Waking the Moon

Dear Sweeney,

Guess what? My mother finally showed up. She was waiting at the guard’s desk downstairs; they just called, so I’m going down now and I guess I’ll go to her hotel or whatever. I told her you and I had plans for tonight and I had to leave by four so I’ll just meet you back at the house. Keep the champagne cold—

“No!”

I pounded my fist against the desk, ripping the page so that no one else would ever read its final lines.

I love you, Sweeney. Don’t worry! I’ll be RIGHT BACK—

Dylan.

CHAPTER 21 Waking the Moon

THE CAR ANGELICA HAD hired was a Lincoln Town Car, pure white inside and out, with plush velvet seats and chromium fixtures. She could tell that Dylan thought it was tacky; it was tacky, but it was the only car she could find that had air-conditioning.

“Mmm, it’s so nice to see you, sweetheart,” she said, hugging him in front of the guard’s desk in the museum.

“You too, Mom,” said Dylan. She let her head rest upon his shoulder for a moment, then drew back to stare up at him.

“So what’s this, you can’t call your mother more than once a summer?” she teased. “I could have been worried, you know.”

“But you weren’t.” Dylan let her slip her arm around him and together they walked outside. “I’m sorry, Mom—really, I am. I just—I’ve been kind of caught up in things.”

Angelica nodded. She had dressed for the weather, in a sleeveless shift of ivory-colored crumpled silk, belted at the waist with a gold cord, and simple but very expensive Italian gladiator sandals. Her hair was pulled into a chignon, and she wore heavy gold earrings and bracelets of ivory and sandalwood. Around her neck she wore the lunula. The silver crescent should have been jarring with all that gold, but in fact it was hardly noticeable, like the moon seen during daylight.

“You look good, Dylan,” Angelica said as they walked to the car. “I told you you’d like D.C.”

“It’s been great.” He stopped at the curb and stared up at the sky. “Except for the weather,” he added, frowning.

Overhead the liverish sky had grown even darker. Heavy brownish thunderclouds crept above the National Gallery and Regent’s Castle and the Treasury Building. Everything had a strange greenish cast, as though he was seeing the world through a whorled glass. A hurricane sky, he thought.

But the first of August was too early to worry about hurricanes. Besides, he was with his mother.

“Hop in!” Angelica said cheerfully pulling open the back door of the car. Cool air like water flowed into the street. “Your chariot has arrived.”

Dylan looked at the town car and made a face. “Gee, Mom, is someone paying you to ride around in that?”

Angelica laughed. “Not yet. Come on, go easy on me—it’s the only thing Elspeth could find that had air- conditioning.”

Dylan slung his long legs into the car and slid inside. “Is Elspeth here?”

“No. I just implored her to take care of a few things for me—I’ve been so busy, and I didn’t want to have to worry about anything on your birthday.”

“Right.” Dylan nodded, stared back out the window at the museum, its dome faded to grey in the glaucous light. He bit his lip, then said, “I know you came all this way to see me, but I have to be back here by four. I—I made plans for tonight. With a friend.”

Angelica slipped onto the velvet-covered seat beside him, motioning to the driver. Without a sound the car eased onto Constitution Avenue and headed toward the Tidal Basin. “Plans? What kind of plans? Anyone I know?”

Dylan opened his mouth to reply, thought better of it. He shook his head. “Just some friends.”

Angelica turned and stared at him. She plucked a stray tendril of hair from her forehead and pushed it aside. “I see,” she said softly. Her voice was even, her emerald eyes unreadable. “Well, that still leaves us time for lunch, doesn’t it?”

“Sure.”

She leaned forward. “Don’t you have something for me?” she asked playfully.

Dylan frowned. “Oh… yeah. Here—”

He handed her the fragment of the lunula he’d found in the museum. She took it and Dylan held his breath, waiting for her to say something else, but his mother seemed distracted. She looked out the window as the Mall slipped by, her mouth pursed, brow furrowed. He’d spoken to her a few times over the summer, usually calling her from the museum, but he hadn’t told her about Sweeney. He hadn’t told her about anything; he hadn’t actually wanted to speak to her at all. But she was his mother, and this was his birthday. She’d come all the way here from Huitaca, though past experience had made it clear to Dylan that his mother usually visited him when there was some other business she could take care of at the same time—dress fittings in Milan, academic cronies in Princeton. This time it was probably some old friends in Congress and the diplomatic corps.

But here she was, cool and beautiful as always, sinking back and sighing luxuriously. “Isn’t this air- conditoning wonderful? The flight here was a nightmare! Maybe we should just drive around for a few minutes and enjoy all this nice cold expensive air.”

She smiled at Dylan, but her son noticed that she hadn’t given any command to the driver: he was already headed for the Lincoln Memorial. Whatever she had planned, and wherever they were going, had all been decided long before Dylan came onto the scene.

“Sure. Just remember—four o’clock.”

“Of course: Four o’clock!” Angelica repeated brightly. “Always time for tea!”

I raced downstairs to the guard’s desk.

“Did someone come here looking for Dylan Furiano?” I asked breathlessly.

Captain Wyatt, the security chief, smiled. “You mean some sweet young thing pretending to be his mother?”

I gritted my teeth. “That would be her.”

“Well, she came by, Katherine, but she didn’t sign in. He came on down here and went on out with her—” He gestured over his shoulder at the Constitution Avenue exit, then looked at me with raised eyebrows. “What, they leave without you?”

“No—yes, I don’t know,” I cried, and turned away. “If you see Dylan, tell him I’m looking for him. Tell him I want to know as soon as he gets back.”

Captain Wyatt nodded. As I left I could hear him saying, “I knew that wasn’t his momma.”

Once back in my office I called the carriage house. The line was busy. It stayed busy for nearly forty minutes, during which I thought alternately of jumping out the window or running home. But at last I got through, only to hear the answering machine kick in.

“Goddammit, somebody pick up!” I shouted when the recorded tape ended.

“Hey.” Annie’s voice came on, sounding a little sheepish. “I’m sorry, were you trying to call? I was talking to Helen—”