merriwether.

Something else still needs explanation.
“Why did Ms. Korey drive back this way?” asks Alice, sitting next to me with an arm around my waist. “She could have bolted instead of coming back towards the Morpheus with the silver!”

I suddenly hear a familiar, and insistent, clanking of chains. Alice and I excuse ourselves and go into the theater kitchen, where Buster now sits on a counter. And there is Leo.
Though Alice and I sense he had something to do with Ms. Korey’s sudden change of direction, Leo is not happy.
“I did not want her to hit that parked car,” says Leo. “I know nobody was injured but still Ed Fukushima and Sofia Luglio have lost the use of their cars for a while, because of the collision.”
Since we know Ms. Korey is under arrest, and the cars are at Guzman’s by now, awaiting repairs, Alice and I become curious about Leo’s involvement with the capture of Ms. Korey.
“Exactly what did you do?” I ask. “And did others—ghosts or DXM people, for example—intervene so as to thwart Ms. Korey’s attempted theft?”
Leo is somewhat less glum now, but he explains how Dawna Korey would up driving toward the Morpheus, with Bob and Winifred in hot pursuit.

[NDP]

“Korey was going to the Morpheus because she figured that it would be the least likely place people would look,” he states. “She was going to rendezvous with somebody here.”

“How did you know that?” I ask.

“I got tipped off by the spirit of a 19th century gambler named Chad Cater who haunts the building where the office for Peterson, Waldron, and Oranjeboom is. He overheard Korey talk to somebody about stealing the ingot on her cell phone. From there, I took action. Unfortunately, I didn’t have enought time to stop her from taking the ingot while she was in the building. So, while I was invisible, I had to get into the van while she was stopped at a traffic light. When the light turned green, I reappeared in the back seat so she saw me in her rear view mirror. She, of course, was surprised to see me back there and, in her panic, suddenly tried to swerve the van over to the side of the street so she could pull over and run away. However, there was a car right next to her and she came this close to side-swiping it. After narrowly avoiding a collision and seeing she couldn’t pull over anywhere, Korey stepped on the gas and immediately attracted the attention of a traffic cop (i.e., Bob Long). From there, other cops joined and a chase ensued that resulted in the accident outside the Morpheus.”

“Who was she going to meet here?” Alice asks.

“That I don’t know,” Leo replies. “But it’s obviously somebody who’s in the Morpheus right now.”

I think of everybody who’s in the theater and get an uneasy feeling. Somebody I know is a thief.

I need Alice’s imput. I turn to her and say…

[dougie_monty]

“Who has been in the Morpheus in the last few weeks besides you and me, the Sharps, and the performers?”
“Well, first of all, I know the roadies for The Cigar Band have been here. They come all the time to maintain the sound equipment and instruments.” (That is, the equipment others brought in; Arthur and Daniel have maintained the equipment installed in the theater.)

When we first came to the Morpheus. I saw two young men accompany The Cigar Band—their roadies, Reid Foraker, a short, wiry fellow with spiky black hair, and Brent Donoho, a tall, skinny blond guy who resembles Shaggy from “Scooby-Doo.” We’ve seen them often, handling and maintaining all of the musical instruments except for the piano on stage, and the sound equipment that their own band, as well as Prester John’s Aunt, had brought in. They’ve been at the Morpheus same as the rest of us, but stay in the background. They don’t even join the rest of us in the lounge.

I sense I’m likely to walk on eggs if I bring this up to Jeanette or the others in the band. But I know there are other possible suspects.
Gwen? Her invasion of the Terwilligers’ property and seduction of Jan Oranjeboom are the only things she has done that are wrong, but that was months ago. But why would she sabotage her better standing with the others, especially Alice? I know Gwen isn’t hurting for money…

Red Nicholas? Perhaps, if somehow he could get out of the sub-basement (He’d have to lift a 375-pound grille to escape through that hole!) But how would Dawna know about him? And how could she sneak down there with that 30-pound ingot, unseen?
The Sharps? Good Lord, no! Jack and Eloise are multi-millionaires. What good would the ingot do them?

There are two other people I can think of offhand who would plot such a thing…
I admit that the other married couples, Mr. Galloway, Alice, myself, and Alice’s brothers seem above suspicion—at least I could safely assume we are. It’s Occam’s Razor again.

