It’s not like Bullseye to trust anyone but himself. He doesn’t dignify our question with a response; he’s said his piece.
I pull the thumb drive from my backpack and, despite feeling a hitch of reticence in parting with this mysterious treasure, hand it over.
“It’s time to go,” Grandma declares.
It’s not clear if that’s what she wants or if, childlike, she senses we’ve reached some apex in the conversation and are heading downward.
I’m still reeling from revelation. Grandma says the man in blue put her head in a machine. Is she imagining this? Is she speaking metaphorically? If not, what kind of machine?
Was the man in blue — or the blue man, as she’s also called him — at the dental offices?
Sam interrupts my train of thought.
“Grandma needs rest, peaceful rest,” she says.
“You’re right, Grandma,” I say to Lane. “It’s time to go.”
I explain to Sam and Bullseye that I’m headed over to my boss’s house for a drink. Pauline’s a good thinker who can help me parse some ideas. And her loft is a good place to rest.
I thank Sam profusely for her magic hands and Bullseye for his savant-like insights and technical support. I ask him to call me if he turns something up.
“Be careful with Lane,” Sam says. Then she puts the palm of her hand on my cheek. She almost withdraws it, then holds it close again, her eyes opening wide.
“Be careful with Lane,” she repeats.
“You said that already?”
“Strange energy. Yellow, something brown,” she says, hand still on my cheek. The Witch, dressed as a lioness, looks concerned.
“Maybe I just need a shower,” I say.
“Doubt that’ll help.” She smiles thinly. “Yellow, brown — I think it means that you know something bad is going to happen.”
Chapter 26
Not much later, we stand in Pauline’s spectacular digs. Her loft has three floors, each eclectically decorated by art, trinkets, collectibles, weavings, rugs, mirrors, and other fashionable items, including a harp and a stuffed bear. They cover every square inch of wall and floor, creating a veritable three-dimensional mural.
Pauline picks her art with a remarkable combination of whimsy and purpose. Same with her clothes.
She stands at the doorway wearing a black skirt short enough to show lovely knees and a snug T-shirt with Mickey Mouse on the front. She rubs her eyes and shakes her head.
“Cobwebs. So excited for your visit I fell asleep.”
I laugh.
“And you must be the infamous Grandma,” she says.
“I’m Lane Idle,” Grandma responds. Then she mutters something I can’t quite make out. Pauline asks her to repeat.
“Pigeon,” Grandma says, quietly. “It’s my identifying password.”
Pauline shoots me a quick glance. I shrug.
“I’m Pauline,” our host says. “Want to know my password?”
Grandma nods. Pauline approaches and whispers something to her. Grandma smiles.
“You are very beautiful,” Grandma says as we walk into the room, her eyes focused on our host.
“You’re not so bad yourself.”
Grandma puts her hand over her mouth. It looks like fear. But then she joyfully exclaims: “Tansey!”
She points at a framed print of a painting hung over the fireplace. The print depicts a cow standing in a museum. Next to the cow, a museum curator pulls a white sheet to unveil a painting of two other cows.
“You like Mark Tansey?” Pauline asks.
“I’m not sure what the artist is getting at,” I say. “Were any cows harmed in the making of this painting?”
Grandma and Pauline simultaneously say: “Just enjoy it.”
Grandma breaks into a grin, takes Pauline’s hand in hers, squeezes.
Pauline looks at me, shakes her head, bemused, then excuses herself. She returns a moment later and hands me a martini with a sunken green olive. I sip and feel its warmth.
“Does this house have a computer?” Grandma asks. “I like to play the game with the falling blocks.”
Pauline holds Lane’s arm as she takes us down a metal staircase with a polished red wood railing to a floor with a wide-open living room. It’s scattered with painstaking design with more eclectic art and furniture, including a statuesque grandfather clock but with Martian ears on its sides and an antenna, and a beanbag chair that looks like a wading pool.
I follow the pair of women to the far side of the room, where a doorway leads to a home office. This is relatively Spartan, a single multicolored weaving hanging on a wall behind and above a metallic desk. On the desk, a sleek Macintosh.
Pauline snags the mouse, bringing the monitor to life, makes a few clicks, and calls up Tetris. “Is this the game you like?”
“No,” Grandma says, looking intently at the screen. “No, no, no!”
Pauline looks at me.
“Where are all the messages?” Grandma asks.
“Messages?”
“I like that one,” Grandma says, more calmly. She is pointing at the screen’s top right corner, where there’s a logo for “super Tetris.”
Pauline clicks on it, prompting the program to appear on the full screen. Without a word, Grandma places herself on Pauline’s ergonomic wonder of a black work chair, and practically pulls the mouse from our host’s hand.
We watch as Grandma starts playing, sort of. The blocks are falling, and she’s in a trance, watching, sometimes clicking.
“Is this fun?” I ask after a minute.
“I’m busy now,” Grandma responds.
“Yowza,” Pauline says to me. “Eerie.”
“Grandma, I’m going to go in the other room for a little while.”
In the living room, Pauline and I sit on a soft brown couch. I slug the remains of my martini and place it on the glass table or, rather, on a round coaster covered with green felt made to look like a putting green. My host refills it from a silver shaker.
I’m immediately buzzed. I find myself staring at an oil painting of a French cafe, where a young woman holds a poodle in one hand and a baguette in the other. I can’t remember the last time I ate.
“So… the mysterious thumb drive. Tell me!” she says.
I want to tell her. I want to untangle the last few days. Does she advise going to the cops? Does she know anything about Biogen? Does she have sources who can help?
Can she tell me about Chuck? Can I trust him?
But I’m just locked up, beyond fatigued.
“Martini got your tongue?” she asks.
“Huh?”
“You’re not speaking. It’s like we’re an old married couple that I never plan to become.”
“Well, we are babysitting — an eighty-five-year-old. So we’ve been married a long, long time.”
She’s inched closer to me — now only a half a foot away. She curls a strand of hair behind her right ear. A
