He wanted to stop playing and ask Gherosimini how this could be. He wanted to know if within Lady Frankenstein’s rapidly-beating heart there was a thermoacoustic element that translated human heat into sound. He wanted to know how her circuits were laid out, and he wanted to see for himself the intricate bundles of wiring that veined her together.
But no.
No, really, he did not.
Because she was what he knew to be the reason something had been awakened in them all, as children. Something they had heard and kept that other children had not. Something they still had, hidden away in a place of safety.
She was magic.
Listening to the music, hearing the voices of an angelic choir with a few bad girls among the bunch, True grunted and said, “Just when you think there’s nothing new in this old world.”
Ariel turned her head, as if to catch those words in her ears before they evaporated for all eternity. “What’d you say?”
“I said just when you think there’s nothing new.”
“No,” she told him. “That’s not all of it.”
He had no idea what she was talking about. He was rewinding his memory when Stereo dropped the chewie and started barking furiously toward the front of the house. The dog jumped over cables and multi-plug boxes like a champ and ran through the open door, still barking his lungs out.
Terry and Gherosimini kept playing, and Lady Frankenstein kept singing in a dozen swirling harmonies.
“What’s wrong with your dog?” True asked. “Doesn’t like music?”
“He loves music.” Gherosimini’s eyes were heavy-lidded, drugged by the voices. “Got great ears. But he doesn’t like cars.”
“Oh,” said True, and then it hit him.
“Neighbor drove by,” Gherosimini said. “Maybe Wally on his ’cycle. Stereo hates it.”
But he was speaking to empty space, because True had already moved and was on his way out of the studio. True looked to neither left nor right. He was unzipping his leather bag and putting his hand on the .38’s grip as he reached the front door, where Stereo was raising canine hell in an effort to get out. That had likely been how Gherosimini had heard their arrival. True went to the window, pulled aside the bamboo blinds and saw nothing but brown waves of dust floating in the air.
He eased the safety off his pistol and cracked the door open. Stereo wasn’t in a mood for caution; he pushed out like a barking battering-ram. Then True walked onto the shaded porch and looked for the car that wasn’t there.
Only dust, and Stereo in the middle of the road, legs splayed, barker aimed toward the south.
The two generators created a continuous thunder. It echoed off the rocks. True looked to his right at the pair of trailers. The dust didn’t go that far. He might be a little nearsighted, but he could see a VW van parked in front of one trailer. Alongside the other was an ugly old hulk that looked like an AMC Gremlin, up on four blocks. A friend of his had owned one of those in college. A death-trap, True had called it when parts fell out of the engine one day as it was being driven. Parked beyond the Gremlin was a motorcycle.
He turned his face toward the south. Stereo had stopped barking and was sniffing at something that scuttled from one rock to another.
Stereo was used to the muffled noise of the generators inside the house, True thought. But only a dog with great ears could detect the sound frequencies of a car or motorcycle through the acoustic tiles.
A car had pulled up in front of the house and then backed away. Probably had turned around on the other side of the snakespine curve. Its driver had surely noted the end of the road where the trailers sat.
True rechecked his cell. No bars, no service in this box canyon.
“What’s the problem?” Nomad peered out through the door. He had to talk loud.
“Do me a favor. See if you can get a signal on your phone.”
Nomad tried it. “Nope,” he reported. He saw a shadow pass over True’s eyes. His heart gave a kick. “What is it?”
“Listen,” True said. “We probably need to leave here. Right now.”
“You’re starting to freak me out, man.”
“My job is to keep you alive. If I need to freak you out to do that, I will.”
“I thought your job numero uno was to catch Jeremy Pett alive and put him in a psych ward.”
True watched the curve. Dust was still floating up from the road. Wasn’t there a song called ‘Dead Man’s Curve’? He wished he hadn’t remembered that. He made a move for the door, Nomad retreated to let him pass, and as True walked back to the studio where a chorus of ladies still sang he zipped his bag up.
“Guys,” he said, “we’d better hit the road.”
“Oh, man!” Terry cried out. He stopped playing and Gherosimini stopped and Lady Frankenstein stood silent but her red heart was still pumping hard. “We can’t go now!”
“What’s wrong?” Ariel asked, getting the distinct feeling from both True and John that all was not right in Blue Chalk.
“We need to hit the road,” True repeated. “Yes. Now.”
“Man, come on!” Gherosimini approached him. “You need to stay for dinner. I make a mean pot of chili and I’ve got some fabuloso magic mushrooms to share.”
“We can’t stay for dinner, thank you. Terry, let’s go.”
“Please, True!” Terry had swivelled his chair around, unwilling to leave it. “One hour! Please!”
Berke said tersely, “Shit’s hit the fan. Am I right?”
True looked at the faces that watched him. They were waiting for an answer. He worked his hand on the leather bag, feeling the reassuring shape of the gun. Not much use against a rifle at long range, though. But they couldn’t stay here. Not forever. Maybe it had been somebody lost, just driving. Yeah, right! But it might have been. Everybody believed Jeremy Pett was in Mexico. So why did he think that Jeremy Pett was sitting in his car on the other side of that snakespine curve? His car? The white car that had gone past the turnoff? Then what had happened to Pett’s dark blue pickup truck?
“Cool it, Mr. Manager Man,” Gherosimini urged. “Give Terry his hour. Anyway, if you don’t like mushies I want you to try some kickin’ ganja I got last time I was in Jamaica.”
“Jamaica?” Nomad asked incredulously. “You?”
“Yeah, me.” An expression of understanding spread across the old acid-head’s face. He gave a wide grin. “Oh, man! Did you think I was…like…destitute or something? Far out! Listen, back in the ’80s I sold a few of my ideas to Roland and they built some keyboards around them. My accountant says I’m worth more than the Six Million Dollar Man. I’ve never let any of my bandmates know. They’re good guys, but some of ’em are slackers and they’d be on me for money. I take Stereo to Jamaica every year for a couple of months. Love the ocean. Deep-sea fishing, rum, good smokes, all that. Next year I’m having a contractor come out and remodel the place while we’re gone. Converting to solar power. Terry, you play any Roland gear?”
“I’ve got a JV80.”
“I’m in that,” said Gherosimini. “Like I told you, it’s all good.”
True looked down at the floor, at his black wingtips.
He didn’t know what to tell his band. He hoped his mouth would figure it out when he started speaking, because his brain was only doing a half-ass job.
“Berke,” he said, “we’re good here for a while. You know me. I just get a little anxious when we’re not moving.” He directed a quick glance at Ariel, who also knew him. Then he looked at Terry.