The other two people I could think of, who are still around, are Claudia Hart, Nicholas’ great-grandniece; and Andy Sharp’s brother-in-law, Dr. Tim Werdin, the nuclear physicist!
I write all the specific names I have suggested as possible suspects in the attempted silver theft. I also write down my comments and what Leo has told us about his ghost friend Carter. Alice and I agree to start with all of the persons who have been in the Morpheus in the last week as possible suspects, her and myself included…

Then we eliminate those whose involvement is impossible or highly unlikely. We could not imagine, for example, little Georgie Blonda and his new girlfriend Maria Oranjeboom plotting such a thing and dragging the ingot into the Morpheus in George’s wagon! :rolleyes:
Meanwhile, the show must go on. Alice resumes her meetings with Eloise Sharp and some others, to prepare the lists of props and costumes needed; and I meet with Jane Bradley and Johnny Goss, of the steering committee, to assemble the program; I’ll need to submit a printed program for the benefit to the college in a few days. I’ll also want to e-mail a copy of the program to Harry Rudolph in San Francisco, so he can start preparing advertisements.

Alice has also started scrutinizing the print Ed Fukushima made of the patterns and lettering on the ingot. According to Fred Moreland, of the 552 ingots we removed from the Morpheus’ basement, only 22 others, still in the Sharps’ vault, have any kind of markings on them, other than their weight. All the rest have a plain texture such as I saw on gold ingots in a display at the old U. S. Mint in San Francisco years ago.
Now Alice meets with Gwen, Phoebe Atwood, and Cornelis Oranjeboom, Loora’s eldest son, to do computer research on the markings. She surfs the Internet on Jack’s office computer; Gwen and Phoebe also suggest some sources and origins.

Now we meet in the kitchen to unwind, and have lunch. Sofia Luglio, who had cooked at the family restaurant years ago, insists on cooking; she prepares her famous spaghetti with Italian sausage. Jeanette, Mary Blonda, and a few other women are in their usual immodest attire. Man, Sofia is quite a cook; only my Mom has made better spaghetti.
Now we get a call from Winifred at the police station. She asks to speak to Alice and me, so we take the call in Jack’s office, on the speakerphone. Buster and Leo are also present; we’ve closed the door.

Bob and Winifred examined the box of tools. They found plenty of fingerprints. Some were Ms. Korey’s, of course. None, however, belong to Loora or anyone else at the firm’s building across town. “We found only one other person’s prints on the tools,” says Winifred…
“Well, _______ and I came up with a list of possible suspects,” says Alice, gripping my hand snugly.

Alice reads the list I compiled, which includes Jeanette’s roadies, Claudia, Dr. Werdin, and Red Nicholas. (Dr. Clouse has been at San Francisco General Hospital for the last week.) And I had also suggested the plasterer Kyle Arbeit (concerning the amethysts in the wall) and even Signora Sofia Luglio.
Winifred’s voice is reassuring. “You’re both quite observant. The other fingerprints we found belong to…”

[NDP]

Wait a minute. This can’t be right."

Winifred’s voice is no longer so reassuring.

“The prints belong to … ______ _______.”

Leo, Buster, and Alice stare at me looking both shocked and puzzled.

“Me?” I say with astonishment. “That’s not possible!”

“Well, they’re your prints on those tools … Hold on … Okay, we just checked out the number Korey dialed on her cell just before the theft. It’s _ _ - _ _ _ . It’s also a cell phone number and it’s assigned to you.”

“I don’t think you should say anything else until you see your attorney,” Buster quietly advises.

Alice takes me aside. She looks more stunned than I am.

“You didn’t let anyone else use your cell did you?” she whispers.

“No, I’ve had it on me at all times over the last few days,” I whisper back.

“This doesn’t make any sense,” Alice says with a distressed voice. “Look, Buster’s right. You best be quiet for now. I’ll talk to Winifred.”

Unfortunately, Winifred is no longer on the line. She’s either been cut off or she’s hung up. Alice tries to call her back but each time she gets the annoying “this line has been disconnected” recorded message. Meanwhile, I feel a sense of panic rising in me. Mentally, I’m scrambling on what I should do next. Then, after a few moments, I decide on what to do. I reach for Alice and…

[dougie_monty]

I ask her to phone the station back, from the solid old rotary phone in the waiting area in the hairdresser’s place next door. (All the women at the Morpheus patronize that place.) Meanwhile, I make some calls on my cell phone.
First, I get a message from the wireless service itself—that there has been some tampering with the access to my phone and someone gained access to my line. The company urges me to change the number.

I call the phone company’s repair number (611).
I call Professor Fields—it’s urgent. I ask him to come over right away.

I call Arthur to come and assist Fields, and to inspect the telephone wiring in the Morpheus.
I call the concierge in my dorm building.

