“No. It can’t be worked out without you. And you’re the one who doesn’t understand. Facing this won’t just release Abu Talib. It will release Lewis Crane also.”
“Release me to what?”
“Maybe peace … finally.”
He looked at her for a long moment. “You said you had two propositions.”
She held his gaze. “I want you to marry me,” she said without inflection.
“What?”
“Paul was a substitute for you,” she said, “the years I spent living with, then trying to get rid of, him were hard, destructive. I’m fifty-two years old and have no understanding of how to meet or approach men.”
“Are you saying you’re in love with me?” Crane asked.
“I always have been … for almost twenty-five years now.”
Crane sighed and slid down the wall to a sitting position, sloshing right into the water still pooled there. “It’s been so long since I even thought that way,” he said. “Since Lanie, there’s been … there’s been nobody.”
“Are you ready for the grave then?” she asked. “Are you already dead? Because if there’s the least spark of life in you, you’ll think seriously about my offer. I understand your work and I understand you. I know this is difficult. You’ve always thought of me as a man. But I’m not. I never was. I was an actress playing a role. I love you, Crane. And I’m so damned scared of getting old and dying without sharing my life with you that I’m willing to sit here in the water and make a fool out of myself to be near you. I’m not ashamed of it.”
Crane leaned his head back against the wall, the wail of sirens a ubiquitous reminder of their location. Yesterday he would have been horrified by Sumi’s suggestion, but that was yesterday. Before today. Before he’d discovered there was still something inside of him that wasn’t hollowed out.
“So, when would we set all this up?” he asked “Kate’s hearing?”
“No,” he said, smiling at her. “Our wedding.”
Crane sat with Sumi on a hard bench outside the hearing room in the drab, colorless jail-house, listening to Joey Panatopolous, Mr. Panatopolous’ grown son, getting excited in his aural.
“Crane … it’s working. Do you hear me? It’s working!”
“The generators are up?”
“Up and running! We are running entirely on thermal power as of right now. The turbines are singing, the heat is channeling through the domes. We no longer need solid fuels or focus. Charlestown is now energy self-sufficient.”
“The moon is feeding us,” Crane said. “It’s working with us, not against. You’ve done a great job, Joey. Your Dad would have been proud.”
“I wish he could have been up here to see it.”
“Yeah … me, too. He’s the only other man besides you who I would have trusted with tapping the core.”
“He was my teacher.”
“I know. My regards to everyone in Charlestown.” He began to sign off, then added, “Make this a citywide holiday. We have attained our independence today. Let’s celebrate it every year.”
“Done,” Joey said. “Talk to you tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow it is.” Crane looked at his pad, then said, “Off,” the line clearing, the comlink shutting down.
Sumi wrapped her arms around him. “Good news?”
He smiled at the love in her eyes. “We have successfully tapped the core and are using its power.”
“I never doubted you’d succeed.”
“You’ve never doubted anything I’ve said,” he returned, leaning down and kissing her on the end of her nose. “That’s why I always wanted you to work for me.”
“That’s because you haven’t been wrong yet,” she said.
“Just once,” he returned, feeling even the happiness of Charlestown’s good news drain out of him. “And now maybe twice.”
“Don’t torture yourself,” she said, pointing a finger in his face. “You’ll get yourself all upset. And you do know that you’re doing the right thing.”
He frowned. “Am I, Sumi? I trusted him and he abused my trust on all levels.”
She shrugged. “You took his girlfriend away and he got jealous.”
“Don’t make it sound that crass and petty. It’s not—”
“You’re the one who’s reduced it to the level of who hurt whom.” She hugged him quickly, then cradled his face between her palms. “Crane, I love you, but you’re bull-headed and blind when you want to be. You preach tolerance, politeness, but you do the same thing everyone else does—you try and build some cumulative tally of pain and loss, then compete to see who got hurt more. You can’t base your relationship with the world on that.”
“Sumi, I—”
She put her finger over his lips. “Listen to me: No one is asking you to forgive Newcombe. Your pain scorecard is your own business. But, my God Crane, that man’s been in solitary confinement for seventeen and a half years. What I’m asking you to do is realize that justice has been done and say so, then talk about the Dan Newcombe you knew before.”
“He was a hell of a scientist.”
She smiled at him. “Then tell them that. That’s all. Be bigger than your feelings. Tell the truth.”
Crane nodded, enjoying her hug. He wondered how it was going inside right now. Burt was giving testimony. Others, mestizos, were walking up and down the hallway, waiting. From tune to time they’d glance nervously at Crane, then look away when he’d catch them watching.
It was so odd to see them, supporters, he supposed. They all desperately wanted Newcombe freed—but why? They were too young to know the man or care about him as a person. It was something else they wanted from him, something more fundamental.
He realized it was unity they were after, a closed nurturing circle of beliefs and ideas, a well from which to drink. It’s what everyone wanted, really. It was what Charlestown was all about. And Newcombe was their elder statesman, just as Crane was Charlestown’s. The faucet through which the ideas poured.
“Please tell me you haven’t testified yet,” came Kate Masters’ voice from down the hall. “Tell me I haven’t missed it.”
Masters never so much walked as swept into a room. She was even able to make the drab hallway hers as she glided up to them, wearing diaphanous chiffon, not looking a day older than she had twenty years ago.
“Hello, hello,” she said, kissing Crane on the cheek. “How’s the happy couple?”
Sumi jumped up and hugged her. “We go next,” she said. “I’m glad you made it.”
“Made it? This is the biggest thing I’ve ever put together.” Masters sat beside them, leaning out so she could speak with both. “Believe me, if this doesn’t go today, you may as well pack up your stuff and move to another country, cause things are getting rough out there. We’re looking at military and militia buildup on both sides of the border with New Cairo. This whole country could go.”
“I’ve heard worse notions,” Crane said.
“What’s with you?” Masters asked him.
“He’s just grumpy, that’s all,” Sumi said. “He’s still having a problem with T-A-L-I-B.”
“I can spell, dammit,” Crane said. “And we’re calling him Newcombe, remember?”
Masters put her hand on his arm. “You’re not going to turn into a headjob on me, are you?”
“Leave me alone, Kate.”
“I will not. You have a responsibility to go in there and settle this issue before things get out of hand.”
“Why? Why is it my responsibility?”
“You already know the answer to that,” Masters said coldly, standing. “I’ll see you inside.” She stalked toward the hearing room.