“I was there,” Johnson told her. “I volunteered too.”
“A black woman volunteered, but they didn’t take her. They took this woman, though. And they took me.”
Skip said, “I want Mick Tooley, Susan. Find him for me. Try your phone to start with. There’s a classroom on G Deck. I’m not talking about the big meeting room on E Deck—a smaller room on G Deck. It could be Room Twelve. Tell Mick to meet us there as soon as he can.”
He turned to Johnson. “I know your name, but who are you?”
“I can tell you, but you’ll have to do a lot of snooping around to verify it.” Johnson had taken out his wallet. “Here my driver’s license, with my picture on it, if that interests you.”
Skip shook his head.
“Right. Come to think of it, I’ve got something better—a little better, anyhow. My gun license.” He slipped it out of his wallet and handed it over. “Look under training, and you’ll see ex-military.”
Skip did, nodded, and handed the license back.
“I was West Point, and after graduation I got stuck in Military Intelligence. They sent me off—I can’t tell you where—and by the time I got home to Earth I’d put in over twenty years. You know how that works, I’m sure.”
Skip smiled. He had relaxed a trifle.
Susan said, “Lieutenant Colonel, right? You look it.”
“Don’t I wish!” Johnson grinned. “I was a captain, Ms. Clerkin, but a captain with twenty years’ service. I took my leave. I assume Mastergunner Blue’s doing that.”
Skip said, “She is.”
“After that I tried a desk job here. That lasted…” Johnson paused to think. “Two hundred-days or so, about half a year. It bored the shit out of me, so I applied for a discharge and got it. I’ve been knocking around trying to find something worth doing ever since. Mick Tooley works for you, Mr. Grison?”
“He’s a junior member of my firm, yes.”
“Well, Tooley put out a call on one of the mercenary sites. I thought it sounded interesting, and the money was good. So—”
Susan coughed. “I texted Mr. Tooley, asking him to meet us on G Deck, and I hate looking at this. Can’t we please go up there now?”
Skip nodded, and led Vanessa away. The air of the corridor seemed clear, but there was enough smoke in it to sting his eyes. Feeling foolish, he blinked back tears. Johnson was asking Susan what had been blown up, and Susan was saying she had no idea.
Vanessa murmured, “Polly’s dead. So is Amelia. I know they are.”
Skip wanted to say that one or the other might have survived; but he knew it would sound as false as he felt it to be, and kept silent.
“I killed them.” Vanessa stepped in front of him and clutched his shirt. “I killed them when I volunteered, but I didn’t mean to.”
He said, “I doubt that the hijackers did this,” and managed to get her to the stairs. The stairwell, closed off as it was by massive watertight doors, had purer air, and G Deck, when they reached it, better air still. The door to the conference room was not locked; Skip and Susan opened the portholes, welcoming a warm breeze from the sea.
“You want to have a conference?” Johnson was not sweating, Skip noticed, despite the climb and his tweed jacket. “Are you sure you want to include me?”
Skip nodded and flipped open his mobile phone. “Give me the second-class bar, please. I don’t know the number.” After a second or two, he said, “Thank you.”
Susan asked, “Collecting more people, Mr. Grison?”
“Trying to. Yes.”
“I might be able to help.”
“I know, and I may have to call on you.” Skip dropped into the nearest chair and spoke into his phone. “My name is Skip Grison. Could I have yours?”
Susan gave Vanessa a package of facial tissues.
“There are soldiers on this ship, Marlon. Men on leave or recently discharged. I’m sure you know them.”
Skip listened intently.
“Correct. I’m trying to find Corporal Donald Miles. Do you know him?”
Johnson said, “He was in that first group they talk about.”
Skip nodded, and spoke into the mobile phone. “If you see him within the next hour or so, please ask him to come to Compartment Twelve on G Deck. Tell him I’m anxious to speak with him.” He snapped his phone shut.
Susan said, “I could get coffee. Probably some sweet rolls or something. Would you like me to do it?”
Mick Tooley came in, tired and worried. “There’s been an explosion on I Deck. Do you know about that?”
Skip nodded. “We were there. Sit down, please.”
The chairs were large and black, and reluctant when it came to moving across the soft Lincoln-green carpet.
“You already know Chelle’s mother. I may not have told you that she’s the ship’s social director.”
“No one did,” Tooley said. “I had assumed she was a passenger.”
“This is pro forma,” Skip said. “Susan, did you know that this lady, on this ship her name is Virginia Healy, is the ship’s social director?”
“No, sir. I didn’t know who Virginia Healy was, sir. Just that the bomb—can we stop calling it the explosion?”
Skip nodded. “You’re right, it was almost certainly a bomb.”
“Just that the bomb killed two of her friends, or she thinks it did.”
Skip turned to Rick Johnson. “What about you? Did someone tell you that Virginia was our social director?”
“No. No one told me.”
“But you heard someone tell someone else. Please tell us everything you can. It’s important.”
“I can see that, but I don’t have a lot of information to give you. It was in that meeting when you and Mick here, and Soriano, were recruiting people to go down into the hold with you.”
Skip nodded. “Go on.”
“She volunteered, and somebody behind me whispered, ‘Who’s that?’ Somebody else whispered, ‘She’s the social director.’ ”
Tooley said, “Did you recognize their voices? Either one of them?”
Johnson shook his head.
“You don’t know who they were?”
“I have no idea. I—to tell you the truth I was trying to decide whether I would volunteer. I raised my hand just after they spoke, I think. I heard the question and the answer, but I paid very little attention to them.”
Skip said, “Yours wasn’t one of the first hands to go up, as I remember.”
“You’re right. It wasn’t. If there had been more hands raised, I wouldn’t have raised mine at all. You had said it was going to be very dangerous, and I felt sure you were right—that it was something just short of a suicide mission. Off Earth…”
Vanessa went to him. “If you know anything, anything at all that might help, please, please tell us! You didn’t know Amelia or Polly. I understand that. But they worked for me, they were nice girls, and they tried to do a good job, both of them. Amelia had been a champion diver, and—and…”
Skip had risen. He put his arm around her.
Johnson cleared his throat. “I didn’t want you to think I was bragging, that’s all. I told you I was in intelligence, and I was. Maybe you thought it meant I had a desk job, and if that’s what you thought I wanted to leave it right there.”
“I did,” Skip said. “I take it I was wrong.”
“I went into some very tight places, Mr. Grison. I did it because it was my duty. It didn’t seem to me that it was my duty to volunteer, and I had to think things over. I did, and went into another tight place, this time with you, and I’d like to know what’s going on.”
“So would I.” Skip cleared his throat. “I need to fill in some details. Virginia will already know much of what I’m going to say—perhaps all of it. I apologize for boring her, and for boring Mick, at least a little bit. But everyone here needs to understand where we stand in this.”