This call turns out to be pay dirt. The concierge did in fact find that several rooms in my dorm building had been broken into—and mine was one of them.
I also call Lt. Don Clay at the police station, on his own cell phone. He knows about the matter and is at least as skeptical as Winifred about the prints being mine. He assures me that the crime lab will inspect the police computer system’s fingerprint data.

Then Winifred and Bob Long come to the Morpheus themselves. Professor Fields, George Galloway, Arthur Terwilliger, and a security supervisor from the college meet them. The dorm concierge is also present. She is a short, hefty woman with scraggly black-gray hair. She and the guard chief have prepared a burglary report.
Bob and Winfred have brought the box of tools. They ask me to identify them. I do so. The officers assure me that nothing has been removed from the box since they took it out of Fukushima’s van.

I unload all the tools. I’m a little more baffled…
Scissors…a little electric sander…a steel ruler…tin snips, old and rusty…a vise-grip, an older style…the spur-like head of a tilling tool…a paintbrush…a brass garden-hose nozzle…a whisk broom.

Bob and Winifred sense my confusion. They leave the room so Fields and Arthur, as attorneys, can discuss this with me.
“Is something wrong?” asks Fields. “Those are your tools, aren’t they?”

“Yes, they are,” I say. “But I haven’t used any of this stuff in more than a year! I brought the box with me when I first moved into the dorm, and I’ve hardly used anything in it since then!”
I pick up the tin snips. They’re so badly rusted I can’t flex them; in fact the handles start to bend.
“I should have thrown the snips out years ago,” I mutter, dropping them back into the box. I’m still in a funk about this.

Fields calls the others back into the room.
He says to Bob and Winifred, “We would move for dismissal of any charges brought against _____. The only tools in the box that could be used for illegal activity are the tin snips—and they’re so rusty they’re useless.”

“What about the scissors?” asks Winifred.
I hold the scissors up. They only thing that they could cut is paper, or maybe hair.

Winifred sighs. “With this ‘evidence’ we’d never get past the preliminary hearing, if we were even to get that far.”
Now she gets a call from Hermione. She leaves the line open so Alice and I can hear.

Hermione tells us:

1. The fingerprint data is indeed faulty, although there is no question—even in my mind—that the tools are mine.

2. A prowler was arrested near the police station, after an anonymous call, from a cell phone, apparently, that the prowler was tampering with a telephone circuit box.

3. Some officers went to the body shop to examine the van, as is routine in a stolen-vehicle case. They arrived just as the tow driver unhooked and lowered the van, and they lifted fingerprints from it—Ms. Korey’s, Fukushima’s, and those of several other people from the place where Loora works; along with the tow-truck driver’s. Two sets of unknown prints were also found. My fingerprints were not found in the van.

4. The burglary in the dorm building—three other rooms were broken into besides mine—has been investigated. Someone pried my door open. My prints were found in my dorm room, of course, but so were two other sets, of unknown persons.

5. The prints of unknown persons in Fukushima’s van matched those of the unknowns found in my dorm room.

Sounding much happier, Hermione rings off.
I am happier; so is Alice, clinging to me; and the others.

Fields now tells Bob, “So much for probable cause for arrest. This would give us plenty of evidence to move for dismissal.”
Winifred nods. She uses her radio to contact Don Clay. He says he has authorized that I be cleared of any charges. And he says the prowler has been fingerprinted and booked.

“The one tampering with the phone junction box?” asks Alice.
“Yes,” says Winifred. She now stands with Arthur, her husband.

I heave a sigh of relief. So do the others. The concierge and the guard chief return to the campus. Bob and Winfred check off shift on her radio.
I also get a telepathic message from Al the Alien.

We’re going to slip through that pipe and do some snooping ourselves in case we may find someone else involved, he says. I acknowledge telepathically.
We now go next door to the Starbuck’s to unwind. Artie and Andrew are still on patrol in and around the Morpheus.

We get into the Starbuck’s; Jeanette, Samantha, Jack, and Eloise are already there.
We sure have plenty to talk about. Alice speaks first; our arms link as we sit down.

[NDP]

“We don’t who yet but I think somebody seems to have it out for you _____.”

“Well, we don’t know if the person who took my tools and ‘borrowed’ my cell phone number did so on purpose or because I was a convenient patsy,” I rationalize since I don’t want to get paranoid.

“But your tools with your fingerprints and your cell phone number?” Alice refutes. “If it was just one of those things, I could believe it wasn’t deliberate–but all of them? Face it _____. Somebody was trying to frame you.”

“She’s got a point there _____,” Jacks says in agreement. “Can you think of anybody?”

“The only candidates that come to mind are in custody,” I reply.

