We waited for a long moment in the hot, gold sunshine, everyone holding a drink or catching someone else’s eye, before the phone spoke. By the time the phone did speak, I think we all knew that it would be Iphwin. “Roll call,” he said. “Lyle?”
I was confused a moment, then Ulrike nudged me. “Here.”
“Helen?”
“Here.”
He worked his way around the table and got a “here” from everyone; then he asked “Is there anyone present I haven’t named?”
“No,” Roger said, “unless you count the waiter who’s inside the building at the moment.”
“Good. Then we can begin. Perhaps I can start by clearing a few things up for you. But first of all, I have a couple more tests to make to be sure that everything is finally in place. These aren’t what you’d call the most normal things you’ve ever done, I’m afraid, but there’s a point to all of them. Is there an electric plug on the outside wall of the cafe?”
I looked and saw that there were several of them. “Yes.”
“Would you please plug something in and out of one of them a few times?”
There was a string of lights across the tops of the posts that ringed the outdoor dining areas. The plug lay on the ground by one of the outlets. I walked over and plugged and unplugged it a few times, feeling like someone was pulling some kind of incredibly elaborate prank on me. Of course, I had been feeling that way for five days.
“Excellent!” Iphwin said. “Now, would you please get the phone from the waiter inside, and then phone Paris directory assistance and hang up as soon as they answer?”
Before anyone else moved, Kelly got up and said, “If there’s any number I know, it’s that one—I’m constantly forgetting phone numbers.” She walked into the cafe.
“What are your little experiments about?” I asked the speaker phone.
“I can’t tell you that just now but I will very soon. Just let Kelly do her experiment, and let me do one more, and then we’ll be in good shape.”
Kelly came out, holding a portable phone, and said, “All right, I’m going to try,” loud enough for the speaker phone to pick it up. Then she dialed and hung up.
A moment later the speaker phone said, “Sorry, try it again.”
“And you still want me to hang up as soon as they answer?”
“Yes. Exactly as you did before.”
She dialed, waited, and hit the button.
“Perfect!” Iphwin said, triumph and satisfaction evident in his voice even through the speaker phone, and immediately added, “Now there’s just one more task. Is there any music coming over the speakers in the cafe?”
“No,” we all chorused.
“Do you want them to put some on?” Terri asked. “I can run and ask them.”
“Thank you, Terri.”
She got up and darted inside; I was beginning to wonder what the staff inside was thinking of our behavior and our requests, but at least so far they hadn’t come out to tell us to knock it off. A moment later, a style of music I’d never heard before—maybe it was something more Latin than my Nazi-run world had retained?—came blaring through the speakers, and Terri came running out, breathlessly. “Thank god for four required languages,” she said, flinging herself back into her chair.
“Just a moment...” Iphwin said. “Now, the phone you were using for calling Paris ... do not pick it up when it rings. It’s going to ring for several minutes. Leave the radio on and leave the speaker phone on. Move the phone to the table, and put an empty chair by the place where you put the phone down, but do not pick up the call.”
The phone began to ring almost immediately, and with a shrug, Helen got up and moved it to the table, then dragged another chair over to the table as it continued to ring and ring.
“Is the phone in place?” Iphwin asked through the speaker.
“Yep. You ought to be able to hear it,” the Colonel said. The phone rang on and on, a maddening sound, and the radio played loudly through the speakers overhead; I was beginning to wonder if this was some kind of complex plan to drive us all mad.
“And is the chair empty?”
Jesús Picardin leaned forward and looked at it, making sure, before he said, “The chair is empty.”
“Everyone sit still for my count of 100. Don’t move while I count. One, two, three, four, five, six, hello.”
The phone had stopped ringing. The speaker phone had shrieked briefly, a burst of high-pitched feedback, at the word “hello.”
And there, sitting in the chair that had been empty an instant ago, holding the phone he had just answered, sat Geoffrey Iphwin, in a magnificent white suit with dark striped tie, a bright red carnation in his lapel.
Everyone jumped back, tipping chairs over and taking big steps backward. Helen, Esmé, Paula, and Jesús had hands on weapons. Iphwin raised his hands, one still holding the phone, and then hit the hang-up switch on the phone. “Is anyone going to shoot?” he asked.
“No, you just startled me,” Esmé said.
“Guess not.” Paula sounded regretful.
“No,” Helen said flatly.
“At least not yet,” Picardin said.
“Good.” Iphwin set the handset down, and reached over to turn off the speaker phone. He looked around. “Well, at last I have all of you in the same world, and now I can explain everything to you. I have identified you all as people I need for an important mission, for which, besides the possible glory if you survive and the undying thanks of your country if it works, I offer to make all of you wealthy beyond your wildest dreams. That’s the offer—take it or leave it—high risk, but glory, service to country, and great wealth.”
“What’s the mission?” the Colonel asked.
Iphwin sat back, crossed his legs, and smiled at all of us, a warm friendly smile as if he were about to tell us the best joke in the world. “It’s really a very simple job. Drive north and find America. It’s been missing for at least three decades, you see, in trillions of worlds, and it’s time we found out why.” He got up and said, “Well, now. If you’ll all accept the deal, I can put us up in a nice hotel and we can hold a little strategic conference this evening, and get an early start tomorrow. Is everyone prepared to accept the deal?”
I was nodding, and then I realized we had all said “Yes” in unison. I wondered if Iphwin had arranged that one, or if it was a real coincidence, or just contagious idiocy. The distinction didn’t seem to matter much.
PART THREE
I Wonder Who’s Schroedinger Now?
Iphwin had gotten us reservations in a big, modern hotel, one of those places they set up in poor countries so that the well-off can go there without having to meet the poor. We rode there in near-silence. I got the shotgun seat so that Paula could show me how everything worked.
Iphwin told us all, firmly, that we were to rest and eat, discuss as little as we could, neither make nor accept phone calls for any reason, and meet him in a large conference room at 8:00 P.M. sharp. Other than that, he wasn’t about to answer any questions.
Helen and I had been given adjoining rooms with a door between that we could unlock; we promptly did. We ordered room service—happily, Agent Helen Perdita’s tastes in food were very nearly the same as Professor Helen Perdita’s, so at least there was something I knew about this person—then took quick, separate showers. I was about to tumble into bed for a nap, since it was almost an hour till we were to meet downstairs, when there was a knock at the door that connected my room to Helen’s. “I’m naked,” I said.
“Perfect.”
Something about the tone of her voice made me open the door very quickly. When she charged in, I had barely a moment to see that all she was wearing was a pair of satin gloves and a pair of spike heels. She’d gotten hold of two of my neckties, and she rushed in and had me hog-tied behind my back, with my ankles and wrists in one big bundle, before I got done asking her what she was doing. Then she gagged me with a pair of her panties tied on with a stocking, turned me on my face, and said, “You’ve been bad,” and proceeded to spank me till tears ran down my face.