“Are they our mommy and daddy?”
Victoria took notice, looking up from her coloring.
“Perhaps. Do you remember them?”
“I don’t,” Victoria said.
Elizabeth said, “I do.”
“Tell me what you remember?” Celeste asked.
“Daddy was tall and he talked on the telephone with a loud voice.”
“I remember that,” Victoria said, unconvincingly.
“Mommy was very kind,” Elizabeth said. “She made us yummy meals and read to us in bed and sang songs.”
Victoria claimed to remember that too.
“Do you remember when you last saw them?” Celeste asked.
Marcus watched Elizabeth bear down in thought and her sister aping her.
“I don’t remember,” Elizabeth finally said.
“Me neither,” Victoria said.
Celeste pressed on. “When you were in the white room on the spaceship, did you see your parents there?”
They both said no.
“Did the gray men ever talk to you about them?”
Elizabeth corrected her. “There weren’t gray men. There was Gray Man and Gray Woman.”
“Ah, I’m sorry,” Celeste said. “Did Gray Man or Gray Woman talk about them?”
After a very long pause, Elizabeth said yes. “I remember once, a long time ago. Gray Woman told us not to cry and that if we were good, we would see our parents again.”
“What did being good mean?”
“We had to eat all our Earth food, we had to brush our teeth, and we had to let them poke us and take our blood.”
“And were you good?”
“Not always. Sometimes.”
“But you didn’t get to see your parents again.”
“No.” Elizabeth fidgeted and said she was tired.
“You can rest, child,” Celeste said. “Thank you for speaking with me. I think both of you girls are very sweet and very special.”
Suddenly, Victoria looked at her and said, “I love you.”
Marcus didn’t know what to make of this burst of affection, but Celeste didn’t seem surprised. She replied, “I love you too.”
The flight time was only just over an hour, but halfway into it, both girls were asleep. Leonora came forward with pillows for them. Marcus leaned into the aisle and, in a low voice, asked Celeste if she found her conversation with them helpful. His question had an edge he couldn’t entirely disguise and she immediately picked up on it.
“You distrust me,” she said quietly.
“It’s not a matter of trust.”
“What then?”
“I just can’t figure out your angle.”
“Angle. I think I know what this means. It’s like, what I want? My intentions?”
“That’s exactly what it means.”
“I want to help them find their parents. I want to help Mikkel find his son and daughter-in-law. I want to help Armando and Leonora find their daughter. I even want to help you, although you don’t want my help.”
“What help do I need?”
“You want to succeed in your job. I believe that is important to you.”
“So, you’re driven by altruism. Is that it?”
“Mostly.”
“Mostly? What else?”
She changed the direction of her gaze just enough to avoid his eyes. “My number of clients has been down lately. If it became known that I helped find Jesper and Elena, my business would be much better.”
“I’m relieved,” he said.
“You are?”
“I am. That’s a motivation I can understand. You’re not a saint.”
“No, Marcus, you’re wrong,” she said. “A part of me is, well, not saintly, but altruistic. If I don’t increase my wealth by a single euro, I will still be content and serene. Why? Because doing good things for people is far more important than making money.”
Their conversation ended, Marcus would have been left to his own thoughts for the rest of the ride had not Elizabeth jolted awake and asked him if he wanted to do a puzzle book with him. He dove in obediently, and soon, Victoria, perhaps attuned to her sister’s wavelength, was awake too and wanting to play. Until they touched down in Rome, the girls were lost in their own kind of space, doing puzzles with Uncle Marcus.
*
Lumaga was true to his word. A contingent of Carabinieri was waiting for them at Ciampino Airport. They were needed. The media presence at the airport and at the hospital dwarfed what they had experienced in Calabria. The trip was only ten miles, but at every traffic signal, photographers on motorbikes tried to land their money shots. Marcus used his sports coat to drape Victoria, and Armando covered Elizabeth with his. Marcus knew they were about to arrive when they crossed the Tiber and he saw the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica.
Pulling through the hospital gates, the van driver told Marcus that he would wait for them to return and take them to the nearby Gran Meliá Hotel. The paparazzi were not allowed into the hospital forecourt and the entourage was whisked through the entrance of a modern, glass-fronted building that complemented the older parts of the hospital complex. In the lobby, some staff had been alerted to their arrival and a billing clerk tried to usher them into her offices. An imposing, white-coated physician with gray, buzz-topped hair and the mannerisms of a field marshal blocked her.
“No, no,” he complained in English, sternly wagging a finger. “This can be done later. I want these girls taken upstairs to my department immediately.” He must have recognized Mickey from his press photos, because he went straight for him with an outstretched hand. “Bruno Spara, at your service. I’m the chairman of the Onco-Hematology Department.”
Mickey introduced himself and added, “It’s good to be here. Jessica Bingham speaks highly of you.”
“Well, Jessica is a dear colleague.” He dropped to a knee in front of Victoria and Elizabeth, his expression softening, and said, “Welcome, dear girls. My nurses can’t wait to meet you. A small bird told me you were a little sick. Do you feel a little sick?”
They shook their heads shyly.
“Well good, because you look nice and strong to me. Come on, I’ll let you push the buttons on the elevator.”
Mickey told Marcus to check into the hotel with Celeste while he and the Cutrìs stayed with the girls. Just then, a heavyset