Our conversation comes to a sudden halt when a man with a red ski mask and gray trench coat bursts through the door of the the Starbucks. He has what looks like a handgun in his right hand.

“Oh shit,” I think, “we would get caught in an armed robbery today.”

But, when the ski-masked man opens his mouth, it’s apparent that depriving us of our cash is not is goal. “Attention imbibers of a socially accepted drug,” he shouts to everyone in the shop. “You are all enabling the rapacious global corporate machine as it engulfs and devours its competition unchecked. Starbucks sucks! Resist the temptation to drink overpriced coffee made from the blood and oppression of exploited workers! Free yourself from the addiction of the coffee bean grown at the expense of the rain forests!”

And, with that, he points his gun at the front counter and, as the barristas dive under the counter, pulls the trigger. But there are no bullets. Instead, a red liquid comes spraying out onto the wall and the counter. The masked man then turns in a circle squirting the red liquid all over the inside of the Starbucks taking care to avoid hitting the patrons (who–like Alice,Jeanette, Samantha, Jack, Eloise, and myself–have ducked underneath their tables).

After less than a minute, the anti-corporate avenger’s squirt gun runs out of red fluid. Still, since we don’t know what he might have in his coat pockets, we remain hidden underneath our tables. However, despite this, the masked man spots our group. He walks over to us, crouches down and closely looks at each of us. I spot a glint of recognition in his eye as he looks directly at Alice and says…

[dougie_monty]

“Are you so cowed by the corporate structure you cannot face reality?”
I recognize the voice, and make a telepathic command to Bob Long, crouched nearby.

The mask flies off. The weirdo turns out to be Professor John McGowan!
I sense Alice is mad enough to work him over again. But she’s careful enough not to provoke him, in case he has another weapon.

I make another telepathic call. I hear a whooshing sound and sense some of the Hellmouth critters are nearby, to assist if needed.
Jeanette suddenly stands up and, with McGowan still distracted, she slips off her green flannel dress and strikes a sexy pose, to show him her big pendulous breasts and her pubic area.

McGowan’s reaction is obvious. :eek:
Then Bob psychokinetically removes McGowan’s pants. He has a hardon and shoots his wad! He looks about ready to faint.

We all get out from under the tables. Some people are even laughing at McGowan, including the employees. Winifred and Bob calmly walk over to McGowan and pull his pants up, and handcuff him behind his back. Winifred Mirandizes him; Bob pats him down, but finds nothing in the pockets except for keys, change, a wallet, and a Muni (San Francisco) bus token.

The rest of us return to the chairs and tables; the Starbucks’ employees and other customers have recovered from the incident. One approaches to clean up McGowan’s semen from the floor; another gingerly wipes a red spot from a wall.
“This is cheap food dye!” she says.

Winifred hears this just as she and Bob drag McGowan to the patrol car.
“Aren’t you ashamed of yourself?” she asks McGowan. “And escaping from Federal prison too!” I know we’ll want to know how this came about…

Jeanette has put her dress back on.
Professor Fields makes some calls.

He has found that Argo Rank engineered McGowan’s escape, the day before the FBI shot him; McGowan had lain low until this last week.
He also calls Bob Long, who also has a cell phone: Long and Winifred will petition for a search warrant for McGowan’s home, near the college.

“I think the FBI is searching Rank’s home—I heard he lived in Sacramento,” says Alice, who holds me close.
Fields suggests that the persons like Dawna Korey, who stole the van and the silver; the cell-phone saboteur; the burglars in the dorm building; were flunkies McGowan or Rank had hired.

Jack Sharp, with Eloise on his lap, says someone may have been spying on me.
“Well, whoever it is should have caught on by now that we aren’t likely to knuckle under,” says Alice.
Now I get a cell-phone call. The company has identified the employee who misused access to customer number files; she has been terminated and turned over to local police.

Now customers come back into the Starbuck’s.
Calming down, I thumb through today’s copy of USAToday and find an item in the regional news section:

BUILDER FOUND DEAD
Retired building magnate and physical-fitness buff Jared Smedley, 80, was found dead in a Las Vegas motel room last night…
Several miles from the scene, a late-model Buick crashed into a tree just off a highway. Found dead in the car, apparently killed by the impact, was reputed mobster Giuseppe Falcone, 40, allegedly connected with a Las Vegas syndicate. The name “Jared Smedley” was found written in a notebook on the car’s front seat, crossed out with a red marker. Falcone is believed to be the bondsman for Smedley, who had been arrested in Billings, Montana, for aggravated assault and use of illegal drugs.

