“You’re a disruptive influence,” I informed him.
“You’d be surprised how many of my teachers said the very same thing.”
“I doubt it.”
“We need to make a shopping list,” said Cassandra. She’d brought her purse out with her. After rooting around inside for half a minute, she emerged with a small pad of paper and a pen, which she handed to Cole.
He waved the pen around appreciatively. It was wrapped with soft red material, and a spray of fine red feathers had been hot glued to the top. “Cassandra,” he said, “I hope you know that poaching Muppets is illegal in this country.”
“Just be quiet and write.” Cassandra read off the list, which included some common herbs like catmint and basil and some items I’d never heard of before like derrentia and triptity. “Where are we supposed to find that stuff?” I asked.
“Corpus Christi’s a big city,” Cassandra replied. “There’s bound to be at least one coven running a supply store here, and most likely it will be near the bay.” She came to the end of the list and stopped, though I knew she wasn’t done.
“What?”
“We need an item of her clothing.”
“Of course. Can’t we save that till the end though? You know, until I’m physically on the yacht?”
She read over the spell. “Yes,” she said slowly. “But we need something of hers—”
“What, like a lock of hair?”
Cole threw up his hands. “How the hell are we supposed to get that? We can be pretty sure they don’t spend the day on that boat. They’d be too vulnerable.”
“Actually, I had another idea. Bergman may need to help though.”
I winced. “He’s slogging through a blizzard of work as it is.”
“Then let’s leave it for now. It may even be something we can accomplish without him. First, the shopping.”
“Can I go?” asked Cole. “Oh, stop looking at me like that. Bergman won’t let me watch him, much less help. Vayl’s down for the count, and all the beautiful babes are at work.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “Or at the mall.”
Four hours later, laden with bags and, okay, a cute green dress covered with silver stars that was on sale and in the same store as the triptity, so cut out the guilt, we returned to the RV.
Cassandra opened the door and stopped with her foot on the first step. I strained to see around her, especially when I heard Bergman humming to himself.
Bergman was dancing.
Okay, it actually resembled an old man’s attempt not to break his hip while proving he could still shake a leg at his great-granddaughter’s wedding. But still.
“Bergman,” I said, “is that your happy dance?”
He grinned at me.
“Cassandra, look,” I said. “Bergman has teeth.”
“They’re very nice,” she replied.
“Lemme in before my arms fall off!” Cole demanded. We piled inside and dropped the bags under the monitor, which revealed a lot more activity than it had in a while. I spared it another glance. The Chinese crew had arrived. But Xia Wu hadn’t called. Well, I knew I might not be able to depend on him. If he didn’t contact me by the time Vayl woke, we’d modify our plan accordingly.
I turned back to Bergman. “What’d you do?” I asked. For an answer he held up a long thin wire. It took a tremendous effort not to snatch it, but I kept my hands to myself as I asked, “Is that the translator?”
He nodded, showing those perfect white teeth again. He came toward me and draped the wire over my head. “The idea,” he said, “is to weave this into your hair. If you have it kind of hanging down by your face like this,” he demonstrated, pulling a handful of curls forward and winding them around the wire, “it should never show. Okay. Say something.”
“How is it powered? I mean, it’s so thin. Where’s the battery?”
Nobody answered. They just stared. I watched slow amazement dawn on their faces.
“Oh my God,” said Cole. “You sound just like that bitch!”
“Watch your mouth, young man,” I snapped.
Cassandra nodded. “Exactly.”
Bergman moved closer. “Now say something.”
“This is so incredible, Bergman. You are a flipping genius!”
“That’s what I thought.” He wasn’t responding to my comment. “When I stand this near I can hear the English before it’s translated. So make sure you keep everybody at least three feet away from you. And figure out how to hide your lips. Use a fan maybe.”
“How’d you do it?” asked Cole.
“Well, I couldn’t have without already having Pengfei’s voice on the computer. Other than that . . . none of your
