Assignment to Disaster (22 page)

Durell thought about it. "I'm not certain."

"Look, as long as you're up and about, you ought to give Sidonie Osbourn a ring. She's been trying to reach you by telephone, but the hospital people had orders to let you sleep. Call her, Sam."

"Sidonie? I'll do better than that. I'll go see her."

The nurse, intern, and resident objected. Durell brushed past them and went out of the hospital and hailed a cab and had himself driven to Alexandria.

The curving street looked serene and peaceful in the evening light. There had been no publicity attached to Cyclops. Not yet. Nobody was out on the sidewalk looking at the sky except two small boys flying kites. Durell paid the cab driver and slowly went up the walk to the small, comfortable house. He felt awkward in the tight bandages that restricted his left arm. He felt awkward for the first moment when Sidonie Osbourn opened the door, and after that it was all right.

"Come in, Sam. Are you sure you ought to be up and around so soon?"

He kissed her cheek. "I heard you wanted to talk to me. Are the girls O.K.?"

"They're fine."

"Are you working for Dickinson McFee yet?"

"I start tomorrow."

"Sid…"

"You're just in time for dinner. Come into the kitchen. The girls are eating out at a neighbor's."

"I'm not hungry," Durell said. "I just…"

"Don't ever say that to a Frenchwoman!" she mocked him. She tugged at his arm. "And don't look so forlorn. It's all right." Then she sobered. 'Truly, Sam. I told you how it was with Lew and me. It's all right. Or at least. I know it couldn't have been avoided. Lew was doing his job."

The kitchen was warm and comfortable. He watched Sidonie move about, setting the table, checking the food in the oven. She looked fresh and clean and wonderful. He felt an ache deep inside him, a vast loneliness. He wanted to talk to her about Deirdre, but he couldn't. They talked about everything else.

Finally, over coffee, Sidonie said quietly, "Sam, do you feel sorry for me?"

"I think you're fine and brave. No, I don't feel sorry for you now."

"Do you still feel you can travel faster and farther alone? Because your job is dangerous, you should have no lies to anyone?"

"I don't know," he said. "But I know now that you and Lew did the right thing. I want some of it for myself, now."

"Then you've changed your mind," she said.

"I found a girl. But I've lost her again."

"Have you looked everywhere for her?"

"I've had the whole damned section looking…" He broke off, staring at her. "What do you know about Deirdre?"

"She was here. Right here. You told her about Lew and me, in the bayou, so she came to me. She told me about that night. And what Swayney said. It hasn't been easy for her. She said you saved her from a lonely, empty life. And she said she'd be wailing for you."

"Where is she?" Durell was on his feet. "Tell me."

Sidonie smiled. "She's waiting in your apartment. The one place no one thought to look. Now kiss me good night and get on your horse and go."

He ran up the stairs, down the hall, to the doorway. The door was not locked. He stood in the entrance and she was there. He looked at her, curled up on his favorite leather chair. The lamp made her red hair a bright glow. She wore a soft dress of cream and gold and she looked different and he did not know what it was that was different about her, at first; and then he realized that he saw her now in composure, without fear, scrubbed and clean and rested, not as she had been in the bayou or before lhat or afterward. And the way she looked squeezed something inside him and he felt suddenly as if she were a stranger and all his thoughts about her had been only dangerous dreams.

"So here you are," he said banally.

"Hello, Sam."

"You… What happened to you?"

"Come in. Close the door, Sam. I didn't know where else to go, so I came here. I've been here ever since that last bad night." She paused. "That was the night I thought they had killed you. After McFee's, I mean. Then I remembered you mentioned Sidonie Osbourn, so I called her and she told me what you had done. So I've just been waiting here for you to come home."

"I've been worried sick."

"I'm sorry."

"Half out of my mind."

"I'm glad."

Her eyes were mischievous. He came into the room and looked down at her. "What happened to you outside of McFee's?"

"I saw Franz on the street," she said. "I was stunned. I guessed he had been watching McFee's for you to show up. But then he started away and I jumped out of the car to follow him and then I lost him. I'd have taken the car, only I don't know how to drive. When I got back there were the police and a big crowd outside McFee's house and I knew it had gone all wrong for you. I thought you were arrested. Or killed. I didn't know what to do. So I called Sidonie and went there. Then I came here. And waited. And died a thousand times and shed an ocean of tears. Because I love you, Sam."

Now her eyes were grave. She stood up and went to the window. "Sidonie told me all about you. How you always thought it was foolish to get involved with someone you loved, because of your job and all the things that might happen."

"So?"

She turned to face him. "It's up to you. If you want me to go, I'll go."

"Could you?"

"No," she said. "Yes. I don't know. I don't think so. Oh, I don't know what I'm trying to say."

Suddenly as they stood by the window she began to shake and then she was in his arms. He told her to look out at the evening sky. The first stars were beginning to shine.

"It's all over now," he said. "It's all right."

"Is it?" She stared at the darkening sky. "Cyclops is up there, somewhere. Over our heads. It will always be there, from now on."

"Like the conscience of humanity," Durell said quietly.

"You… Sam?"

Her eyes questioned him. He smiled. He kissed her.

"Come closer," he said.

"Sam?"

"I'll never let you go," he said.