We’re all glum about Smedley’s death although none of us knew him except for Jack Sharp.
“It’s bad enough he turned to drugs,” says Alice.
I remember what we had found out about Rank’s own scams and other illegal activities in the Laughlin area, and how the legitimate gaming interests, and the mob, were after him and Maya Kalp.

Other policemen have come and gone, conducting the investigation; it obviously isn’t as serious as if McGowan had carried a real weapon. He was just a weirdo with a gun that shot red food dye. The Starbuck’s employees have returned the place to normal and business has resumed. We’re sure, however, that Bob and Winifred will return.
But now our whole group goes back into the Morpheus.

Back inside, near the stage, Alice joins Eloise and Mary to organize the props and costumes. I meet with Jane Bradley, Lena, and Johnny Goss, to assemble the program; it’s almost time to submit it to the college. Buster sits in the set opposite me from Jane and the others; he purrs calmly. The Hellmouth critters whoosh back into their cavern; I think they want to watch Antiques Roadshow.

And I’d still like to know what the patterns and lettering on our silver ingot means…

[NDP]

so Alice gives me the print made off the ingot we sold to look at.

It takes a few minutes for my eyes to adjust to the print’s intricate patterns but, eventually, I am able to make out some ornate lettering.

Nos es somnium effercio est texo of.

The phrase looks like Latin but since I’m not that familiar with the language, I decide defer to an expert (i.e., Alice) on what it means. Until then, I help assemble the show’s program with the others. One of the things we decide to do is…

[dougie_monty]

…to set an order, with Prester John’s Aunt as the opening act, followed immediately by Lloyd Werdin’s pantomime with the chess queen; then the penguins.
After this will be Jane Bradley singing and playing country-western; then I’m to sing “Fer the Good Times”; Alice will sing “Night and Day”; and The Cigar Band follows; then Claudia’s mime act.

We have taken some time to establish this. And we haven’t yet set an order for acts such as Doris Sharp’s punk band, the Contralto Quartet, and Joanie Sharp’s “The Typewriter.”
Now some more visitors come in, with Eloise’s permission. One is Dr. Clouse, who is ready to give us a diagnosis on Red Nicholas—her test results on him have arrived. Eloise tells me she’ll consider adding Dr. Clouse singing “I Dreamed a Dream” to the program.

Lena Martínez has asked Howie Albert—long recovered from the sword attack—to visit. Unlike me, he no longer wears glasses, and is somewhat thinner now. He comes in and finds he has plenty in common with Lena.

Samantha also arrives, with a woman she has known for years; a rather ordinary-looking woman (similar to Gwen) named Grace Tolliver, a militant feminist. Grace has also known some of the other women for years, and since she latched onto feminism she has frequently criticized the five married women for something—Jane Bradley for not reducing her ample bust, Eloise for having so many kids, and the others just for being married. This contrasts with the quietly effective, and certainly not judgmental, Samantha.

I have tilted with Grace myself a few times, but never anything serious—she has a splendid sense of humor and she and I have even discussed social issues, in fancy bistros, over glasses of sherry. And one time I was present when Mary Blonda rebuffed Grace, who had imprudently pried enough to find out about Mary and Bob’s sex life. Mary retorted, “Keep your feminism, Grace. Bob may treat me like a whore in bed, but, hey, I’m not divorced five times like you are!”

I have sensed, and I’m sure that Alice and the other women have too, that Grace’s bark is far worse than her bite. Alice in fact has commented that Grace really admires her, as well as the other women; and they, and I, are all cordial to her.
She hasn’t yet met Jeanette Strong, Dr. Clouse, or Harriet McKenna, and I don’t know what will happen when she does.

The dress rehearsals begin, although not all of the costumes, props, and makeup are ready yet. Lloyd Werdin, the penguins, Claudia, and the Contralto Quartet go through their numbers; I sing “Fer the Good Times”; Dr. Clouse sings her song.
Meanwhile, I get a call on my cell phone: The company has concluded its investigation of the phone-number theft, and the employee they fired had misappropriated dozens of numbers, not just mine.

This is followed by a call from Bob Long, who tells me something similar: The prowler who tampered with the junction box near the police station had a long rapsheet full of such offenses, and could not be expected to know that Winifred was calling me at that exact moment—those boxes take a long time just to open, let alone tamper with the way he did. He’s in serious trouble now, though, for interfering with police business.

Alice has gone to use Jack’s office computer for research on the ingot inscriptions I expect her to return soon, to rehearse with Prester John’s Aunt.
A few minutes later I get a shock. After a lively squabble between Grace and Jeanette—wearing a flannel dress without underwear again—Eloise and Jane had led a group of small boys in, to watch Eloise’s 20-year-old son George do a magic act. He isn’t wearing a magician’s outfit, but uses stage props—a top hat, a small card table, a wand.

