"Malcolm — " Hannah started, then exhaled. "I don't want to close this case. I want to keep working on it."
"Whatever for?" Malcolm blinked. Hannah realized that it was the first time she'd ever seen him do that. "All the evidence is here, Ms. Davis. In fact, it's rare that we have such a clear-out case against a person."
"That's exactly what bothers me, Malcolm. I … I'm not saying that Ramblur didn't set the fire. He probably did. I already had the paperwork in motion to get a search warrant for his apartment. But it seems awfully convenient that he managed to blow himself to kingdom come just before we moved."
"And just what angle do you wish to pursue in this?"
Hannah hesitated. "I want to go to Saigon and see what I can find on Dr. Faneuil and his nurse. I have the Free Vietnam government's permission to go there, and they're willing to pay my way …"
Hannah stopped. Malcolm sat behind his desk like a blue-suited statue, his eyes cold. "Let me get this straight," he said, and there was no mistaking the sarcasm in his voice. "We have an air-tight case against the arsonist. We have found not only the history of arson with him and a prejudice against jokers, but also the very materials that were used in the fire: the steel bars, the oxygen canisters, and the jet fuel. Yet you want to pursue a far-fetched conspiracy theory, one that not only takes you out of the city, out of the state, but across the entire Pacific Ocean toa country that half the civilized world has yet to recognize as legal. No, Ms. Davis. Absolutely and emphatically, no. Please do yourself a very large favor and accept the rewards your hard work on this case will undoubtedly garner."
"Malcolm, you have to trust me in this. After all, it's not costing us anything but my time. Not even the plane fare. All I'm asking for is another week or so. If I have to, let me take an unpaid leave. I just … I just want to be sure."
"Ms. Davis, which is more likely: that a deranged pyromaniac with a grudge against jokers would burn down the church, or that the fire was a deliberate part of some decades-old conspiracy?"
"I know what it sounds like …"
"Do you? Do you really? Ms. Davis, I am aware that you have gone to the World Health Organization, that you contacted the UN, that you spoke with Free Vietnam's delegation in Washington. I'm telling you now — enough. You will drop this investigation."
"Or?"
His expression didn't change. "I should think that someone with your imagination would be able to figure that out," he said.
Hannah stood. "I don't need to," she told him. "I quit."
She threw her identification and pass down on his desk.
***
David came in while she was packing. He stood in the doorway of their — his, she reminded herself — bedroom and watched her throwing clothes into her suitcases. "Malcolm Coan called me at the office," he said. "I thought I might find you here, but I really didn't think you'd be this crazy, Hannah. What is it with you? Can't you stand having success? You enjoy wrecking everything anyone's done for you?"
Hannah didn't answer him. She continued to fold her blouses, to cram pantyhose into the corners of the suitcase. "So this is it?" David said. "You've walked out on your job, now you're walking out on me, too."
"Yes," she said. "Very observant of you, David. Go to the head of your class."
"Where are you going?"
"To some friends."
"I didn't think you had any friends here. I thought they were all my friends," David suddenly laughed, bitterly. "Oh, I get it. Joker friends. Twisted freak friends. Infected friends. Is he good in bed, Hannah? Did the wild card give him two dicks, or maybe a prehensile tongue?"
Hannah slammed the suitcases shut, clicked the locks closed savagely. "You're sick, David. Listen to yourself." She swung the suitcases from the bed and started to push past him.
He blocked the door with his hand. "Move, David," Hannah said. "Please. I don't hate you; this just isn't working out, and I need to do this. Don't destroy my good memories of you with something we'll both regret."
David glared at her. Hannah thought that he might actually strike, but at last his hand dropped from the door jamb and she moved past him into the living room. He stayed where he was, staring at her as she moved to the door to the apartment and opened it.
"The jokers aren't worth this," he called after her. "Nothing touched by that damn virus is worth it — "
She shut the door. Quietly.
And she wondered.
"Father Squid? Quasiman?"
Hannah knocked again on the door of the apartment a few blocks from the ruins of the church — the address Father Squid had given them when he left the hospital. She heard footsteps beyond the door. A chain rattled, and the door opened to reveal the priest standing there. Quasiman was standing in the middle of the shabby living room behind him, looking like a mishappen statue. Hannah backed up a step. "Ms. Davis?" He looked at the suitcases.
"I … I'm in the process of moving. I also need to talk with you. You're going to get a package in a day or two."
"Why don't you come in, Ms. Davis?" Father Squid said.
"Hannah," she replied. "Please. Father … I think I've just done something every crazy and very stupid."
"That hardly makes you unique," Father Squid said, and smiled under the forest of tentacles. He opened the door fully and stepped back. "Come on in. You'll be welcome, for as long as you need."
Father Squid and Quasiman saw Hannah off at Tomlin International two days later. Ambassador Ngu hadn't seemed to care that Hannah was no longer official; the paperwork and tickets arrived at Father Squid's apartment on schedule from the Free 'Nam delegation. Hannah's passport was still valid from a trip to Paris the summer before, and Belew had promised that all the necessary entry papers would it be waiting at Saigon International.
The flight was an interminable nineteen hours: New York to Dallas / Ft. Worth, Dallas to San Francisco, San Francisco to Honolulu, Honolulu to Tokyo, Tokyo to Saigon. Hannah arrived exhausted, desperately weary of planes and airline food, and bedraggled. The passengers on the flight in had been largely jokers of various descriptions, heading for this new Promised Land of joker freedom. Hannah, as a nat, had been the one out of place, and the jokers had made that abundantly clear to her. She'd been glad to escape the stares, the whispered comments, and the rudeness.
She told herself that she'd simply experienced what they had gone through every day. The rationalization didn't ease the hurt.
The tropical heat and humidity hit Hannah almost immediately, sucking the air from her lungs and causing her cotton blouse and bra to stick to her skin. Palm trees swayed in the hot wind; in the distant haze, the airport buildings shimmered. Inside the air-conditioned but still sweltering terminal, Hannah queued with everyone else for customs. A man approached her as she stood there. He was white, and looked normal enough until she noticed the tiger-like tail protruding from the rear of his jeans and the incisors that showed as he smiled. "You Hannah Davis?"
She nodded, unsure.
"Name's Croyd Crenson. Mark Meadows sent me to meet you." He held out his hand and she saw that the tips of his fingers were thick and rounded. The tips of retractable claws gleamed. She took the proffered hand tentatively, and the man grinned. "They're great for peeling oranges," he said. "And other things, too."
Hannah took her hand away quickly. Croyd continued to grin. His tail lashed and curled around her ankle. It tugged gently. "Come on," he said. "We'll get you past here and get your luggage."
The tail tugged again, much higher up the leg this time, past the hem of her long skirt. "Aahh, pantyhose," he said as Hannah brushed the tail angrily away. "Nobody wears real stockings anymore." Croyd chuckled. "The tail's great for other things, too," he said. When she didn't answer, he shrugged. "Come on."