I return to the seats. I see all the younger boys who have already been at the Morpheus; only boys, such as Georgie Blonda, Owen Sharp, and Jack Sharp II, Andrew’s little boy. One of the other kids, presumably from these boys’ school, has left his seat to volunteer, though I don’t see him.

The shocking sight is a young naked woman emerging from the open top hat, which sits upside-down on the table. The young woman is easily 5-foot-4; the top hat is an ordinary-sized one.
George Sharp now asks his audience, “Any other boys wanna see if my magic hat is a fake?” The boys gasp. :eek:

Some adults are in the seats, much farther back. Eloise sees what has happened and shrieks loudly. She then storms up to the stage, furious with her son. Pete and Loora Oranjeboom follow her. The Dutch couple stands next to the young woman; they raise their arms, and say something in Dutch; and the naked woman disappears, replaced by a small boy—apparently the one who had volunteered. Eloise sees Pete and Loora do this and nods approvingly. Alice, Grace, Dr. Clouse, and I, approach.

But Eloise is angry enough to chew nails. :mad: She stands almost face-to-face with her son George and screams at him:

[NDP]

“George Sharp just what the hell do you think you’re doing?! I cannot begin to tell you on how many levels that ‘magic’ act is offensive! And with kids in the audience no less! Jesus Christ, I don’t why your father and I allowed you to join that frat at college! Ever since you started hanging around those beer-bong guzzling, misygonistic pigs, you’ve been treating women as little more than blow-up dolls!”

All during Eloise’s tirade, George sports a smug grin that–in my opinion–is just asking to be smacked off his face.

“Oh, you think this is funny?” Eloise continues. “Well, I don’t care if you’re legally an adult. You’re coming with me. Come on!”

She grabs George’s shirt collar and pulls him off the stage toward one of the dressing rooms. There, they will continue their intra-family argument privately.

After George and Eloise depart, Alice says, “You have to admit that was a questionable act to put on with children in the audience.”

“I agree,” I say. “But George knew what he was doing was inappropriate. His goal was to shock people and I certainly think he succeeded. By the way, that naked girl in his act looked awfully familiar. Do you know who she was?”

“I really didn’t see her long enough to identify her,” Alice says. “Anyway, Lorna is up next. I’m going backstage to see if she’s ready.”

Alice leaves before I tell her I want her to translate the Latin phrase from the silver’s ingot’s print. I guess I’ll have to wait until later. As Grace, Dr. Clouse, Pete, and Loora remain on stage talking, I sit back down in the audience and quietly wait for Lorna to come on stage. Then, after a moment’s thought, it occurs to me who the naked woman in George’s act is. It’s …

[dougie_monty]

Anna Luglio, Ferruccio’s granddaughter! :eek:
I sense that Jeanette, whose mother is a cousin of Ferruccio, recognized her. Most of the people present, me included, are shocked to see Anna like that.

How George Sharp pulled off this trick I don’t know. Perhaps he picked up something from Red Nicholas. Who knows?
Anna reappears, fully dressed, from behind the backdrops; she sits alone musing; I sense she’s as annoyed with George as Eloise is. Loora and Samantha go over to her to console her. Jeanette stands up and swivels away, to join Eloise and George in the dressing room as a relative of Anna’s. I can still sense Eloise’s anger…

I don’t know who the little boy is. Anyway, he reappeared fully dressed, as I assume he was when George called him up on stage.
I tell Alice, who has returned to sit next to me, “Jack and Eloise reared their kids in a strict, but not severe, manner. They rarely step out of line like that—even the eldest.”

“George is sure to be in the doghouse with his parents—and Andrew and Joanie—for a while,” says Alice. “Little Jack II was watching!”
Grace speaks up. She apparently approves of Eloise’s handling of the matter; this years after she had chided Eloise for bearing fifteen kids.

“Ms. Sharp seems to know how to deal with her chauvinistic son.”
“He isn’t chauvinistic often,” I say. “I happen to know that in high school he was a real gentleman with the girls.”

“That doesn’t mean he couldn’t have been as sexist then as he is now,” Grace shoots back. I don’t take her bait.
“I feel a little sorry for Anna, too. Ferruccio and Sofia aren’t going to be happy with George for getting their granddaughter to participate,” I say. “Fortunately, the senior Luglios—and Anna’s parents, Tomasso and Lucrezia—have known the Sharps for years.”

Now the other kids have filed out, led by Jane Bradley. She intends to let the kids’ parents know the magic act they came to see has failed—and she will apologize to the parents on our behalf.
Lorna, meanwhile, is waiting. We all have cleared the stage. She goes through several of her numbers, since she had not yet had time to choose between them before this point in the development of the program.

Alice sits next to me; I hand her the print from the ingot, but she has other things on her mind right now and slips the print into a large portfolio she has brought.
After Lorna finishes, she leaves the stage to talk to Mary; and Jock, who has just come off duty, joins them. He and Lorna embrace.

“Who’s the cop?” asks Grace.
“That’s her fiancé, Jock Dumfries,” answers Alice.

Now, even without ESP, I can tell that Lorna is telling Jock about George Sharp’s magic act. He is almost incredulous. They walk back to the back row of the seats, at a far corner; we leave them alone.
Now Eloise, George, and Jeanette return. Eloise is still angry; George is obviously chastened. Jack is with them and he looks angry too. The parents order him to sit with them in the back row, opposite from Jock and Lorna, with them sitting closer to the aisle so George can’t get out. I can almost see the smoke rising from Eloise’s head…

Alice now gets up on stage and goes through her numbers with Prester John’s Aunt. She and Amy and Gwen and Lena seem in top form.
Next is Jane Bradley. When Grace sees her, she mutters something about Jane’s bosom. I ignore this.

Jane plays some C&W numbers, including “Rusty Old Halo”; I cry again. Alice comes back to sit next to me and cuddles with me.
Then the Sharp kids’ punk band returns to the stage and cranks out “Avril Lavigne, Poseur Punk Queen.”

After we all recover from this, we declare the session closed. Mary tells me they’ll have a draft of the program ready for me, later today.
Now our whole group, about 40 people (and Buster), goes to the spacious conference room. Anna’s grandparents are here; I note that they seem satisfied that George has been adequately reprimanded. He stands between his parents and appears full penitent now. I even see him shedding tears…

Alice and I approach the parents and George, along with Grace, Samantha, Dr. Clouse, and Mr. Galloway. The others present in this impromptu meeting are Jack, Eloise, George, and Ferruccio and Sofia Luglio. George is in the doghouse and he knows it.

I want to know how he learned that trick; but that’s not relevant at the moment.
In any case, Dr. Clouse steps forward. She introduces herself to the Luglios, and to Grace; and she is the first to speak.

[NDP]

“I was wondering. I’ve been examining Red Nicholas and am curious about the Luglios’ connection with him.”

"Nicholas employed Federico Luglio as an errand boy when he was in Naples, " Ferruccio explains. “One day, Nicholas was attacked by two knife-wielding assailants. Federico intervened and saved his life. Red repaid Federico by making him his personal assistant and awarding him a fair amount of money. Later, when Federico and the rest of my family came to America, Nicholas’ ‘heirs’ gave him a job at the Morpheus.”

“That’s interesting,” Dr. Clouse says. “What else do you know about Federico’s work for Nicholas?”

“Well, that’s pretty much it,” Ferruccio states. “My family never really went into much detail beyond that and, frankly, I never saw the reason to dig any deeper.”

“Oh, I hope I wasn’t prying too much.”

“No, we’ve always realized that once anyone mentions Red Nicholas’ name, people want to know more. He’s quite an eccentric character to say the least.”

“That might be true but I haven’t seen him display much eccentricity yet. He’s too obsessed with watching television.”

While Dr. Clouse and Luglios converse, Grace drifts off to where Gwen is and starts talking to her. I can’t make out what they’re saying but I do notice that Grace looks like an older (and more bitter) version of Gwen–they could almost pass for mother and daughter.

My silent fascination on how two people who aren’t related could look so much alike is broken by a sudden high-pitched ringing in my ears. Dr. Clouse and the Luglios don’t seem to notice the noise but Alice, who is visibly wincing, certainly does. When I look across the room and see Jeanette with a pained look on her face, I automatically conclude that only those with ESP can hear this irritating noise.

Alice, who has tears of pain welling in her eyes, motions for me to join her in a corner of the room. Upon doing so, the high-pitched ringing in our ears changes to …

[dougie_monty]

…a soft, low-pitched hum. The last time I heard a sound like that I had a TV in my college dorm, the first semester, with “rabbit-ears”; it sometimes made that sound when I walked close by.
“This is like a collective case of tinnitus,” says Alice. She and Jeanette are no longer wincing. Nor am I.

I ask Jane to help—she of the radar eyes. She stands with us. She activates her radar sense and slowly turns around.
Then she stops. We’re standing near the west wall of the room. She seems to get a fix on something.

Suddenly Jane sneezes. The sound stops altogether. Jeanette, Alice, and I react to the sudden stop of the sound, for a moment. The force of the sneeze snaps Jane’s bra straps and pops buttons off her blouse and jeans. She holds onto her clothing and says, “Joe, help me…” They go into another room.
Meanwhile Jeanette asks, “What was Jane facing?”

“I don’t know offhand,” I say. “Let’s go outside.”
Alice, Jeanette, and I step out onto the street, just outside of where we were in the conference room, which is right off the sidewalk. We look directly across the street and see the building housing the Courier-Times. There’s a small window in the wall directly across from where we stand.

I cross the street and peer discreetly into the window. It looks like a kitchen or lounge.
Back across the street with Alice and Jeanette, I look, and use ESP, sighting directly from the line of Jane’s radar sight into the room across the street. I see someone use a microwave oven.

Since Jane sneezed we haven’t heard the sound. We may ask Leo to investigate that microwave oven, later.
We go back inside. The senior Luglios are still in the conference room, with Anna, and now her parents Tomasso and Lucrezia Luglio are there. Jeanette steps over to them; she is Tomasso’s second cousin.

Eloise now tells Alice and me, “We had George make a full apology to all the Luglios. We also ordered him to go to the parents of all those boys who saw his ‘trick,’ and tell them how sorry he is.” George nods.
I still wonder how George did that trick. I ask Alice, “Where did that little boy go when George drew Anna out of that hat? I thought at first he had used magic to turn the little boy into a grown woman!” Now that sounds fantastic, even to me! “And how could he do that anyway? She’s five-foot-four and that wasn’t a trick top hat—or was it?”

Alice thinks this over and calls Jeanette back. The platinum-blonde singer still wears a flannel dress that leaves little to the imagination.
“Jeanette, since you are a blood relative of Federico Luglio, maybe you can talk to Nicholas—he has always felt close to Federico and his kin.”

“What do you have in mind?” Jeanette asks. Like Mary Blonda, she seems a perfect combination of beautiful personality and sexy body…
“We’d like to ask Red if he taught George Sharp that hat trick—pulling full-size Anna out of a 6 7/8 top hat isn’t simply sleight of hand!”

We decide to ask Pete Oranjeboom, who is our technical director, to send a message to Nicholas that he must appear in the basement level: Joe Bradley and I will lift the grate for him. And Dr. Clouse will give him the test results, as he had requested. Jeanette will be present too, to ask Nicholas about George’s trick; we know she has charmed him and he has long felt a sense of gratitude to the Luglios and their kin anyway.

“And we’d also like Leo and Salbert to assist us in investigating that noise we heard, and that microwave you saw,” Alice tells me. “Loochy the burro, with his sensitive hearing, can probably help.” I also wonder if Loochy, like Buster, can talk…
Now the Luglios, satisfied, have left. George Sharp has gone to carry out his parents’ order to make formal apologies to the various families.

Jeanette, Amy, Jerry, and Johnny go into a dressing room; and the married couples, and Jock and Lorna, do likewise. And so do Alice and I. And now, in a naked embrace, by ourselves, Alice and I discuss these recent events:

[NDP]

With regard the Latin inscription on the silver ingot, Alice authoritatively states, “Roughly translated into English, it says, 'We are dreams that stuff is built (or constructed) of.”"

“We are the dreams stuff is made of,” I comment. “That same mangled Shakespeare quote again. Why do they keep getting it wrong?”

“Maybe ‘they’ aren’t getting wrong.”

“Well, I don’t have a Ph.D in English literature, but unless there’s a different version of The Tempest out there that says otherwise, I’m pretty sure the quote’s muffed up.”

“That’s not what I mean.:rolleyes: Whoever inscribed 'We are the dreams stuff is made of” on the sub-basement hatch and–in Latin–on the silver ingot purposely altered Shakespeare’s ‘stuff dreams are made of’ quote to make a comment about something. Exactly what I don’t know, but I’m guessing it might have something to do with with Red Nicholas and maybe the Morpheus itself."

As Alice says this, she traces an infinity pattern with her finger on my chest.

“I would think so too,” I say before lightly kissing her hand. “I don’t why I didn’t see some sort pattern to this earlier.”

“Anyway, while we’re on the subject of Red Nicholas, do you think he also has anything to do with George’s ‘hat trick?’” Alice asks.

“I would but I don’t remember ever seeing George and Red together,” I answer as I begin to kiss her neck. “Unless George paid him a visit in his subterranean TV room. And I would think the DXM would be keeping a close eye on any guests Red might’ve seen.”

“Good point,” Alice murmurs, "In fact, I think we should ask…